Page 90 of Atone

It’s a fight not to roll my eyes. “I’m pretty sure your dad was clear that I was not included in that invitation. He doesn’t want me there.”

“I want you there.” So simple, yet… not.

Taking a deep breath, I come up empty on excuses not to. His dark eyes rarely show a hint of hope. I refuse to be the one to snuff it out now.

“All right. I’ll go.”

“Good.” Alex hums, leaning forward and lifting me from my chair.

“Alex!”

He sets me down on the table in front of him, peeling up my skirt. “You’re going to have to be quieter than that unless you want the librarian’s attention.”

“What are you doing?” I whisper yell, trying to close my knees when he starts to tip them open, but there’s no use.

“Thanking you for being so agreeable and understanding.” Alex peels my underwear to the side, kissing the path up my inner thigh. “Don’t you want me to thank you, Mila?”

“This is a public library.”

“Exactly.” He grazes his teeth on the sensitive skin right between my legs; his hot breath sends my blood coursing through my veins. “So be a good girl and keep quiet for me.”

That’s the last warning I get before he flattens his tongue on my pussy, licking all the way up. And it takes both hands on my mouth to stifle my scream as he ravishes my core, not stopping until I fall apart.

29

THE NEXT THING TO BREAK

ALEX

“The silent treatment, sis, really?”I drop into the chair at Patience’s desk, facing where she sits on her bed.

“You deserve it.” She refuses to look up from her book, even if she’s clearly no longer reading it, with how fast she starts turning the pages. “I’m guessing you’re done meeting withour father?”

The bite in her tone is venomous.

“I am.”

She huffs, turning the next page even harder. “So is this goodbye before they cart you off to prison?”

“Why would they do that?”

Her fingers freeze, her golden gaze shooting to me. “You made a deal with him?”

“Would you rather I let him send Sigma House after me?”

“Alex, you know how he is. What he’ll do. What he’ll make you promise for keeping this quiet. You”—her eyes dart to her door and around her room like she’s worried someone will hear her—“you killed someone.”

Patience’s innocence still catches me off guard sometimes. She’s not naive or stupid. She knows as well as I do that our father has donemuch worse. If she paid closer attention, she’d realize I’m not much different. She chooses to ignore it. Except now she can’t.

I should be thankful that up until this point, she thought I could be saved.

At least someone did.

“I figured you’d be relieved.”

Patience closes her book, sliding to the edge of her bed to face me. It lifts her skirt up over her knees, showing off the scars on them, so she quickly adjusts.

“Of course I’m relieved, but I’m not an idiot, Alex. I know whatever Dad’s offering you in exchange for keeping Sigma House in the dark has strings. The minister was one of them.”