“But Paradise?—”
“Is a thirty-mile hike. Across mountains, in the dark.” He either doesn’t see my shoulders bunching higher, or he’s choosing to ignore it.
“What if Alistair weren’t an option?” I ask, rubbing Rocky in my pocket like a worry stone. “We’d do the hike, right?”
“Yes. We’d do the horrible, potentially fatal thing we’ve concocted. Except it’s not the only option.”
“Why are you so selfish?” I ask.
“I’mselfish?” His shock only pisses me off more. “You’re a text away from saving our lives, but you’d rather dangle me over the flames for fun.”
“Oh yeah. Real fun.”
Tears prick, and I lengthen my stride so he can’t see.
“You enjoying this?” he says. “You want me to beg? You want me to say you’re a genius for texting Alistair? Fine. You’re a genius. Thank you for using your very ‘special relationship’—which certainly isn’t what the whole world thinks it is—to get us out of here.”
“I told you.” My jaw locks as pressure builds behind my eyes. “I’m a painter.”
“I really don’t care, Kael. Just please get us. The fuck. Out of here.”
One tear hits the dirt before anger catches up to it.
“You asshole!” My voice cracks.
“Are you crying?”
“Are you blind?” My voice cracks again, and I swipe the tears off my face.
Ash is an asshole. He’s also right. We need Alistair, and all it takes is one text. I flip back to my messages, but my thumbs just go back to hovering over the keyboard.
Ash’s tone softens. “Hey. What’s going on? What did he say?”
I hesitate, then read it out loud, fast, before I can stop myself. “He says, ‘This’ll cost much more than rent.’”
The words sit there on my screen, unchanged.
The tabloids barely scratch it. Anyone who’s been to more than one of Alistair’s parties knows the artist room on the bottom floor isn’t really the basement. It’s the lobby. There are doors beyond ours, hidden rooms you only reach if you’re beautiful enough and willing enough. I’ve never gone farther, but I’ve seen enough men come back glassy-eyed and grinning to know I don’t want to.
Alistair’s money is bait and his patronage the hook. This text about “more than rent” is him reminding me that boundaries only matter if the man with the money agrees.
I’m not a prude. This really is life or death, and I can’t even say for sure what he’s asking for.
“So we hike,” Ash says, reaching the only conclusion that doesn’t make my skin crawl.
“We can’t hike.”
“It’s our only option.”
I exhale one tired, humorless sound at how he’s turning this around.
Ash sets his jaw in case stubbornness can get us off this mountain. I hate that seeing the ugliest parts of my life seems to make him step closer instead of back away.
“But it’s not our only option.”
“Hey.” Ash stops directly in front of me, squared up, mouth drawn to a hard line that’s ready to argue his way through the fire. “We have the supplies. We can do this.”
He jerks his chin at the bags on his back, then at the little pocketknife clipped badly to his belt.
