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The Pit is all smokey, like it really is in Hell, but it almost feels like home. I’m sitting’ on the battered couch in the back room, wearing’ one of Legend’s shirts, sleeves swallowing’ my arms, and he’s crouched in front of me like he’s afraid I’ll perish if he blinks.

“You were smart,” he says. “That shit you made up about Becki and me. That bought us time.”

I arch a brow. “So, it ain’t true?”

He shakes his head, like the thought it absurd. “No. Not even close.”

I study his face. “You and Becki… You didn’t have a baby together?”

Legend leans back on his heels, runs a hand through his hair, and exhales slow. “No, darlin’. We didn’t.”

My stomach twists. “So that story she told, about you burying it together, behind the chapel, the whole you promised to love her forever, that was all made up?”

He shakes his head again, slower this time.

“We buried somethin’. Yeah. But it wasn’t what she said.

It was an animal. We found it dead, mangled like somethin’ tore it up real bad.

We thought… hell, we thought it might’ve been the same creature that killed Midnight Glory.

It was after my dad ran off, and I thought I’d be blamed. ”

My blood runs cold. My daddy told me he hired someone to steal Midnight Glory. But someone cut him up. I’m tempted to tell Legend, but if there was another animal. Maybe it wasn’t a who but a what.

Legend’s eyes go sharp.

I bite my lip. “There is something I should tell you,” I whisper. “Legend, the night I found those pink panties in your bathroom, I didn’t just run home and cry. James was there. He told me Daddy was awake. I went upstairs and Becki… she was wearin’ my mama’s weddin’ gown.”

Legend’s brow furrows. “She what?”

“The Reverend was there. Said Daddy owed him a debt. Old money, from when times were tough. You know, like what we found in the barn before it collapsed. He claimed the farm belonged to Pearly Gates. And that unless I gave you up, Becki would be my new mama and they’d take everything.”

Legend is silent, but his jaw is workin’ like he’s chewin’ nails.

“They had dirt, Legend. A whole file. Said if I didn’t give you up, they’d expose the Kings, said Big Daddy’s got ties to traffickers. Claimed y’all were connected to the ones who took me.” I suck in a breath.

“Connected? Big Daddy would get a big kick out of that. We’ve dealt with them, yeah, but he hates those assholes. Kings deal with all kinds of low lives, but we’re only connected to the Kings. We follow our own rules.”

“I didn’t believe them. Not really. Not deep down. But they knew things, and I wanted to protect you.”

Legend stands, turns away, shoulders shakin’ like he might break somethin’. He doesn’t.

Instead, he turns back to me, slow and dangerous, a voice like thunder in a bottle. “You kept quiet to protect your family. To protect me?”

“I did,” I say, tears pricklin’ my eyes. “I gave you up. Lied to your face. And it gutted me. But they said they’d ruin my father. Said they’d put him in prison. Or worse.”

He walks over, drops to his knees in front of me again, and cups my face in his big, scarred hands. “You should’ve told me.”

“I couldn’t.”

He presses his forehead to mine. “You still should’ve.”

And maybe he’s right. Maybe I should’ve trusted him. But at the time, I was holdin’ the whole damn legacy of Paradise Falls on my back, and I didn’t know what was truth anymore.

All I knew was I loved him.

Still do.