Page 118 of His Trick

“Amelia is the bride,” she continued.

Like I gave a flying fuck who any of these morons were.

“Fifi, Octavio, Oliver, Charlotte, Charlie…” The list went on and on, and my mind started to tune out, focusing solely on the music.

Why did my body feel so spent today?

My back hurt, and from the shower mirror, I had scratches going down all the way to my ass. My neck had a cut under my chin, and my shoulder was bruised. I tried to remember the hunt. I hadn’t caught anything, but maybe something caught me…

Someone’s got to watch you before you get your drunk ass killed.

I shook my head, the internal echo making my eyes hurt.

“Babe. Really? Did you hear anything I said? You’re not going to know anyone’s name.”

I winced at her shrill volume and attempted to repeat the long list of names. “Frufru, Oswaldo, twist, uh…Wilber?”

Xanthy sighed exasperatedly and pouted. Her body was turned away from me, and she opted to stare out the window. I was enjoying the silence until the echoes in my head got louder.

If anyone is going to kill you, it’ll be me. You ready for that, Sunshine?

I couldn’t take it anymore. I grabbed Xanthy’s phone, once she fell asleep against the window, and dialed Carrington in my headset.

“What do you want, Alexandra?”

Hearing his voice brought tears to my eyes, and I sighed, not even realizing I started crying like a bitch until the road became unsteady.

“Xan?”

I couldn’t speak. I tried to open my mouth to form words, but just hearing him was overwhelming. Images of the woods flashed in my mind. Like a dream sequence, but it felt more real than any dream I’d had. The broken bottle held against my neck, my dick rubbing against his, and my orgasm painting his in the pouring rain.

“Sunshine? Is that you?”

Fuck. Of course, he would know it wasn’t his fucking sister.

“I needed to know you weren’t dead,” I stated, an insult dying on my tongue as the truth spilled free of me instead. “I don’t know what I’m doing lately. You killed that girl, didn’t you? You are always playing tricks on me, Care Bear. Why? Why her?”

He didn’t speak for a moment. I started to speak again, but his voice cut me off.

“I used to think I had an answer, Shiloh. But now, I don’t know.”

Did he feel…guilty?

“She wasn’t a bad person. I was,” I said, my voice choking up, making me raise the volume on the radio to keep from disturbing Xanthy’s rest.

“I know that,” he said quietly. “But she had you. No one can have you, Shiloh. You are mine.”

“No, I’m not.” I responded on instinct, but then I shocked us both when I stopped myself and instead said, “I know.”

I heard Carrington’s slight intake of breath through the phone.

“But what good does it do us, Carrington? You can’t take back what you did. I can’t turn away from the man I have worked so hard to become. Not when…”

I stopped again, waiting for Xanthy to readjust and fall deeper into sleep.

“Not when I’m so close to finally getting there.”

It was a whisper, but he heard it, and he fell silent. All I heard was his unsteady breathing on the other line.