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My eyes shift to study the asshole’s face in the mirror reflection and realize I’ve seen him before. He’s one of the frat presidents over at Whittmore. We’ve done business—which means he may know more about me than I realize.

Shelly’s eyebrow rises. “What’s he’s going on about?”

“Nothing.” I stand. My history isn’t anyone’s business, especially these two. “Night.”

“He’s one of those wackos,” Royer says, apparently not ready to give this up. His voice lifts over the music and crowd. “From that cult.”

My spine tenses at the word, my heart racing. Instinct is hard to alter, and a lifetime of defending Serendee is second nature. My fingers curl into a fist.

“You know, where the girls wear those creepy dresses and act all pure and innocent.” He snorts. “I heard a rumor that they can’t actually leave—the girls in particular. That the freak leader has more than one wife.”

I turn on him. “You’re really going to talk to me about subjecting women? I know what your parties are like, how you treat the women let in the door. They’re nothing but glorified whores.”

Behind the bar Shelly’s eyes are wide. “You’re in a sex cult?”

The weird thing is that she doesn’t seem entirely disinterested. Maybe she’s a better target than I realized. The kind of girl I can introduce to Rex, and he can—

Fuck. I rub my hand over my face.

I keep doing it. I fall back into the routine over and over. That life is over. Rex and Silas are trapped behind the walls, suffering God knows what kind of punishment. Imogene is—I can’t even think of what could be happening to her.

And Levi.

Shit.

There’s no doubt he’s taking the banishment harder than I am. His entire life was wrapped up in Anex and The Way. His entire identity. Where Rex, Silas, and I succumbed to the temptations of the secular world, Levi… he held firm to his faith.

And now he truly has nothing but me, a Regressive, with no path to Enlightenment.

“Is that true?” Shelly asks again. “Is the leader a polygamist?”

The argument that Serendee isn’t a cult—isn’t a sex cult—is on the tip of my tongue, but for the first time in my life I’m too tired to say it. Or maybe, for the first time I don’t believe it, which is why the following falls from my lips.

“Why?” I ask. “Do you want an introduction? Do you want to go in and see if he’ll take you?” I look her up and down, at the outline of her nipples, at all the flesh and exposed skin. “You can try, but before you even get in the door he’ll break you down, bleed your bank account, isolate you from your family, and force you to submit to his whims.” She swallows, my bluntness shaking her confidence. “Is that what you want? Someone to demean you? Control you?” I snap my arm out and grab her wrist, leaning over the bar until we’re inches apart. “If that’s what you want, you and I can go to the back, and I can give you a taste of what it’s like personally.”

A tremor runs down her spine, spreading goosebumps across her skin, tightening those nipples into hard peaks.

“Don’t hurt me,” she says in a quiet voice. “Please.”

Royer’s hand comes down on my shoulder. “Let her go, asshole, or lose the hand.”

I release her, dropping her wrist like her skin is made of fire. I need to get out of the bar. Get away from these people. Fuck the money from the fight. We’ll make due or maybe we can try to—

No. I shake the thought from my head for the millionth time since we were tossed outside the gates. We can’t go back. Not just because Anex is a fraud, but because he won’t let us. I’m certain of that.

And that, I think, exiting the bar and heading into the night, is the worst part of it all.

If he let me come back, I’d probably go.

Because without Serendee, without Anex, I not only don’t know who I am, but I’m not sure I’m anything at all.

“Hey,” Royer calls, grabbing me by the shoulder and spinning me around. “Don’t think you can manhandle her and walk out of here.”

I snort, head swimming from the night of drinking. “And you’re going to stop me?”

“Someone needs to.”

Gazing down at the guy, it’s easy to see that I’m not just taller than him, but I probably have him by thirty pounds. It’s when I meet his eyes that I see there’s something wicked lurking in there—a wildness I’ve seen before. Rex gets that look when he wants to cause trouble and that’s what this guy wants—trouble.