Page 32 of Ravaged

“Tell me why you’re an outsider, and I won’t run.”

It was a lie, but it was all I had. If I found out more about him, if I got closer to his truth, I could use that to help me escape. He had to have a weakness. Everyone did. Even if it wasn’t tonight, if it was another night, some cold dark day in the future, the more I knew, the better chance I had of survival. And I needed everything I could get my hands on.

“I moved here recently,” he said.

“Are you really an Adler?”

“Am I Gerard’s son? Yes,” his voice boomed. “Am I his son through marriage? No.”

The truth rattled through me, making me cold. So that’s it. He was an illegitimate son.

But he had a reason to be here.

“You’re hoping to take over once Gerard retires?” I asked.

“Why the sudden interest?” He leaned a hand on the tree trunk next to us. “You’re awfully curious for a captive.”

“Aren’t you afraid?” I asked. I narrowed my eyes, as if I had full confidence I was coming to the right conclusion, when these grasps in the complete darkness were all I had. “Without his wife’s blood, they won’t let you take over. That’s why you’ve only been invited in now, isn’t it? They’re using you.”

I was talking out of my ass, but the way his mouth closed shut, his jaw tight, I knew I had hit a nerve.

“I’m not here to be used by anyone,” he said in a low voice. “I won’t hurt you, Teagen. Trust me, I don’t want to. Not like that.” He paused, giving me a moment to object. I said nothing. “But you need to come with me. Now.”

How could I trust him? He had tricked me into a paid date, captured me, and left me in a cage.

But he had also brought me food, blankets, a music player. Opened up about playing in a band, that he liked music. That he was only half of a true Adler.

A gleam shined in his eyes, full of tenderness and longing. Emotions that he shoved down, burying them beneath the weight of his emptiness. He didn’t want to feel anything. It was better to pretend to be empty. To pretend like you wanted nothing to do with the woman in front of you, even when you knew you cared.

I desperately wanted to believe these lies.

But I knew better than to trust him.

I ran as fast as I could, crossing my fingers that the earth would be soft underneath the ivy. Ethan growled, muttering curse words under his breath, and I kept going. Kept running. Kept trying to escape. Because this—running for my life—was better than being left to die in a cage. Because Dad had stabbed himself to protect me, and I couldn’t let him down.

The root of a tree caught the top of my foot, and I fell forward, falling to my hands, my knees crashing into another root. A shooting pain ricocheted through my legs, and I looked behind me. Ethan was right there. Fear seized me.

“I warned you,” Ethan murmured. “Are you ready to pay, little one?”