Page 139

“I’m sorry.” I back up farther. “I just need a...”

My back hits the cliff face.

Buck’s face flashes into my head. Alastair’s gun. Jennifer and Sawyer sitting on the bridge. Sawyer holding up the drink to his men after the raid, and the civilian’s cheers.

Pete’s heartbroken sobs.

His story.

But Sawyer, he thought... he liked to bring us up to meet new folks passin’ through. Said we were good. Friendly-like. Made it so maybe they didn’t want to fight none. We... we were good at makin’ friends... I can’t bring anyone in without Buck. No one’s gonna trust my ugly mug.

Silent, horrified tears spill out over my cheeks. Over the hand that is still the only thing holding me back from vomiting on the grass.

Making friends .

They were drawing them in with this... this kindness . They used it as a trap. They offered them food, and compassion, and...

I remember Lucky unwrapping the cheese when we first met.

Beau’s slow drawl and how he tended my foot.

The call of a real bed.

What if I’d met the Reapers instead of my brutes that day?

“Oh my God ,” I moan, fear and nausea and some awful, shuddery despair crawls over me.

It’s not fair.

It’s not fair!

How are we supposed to know who’s good when they all act the same ?

“Fuck,” Dom curses.

I feel him come up beside me, and he pulls me against his chest. He still has his pistol in his hand, watching them, but... I press my face into him, and I realize I’m crying.

“How were we supposed to know ?” I beg, sobbing, and Dom grips me harder.

“I’m sorry, pet.” He’s shaking, too. “I’m so sorry.”

“Jennifer. She’s with him right now, Dom. She’s—” My voice breaks, and I grip his shirt like he’s a lifeline.

How am I supposed to tell her that the man she’s falling for is a predator? How is she supposed to react to that? Knowing the man she finally allowed into her life trapped and sold women to save himself?

How would I ?

I sob into Dom’s chest, shaking. The heat of him almost hurts.

He would never. My brutes could never . I always had a choice. Always. They helped me find my voice. They protected me and anyone— everyone —who needed it. They heard me when I spoke. They learned from their mistakes.

But God, there were mistakes.

“I’m sorry,” Dom whispers again.

I feel like I’m unravelling. I’m sick, and angry... and I don’t want to do this anymore. I’m so tired of being afraid. I’m so tired of guessing who is going to hurt me. I’m so tired of needing to be smart and perceptive and prepared ... only for it to not matter anyway.

I wish my brutes had been better then. I wish Alastair and Mateo and Bentley were better.

I wish none of them made this so damn hard .

Because I’m tired .

“Jennifer’s on watch tonight,” Dom tells me. “Sawyer’s with Cole. We’ll... we’ll fix it, Eden.”

I breathe out, slowly coming back to myself. Remembering where we are. Why we’re here. Remembering the trees and the shadows and that this is just a footnote to what Alastair is here to talk about.

War.

Finally, I step back from Dom, and my throat is full of tears.

“We’ll tell Jennifer the truth.” I remember her stepping out of Jasper’s office, her eyes red, holding a journal not so different than mine. “But it won’t fix her.” I swipe away the next fall of tears from my cheek, and my mouth twists. “It won’t fix her at all.”

Shoving my hands into my pockets, I walk back over to the Sinners. To Alastair and Mateo, and Bentley standing by their side.

My villains, who may not be the worst I need to face.

My villains who, strangely, after everything, might just be among the few who rise above my expectations instead of crushing them.

I don’t apologize for my tears.

After everything, they’re the least of our concern.

“I’m assuming you saw this?” I ask Bentley, my dull voice still a husky wreck.

The humor has been stripped away from his face, and I see the man underneath.

I see his sympathy.

And his anger.

The breeze buffets us softly, and the trees whisper through the forest. Ents and wild things sharing our rage.

Bentley runs a slow hand over his hair, but he nods once.

“I freed nineteen women from a barn while Alastair attacked their main compound. Bane and Sullivan watch these guys and their men closely.” He lifts a heavy shoulder.

“But they assume I’m under watch, so no one’s looking for me.

It’s easy enough for Mateo to slip me out without me being noticed. ”

“He can hide well enough when he wants to... for a giant,” Mateo murmurs, but his Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows, like all of this disturbs him too.

I feel Dom’s heat again as he comes up behind me, but this time, I don’t lean into it.

I’m glad he’s here, but I feel too cold to be touched right now.

“It was bad,” I whisper.

Bentley’s face darkens, and he looks away. “It was bad. They were chained up in stalls. They had buckets. I heard... one of the Reapers was leaving when I got there. He apologized to them the whole way out.” When he looks back at me, his eyes are hard. “He didn’t make it.”

Somewhere, there’s a vague sense of satisfaction at that, at least. Of relief.

But it’s drowned out by the dull, seeping horror.

Not the Sam kind that grabbed me out of the dark. Not the kind that lives in shadows or that throws knives at my chair.

It’s a fear of sunlight and smiles and the men inside my home.

“I need them out of my house,” I tell Alastair. “I need them out now .”

Away from my friends. Away from Kasey. Away from anyone they could ever hurt again.

The air is so cold it burns my wet face. It scalds my tears into my cheeks and blisters the raw end of my nose.

It’s so cold that even those burns become numb.

Alastair’s lips are compressed as he studies me. “So they can go on doing what they’ve been doing? I won’t buy from them... but there are others who will.”

Of course there are.

An ember of something begins to burn, deep in my chest.

Giving me a knowing look, Alastair wanders over the grass. He glances curiously over our tunnel, then finally, his gaze returns to me.

“I want a war, Eden,” Alastair repeats. “I want a war in which only the worst kind of people die.”

“According to you, I suppose?” I ask.

Dom shifts into view beside me, glancing at my face far more often than he was doing earlier.

I’m numb to my fingertips. I look down at them, rubbing them together.

It reminds me of my first days in the Sinners’ camp, when I thought my brutes were dead.

When my rage first truly woke up.

Alastair pauses in his strolling, and he crouches to examine the dirt, his forearms on his knees. When he lifts his hand, I see he’s holding a fluffy black feather.

Henrietta’s.

It makes the small ember in my chest flare, thinking of Lucky protecting her. Of all my brutes helping him keep her safe.

Trying so hard to keep all of us safe.

Twirling the feather between his fingers, Alastair ducks my question. “You saw the issues I’m having.”

Studying him, I nod slowly. “You have people who want to take your herd.”

He glances up, and the moonlight catches in his eyes. They gleam at the reminder of our conversation months ago, when he told me he wanted to take everything from Sam.

It was the conversation that saved his life that day.

“Bane is an issue,” Alastair agrees, rising.

“Or rather, who he represents. The Sinners, as a collective, were recruited to be henchmen and thugs, and if Sam managed anything, it was bringing in the hordes. We have two hundred and fifty Sinners remaining at last count—of those, there are at least one hundred who follow Bane’s persuasion of thinking.

.. but it could be as many as one hundred and eighty. ”

I close my eyes—against his words, and the night, and the deceptive, bright moon.

One hundred and eighty Sinners who need to die, at the very least, and so, so many Reapers. I don’t have enough soup for that many men.

Alastair’s right . . . I can’t do it alone.

When I open my eyes again, all I see is Dom, grim and intent. My military man. I know he’ll help me. My brutes are helping all of us—and they’re not asking for anything in return.

Not anymore.

Dom meets my gaze, and I see the trust. The resolve.

He’s in this.

If I ask, he’ll go to war for me.

“Bane isn’t a leader,” Alastair tells us as he walks over.

“He’s a loud voice that starts louder echoes.

In some ways, it makes it more difficult than if he led them outright.

At least then he might have gathered them together so we could know who agrees with him.

” Frustration edges Alastair’s whispery voice.

“Mateo and I have been trying to work out who we can trust since the day we joined. We’re working through our lists.

Testing them. We’reextremely cautious about who we bring in on our plan, so our numbers are. .. fewer than Bane’s.”

“Fewer? By how many?” Dom asks, his voice steel-edged, and Alastair’s gaze chills.

“ Somewhat fewer.” Alastair’s lips tighten, just slightly, when he looks at me. “And fewer than that after dear Eden here wiped out several of them.”

“And Heather,” Mateo breathes, not bothering to hide his sour tone.

But Alastair’s cold smile is more appreciative. “Heather has also done some damage.”

All I can see is her collar. All I can see is BEAST .

“I’m assuming she doesn’t know about?—”

“No,” Alastair says. “We’ve tried to bring her around but she refuses to see anything redeemable about me. Keeping her alive is becoming a full-time job. You’ll have to forgive my creative solutions. She doesn’t leave me much choice.”

“You could let her escape,” I say coldly.

“You think she would? She’s devoted to my demise.” Hollow amusement crosses his face. “Heather is currently busying herself with Sullivan, trying to whip up a rebellion under my feet. Bentley here is keeping it under control.”