Page 104 of Suck This

CHAPTER 23

I’d rather not.

-Coffee Cup

ACADIA

“This wasn’t exactly what I had in mind when you said you’d fix everything,” I murmured quietly to the man at my side.

Constantine didn’t even crack a smile.

His eyes were focused straight forward, and he was staring at the destruction of his home with nothing but a blank mask covering his face.

I could hear the flashes going off behind us, and I knew that every news channel in the area was currently taping our every reaction.

We’d been waiting here for something to happen for over ten minutes, and I was half convinced that said trap that they all felt was here wasn’t actually here. Surely something would’ve happened by now if it was going to happen… right?

“Aren’t you worried that I’ll die a terrible death if I’m here?”

He looked at me then, his face filled with amusement.

“Did you forget that I could transport you anywhere I wanted you to go with less than a thought on my part?” he questioned.

I pursed my lips.

“I don’t understand why I couldn’t stay where I was,” I grumbled under my breath.

I really did not want to be here. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but I somehow knew that I shouldn’t be here. Something was practically screaming at me to break free and run from this place. To cut out and get away while I still could.

Rationally, I knew that Con could take me wherever the hell I needed to go. Rationally, I knew that he was strong, fast, and could likely change the world if he put his mind to it.

But irrationally, something was squigging me out. Whether it be the cameras that I could still feel through the trees that managed to escape the explosion, or the fact that something felt off.

Whatever it was, my sixth senses were screaming at me to get gone.

But I couldn’t leave. Not without seriously dividing not only Con’s attention but also my brothers’ as well, seeing as they were both here for some reason.

We passed the cemetery, and I felt rather than saw Con’s emotions go from bad to worse. His eyes landed on the desecrated grave, the resting place of his baby girl.

It was when I saw the tiny little bones of a hand that I lost it. I stopped and stared, a sense of utter horror at what had been done to this tiny girl’s resting place, and wished that this had never happened to Con.

“Come on.” Con’s words were short and clipped, but I could feel the underlying tension. The anger that was building and building. It—he—would blow here shortly, I just knew it.

He grabbed hold of my hand and pulled me along, forcing me to walk when I wanted nothing more than to run in the opposite direction.

We’d just made it up to where the house used to stand, in between the cemetery and the still smoking rubble, when a voice came from the darkness at our sides.

The man that appeared surprised me. I hadn’t known he was there.

Constantine, however, look unsurprised, as did the rest of the men in our party.

“Constantine Worth?” the well-dressed man asked.

Con turned and looked at the man that had trespassed on his property.

“Yes?” he asked calmly.

“You are being arrested for the murder of Acadia Powell.”