(Gypsy Brothers #6)St Germain Lili - Two Roads

Published by Lili Saint Germain This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance it bears to reality is entirely coincidental. Produced by Lili Saint Germain at Lili Saint Germain Publishing

Formatting by Max Henry of Max Effect Author Services Copyright© 2014 by Lili Saint Germain All rights reserved.

Prologue One Two Three Four Five Six Seven Eight Nine Ten Eleven Twelve Thirteen

Fourteen Fifteen Sixteen Seventeen Eighteen Nineteen Twenty Twenty-One About the Author

Two Roads. Two choices. To let go? To give up? No. I would never — will never — give up. I take the road less traveled. I write my own fate. I deliver my own justice. I wreak my own special brand of revenge. And I won’t stop, until they’re all dead, until it’s all done, until I wipe Dornan Ross from the face of this earth.

He killed my father. I’m having his baby. He killed my father. I’m having his baby. Those two sentences are on repeat in my head, the agony of the rolling waves almost too much for me to bear. And the agony of my nausea slams into me again with the violent rock of the waves that carry us to safer shores. I think. I hope. But really, how safe am I? I’m suddenly questioning everything, stuck in

a vortex of swirling paranoia and doubt. Is Jase on Dornan’s side? He killed my father. He didn’t even try to deny it. I can’t believe it, I can’t accept it, and I just wish I could think straight for five fucking minutes. I wish I didn’t feel like this. I’ve left one prison, the one Dornan constructed for me, only to be trapped in one of my own making. The one in my mind that goes over and over and over again. I’m curled as tight as I can get into a ball on a bed in the main cabin of the boat. We must be going pretty fast, or be in some crazy swell, because I swear if the boat tilted a little more, it’d capsize. The door is closed. I made Elliot promise he wouldn’t let Jase come in

here. I’m going to have to face him eventually, but I just can’t face him now. I don’t want to hear his excuses, if he even has any. He killed my father. I’ve never been afraid of drowning before, but right now, I’m terrified. Drowning in this ship. Drowning in lies and in blood. Drowning in my own treacherous deceit. For so long, I’ve had only one goal - to destroy Dornan. I was too busy focusing on his suffering to notice or care about my own, and now, I feel so damned broken. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to feel normal again. In fact, come to think of it, I don’t even know what normal is. I jump as a warm hand touches my

shoulder. “Hey,” a low voice murmurs beside me. I turn over to see Elliot lying beside me, his pose mirroring mine. I can see water lashing against the small round window that looks out to the cruel sea we travel within. “You’re shaking,” Elliot says, frowning as he reaches out a hand to me. Without thinking, I shrink back, an automatic response after three months of Dornan’s psychotic hands being the only ones to reach for me. Elliot’s face crumples into something resembling sadness—despair—as he reaches out to me again, slower this time, and pushes my lank hair back from my face.

Am I even here? I’m not sure. This could all be a dream. An elaborate, drug-induced hallucination. The thought makes me reel. Am I out? Or am I still in the basement? Is Elliot in front of me, or is it Dornan? Dornan. I scramble away from Elliot, clambering off the bed and backing up to the far end of the tiny room. Behind me, waves pound violently into the thick glass porthole, the only thing separating us from the deadly currents beyond. The movement of the waves catches my attention and I turn, mesmerized, as I press a trembling palm up to the freezing cold glass.

Am I here? Am I alive? A nudge in my stomach, nothing more than a flutter really, propels me back to sanity. Yes. I am here. I am here, while Elliot hovers behind me, and Jase and Luis are somewhere beyond the door that keeps me safe in this room. And I am carrying a baby inside me. A baby that should never have existed. And I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a terrible thing. I start to cry. Funny. I thought I was out of tears. I’ve cried enough to last me lifetimes, but the tears don’t know that. They spill onto my cheeks and my arms as I continue to watch the seawater swirl

and smash less than a foot from where I stand. “Julz.” I turn slowly, wiping my cheeks with uncertain hands. Fresh nausea roils in my gut, but this isn’t just morning sickness. No. This is different. This is worse. My head is pounding, and my mouth is dry. Without thinking, I bring a hand up to the crook of my elbow, fingering the delicate flesh there that Dornan tracked repeatedly when he injected me every single day with enough heroin to turn me into a babbling idiot. The image of him swims in my vision, above me on his bed, his arms caging me in as he pushes the plunger down and floods my

dark soul with artificial light. With sweet happiness that makes me light up inside. My mouth waters just thinking about it. “Juliette!” Hands are shaking me. I snap out of my little—I don’t even know what the fuck that was I slipped into—and find his eyes with so much more effort than I should need to use. I’m heavy, and I’m weak, and I just want everything to go away. “What?” I reply, but my words hold no substance. They’re like feathers, soft and light, and they float away from me on the wind that howls outside. Elliot’s jaw is tight, his dark blue

eyes flashing with emotion. “What is going on in there?” he asks, pointing at my head. “I’ve been calling out to you for ages.” My eyes lose focus again, wandering around the room, taking in every insignificant thing. It’s all new stuff, stuff I haven’t seen in three whole months, and it frightens me. The bed is too soft. The pillows are too firm. The ocean beyond too stark, too bright even in the moonlight. The fact that Jase is just outside of the door is too much for me to bear. “You won’t let him in here, will you?” I ask, finding Elliot again in the dim light. His shoulders sag, the muscles in his arms tense. I can feel the waves of

frustration pouring off him and it scares me. “What happened to you?” Elliot asks, and that makes me angry. How dare he ask me that question? I choke on a horrified sob as I push him away from me. “Don’t you know?” I ask shrilly. “Can’t you see?” But then I remember he hasn’t seen what Dornan did to my stomach. Hasn’t seen the mess of barely healing flesh, the top layers violently stripped from me with a knife and cruel smile, as I screamed and begged for Dornan to stop. He hasn’t seen the scars inside my elbow, the secret map that marks out my descent from control to

absolute chaos and dependency. He hasn’t felt the being inside me, making itself known with ill-timed prods and nudges that make me feel ill. I’m still wearing the stupid white sundress Dornan put me in, the one that has stretchy elastic at the sides. I lift it up, the exact same movement I made all those months ago when I asked Elliot to ink over the scars Dornan and his sons left on me. Those seven horizontal etches in my skin, the ones Elliot covered with his beautiful tattoo, are gone. It’s all gone, now, in its place something so grotesque I’m not even sure how to describe it. “It’s gone,” I say numbly. “He cut it all away.”

There’s a strangled noise in the back of a throat, and it takes me a moment to realize the sound comes from Elliot, not me. His face falls; he swats my hands away from where they hold my dress up, causing the material to waft back down and settle above my knees. He pulls me close to him, smothering me in his embrace. I fight for a moment, until I remember I don’t want to fight; I don’t want him to go away. I don’t want to be alone. My entire body is shaking, poised on tenterhooks at what comes next. Stuck in limbo, stuck on this motherfucking boat that seems to be circumnavigating hell itself. “We’re going to fix you,” Elliot

says, drawing back and cupping my face in his hands. “Do you understand? We’re going to fix you, and then we’re going to kill that motherfucker. Do you hear me, Julz?” My eyes well with fresh tears and I can’t see him until I blink them away. I nod vacantly; I hear him. I hear him, but I’m not sure if I believe him. Dornan Ross is not a man who will die easily.

Elliot leaves me eventually. Leaves me to be alone to stare at the choppy water outside. It’s settled a little, but it is still raining, and my window half submerged in the sea. There’s a soft knock at the door. My heart leaps into my throat and I spin around, backing myself against the wall. I’m expecting Jase to have snuck in here, but it’s The Prospect. Luis, as Elliot referred to him. I swallow thickly as I watch him enter the room, closing the door softly

behind him. His movements are slow and cautious, his face friendly, and I get the feeling he’s moving around on eggshells while he figures out what kind of state I’m in. I must have that crazy bitch look on my face, I guess. Who knows? He’s got clothes in his hands, folded, on top of them one of those TV dinners wrapped in silver foil. The smell makes me want to eat and be sick at the same time, and I’m confused as to whether I’m starving or nauseous. I guess I’m both. He holds the clothes and food out to me before putting them on the foot of the bed. “You should eat something.” He fishes something out of the pocket of his

jacket and tosses it on the bed. A fork. “Thank you,” I whisper, looking between his bright blue eyes and the food. “The clothes are probably too big,” he says. He talks more softly here than he did back at Emilio’s compound. “You killed Emilio,” I say suddenly. He grins, nodding. “Yeah, mamacita. Yeah, I did.” He runs his tongue over his top teeth and watches me. He’s hovering, I suddenly realize. He wants to ask me something, or tell me something; I’m not sure which. My stomach roils at the thought Jase might be the subject he’s here for. “Did Jason send you in here?” I ask

harshly. He quirks his eyebrows. “Nah, Giulietta. Your Romeo wouldn’t dare come near you in the state you’re in.” I roll my eyes, huffing. “He’s not my Romeo,” I say bitterly. I don’t even know what he is to me right now. “You should listen to what he has to say sometime,” Luis says. “You might be surprised.” I squeeze my eyes shut, the pounding in my head back. It feels like someone is stabbing me behind my eyeballs. I’m so hot, there’s a fine film of sweat on my forehead and chest, and everything hurts. “I think I’m getting the flu,” I say. “Is there any aspirin on this boat from hell?”

Luis cocks his head to the side. “You can’t take aspirin,” he says, pointing to my stomach. “And you don’t got the flu, bebe. You’ve got the bends.” “What?” I snap, before I follow his eyes to the spot on my arm where countless needles full of heroin have slid underneath my skin. I’m still letting his words sink in when he takes something from his pocket and shakes it. A bag of beige-colored powder. “Don’t be stupid,” I say, scratching at my arm. “You got the itching, too, right?” he asks, gesturing to the way I’m raking my fingernails up and down my arms to try

and drive the crazy crawling feeling from my skin. It feels like millions of fire ants are teeming across me, the image as unsettling as the feeling itself. I shake my head to try and get it out of my mind, focusing on Luis. I feel my face fall because I know he’s right. “Fuck,” I say softly. He takes a few steps toward me, then seems to think better of it and sits on the end of the bed instead, shifting the food and clothes behind him. “Will it get worse?” I ask. Even though I already know the answer better than most. My mom was shooting this stuff my entire childhood. I’m well acquainted with what a junkie who is

going through withdrawal experiences. And I’d say it hasn’t even started for me. This is nothing. It is going to get so much worse for me, if he’s right. And I’m almost entirely sure he is right. He pats the bed next to him, and I stop scratching myself long enough to sit beside him, as far away as I physically can while still being on the bed. We aren’t close enough to touch, unless he leans over. I stare at my bare knees, still marked with Emilio’s blood. It doesn’t even bother me anymore. Blood and death are all I have right now, the only things that tell me this is real and not some awful hallucination, a sign I’m here and not

still stuck on that bed with that stupid music playing full blast in my ears. “Hey,” Luis says. I’m like a kid with ADD; I can’t focus on anything. My mind is like mud. Or soup. Or something equally murky. “You want a little bump to take the edge off?” he asks, offering me the white powder. My first reaction is to push it away and tell him to fuck off. But my arm is heavy and the words die in my throat as I zone in on the very thing that could take this pain away. Something brushes against the inside of my abdomen and I snap out of my daydream. I launch myself off the bed again and back to the round porthole

again, pressing my shoulders against the curve of the wall. “Okay, okay,” he says, putting his hands in front of him in a sign of peace. He drops the baggie back into his pocket and crosses his arms across his chest. “You change your mind? You tell me.” I nod thankfully, my throat painfully dry as I attempt to speak. “Why…why didn’t you tell me you were one of the good guys?” He cuts me in half with the intensity of his stare. He’s amused, too, the ghost of a smirk twitching at his mouth. “I didn’t know if I’d be able to get you out, Giulietta.” He pulls out a

cigarette and puts it between his teeth, holding it there for a moment before he glances at my midsection. Sighing, he tucks the cigarette behind his ear and shoves the packet back into his jacket pocket. “Why did you care if I got out?” I ask. “You don’t even know me.” “Ah, but I do know you,” he says, nodding as if he’s privy to some great big secret I don’t know about. Which pisses me off. “Oh yeah?” I say. “You another Ross brother I don’t know about? You don’t look like the rest of them.” He shakes his head slowly. “Not me, bebé. I’m not related to that pig.” “The pig you killed, or his son?” I

ask, referring to Emilio and Dornan. He snorts. “None of them.” My chest constricts. “You are related to her somehow. I know it.” His expression tightens; for a moment I think he’s angry with me, until he reaches down into his T-shirt and pulls out a locket attached to a thin gold chain. I frown, confused. “You enjoy wearing women’s jewelry?” He flips the locket open and holds it up for me to look at. I have to crane my neck closer to make out the faces on the faded photograph inside. Three teenagers who look like siblings with their matching noses and chins.

My heart skips a beat as I recognize one of them. Mariana. Of course. I knew I’d been right. I look at Luis, stunned, as he closes the locket again and tucks it back under his shirt. “My mama,” he says, his voice thick with passion, his blue eyes ablaze with fury. I nod slowly, my head whirling. “She spoke about you,” I whisper. Memories of the past slam into me like a car knocking the wind from me and tossing me high into the air. I can’t get enough air into my lungs as I remember those final few days before hell

descended upon us all, when we still truly believed we would escape the vicious hold of the Gypsy Brothers. That admission surprises him. His eyebrows practically hit the roof. “She did?” I nod. “She didn’t say your name. But she told me. She told me about her baby boy with the big blue eyes.” He swipes a hand over his bald, bronze-colored skull, averting those big blue eyes away. “I knew there was something about you,” I say, the first real thing I’ve said in hours. “I knew you wouldn’t hurt me.” He smiles, giving me a sidelong glance that’s almost…shy. Which is funny, given that he’s seen me naked on

more than one occasion and even worse than that. He’s seen the things Dornan did to me, the dark moments after he forced himself on me. Luis has seen me have a complete fucking meltdown while I screamed at my mother. He’s watched me be tortured and he’s fed me when I was about to pass out from hunger. “Why you?” I ask suddenly. His lips curl into a knowing smile. “You know how hard it is to break someone out of a prison? Like a real, legit prison?” I shrug. “It’s very fucking hard, bebé. And it’s a piece of cake compared to the things we had to do to get you out of that

hellhole.” I chew on my lip, mulling that over. My arms are itching like crazy, in fact, my entire body is screaming to be scratched, for me to rake my nails across crawling flesh until bright red blood springs forth in jagged lines. But I restrain myself for the moment. I don’t want to show Luis how much he’s right. How much my veins are screaming, sizzling on shot nerve endings, dying for something to soothe, for something to help me forget. He sees right through me. He watches my fingers as they tremble, as I make tight fists with them and then loosen them again, and I know he sees the truth.

He takes the baggie of heroin out again and tosses it at me. Stepping over to the door, he flips the lock, then comes back to me, a syringe materializing in his hand. “We’ll wean you off slowly,” he says, looking badass in his leather, his blood-spattered white T-shirt, and needle in his hand. He holds it like it’s a weapon, and in another place it would be. For Dornan, it was, anyway. *** The gear is good. Better than good. As soon as it enters my vein I feel a rush, a burst of stars that appear behind my eyelids and make them droop. I sag

to the side and feel hands stop me from sliding to the floor. Though, with the heroin kicking around inside me, I honestly wouldn’t give a fuck if I did fall down. Something troubling gnaws at the edge of the bliss, and this is how I know he’s given me less than Dornan did. A troubling thought rears its head—if I died, if my heart ceases to beat, even momentarily, what did that do to the baby? I make a mental note to think about that later. I can’t focus on anything right now, and I think I’m giggling, the sound muffled with my face pressed against Luis’s shoulder. Strong arms loop around me and

pick me up easily—much, much too easily. I am skin and bone. I sigh, letting the bed swallow me up as Luis deposits me under the covers and pulls them up to my chin. “You’ll be okay, mamacita,” he says, but I’m already fading into the blissful void, and I’m frozen, unable to reply.

A noise rouses me from sleep, the scrape of a door hinge that needs oil. I sit up in bed, my hair still plastered to my forehead, the comforter too warm, but without it too cold. I peer at the figure in the dark, trying to decide it it’s Luis or Elliot. It’s too tall to be Luis. “Elliot?” I whisper. I reach over and flick on the bedside lamp, bathing the small room in an eerie yellow glow. And my stomach seizes.

“You can’t be here,” I say, panicking, sliding myself over to the far side of the bed. I don’t have anywhere to go—even if I could somehow maneuver myself out the window, I’d be dropping into an icy sea and drowned before I could second-guess myself. Jase is an imposing figure any day, but usually it’s not me who is afraid of him. But now, with the revelation he killed my father, I am terrified. I am angry. I am despondent. I am so completely fucked up, and I don’t even know where to begin. I swallow, tasting the last remnants of heroin, oily and bitter on the back of my throat. “What do you want?” I ask

weakly, the heroin still dulling my senses. I am two steps behind, too slow to catch up, and I pray he doesn’t notice. In the dark, I pray he doesn’t notice the fresh needle puncture in my arm. He’s dressed in jeans, his chest bare. He stands on one side of the bed as I crawl off the opposite side and stand. It’s the most confusing standoff I think I’ve ever had. I love him. I do. But that alone is not enough, not anymore. “I want to talk,” he says finally. His voice is cloaked in sorrow, the muted light casting all kinds of weird shadows around the room. “Please go away,” I whisper. “Juliette,” he says. My heart breaks

at the sorrow in his voice. “You killed him,” I whisper. “How am I ever going to forget that, Jase?” Pain blooms in his eyes. “You’re not,” he says quietly. “You won’t.” And in that moment, I know. We’ve survived everything so far. But we won’t survive this. He walks toward the door, and for a moment I am relieved. But he doesn’t walk out. No. He closes the door instead, with an air of finality that says he won’t be opening it again any time soon. I stare in horror as his hand rests on the handle a beat too long, before he turns to face me again.

“Get out,” I say, louder this time. My heart is going insane inside my ribcage. I am afraid of the man I love. It’s unbearable. He looks terribly sad. There are circles under his eyes, and his hair looks as messy as mine feels. There’s threeday old stubble on his face that he scratches absently, reminding me of his father. That reminder—it sickens me. “I…killed him because he was going to die anyway,” he says sadly. The effort it takes for him to say killed is like a shard of glass stabbing into my heart. How dare he. “It doesn’t matter!” I cry, picking up

the thing closest to me—a fucking pillow —and hurling it at him across the bed. I begin to cry. “I hate you,” I sob brokenly, as the pillow bounces off him and lands on the floor. “I trusted you. I made love to you, I told you every shitty fucking secret I had. I gave it all to you, and you knew all along that you killed him? You must have been laughing at me this whole time behind my back.” He’s moving slowly to the end of the bed, trying to be subtle so I don’t notice him rounding toward me. “Stop,” I say, pointing at him. “Stay there.” He doesn’t stop. I scream.

He looks surprised. His eyes light up in surprise. “Shut up,” he hisses. I take another breath. “Elliot!” I scream. He rushes me, coming around the bed, all arms and hands, pushing me against the curved hull of the boat with one hand and slapping the other across my mouth. My screams die as he seals my mouth shut. I stare at him with as much hate as I can muster. “What the fuck?” The door crashes open to reveal Elliot, dressed in blue boxer shorts with neon-yellow stars printed all over them. He’s holding his

gun in front of him, and his light brown hair is all mussed-up. “Oh,” he says, lowering his gun. Jase takes his hand from my mouth like he’s been caught with it in the cookie jar, running his fingers through his hair as he takes a step back. I give Jase the most withering glare. “Get out, Jason.” He doesn’t move. “You killed four of my brothers,” he says through gritted teeth, “and I gave you the benefit of the doubt, Julz. I let you explain. And I’d really fucking appreciate if you’d listen to me for five fucking minutes. Can you do that?” “That depends,” I shoot back, fucking furious. I’m yelling and

throwing my arms around and I don’t even care how overbearing I might appear. “Did my father beat you and rape you until he thought you were dead? Because if he did, I’d really fucking like to know, Jase.” They both stare at me, stunned. “What!” I demand. Elliot looks awkward, scratching his chin with the butt of his gun. “Maybe you should hear the guy out,” he says. “I believe him when he says it wasn’t his fault, and I fucking hate the guy.” My thoughts whir; I can hear them hurtling around in my mind. Not his faul t? Killed my father. Having his baby. Too hard. Too much.

“It was a mercy killing, Juliette,” Elliot adds softly, his voice thick with sleep. “Not a murder.” I soften at Elliot’s words. Knowing how much he hates Jase, knowing how hard it must be to defend the man who ruined our relationship just because he existed and my heart couldn’t forget him. I feel like a fucking idiot. “Is that true?” I ask Jase softly, shifting my attention to him. He nods. “Why didn’t you tell me?” I ask Jase, slower this time. He laughs mirthlessly. He raises his hands at me like he’s going to shake me by the shoulders, but clenches them

instead as he pivots and paces. “I TRIED to tell you,” he yells. “If you’d shut up for five fucking minutes, I’m TRYING to tell you what happened!” Dazed, and on the verge of tears, I sit on the end of the bed where Luis and I spoke a few hours ago. When Luis shot you up, you mean, my conscience screams inside my head. I shiver, two fingers pinching the delicate skin in the crook my elbow that’s now marked and bruised from the needle he gave me. I take a deep, ragged breath, steeling myself for what comes next. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I’m listening.” He turns again, pressing one hand

against the wall where I was just leaning. He licks his lips, his eyes are red and glossy. He looks terrible, and yet I know I look so much worse. He can’t even look at me, addressing the wall instead. “John and Mariana were taken by the Sangue Cartel,” he begins, his words slow and faltering. “The Cartel and The Gypsy Brothers. It was a complete clusterfuck. Dornan found out what they’d done, and after he took you, after…” he draws in an angry breath, every visible muscle in his body tight to the point I think he’ll snap, “after they killed you, they took me. I saw them. He…shot your dad, Julz. He shot him…

Jesus.” He scrubs his eyes angrily, and Elliot shifts uncomfortably next to me on bare feet, his gun held down at his side. “Tell me,” I press him. He clears his throat. “Dornan shot John, and he put him in that room. That room where you were.” Jesus. The room I spent three months of my life in—living a nightmare—was the room where my father died? “He was bleeding, real bad. It was everywhere. And then Dornan threw me in that room,” he shudders. “And threw a gun in behind me.” I can feel my palms turn slick with sweat as I listen. I want this to stop, yet I need to know what happened. “Your dad, he was dying, Julz.

Where Dornan shot him? He said it was for betraying him. For screwing Dornan’s girlfriend behind his back. He shot him there so he’d never screw anyone ever again.” I want to be sick. I imagine Dornan pressing his gun into my father’s lap, the fear he must have felt. The deafening blast, the agonizing pain. My poor father. My poor fucking father. “Your dad was so brave, Julz,” he says, choking up. “The dude had just been shot in the dick, and instead of freaking out, he was trying to make me feel better. Trying to help me out.” “What happened?” I breathe. “I need to know it. All of it.”

He steadies himself, looking at me for the first time since he started his macabre confessional. “He’d lost a lot of blood,” Jase says softly. “And he was in a lot of pain. People think when you’re shot the pain gets better when you go into shock, but not that kind of pain. It’s with you until you pass out, or until you die.” I nod, swallowing thickly; I know that kind of pain too well. Its remnants are written along my disfigured flesh. A pain that doesn’t allow you to pass out. A pain that seems to last forever. “He told me a phone number. A name. I memorized them. I recited them to myself for three fucking years.

Amanda Hoyne. Nine-seven-five-threethree-zero-five.” “The DEA contact?” I guess. He nods. “Even in his final hours, your dad was more worried about me than himself.” Of course he would have been. He died trying to get us out of the hell that was the Gypsy Brothers. He did everything for me, for Mariana, for Jase. For us all. It can’t all be for nothing, surely. That would be too cruel. “He was in so much pain,” Jase says, his words almost dream-like. They roll over me, like water, like fire. “Dornan had said to me, only one of

us would be coming out of that room alive. And that it was up to me to prove myself. To show I could be…a Gypsy Brother.” His eyes flash with emotion hatred for Dornan? I cry, then. “He made you prove yourself because you didn’t rape me,” I say emptily. He nods. “Yes, he did.” “My father told you to do it.” It’s the most logical explanation. Deep shame bursts inside my chest. I didn’t trust Jase when he needed me the most. He didn’t murder my father. He ended his suffering. “Your father took the gun from me, and I begged him to kill me. After what I’d seen—after watching you die—I

didn’t want to live, not as a son of that motherfucker. But your dad, he told me I’d be able to get Dornan back one day. He gave me what I needed to bring them all down. A contact. Some fucking hope.” I’m shivering violently as I watch Jase’s anguished speech. “Your father smiled, even though he was in pain, and he said, ‘Don’t be silly, Jason. Do you know where I’ve been shot? I’m going to die anyway.’ He’d already made up his mind.” “I begged John, but he took my hand, and wrapped it around the gun. He put it to his temple, and he squeezed the trigger. And he died, in my arms.”

Jase finally looks at me, probably expecting anger. Instead, all I feel is devastation. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I’m sorry I didn’t believe you.” Oh, god. I had told him earlier he was just like Dornan. Elliot leaves the room, just like that. He must see the resignation on my face, the acceptance. It was a mercy killing. I reach out for him, the boy I love. The boy I’ve always loved. Hands stretched out in front of me, and I cannot bear to go one more second without his skin against mine. I tell him I’m sorry, over and over again as he crushes me in his arms.

He whispers to me that it’s okay , that he’s missed me , and that he’s so fucking glad I’m here, now, with him. He holds me for a long time. And it feels right. It feels better than anything. I am safe. I am loved. Maybe everything will finally be all right, at least our screwed-up version of all right. We can get through anything. Our love survived beyond death, so we can survive this. “Thank you,” I say to the quiet room, and to the boy who took me on the Ferris wheel on our first date and held my hand tight. The boy I was always meant to be with. How did I ever think he could be capable of killing my father in anything

other than mercy and desperation? “What for?” he asks, rocking gently from side to side, his chin resting on top of my head, his arms clutching at me like he’s drowning and I’m the life raft. Which is rather ironic, really, given what’s just happened. “For ending his suffering,” I say, my voice cracking under the burden of the truth. “For making sure he didn’t die alone.”

The relief, the embrace, is held for several minutes before we break apart. Because there’s something else. There’s always something else. “Are you…are you all right?” Jase asks, his eyes roaming my face. They drop to my neck, my arms, looking for damage I suppose. I turn my arm, too late, and he shoots a hand out, clamping it around my wrist. He stares at me and there seems to be a thousand unanswered questions in his eyes. What do I say? What do I do? I

cannot bear the shame of what I am, of what I have become. Of what Dornan has caused me to be. I have become my mother. An addict. A junkie. Mere hours ago, I sat and let someone put a needle into my flesh, to push forth a substance my baby—our baby—shouldn’t be subjected to. I am a terrible person, because instead of thinking about how to stop, I am already thinking about how to get more, how to hide this, because I. Can’t. Stop. I feel like if I have to stop, I will die. Jase turns my arm over, exposing my scarred flesh, the tender skin where veins run underneath like rivers and tributaries, like a great system of influx

and outflow. I shudder as he presses his thumb to the punctures in my skin, some new, some old, all telling a story best left unsaid. “What is this?” Jase murmurs, his eyes hovering between my eyes and the telltale track marks, the story of my destruction. I might be free, but I still belong to Dornan. In this moment, I feel like I will always belong to Dornan Ross. “He gave me drugs,” I say softly, casually almost. Don’t let him see how bad this is. Don’t give him another burden to bear. “What drugs?” he growls. I lick my lips nervously, feeling dry,

chapped skin under my tongue. I am a mess. I must look like some sort of gross caricature of my former self, all bony and dull, pale and vacant. The word heroin is on the tip of my tongue. I almost tell him. It’s ready behind my teeth waiting for breath to make it alive. Heroin. But I am a coward. I remember my mother. How tragic her existence was when I was a child. How nobody, not even my father, wanted her around because of the way the drugs turned her into a monster. I remember the pity in my father’s eyes. The frustration. The way he ended up dying for another woman because the first one he loved destroyed herself

every single day until there was nothing left. I don’t want to lie to Jase. I love him. But he’s all I’ve got, him and this baby inside me, and I cannot become my mother. I cannot risk him leaving me. Not after everything. “Antibiotics,” I say automatically. It’s not a lie, really. They did give me that huge disgusting needle full of antibiotics once, to stop my infected stomach from turning gangrenous. “For what?” he asks, looking dubious. I look down. See that I still haven’t

changed out of this blood-spattered dress. I pull my dress over my head, letting it drop to the ground beside my bare feet. I’m naked save for my panties, a scarred, disfigured girl who was too stupid to listen to his warning all those months ago. Don’t leave like this. He’ll kill you. Dornan didn’t kill me, but he might as well have. Jase inhales sharply, his eyes stuck on my midsection. “How—what the hell happened?” My eyes burn but I keep my voice steady. I can do this. I can be numb. “He didn’t like the way I covered up his marks with the tattoo,” I whisper.

“He kept cutting until it was all gone.” “With a knife?” Jase asks. He’s disgusted. Disgusted by me. And I deserve it. I nod dejectedly. I want to ask him, Will you still love me? Even with all my scars? He seems to read my mind. “Jesus, Julz,” he says, pulling me toward him again. He hugs me like I might break, like I’m made entirely of glass, and if he squeezes too hard I’ll shatter into pieces, gone forever. “I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry, baby.” “I should have listened to you,” I say tonelessly, letting him pull me closer. I can’t even ask him, I’m so afraid. I don’t

want to know if the sight of me hurts him. It hurts me enough that we even have to go through this. It’s my fault. I’m the one who left, who stormed out of his apartment and back into the arms of the devil himself. It’s my fault. He slides one hand into my hair, letting his thumb brush up and down my cheek. His other hand rests in the small of my back. I am ruined. “Tell me,” he says softly. “Tell me about the baby.” A light in the dark. Something to hope for. A baby. Our baby. A tiny sliver of hope - our beacon in this, the darkest of nights.

After I tell Jase the few details I know—the test was positive, the baby was moving, I had morning sickness when I woke up in the dungeon, and according to my basic math Jase is the father—we both curl up on the bed, him behind me with a protective arm slung across me. It feels wonderful, albeit totally foreign. In the night I turn onto my back, his arm still heavy across my ribs, and I study every inch of his face. I watch the steady inhalation of each breath, the way his lips occasionally

move subtly, and his slow exhalation. With light fingertips I trace his eyebrows, his eyelids. His cheekbones. Let my touch come to rest on his full lips. And by then, of course, he’s cracked an eyelid, giving me a sleepy grin. He hasn’t been sleeping, after all. He moves his hand to cover my stomach, his touch gentle against my marred flesh, and I have to bite my lip to stop myself from bursting into tears again. Not because it hurts, because it feels good. He’s really here, with me, and maybe, just maybe, things are going to be okay after all. And then we have to go and fuck it all up, this fragile peace. He shifts beside me, propping himself up on an

elbow, pushing tangled hair out of my eyes. “Julz,” he says to me. “I love you, okay?” There is a but in his tone. “But?” I supply the word for him. “But, the baby could still be his. Right?” Sucker punch, right in the gut. Fuck you, Dornan Ross. I want to die. I push Jase’s hand away, devastated, and turn onto my side, getting as far away from him as I can. Our feet are still touching, tangled together underneath the covers and I angrily kick his away from where they’ve been resting against mine. I don’t have any right to be angry. I

know I’m being a fucking diva, honestly, and even as I’m reacting like this, curling inward, drawing back inside my shell, I hear the voice of reason inside my mind. He has every right to ask you that question after the things you’ve done. “You’re mad at me?” he asks me, seemingly bewildered. “Don’t you think I deserve to know? Don’t you know I’d be by your side no matter what?” Inside my rational mind, I’m ninety percent sure Dornan didn’t father the baby. The dates are all wrong for that, and I had a period after the last time I slept with him. Plus, I’d been on the pill the entire time I was screwing Dornan— just that reality revolts me, the depths

I’ve sunk to to procure my endgame— and I stopped taking them, purely by accident, after leaving them at Emilio’s compound when the bombs blew. And then, twice, Jase and I had had sex, unprotected, no pills, no barriers, nothing. The baby is Jason’s. But that ten percent of maybe it could be Dornan’s chews at me, gnaws and snaps until I’m a mess of tears again. I explain these details to Jase, through my tears, feeling like the biggest whore in the entire world for even having to explain in the first place. God, what have I become in the name of vengeance? I am so utterly, utterly ashamed.

I vowed at the beginning I’d do whatever it took to bring Dornan and his sons down, but to what end? Is it worth this, here, right now? I don’t think so. “It sounds solid,” Jase says dubiously, as he cradles me in the darkness. “No mater what happens, Julz, you’re out. You’re here. Everything is going to be okay.” I clear my throat and ask the question I’ve been dreading. “What do I do?” I ask, wiping the tears from my cheeks. “What if it turns out, by some shitty stroke of fate, that it came from him?” Jase would leave me. He’d leave me, and I’d be all alone carrying the

baby of the devil himself. “Hey,” Jase soothes. “I came from him, remember? And I’m okay. I’m on your side. It doesn’t matter.” But it does matter, I can see it on his face, even in the dim light thrown from the half-moon outside. He’s being amazing, telling me all the things I need to hear, but I know that deep down, it does matter to him. “I don’t know if I can do this,” I whisper in the dark. Panic rises again inside me, threatening to strangle me. “You have other options. Even where we’re going. If you don’t want to keep going with this, I would understand.” Abortion. That’s what he meant. A

vision of Elliot materialized in my mind, of a dented tin bowl that I held in front of me as I puked my guts up, while he held my hair back. What do you want to do? he’d asked me, and I had asked him to just make it all go away. How naive I had been, thinking it would make a difference. Because nothing ever really went away. I just traded one nightmare for another, one shitty set of circumstances for the next. I aborted the baby that had somehow, tragically, been created as I was held down and systematically raped, but I was still trapped in hell even after I stopped bleeding weeks later. And I mean, I’m glad I did it, I don’t regret the

termination I had six years ago after what Dornan and his sons did to me— but I can’t go there again. Not again. “I can’t go through that again,” I blurted out. “You mean, a termination?” Jase asks gently. I nod. “You think—you think it’s going to make everything better, that it’s going to take the pain away, but it doesn’t. It didn’t change what they did. Nothing does.” Well, one thing does. Where is Luis? I want him to tap into my vein and blow all the pain and sorrow away with one press of the plunger. I can’t believe I’m thinking like this! Like my fucking mother. I suddenly have the violent urge

to smash something. “Let’s just wait until we get to see someone,” he says, and he’s trying to be reassuring, but to me, riddled with insecurity and need, it sounds more like, let’s see if I leave you or not. I turn away from him for the last time, and I close my eyes. “Julz?” he asks again. I don’t answer. I have nothing left to say. I lie there awake for the entire night. Jase eventually gets the hint and leaves the room, closing the door softly. And after he goes, I sit up in bed, watching the water buffet the small round window to my side, waiting for morning, and for Luis.

I promise myself I’ll tell Jase about the heroin. Soon.

I don’t get a morning visit from Luis, and I’m starting to itch again. It sucks, this dependency Dornan has created in me. The lazy method he had used to sedate me, to force me into obedience, because he couldn’t be bothered tying me up or locking the door? And now, I am a heroin addict. I am addicted to the same drug that ruined my mother and destroyed our chance at being a real family. The drug that made my father virtually a single parent. The drug my mother traded me for, a bag of smack for

her fifteen-year-old daughter. I would take Elliot’s gun and hold it to somebody’s head right now if it meant I’d get some more of what I need. Luis knows, he must. He nods silently at me when I come above deck, finally showered and kitted out in the jeans and loose black T-shirt he brought me last night, the flip flops on my feet two sizes too big, bright red, and feeling very, very strange since I haven’t worn anything on my feet in three months. The tiny jetty that we dock at has obviously been chosen for a reason. It’s in the middle of absolutely nowhere by the looks of things, flanked by a tiny strip of sand, some rocks, and densely packed jungle beyond. The guys grab the

bags—I don’t have a single possession to my name, except the bloodstained dress I threw in the trash after my shower—so I linger on the back of the boat, watching and waiting without making a sound. The T-shirt sleeves are long enough to cover up my track marks. Thank heavens for small mercies. I watch the three guys and wonder how they even found each other. I tell myself I must ask them one day soon, to tell me the story of how they even met. How did Elliot and Jase get beyond their abject hatred for one another, their desire to actually kill the other, to end up working together? I mean, they’re

actually talking to each other and shit. It’s insane. And Luis fits in like they’ve all known each other a lifetime, in the way they communicate, the way they operate as a team. I suddenly feel very out of place as the lone damsel in distress. It doesn’t alarm me, it just occurs to me that I’m in their space now. Funny that. And yet without me, without the things I’ve done in the name of revenge, they might have never met each other at all. The boys finish loading their bags and things into the back of a tan-colored jeep, and gesture for me to get off the boat. Luis hands the owner a thick wad of cash, something that startles me out of my daydream.

Money. My money, the money my father and Mariana spirited away for me all those years ago, just in case the worst happened. Which of course, it did. Stolen cash, hidden carefully away, in a collection of bogus business accounts across several tax havens. It occurs to me I might actually need it soon. I mean, we’re in the middle of fucking nowhere, and I’m assuming we’re hiding out for a good long while. That requires money, and I need my stash of documents in the L.A. safety-deposit box before I can access any of that money. I’ll need to see a doctor sometime soon, we need somewhere to stay…I can already see the dollars piling up in my frazzled

mind. Right now, I am the poorest rich girl around. Jase sticks a hand out to me and I grab on, letting him haul me off the boat and onto the thin jetty. It looks ancient, rickety enough to wash away in the next tide. Luis is already in the front passenger seat of the jeep parked at the end of the jetty, a caramel-colored dude who looks to be in his mid-thirties in the driver’s seat. I approach cautiously, my trust in humanity as a whole seriously eroded, wondering if this guy is legit. I study his face from behind my thick sunglasses—oversized drugstore cheapies to shield my basement-eyes from the glare, thanks Luis—and notice

the two share the same nose and jawline. “Where are we?” I ask Luis as I slide into the back seat. Jase slides in behind me, Elliot on the opposite side. Great. Because sitting between the two men I love isn’t going to be awkward at all. Sandwiched in the middle, I look to Luis, who’s busy texting somebody. He drops his phone into his cup holder once he’s finished and turns around. “We’re in my country, bebé,” he says, winking at me. “Welcome to Colombia.” As the driver throws the car into gear and burns rubber, I take a deep, steadying breath as a dense jungle whizzes past us.

As I think, we are a long, long way from Venice Beach.

Crammed between Jason Ross and Elliot McRae. In other circumstances, what a delicious sandwich that would be, but with our reality, it’s just fucking weird. Elliot tried to kill Jase. And Jase loathes Elliot. Yet here we are, the three Musketeers and me, with Luis’s older version driving us god only knows where. After about an hour, we make it out of the remote jungle and onto a sealed road. We don’t stay on the road for long, five minutes if we’re lucky, and then

we’re pulling into another dirt stretch that leads up a hill and to a small stucco house. It looks like a dirty brown box, sitting there in the midst of tall trees and dense vegetation, but to me it is positively luxurious. If it’s got running water, that’s a plus. Inside is just as drab, chipped laminate furniture and beds that sag in the middle. I couldn’t care less if I tried. I am out of the dungeon, finally. As we get into the house, Luis directs me to a bedroom at the far end of the hall. I fix the most pleading look I can muster onto my face, and he grins, shaking his head. “Five minutes, bebé.” Before I can protest, he disappears,

back in the direction of the car, and the boys. I enter the bedroom, my nose immediately twitching at the dust. This house looks like it was once lived in, but it hasn’t been inhabited for some time. Thick dust coats the windowsills, a small dresser shoved up against one wall. Even the floral bedspread that covers the double bed looks like it used to be a brighter color, until the dust grayed it out. I feel like that right now. Dull. Grayed out. It’s hot here, a humid kind of air that sticks to my skin. We mustn’t be that far from the ocean, because I still smell salt in the air that hangs around me, heavy

and oppressive. I don’t have any possessions with me. Nothing to weigh me down, nothing I am attached to. I float above the dark carpet like a ghost, my feet only barely touching the ground beneath me, my movements not making a single noise. It is unnerving, this silence. In the three months I was in the basement—the dungeon, whatever you want to call that hellhole—I’d grown accustomed to the noises. The dripping of pipes that must have intersected above my roof, letting me know whenever water flowed through the mansion Emilio had called home before Luis blew his brains out. The scraping sound, several times a day, that marked a key in the door -

somebody bringing me food…or something worse. Bringing me pain, if it was Dornan visiting. Dornan. Where is he now? I try to picture him, wonder if he tried to save his father when he finally made it over to him. Did he crawl through blood and skull? Did he try to press his hands against Emilio’s wounds, try to help him even though it was futile? Did he hold the man who had created him? Dornan murdered my father, and now his own father is dead. The irony is not lost on me. I imagine him now, one son left, just Dornan and Donny against the

world, a smaller band of increasingly suspicious and on edge Gypsy Brothers bikers behind their rage. I still can’t believe they even got me out of there, and killing Mickey and Emilio in the process? That is the icing on the motherfucking cake. Yeah, I know. I’m a strange girl. Horrific death and pain surrounds me, and I still celebrate silently when one of those bastards is taken down. I can’t help it. It’s who I am. I am a damaged girl. I perch myself on the bed, shades drawn, reveling in the solitude that engulfs me. The silence might be scary but the being alone part is nice, being

alone and knowing Dornan isn’t here, ready to burst the door in and torture me to within an inch of my life. I have no worldly possessions. Nowhere to be and nowhere to go. I am just here, and so I sit with my hands in my lap, and I wait. After a few minutes, Luis returns. When I snap my gaze up to see it’s him walking through the bedroom door and not Jase or Elliot, I am so surprised at the relief that takes hold of me, it’s like I’ve been sucker-punched in the gut. I mean, I don’t even know him. But I believe he means me no harm, and so the rest doesn’t matter right now. I make a mental note to speak to him

more, to see what his story is, but somewhere inside I already know. I feel safe with him because he is a survivor, just like me. Not only a survivor, but a warrior, on his own journey of vengeance and redemption. Yes. That’s why I feel safe with him. Because, even more than Jase, Luis is just like me. He closes the door and stands in front of me. From his jeans pocket he withdraws a plastic medicine bottle full of cloudy fluid. My first reaction is to frown and tilt my head. That’s not what I want, I want to say to him. That’s not what I need. But I clamp my lips shut, because I cannot jeopardize this fledgling relationship with this man, whatever it is. This man with the bright

blue eyes who wants to rescue me from myself, for no other reason, it would seem, that just because he sees what I see, as well. Because Dornan Ross took both of our parents from us. What a sorry connection we have—united by Dornan. United by death. Luis must see the displeasure clouding my eyes, because he smirks. “Hey, mamacita, you don’t look so happy. Let’s fix that.” He takes something else from his pocket and when I catch sight of it, I get excited. A syringe. So he is going to give me something. But then my heart drops, thud, back into my stomach, because what he’s

actually holding is one of those medicine dropper syringes, the ones they use to give babies medicine. I bite the end of my tongue to stop myself from screaming. I watch tensely as Luis uncaps the bottle and draws light brown liquid, the color of cola mixed with water, up into the dropper. “Open your mouth,” he says, and I do. He squirts the stuff into my throat, and it burns on the way down. I close my mouth, willing the strong, cherry medicine flavor to fade. It’s disgusting, and it makes me want to throw up. But I don’t. I will not waste whatever he just gave me. I look up at Luis, who is watching me silently.

“I don’t feel anything,” I say. Underneath my blank, cool exterior, I’m fuming, bubbling with a desperate rage that threatens to consume me. In my head I imagine springing to my feet, wrapping my fingers around his throat, and squeezing until he agrees to get me some actual heroin. But of course, I don’t. I snap back to reality, take the water he’s offering me and gulp it down, swishing some around my mouth at the end to dilute the shitty cherry taste coating my tongue. “Tastes like Nyquil,” I say. “What was that?” “Dolophine,” he says, putting the bottle back in his pocket. I take a deep breath. I know what

that is. Fucking methadone. Not only am I a fucking addict, but I’ve just swallowed the drug my mother was given countless times to curb her own dependence, a drug she loathed because it didn’t give her that same instantaneous bliss the smack guaranteed. I burst into tears. “Hey, mamacita,” Luis says softly, coming to sit beside me. He pats my back, maybe in an attempt to snap me out of my own wallowing. I catch sight of myself in the fulllength mirror at the end of the bed, and what I see disgusts me. Where is the strong girl, the girl who dealt with her enemies in poison and fire? Where is the

girl who thrived on pain, the girl who got off on the suffering of her foes, who tasted the salty tears of Dornan Ross and declared herself the winner? Where am I under the layers of trauma and scarring? Who am I anymore? I look away from the mirror. I can’t bear to see any more. The weak, thin girl with the swollen belly, the girl who carries the weight of her lies inside her like a toxic virus. I’m tired. I’m desperate. “Please,” I beg Luis. “Please, I can’t. I need the real thing.” His blue eyes darken, and he shakes his head emphatically. “Think of your mama,” he says.

“I don’t want to think about that bitch,” I snap. “It was better when I thought she was dead.” I press a hand to my mouth as I hear my own words. “I didn’t mean that,” I whisper, taking my hand away just long enough to let those four words out before clamping it back down. I didn’t mean that, I didn’t mean that. What is happening to me? My desperation, my utter despair at needing what I cannot have, just one little hit, curls around me like poison ivy, dragging me down to the earth. Suddenly, I am so heavy I could sleep. “A few weeks, bebé,” he says, reaching underneath his shirt and taking

out a chain, black rosary beads and gold with a black and gold cross hanging from one end. He drapes the long chain over my head, letting it fall onto my chest. “Are you going to tell them?” I whisper, fingering the delicate cross. I feel bad, taking this from him. I don’t believe in God, not anymore. “Nah,” Luis says. “We can do this, Giulietta. You’ll be all right in a couple weeks.” I feel guilty. Taking his rosary beads. “I can’t take these,” I say, hiking the beads back off myself and holding them out to him, tangled up in my fist. “I’m not even remotely religious. It wouldn’t be right to take your beads like this.”

He shakes his head, his eyes soft, and pushes my fist back toward me. “It’s a loan,” he clarifies, giving me a wink. “You need something to fidget with when you’re thinking of the smack, bebe. You get past that, you give them back to me then.” He’s got a point. I remember my mother digging at her own skin until it bled on the few occasions she either tried to quit cold turkey or had run out of her beloved heroin. “Thank you,” I whisper, untangling the beads and putting them back around my neck. “Hey, Julz?” Elliot calls from the kitchen. “Where you at?” I look toward Luis, who shrugs.

Time to face the music.

Luis excuses himself to pick up more supplies, tearing off in his jeep with the guy who looks just like him. He’s said his father is dead, murdered by Emilio, so I have to assume that he is another relative. Mariana’s relative? The obsession with figuring out how it had all gone down all those years ago is killing me. I want to know. The three of us sit around a scuffed laminate table that rocks on the floor. I’m not sure what’s at fault - the table or the uneven floor itself. I rest my elbows on the table, a dull warmth forming in

my stomach, and survey Jase and Elliot as they sit across from me. Elliot looks relieved, Jase worried. They wear matching poker faces, but I’ve known these boys a long time, and even in their blank looks I find the truth. I can tell what they’re thinking. Elliot thinks now I’ve been rescued, the horror is over. Happily ever after. He rescued the girl, he made the deal, and he made it out alive. I know Elliot McRae, and I know he thinks this is finished. I glance to the left, to where Jase is grinding his jaw noiselessly, and I know what he’s thinking: It’s only just begun. I reach my hands across the table,

wiggling my fingers at them. “Hands,” I say softly, and they each slowly break out of their own worlds. Jase darts his hand over to mine, crushing it with his. Elliot watches as Jase’s hand hits mine and hesitates. “El,” I urge, reaching across the table. “We’re all friends. Fucked-up friends, but friends. Come on.” He rests his palm atop mine, but doesn’t do the whole almost break my fingers thing Jase did. He is more reserved, and I see the way he holds back. The way his body language and the distance in his eyes says this isn’t my girl anymore. I take a deep breath as I study the two people in this world who are my

absolution. “Thank you,” I say, squeezing each of their hands, tears welling in my eyes. “Thank you for getting me out of there. For risking your lives. And…” Even now, I find it so hard to admit fault. I am so stubborn. Just like my dad was. “I am sorry,” I whisper, with every ounce of emotion that lives inside me. The overwhelming gratitude. The crushing sorrow. I bundle it up into those three words, I am sorry, and hope they believe me. “You don’t have to be sorry,” Jase murmurs, staring at my hand, the one he’s holding. Elliot swallows thickly,

his eyes glassy. These men have done everything in their quest to save me, and I can never repay them for that. “I do,” I murmur, tilting my head back and blinking so the tears don’t fall. “I’ve had a lot of time to think about this. I was selfish, and I used you both, and I’m sorry.” They don’t speak. Elliot fixes me with his sorrowful stare, waiting for me to continue. “I don’t like the person I’ve become,” I press on, the truth stinging me. “The things I’ve done. If I met me right now, I would hate me.” Jase shakes his head, running his free hand through his short hair. “Nobody hates you, Julz.”

Except Dornan. “My father would be so disgusted by me,” I whisper, tears dripping down my face, my voice remaining strong by some miracle. “He would hate me.” Elliot looks frozen, like he can’t form words. Jase drops my hand and sits back in his chair, lacing both hands behind his head. He looks like he’s aged five years in three months. My fault. My fucking fault. Elliot uses this time to drop my hand, too. He gives it a gentle pat, before standing and walking over to the window. He parts the curtain slightly, looking outside, close enough to still be a part of this discussion.

“Your father would be proud of you,” Jase says finally. “Horrified, but proud. He raised you to be a fighter, Juliette. He’d be fucking proud.” A flash of the past bites at the back of my mind, of the first time I walked into Dornan’s office after six years dead and let him put his hands on me, welcomed it, and even got off on it in some perverse way. I shudder, wondering how I ever thought it would end up anywhere other than here. Dornan was always going to find out. I think I knew that, deep down, but I pushed it aside, assigned that horror to future Juliette, because present Juliette just wanted to drown her pain and her

grief in a dirty little cycle of fucking and killing. “I could’ve just bombed that fucking clubhouse and let them all burn to death inside,” I say, my words thick with grief and realization. This is the first time I’ve ever acknowledged this out loud. And it hurts. I am a bad person. “I could’ve paid a dude with a sniper rifle to take each one of them out, end it all in a day. I could’ve figured out a way to frame them for something, get them arrested and thrown in jail.” Elliot’s expression says devastated, Jase’s says numb. “But I didn’t,” I finish, the truth like a stab to my gut. “Because that would be too kind. That would be too unsatisfying.

You understand? I had to do it like this because I needed to watch them die. I needed to know that they knew who I was, and feel the same fear I felt when they thought I was dying at their hands.” I am a bad, bad person, as bad as they come. Because this is my truth. “It doesn’t matter,” Jase says suddenly, but I press on. I have to finish. “I’m so sorry I risked both of your lives for my fucked-up vendetta.” I am so fucking sorry. “Elliot, I’m so sorry you gave everything up for me. Your life, your career, and now your safety. I’m sorry you had to hide your family away because of my selfish crusade. I’m sorry you had to build a new life after

you gave your old one up for me, and I’m sorry you lost that one, too.” He doesn’t respond. His face is drawn, his cheeks pink, as if, for the first time, he’s realizing how much that decision to save the dying girl six years ago has actually cost him. But he doesn’t look angry. He just looks really, really tired. “Jase, I’m sorry I lied to you. I’m so sorry I felt like I couldn’t tell you who I was. Because I should have known you weren’t like them, but after six years, I couldn’t understand how you were still there with them. I should have looked harder.” I think of all the people who died at Dornan’s hands. Jase’s mom. Mariana.

My father. “I should have known you’d never give up on avenging all that death.” His stubbled jaw tightens; he rubs his red eyes with his palms. “I’m sorry for what I did with Dornan,” I whisper. He shakes his head, covers his eyes. “Don’t,” he says. “I can’t talk about that, not now.” I swallow, nodding sadly. Elliot steps away from the window as a buzz emanates from his pocket. He drags his phone out and looks at the display. “Sorry, I gotta take this,” he says, busting the front door open and closing it loudly behind him. I imagine him on the

stairs, talking to his ex, or maybe to his grandma. I turn my attention back to Jase. “My darling boy,” I whisper, my two palms outstretched. A sad smile ghosts across his face, his thick eyelashes glistening. He isn’t crying—he’s far too stubborn to cry in front of me—but he’s right on the edge. “I thought he’d killed you,” Jase says, distraught. “I walked into that room and there was blood everywhere, and I thought you were dead.” The lump in my throat is like a piece of razor blade, wedged in my neck; I try to swallow and talk around it, but it doesn’t budge. “You must hate me for the way I left

things,” I say softly. “For the way I stormed out of your house, for the things I said. I don’t know what I was saying. I was stupid.” He shakes his head, “I don’t hate you, baby. I couldn’t hate you if I tried.” My smile is watery but full; the contraction of facial muscles squeezes more tears from the corners of my eyes. “Sometimes,” I whisper, “I wish we were different people. That we’d been born into another life. That we didn’t have to fight so hard just to have each other.” He simply nods, bringing one of my hands up to his mouth and kissing the back of it so slowly, so tenderly, I feel

like I might break in two. “It’s worth it, though,” I add, my skin burning pleasantly where his lips have touched. He smiles. “I know,” he murmurs. He stands, taking my hand, leading me down the hallway back to the bedroom where Luis gave me the methadone. “You should rest,” he murmurs. “I’ll fix you a sandwich.” I don’t resist. I’m too tired, and so hungry I could eat a horse. I arrange several pillows against the headrest and sit against them on the bed. I am safe. I am free. It’s still so utterly foreign, and it makes me realize how crazy I must have

been acting on the boat last night. When I refused to let Jase near me. Fuck, what a bitch I must seem. A damaged, crazy, bitch. It’s only afterward, while I’m chewing on the sandwich Jase has made me that I remember. I still have that craving at the back of my mind, that annoying, on-edge, cloying sensation that screams for another hit. But the itch that covered my body, it’s gone. The nausea is much less intense. And the pounding in my head is better, too. Maybe I can do this, after all. And Jase will never need to know how close I came to becoming my mother.

Jase falls asleep on the bed next to me before I’ve even finished eating. He must be exhausted. I doubt he’s had much sleep at all, worried sick, staying up to make sure nobody hijacked our ship in the night as we drifted out of Dornan’s grip. I gently shift myself off the side of the bed and pad out of the room. It’s been raining steadily for a few minutes now, rain thrumming down on the tin roof, and I hear the guttering gush and creak with the onslaught of heavy rain.

I spot the top of Elliot’s head as he sits outside, under the verandah, just like he always used to in Nebraska. There’s a peace here that didn’t exist in Los Angeles, even when I was somewhere hidden away from Dornan. A quiet stillness punctuated only by the rain that pours from the heavens above us. The little old house almost seems to rattle under the weight of it. I find a kettle and rinse it out, boiling it and making tea with the teabags I find underneath the sink. There’s no milk, not yet at least, so I put a little cold water and some sugar in each mug and give them a stir. Holding the two mug handles in one hand, I get the door open using a

combination of my hand and my hip. Elliot glances briefly behind him, his hand going to the gun beside him on the step. When he sees me, he smiles briefly, taking his hand from the gun. “Hey,” I say softly. “Am I interrupting?” Elliot’s always been a thinker. I know he likes his solitude; I don’t want to intrude. He shakes his head, accepting one of the tea mugs. “Nah. I was just sitting.” It’s awkward for him being here. I can tell. “What’s the plan?” I ask him. Jase likes to shield me from things, to give me vague half-answers because he thinks I can’t handle things. And he thinks I am

so weak and defenseless and pregnant right now, I doubt he’d share anything vaguely important with me if he thought it might alarm me. Elliot shrugs lazily. “Get you out. And run. That was the plan. Now?” he takes a sip of the tea and pulls a face, “now, I don’t know.” I nod, staring into my own tea. I probably won’t even drink it; I just like the way it feels comforting to hold tea in my hands. “Where are the girls?” I ask, referring to Kayla, his daughter, and Amy, his ex. “Somewhere safe,” he says. “Somewhere nobody will look.”

I nod. “And grandma?” His face drops. “She’s at home,” he says, with difficulty. “Wouldn’t leave her place. Said the diner was too busy, and that she’d keep her shotgun loaded.” “Oh,” I say. “I’m going to get her to change her mind,” he adds. “Stubborn old woman.” That makes me feel relieved. She shouldn’t be in the path of danger because of me. “I’m sorry I put you in this position, El,” I say, and I am so fucking sorry right now I feel like my heart might break in two. He nods, staring at the densely packed trees that surround the house.

Some of them are so tall, I can’t even tell where they end. “Yeah, well,” he says, giving me a small smile. “It was always just a matter of time, right? Until they figured out what happened? I mean, that guy at the diner years ago—that was just a lucky fluke I was there, and that I was packing.” I nod, a chill settling into my bones as I remember the Gypsy Brother who inexplicably stumbled upon me, the girl everyone thought was dead, his greedy eyes lighting up in delight as he probably counted the bonus Dornan would give him for forcing me into his car and taking me back to him. You look pretty good for a dead girl. And then he hadn’t

been able to see me at all, because Elliot had shot him in the head and buried the body in the woods. “Yeah, I guess.” We sit there, silent for a little longer, as our tea turns cold. “A baby, huh?” Elliot says, finally. I hear the anguish in his voice. The torment. “Yep,” I reply awkwardly, unable to meet his gaze. “I’m happy for you, Julz,” he says, patting my knee. “You deserve something good after everything.” Is it good, though? “And Jase is a good guy. As much as I fucking hate saying that, he’s proven

me wrong.” He chuckles to himself, shaking his head. “What?” I press. “Some inside secret I don’t know about?” He shrugs, flashing me a dazzling smile. “Nah. Just that, I never told you how I almost killed him once.” This is news to me. “What?” He smiles self-depreciatingly, taking a sip of tea. “Had the motherfucker lined up in the crosshairs of my sniper rifle. Finger on the trigger and everything.” I feel sick. “What happened?” I ask, not sure than I want to know. “I breathed in,” he says casually. “I breathed back out, and my fucking phone

rang.” “Who was it?” “It was Amy. She was calling to tell me she was pregnant with my kid.” Oh. He shakes his head in disbelief. “I packed that gun up faster than you could say Gypsy Brother, and I got the fuck out of there.” Huh. His girlfriend getting pregnant three years ago might have ruined any chance of him coming back to me, the girl who waited ceaselessly for him, but inexplicably, it had given me another chance at life with Jason. And, of course, the baby I carry inside me now. He stands, throwing the last of his

tea on the dirt beneath the steps. “Tell that to your kid one day,” he says with an amused smile, offering me a hand up. “Make sure Jase hears every word.” I raise my eyebrows as he lifts me to my feet. “You are such a shit stirrer,” I admonish, shaking my head at him. “You better believe it,” he says, opening the door and ushering me back inside.

The next day, Elliot leaves. He wraps me in a tight bear hug before he gets into the old jeep with Luis. I can see the worry etched onto his face. And it kills me that I’m the reason it exists. After giving me another dose of the cherry-flavored syrup later that afternoon, Luis informs me he’s lined up a doctor for me to see. A baby doctor. He hands me a crumpled piece of paper with a hand drawn mud map and an address that’s barely decipherable. “You mean, an obstetrician?” I ask

him. He clicks his fingers. “Yeah, that.” “Thank you so much,” I say gratefully, feeling blessed to have someone—a virtual stranger—watching out for me. I still haven’t heard the full story about how he ended up working with Jase and Elliot to bust me out of Emilio’s compound, but I know the three have some kind of bizarre bromance going on. It’s kind of cute. “Come see me before you go,” he says, giving me a meaningful stare. I nod, pocketing the directions. Ten minutes before we are due to leave, I find him in the small woodshed attached to the back of the house. He’s sitting on an upturned milk crate,

smoking a cigarette, almost like he’s been waiting for me. He stands and crushes the cigarette under his boot as I approach, waving the smoke away as if he’s forming a path of clean air for me. It’s insane how attentive these three are being on account of my being pregnant. “Thanks again,” I say. “For setting this up. And for, you know… everything.” He smiles. “You’re welcome,” he says. “Good choice on the outfit.” I look down at what I’m wearing. I’m not sure what he’s saying until he pokes my arm. “The marks,” he says. “Don’t show the doctor, and if he sees, make something up.”

“Oh. Okay. Thanks.” He shrugs, and starts walking toward the house. Right. That must be it. The drive takes us half an hour. It’d be quicker, but a lot of the roads here are unsealed, and with the recent rain, Jase has to drive carefully to avoid us getting bogged. I can just imagine how that would turn out. Once we’re at the hospital and settled into the consultation room, Jase starts poking around at the equipment as I watch him from my spot on the exam table. He pulls a face at me as he picks up a small replica of a woman’s pelvis with a cabbage patch doll’s head stuffed through the middle. It’s such a light-

hearted thing, such an innocent moment, that I don’t know whether to laugh or cry at how little of these moments we’ve actually had together since he figured out who I was. I decide to go with laughing, and I have to cover my mouth with my hands to stop from sounding like the hysterical pregnant lady. He puts the pelvis-doll display back down and smiles at me, a boyish grin that shows his dimples. “I haven’t seen those in years,” I say, reaching out and pressing my finger into the deep dimple in his right cheek. He just keeps on smiling, a glint in his eye, and I realize that maybe he’s telling the truth. He’s excited. He’s actually happy to be here with me, even after everything

that’s happened, even knowing that there is a chance this baby might belong to a monster instead of to him. That realization makes me tear up, and his smile turns to concern. “You okay?” I nod, smiling through my tears. “I’m better than okay,” I reply, reaching over and squeezing his hand. The doctor arrives eventually, asking me a whole bunch of questions. When was my last period? Have I taken any drugs? Of course, I lie when he asks me that. Jase cannot find out what happened. After he’s finished with his boring questions, and poked around my stomach a little bit—I’ve explained my wound as

a burn from a wood fire, though I don’t know if he buys it—he sends us down the corridor with a slip of paper. As we’re walking to the ultrasound department, Jase stops me with a tug at my elbow. “Why did you lie?” he asks me. “That’s not a burn.” I shrug. “I don’t know. How do I explain what really happened?” Jase seems to think about that for a moment. “Like, really,” I add. “How do I even begin to put that into words?” “Yeah,” he says, and the anger is back. “I suppose you’re right.” I don’t want him to be angry. As we keep walking toward the radiology

department, I slip my hand into his, giving it a reassuring squeeze. He squeezes my hand back, our secret language, the thing we used even as teenage sweethearts to talk to each other without using words. I look at him sidelong, and he flashes me a smile. We’re okay. This is going to be okay. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t worried. I might’ve felt the baby move a few times, but I don’t know if it’s okay. I can only hope and pray that whatever horrors I’ve experienced in the past three months haven’t affected it. It doesn’t take long for the technician to get me half-naked and on the bed. I should’ve worn a dress, I think to myself

as I shed my jeans and climb up on the table. I take a deep breath as I realize my hands are shaking. I am so nervous right now. The technician asks me a round of the same questions I just answered in the doctor’s office, and I repeat each answer. Last menstrual cycle. Average cycle length. That delightfully mundane stuff. Then, finally, Jase and I are glued to the monitor as hazy black and white snow fills the screen. It doesn’t take long for something to materialize, and when it does, I gasp. A baby. A fully formed baby, with arms and legs, waving madly as if it knows we’re looking. I actually hear Jase make a surprised noise beside me,

and when I look at him, he’s beaming. I blink back a grateful tear as I pay attention to the screen, trying to follow the measurements but in the end just watching tiny limbs as they dance around. The technician stops for a moment and leaves the room, calling “un minuto,” as she leaves. I look at Jase. “Do you think she’s worried?” I ask. Jase shakes his head. “Nah. Maybe she’s getting someone to tell us in English.” I nod. Yeah. That has to be it. The doctor bustles in and takes one look at the screen, then nods at the technician. “See these three lines?” he

asks us, pointing to the screen. I peer at what I think are three lines, but I can’t even see what context they’re in. The limbs are gone now, and this is a close up of something. Of what, I’ve no idea. “Is something wrong?” I ask, my stomach sinking. “No,” the doctor says quickly. “Everything is perfect. Three lines means a girl.” Everything is perfect. Three lines means a girl. I start a chin wobble that will surely dissipate into a stream of tears. “It… she…is okay?” The doctor frowns, handing me a print-off of several grainy pictures that

show our perfect baby in various stages. “Madam, I am not sure what has happened to you to make you question your baby’s health,” the doctor says cautiously, his eyes dropping to my scarred stomach. “But I can assure you, from everything we can see now, your baby is in perfect health. You’ve passed the danger period, so you can go ahead and start telling people now.” I nod, relief flooding my veins. “And the conception date, was that accurate?” I feel Jase tense beside me. The doctor scans his paperwork and nods. “Usually a conception date is hard to pin down, but in this case, your due date tracks perfectly with the baby’s size. You must

keep a good diary.” He winks at me, and I can’t suppress the smile on my face. Jase kisses the top of my head. A little more of the wall I’ve built around my heart crumbles. I let myself sink into the feeling of relief that floods me, just for a moment. Because I can finally believe the words I keep whispering to myself in my darkest moments of doubt. Everything is going to be okay.

That night, the house is silent. Luis is off somewhere and Elliot is gone, back to his girls, and hopefully to force grandma to leave her house in case Dornan decides to pay her a visit. I decide to take a shower after dinner and get an early night. Pregnancy is kicking my ass all of a sudden. As I turn off the water Jase appears in the bathroom. We’ve been fairly intimate, kissing and holding each other, but he hasn’t seen me naked since Dornan cut my tattoo away. I’m so selfconscious now, and I make sure I’m

always covered up. Jase hands me a towel, and I wrap it around myself, stepping out of the bathtub onto the bathmat. “There’s still some hot water left,” I murmur, not looking at him as I reach for my toothbrush and toothpaste. Thanks, Luis. The guy thought of everything - he’s even got bottles of prenatal vitamins stacked up on the kitchen counter for me. “Thanks,” Jase murmurs, giving me a lingering kiss on the top of my head as he steps past me. Jase takes his shirt off and drops it to the ground, and I do a quick brush and rinse, shoving the toothbrush back in the makeup bag Luis also bought me. I have a feeling I owe the dude a lot, and not

just money. I owe him big time for setting all of this up for us, for helping us, for those sweet, reassuring yet cryptic words he uttered to me while I was still Dornan’s prisoner. It’ll all be over soon. I wonder if he had already started buying me vitamins and toothbrushes when he spoken those words in my ear. I turn and lean against the sink, watching as Jase sheds the rest of his clothes, placing his gun on the windowsill in the shower. He’s obviously still on edge, which makes me think he either needs to relax a little, or I need to get my own gun to keep on me at all times.

He’s about to step into the shower when I step forward, completely on impulse, and tug his hand. He looks down at my hand and then to my eyes, and I smile back at him almost shyly. “Julz…” he begins, looking torn. “Jase,” I echo his tone, but with a playful smirk. His naked form in front of me is too much. He’s devastatingly good-looking, all tightly coiled muscle and sinew, a “V” that draws from his tightly packed abs down to the thing I’m more interested in. Yes. I’ve missed him so fucking much it hurts me to think about it. How is it I’ve loved this boy madly and deeply for over seven years, almost

since the moment I met him, and we’ve only made love a handful of times? It’s not right. Desire flares across my midsection and lower, a delicious itch that must be scratched at once. I wonder if he’ll be game or if he sees me as tainted and ruined after the last three months? Can push that horror away to reconnect? To be together the way we were always meant to be. I no longer think he’s disgusted by me. When I saw the look in his eyes when he saw our baby on the ultrasound, my last paranoid fear was drowned in the brilliance of his excited smile. He loves me. I believe this, now. “Kiss me,” I whisper, and his eyes

widen slightly. He won’t, I think. He’s afraid But he does. He rushes me, pinning me against the sink as he presses his lips greedily against mine. A thrill courses through me as our tongues collide, as months and years of pent-up desire crackles in the air around us. I rip the towel from around my torso, letting it fall to the ground. I press my body to his, scars and all, needing every possible inch of our bare skin to be touching. I need this man like I need air to breathe. I burn. Because this is electric. His touch ignites in the most delicious of ways, his cock thick and hard as it

presses against my skin, wedged firmly between us. I moan as he breaks the kiss long enough to lean down and take a nipple in his mouth, sucking lightly. I use the shift in our bodies and the slight gap between us to reach my hand down and wrap my fingers around him, pumping my hand slowly back and forth. “Fuuuuuck,” he groans, moving his hips to match my own rhythm. He releases my nipple and stands tall, batting my hand away from his cock and cupping my ass in his hands. Attacking my mouth again, he lifts me up and deposits me on the bathroom counter. I smile as he uses his body and one of his hands to push my legs wider apart, so wide it aches. I gasp as he trails his

fingers up the inside of my thigh, rubbing fingertips over my slick heat and around my sensitive nub before he plunges one finger inside me. “Oh, fuck,” I moan, pressing my mouth to his tattooed shoulder and biting gently. I could come right now, like this, especially with the way he’s touching me, two fingers now thrusting slowly in and out of my wetness. “God, I’ve missed you,” he murmurs. “You’re so fucking wet.” He continues to touch me with an intensity that tells me he’s only just getting started. Just as I’m pushing my hips farther forward into his thrusts and cresting that peak, he stops, withdrawing his touch completely.

Son of a bitch. I attempt to catch my breath as he takes one step back his cock standing to attention, so ready for me. He uses my wetness to smear across his dick, squeezing himself with a look of barely bridled lust. “Please,” I say, squirming in the spot he’s left me, my legs still wide, my pussy burning. He smiles, steps closer, pressing the tip of his cock against my wetness. “Please what?“ he asks, a cocky smirk on his face. My darling boy. Here he is. I thought I’d lost him, but here he is. With me. “Please, fuck me,” I say, smiling wickedly.

He grabs my jaw roughly with one hand, parting my lips with his thumb, devouring me greedily with his tongue. He’s exactly where I want him to be, but he’s not moving, hovered just outside of me. I pull my mouth away a little, enough to beg him to keep going, when he pushes himself into me in one long stroke. “Ahhhh!” I yell, before his mouth drowns my surprised exclamation. He stays still inside me for a moment, as I stretch around him, adjusting to his size. I moan with satisfaction as he begins to thrust his hips, sliding in and out of me. It’s like

we were made for each other—if he was any bigger it would hurt, but this way, it’s a tight but perfect fit between our two bodies. He keeps thrusting as I climb that white-hot peak again, until finally, I can’t hold it off any longer. I open my mouth crying out loudly, and Jase growls low in his throat. When he sees my face, sees what he’s doing to me, I feel him go even harder inside me as his entire body stiffens and he roars, four sharp thrusts as he comes inside me. Well, it’s not like we need to worry about me getting knocked up, I think wryly, watching his face as he finishes his own climax and drags in a sated breath. “Holy fuck,” he whispers, closing

his eyes and pressing his forehead to mine. I just nod, enjoying the way the fine sheen of sweat on his forehead melts into my skin, one body to another, two people as one entity. I’m still not ready for it to be over as he begins to pull out of me; I press my hands to his lower back, holding him to me, and he stills. We stay like that until the temperature drops and our bodies turn cold. Outside, the sun dips below the horizon. And for these moments, it’s just us, just Jason and Juliette, two people who’ve fought through every shitty thing to get to this moment.

And it’s beautiful.

We spend several weeks alone at the house. Luis visits us every couple of days, but most of the time, it’s just us. I can tell Jase doesn’t want to take me anywhere—it’s still going to take a while to regain the strength and weight I lost under Dornan’s (lack of) care, and Jase insists on feeding me up, cooking me creamy pastas and juicy hunks of beef. We talk a lot about the future— kind of—but we don’t talk about Dornan. We both seem to know we need to focus on the baby before we do

anything reckless. However, the thought of Dornan still out there, actively looking for us, makes me frightened beyond belief. I find it so hard to reconcile this new, meek and afraid girl with the tough-as-nails Julz that woke up in a nightmare three months ago, but that Julz didn’t know if she pushed Dornan too much, it could cost her her child. Walks on the beach and dinners on the porch. Lazy afternoon sex and spooning at night. Everything is tinged with a film of fear, but most of the time, I think we do a pretty good job of blocking out the threat of the Gypsy Brothers and focusing on us. It’s the first time we’ve ever been able to just peacefully co-exist, and I find myself

falling even deeper in love with this man who is my everything. I lock the bathroom door once a day and retrieve my bottle of medicine from the depths of my makeup bag, measuring a slightly smaller dose as each week passes. My one dirty little secret amongst all the good stuff, but with each passing day, I’m more confident I can do this. I can beat this. When the bottle runs out, Luis seems to know, turning up with another. He is truly a guardian angel, and I don’t even know why he’d do this for me. I want to talk to him about his mother, about my father, but he doesn’t seem ready to talk about that. When I

question Jase about him, he’s just as vague, warning me away from pushing him too far. Seems The Prospect has a few scars of his own. On the beach one afternoon, I am dressed in a cheap blue one-piece I picked up at a gas station during one of our rare ventures into town for supplies. Jase is wearing swimming trunks, his back bare, the GYPSY BROTHERS tattoo emblazoned on his skin like a homing beacon. I touch my salty fingers to the thick black lettering on his back and he flinches slightly. “Luis is getting his lasered off,” Jase says quietly, scanning the deserted beach from behind his aviators. “I think I’ll do

the same.” I think about that for a moment, as I trace each letter with my fingertip, the black ink an obvious burden to him. “I think you should leave it,” I whisper, pressing my palm flat against his back. He turns sharply to look at me. “What? Why?” “Because you’ll be the only one left.” After we kill that motherfucker and his son, those bastards who refuse to die. “Imagine how afraid people will be of you, then.” Jase laughs, taking my hand and dragging me around to the front of him. I end up face-up in his lap, smiling as he

peppers kisses all over my face. “I don’t want people to be afraid of me,” he says, tracing underneath my eye with his thumb. “I just want to be a regular guy, with a regular wife, and a regular kid.” “I’d love to meet them,” I say lightly. He rolls his eyes, kissing me again. “I’m talking about you,” he says, and my heart does a pleasant little skip. “We should buy you a minivan,” I joke. Jase raises his eyebrows, patting the side of my cheek. “That is a terrible idea,” he says, leaning down and pressing his lips to mine. I laugh as his salty lips crash into mine, a real, lighthearted laugh that fills me with hope.

I am really here. With the man I love. And our baby. A baby who by the odds, should never have survived being in that basement with Dornan. I shiver as Dornan’s face looms above me, just like it always has. I hope that once he’s dead, I can forget him, but I’m not so sure. Jase breaks the kiss. “I’m hot,” he says. “We should swim. You coming?” I nod, and he gets to his feet, giving me a hand up. The water is a cold slap, but refreshing at the same time. With the methadone I’m slightly sleepy all the time, so it feels good to be woken up by the cold seawater. I float on my back impressed with the way my bump rises

out of the water, when Jase yells. I put my feet down quickly, scanning the beach as I wipe salt water from my eyes. “What?” He’s holding something in his hand. “I found something in the sand!” I will my heart to stop beating so fast. Nobody is after us. We’ve not about to get ripped apart by bullets. No, he found something in the sand. I swim over to Jase and stand, waistdeep in the water. He’s on his knees, still searching the water, and he holds something up to me. It’s a ring. It looks like an antique, diamonds pressed into the thin band and a monster square diamond in the middle, surrounded by smaller ones.

I hold it up to the light. “Wow. Somebody must be missing this.” Jase nods. “I think there’s something written inside, can you see?” I turn the band around, feeling awful that someone’s probably looking for this gorgeous piece of jewelry. I squint to read the tiny writing inside. J & J and a love heart on either side of the initials. I gasp, almost dropping the freakin’ thing in the water. Jase laughs as I look down at him, where he’s kneeling on one knee. “Is this—” He nods. “It is.” “But how did you—”

“I had some help.” I take a shaky breath. “This is for me?” Jase smiles, taking the ring back and pushing it onto my ring finger. It sparkles in the sunlight, dazzling me. “It belonged to my grandmother,” he adds. “My mom’s mom. If you say no she’ll haunt you for the rest of your life.” I shove him in the shoulder playfully, my chest swirling with dueling emotions. After everything we’ve been through, could things really be this easy, this wonderfully good? “Juliette,” Jase says, moving his sunglasses onto his head so I can see his eyes, “will you marry me?”

Is he joking? Of course I’ll marry him. I’d die for this man. “Hell yes,” I say, swallowing back the lump in my throat. I lean down to kiss him, a salty wet kiss that tastes of the ocean. I have never felt happiness like this. It’s wonderful. It’s…terrifying. This is the life I’ve always dreamed of. The life I assumed was reserved for other people. Not for dead, broken girls like me. But here, now? I’ve never felt so alive. I am loved. And nothing has ever felt so good.

Everything is going so well. So well. We’re getting married, and we’re having a baby. Two things I never thought I would be able to say. Two things that I’d never seen in my future, and that I probably don’t deserve. My demise is pathetic, really. I’m holding the bottle of methadone in one hand, my little measuring cup in the other, when the door to the bathroom bursts open. I jump ten feet in the air, reflexively dropping the bottle into the sink. “Fuck!” I curse, horrified.

“Crap, sorry,” Jase says, closing the door again as I watch the last of the precious fluid glug down the drain. I swipe up the bottle in my hand, but I’m too late. Everything but a few drops is gone, gone, fucking gone. I stare into the basin, hearing a glug and a gurgle, and I freak the fuck out. Every last drop, gone. I try to call Luis on the burner phone Elliot left me. No answer. I even get so desperate as to cut the plastic methadone bottle in half with a pair of scissors and lick every last bit of sticky fluid from the inside of the bottle. It doesn’t do anything. Not even a mild buzz. Nothing.

After pacing in the small bathroom for a few minutes, I begin to shake. I’m panicking, freaking the fuck out. I have nothing left. Not even some fucking codeine for when shit gets really bad. Which it will. Really fucking soon. It’s better this way, I finally reason with myself. Get clean, detox—hell, I’m already halfway through, with the way I’ve been dropping my dose steadily each week, and all in plenty of time before the baby’s born. By the time they need to stick an IV in me during labor— because I’ve decided I’m definitely having as many drugs as they’ll let me have—the track marks in my elbow will be gone entirely, and this day will be

nothing but a murky memory, a lesson in the fragility of things. Jase knocks on the door again about fifteen minutes later. “You okay in there?” “Yeah,” I call out. “Just morning sickness.” I’m almost five months along. My morning sickness dried up weeks ago, but he doesn’t know that. The worst part is, because I grew up watching my mother go cold turkey so many times, I know exactly what awaits me. A fine film of sweat breaks out on my forehead as I remember the way she would clutch her stomach and scream when she ran out of smack and had no way of replenishing her supply. How she

would puke for days, and cry and cry and cry. I wish I didn’t know what was about to happen. I go through the motions. Eat a good breakfast, knowing it will probably be my last good meal in a couple days. Jase must notice how quiet I am. “You okay?” he asks. I nod. “Yeah. I think I’m just getting a flu or something,” I lie. He looks concerned. “You need to see a doctor?” I shake my head emphatically. “Nope.” You cannot know what I’ve done. “I’ll just get some rest.” I dump my bowl in the sink and

move stiffly to the bedroom, laying myself under the thick duvet. It doesn’t take long to hit. First, the headache that feels like a vice squeezing my skull until it explodes. Then, pain spreads to all of my joints. My stomach churns for a couple hours, and then I start puking. I’ve got the sweats. It’s all stuff I know much too well from days spent nursing my mother as she suffered through the same. The clock does nothing to help my plight. I think three hours must have passed, roll over to the clock, only to see two fucking minutes have crawled by. I am dying. I want to die. This is the worst pain I’ve ever experienced; the shame of knowing why

I’m sick only adds to the writhing pain and panic that runs through my veins. Simultaneous fire and ice, hunger and thirst, empty and full. I am a mess. I sweat and twist, knotting myself in damp sheets, until Jase is there with a cold compress and a glass of water. “You think you have the flu?” he asks me, helping me up and holding the water to my lips. I take a sip, the cold water refreshing as it hits my tongue and throat. He’s frowning. He looks concerned. “Do you need a doctor?” he asks me. “Is the baby—” The baby seems completely fine. She continues to pummel me, seemingly

unaware than mama is sick as a fucking dog and would really appreciate some stillness for a little while. Every welldirected jab of tiny arms and legs kicks my hideous nausea into overdrive, the only thing stopping me from puking more the fact that I have already emptied my stomach. But in a strange way, I’m also welcoming of the movements. My fellow fighter, my mini warrior, my daughter—I still find it incredibly strange to say that, daughter—letting me know she’s still in there, still as feisty as ever. A survivor, just like me. I take another sip of water and it’s one sip too much. Violent nausea grabs hold of me again, bitter bile rears its way up my throat, and I’m lucky I have a

bucket beside me to grab and hurl into. I’ve never been a delicate vomiter—I almost always get tears in my eyes and feel like I’m being suffocated—but this is even worse than the standard morning sickness fare. I look in the bucket, halfexpecting to see I’ve finally hurled up my own stomach. Nope, just the water. I take the glass back from Jase and suck out one small sip, swishing it around my mouth before spitting it back in the bucket. The logical side of me says I’ll be dehydrated very soon if I can’t keep fluids down. “I don’t need a doctor,” I say, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. “I’ll be fine.”

Jase presses his hand to my forehead, his hand freezing, and he raises his eyebrows. “Jesus,” he says. “You’re like a furnace.” He takes the bucket from my hands and leaves the room. I let myself flop back on the pillows, frustrated. I’ve never been good at letting other people take care of me when I’m down and out, and this time is no different. But Jase is a natural. He’s going to be such a good father. He’s showing me he’ll be an excellent husband, but I already knew that. Someone who risks his life on an almost hourly basis to protect me deserves a fucking medal, especially when they also

hold my hair back while I vomit and clean up the bucket afterward. I am truly the luckiest girl alive. I went back to L.A. to kill every single motherfucker who did me wrong that afternoon six years ago, and not only did I get to revel in their sweet suffering, but I’ve also managed to score a fiancé and a baby out of the deal. It’s all too good to be true. Which is why I just have to push through this. Get past my body’s desire for the smack, get past my dependence on the bottle of cherry-flavored liquid that was keeping me from going completely insane. “You wanna try and eat something?” Jase asks, as he returns with the empty bucket. He places it beside the bed as I

kick the blankets off again. HotColdHotColdHotColdHOTHOTHOT My body’s doing a lousy fucking job of making its mind up. Blankets on, blankets off. Repeat. I shake my head. “Maybe later.” Jase nods, taking a stand of my hair between his thumb and forefinger and tucking it gently behind my ear. “Try and get some sleep,” he murmurs, leaning in to kiss my forehead. My skin burns where his lips have touched, but it’s a nice burn. It’s raining outside again. I drift off, thinking that when I wake up, the worst will be over, and I can finally be free.

I’m screaming. Screaming and thrashing about, my nightmares full of blood and terror and his face. “Hey,” Jase yells in my face. His voice cuts through the greasy haze, and I force my heavy eyelids open, peering up at him. “Wake up,” he urges. “Are you awake?” I hear fumbling and the lamp next to me switches on, blinding me. “Ahhhhh!” I protest, throwing my hands over my tender eyes. Everything hurts. Everything

hurts so fucking bad. Jase grabs one of the shirts I’ve hung next to the bed and drapes it over the lampshade, dulling its intensity. Thank crap for that. I slowly take my hands away, looking up at Jase. He looks mad. “What is going on?” he asks, and I see anger flash in his eyes. I struggle to sit up, but it hurts, everything hurts. I try to catch my breath. “What do you mean?” I ask weakly, my teeth feeling like they’re about to burst out of my gums. The pressure, the pounding is fucking intense, and it’s everywhere, all over my body. My skull. My skull feels like it is going to explode. “You’ve been crying for almost an

hour,” Jase says gravely, running a hand through his hair. “Saying I need it, saying help me. What the fuck is going on, Juliette?” His eyes are dark with emotion. He looks like he’ll wrap his fingers around my throat and throttle me if I give him the wrong answer. “I have the flu,” I say. I lie. To the man I love. I am a terrible person. We promised no more lies, and straight away they’re coming out of my mouth faster than I can draw breath. There is something seriously wrong with me. His jaw clenches; I see his fists are balled up as well.

“Last chance,” he says. “Don’t fucking lie to me. I deserve the truth.” My heart rate picks up considerably, my mouth suddenly very dry. “What is this?” Jase asks, holding up the two pieces of the methadone bottle I’d buried in the bottom of the trash. Fuck. I don’t answer. He’s seething; I can see it in the way he’s watching me with those eyes, those dark, haunted eyes of his. He stares up at the ceiling, clearly disgusted. “Can we talk about this later?” I ask, swinging my legs out and letting my feet hit the floor. I stand, wincing as the

sudden change from laying down to standing up makes me dizzy momentarily. Sharp pain shoots up my spine, and I gasp. “Fucking heroin,” Jase says with an air of resignation. “Really? I didn’t pick you for a junkie, Julz.” Images rush at me as Jase’s cruel words hit home. Dornan’s face, those identical eyes of his boring into mine, taking his twisted pleasure as he got me high again and again, as he took me to the brink of death, only to bring me back to life. That fucker did this to me. “Fuck you,” I spit, narrowing my eyes at him. “I didn’t do this. He did this to me. I’m just trying to get better.” That month of lazy sex and morning beach

walks and a goddamn marriage proposal are all but forgotten, a lie, a mistruth because I am a liar and an addict. “How could you keep this from me?” he asks. “From the doctors?” My head is pounding, my mouth dry. I can’t focus. I can’t do this. He looks at me now, and the look of betrayal in his eyes is enough to make me want to die. I have failed him. I will always fail him, because I am a liar and a cheat and I have become my mother. “You would have left me,” I say, a small sob coming from my throat as my eyes fill with tears. “I couldn’t tell you. I couldn’t tell anyone what he did to me. Who he made me.” I whisper the final

words. Jase looks like he wants to kill me. “What is wrong with you?” He roars, pounding his fist into the wall. Everything is wrong with me, I think sadly. I’m sweating so much from the comedown (will it ever fucking end?) and I need to get clean, to rinse off my skin and let warm water ease my cramps and aches. I go to push past Jase, to make it to the shower, but as I pass him he reaches out a hand and locks it around my upper arm, spinning me around to face him. At the same time, he switches on the main light of the room, casting us both in a bright amber glow. He opens his mouth again, the look

on his face clearly saying attack, but his scowl fades rapidly as he looks down at something. I follow his stare, seeing nothing. “What?” I ask. The sweat is pouring off me now, and I think I’m going to be sick again. I swallow thickly, fighting the nausea, deeply alarmed by the look on Jase’s face. “Juliette,” Jase croaks, pointing at my legs. No—pointing at my panties. I’m not wearing pants, just a thin tank top and white cotton panties. “You’re bleeding,” he says, horrified. “Why are you bleeding?” I’m bleeding? Why am I bleeding? I’m so drenched in sweat, I didn’t

even notice. But Jase is right; beyond the slight swell of my stomach, when I tilt my head to the side and down, I can see sticky red fluid coating the insides of my thighs. Oh, God. I immediately put my hand between my thighs and bring it back to my face; red. Bright red and the most horrifying thing I’ve ever seen. “Juliette,” Jase repeats, and this time it sounds more like he’s begging me to give him an answer that doesn’t spell tragedy. A whisper. “ Why are you bleeding?” Too good to be true. Too good to be true. I always knew this was too good to be true.

I start screaming. Jase takes over because I’m screaming and bleeding and I don’t know what to do. The baby. The baby. Is she okay? Is she even alive? When was the last time I felt her move? Before I know what’s happening, I’m being gathered up in strong arms and then, I’m in the passenger seat of the pick-up truck Luis left for us. There’s a thick towel between my legs and I watch in horror as the beige cotton turns red. It hurts. It hurts everywhere, sticky and clammy, but mostly it hurts in my chest. In my throat. I did this. This is my fault. And although we’re hurtling away

from the house at illegal speeds, I can already see there’s too much blood for this to end well. A sharp pain stabs my back, gripping me and staying there, like a razor blade, for several seconds. I hold my breath and squeeze my eyes shut as it builds to a fiery peak. Five seconds. Ten. Fifteen. I’m biting my cheek hard enough to draw blood as the inferno finally lets up a little, but it doesn’t go away completely. I draw in a breath, looking at Jase as I clutch our baby through my scarred skin. When was the last time she moved? I need to know, but for the life of me, I can’t remember. Did I do this? Did the drugs make me bleed? I can’t even

entertain the possibility of what that could mean. The possibility I’ve killed our baby. I would cry, but I’m too shocked. Five minutes ago, we were screaming the house down, and now, everything is melting away, fading, taking the last bit of my hopes and dreams along with it. The only good thing to come out of this clusterfuck—and now I’m going to lose this, too?

The pain is so great by the time we get to the hospital that all I can see is red. This is more painful than being held down and raped. This is more painful than having my skin excised, piece by violent piece. More painful than a knife in my leg, than a cocaine overdose, than anything. This. Is. Hell. This is like being ripped apart, from the inside out. Somebody is screaming. I want to tell them to shut up, until I realize somewhere through the thick red haze

that I am the one screaming. OhGodOhGodOhGod. I can’t walk. My legs don’t want to function right now. I’m panting as pain racks my body, onetwothreefourfive, reaches a violent peak, sixseveneight, before coasting back down, easing off, settling into a familiar dull ache for a few minutes of respite. Contractions. No! I refuse to accept that. These are cramps, I tell myself, just cramps, nothing more, just the comedown. But you’re bleeding, the rational voice in my head whispers sadly. I want to smash that rational voice in the face until she shuts her mouth. Strong arms circle around my waist

and pull me from the car; it’s raining, and I lean into Jase as he runs, two of us moving as one. Three of us. But for how much longer? When I open my eyes again we’re in a foyer, all drab beige paneling and plastic bucket chairs. I pant as another wave of pain slams into me, biting my lip so I won’t scream again. “Sangre,” Jase yells. At first I think he says Sangue, as in Il Sangue, Emilio’s Cartel, and I go rigid. Until he says it again and I realize he’s saying Sangre. Spanish for blood. Jase glances around the walls, looking for the right word, I guess. “Embarazada!” he yells,

turning me toward the bored-looking receptionist. She peers at me in alarm, her doe-like brown eyes going wide, and then she’s yelling something in Spanish. Embarazada. Pregnant. I remember that from the forms I filled out at the hospital before the ultrasound. Out of nowhere, a stretcher appears. Stranger’s faces surround me as Jase lowers me onto the flat trolley and then I’m moving, watching the ceiling whizz past above me as I hear Jase and the medical staff try to communicate in broken English and Spanish. I hear sixteen weeks a nd blood. There is so much blood. Before we make it wherever they’re taking me, I black out.

*** When I come to, I’m propped up on a hospital bed, and there’s a doctor hovered between my open legs. I come to with a start, trying to press my knees together, trying to remember what the hell is going on. My legs are trapped in stirrups, and I can’t figure out why. Then it hits me. I’m bleeding. Everything hurts so bad, I’m in agony. Is it already too late? A hand squeezes my shoulder softly and I turn my head sharply, locking eyes with a generically pretty woman, probably only a few years older than me, dressed in nurse’s scrubs. She’s got one hand on a portable ultrasound machine,

the same kind the doctor used just a few weeks ago when we saw our baby’s strong, steady heartbeat and reedy legs that kicked and somersaulted. “We’re just going to take a look at your baby, okay?” Her voice is kind, her accent thick. I nod vacantly. I hike up my singlet, my panties already gone, my lap and knees covered by a green hospital sheet, to retain a little dignity, I suppose. The doctor stands and strips bloodied plastic gloves from his hands, glancing at the nurse and nodding before he leaves the room. She squeezes the cold stuff on my stomach, just like the doctor did a few weeks back, and presses the plastic thing onto my skin.

Jase enters the room, wearing green surgical scrubs. I frown at him quizzically for a moment before I realize he was covered in my blood before. They must have given him clean clothes to wear. He rushes to my side, his expression pinched. “You’re awake,” he murmurs, kissing the top of my head. I give him a brave smile and turn back to the screen. The pain is still here, still intense, but being somewhere where people know how to fix me tapers my hysteria dramatically. Everything will be okay, I chant to myself. It has to be. On the screen, black and white materializes. It takes the nurse a few

moments to locate the baby, floating in my womb. Nothing looks different than the other day, but everything is different. There’s no kicking legs, no rolling. There is no movement at all. “Do you know what you’re having?” the nurse asks cheerfully. Distracting me. “A girl,” I say tonelessly, Jase’s hand squeezing tighter around mine. She nods, a look of intense concentration on her face. My mouth goes dry as I listen to the nothingness that surrounds us, the nothingness that says I can’t find a heartbeat. “Is the sound on?” Jase asks, pointing to the screen. He must be thinking what I am - where is that noise, where the fuck is that gallopgallop that

tells us our baby is okay? The nurse gives us a tight smile, placing the plastic thing back into its tray. She doesn’t answer Jase. “Let me get the doctor,” she says, patting my hand reassuringly. “He’ll be able to get a better look.” I swallow thickly as she leaves my peripheral vision and exits the room, my gaze locked firmly on the display, currently empty. Jase side-hugs me, kissing the top of my head again. “The doctor will find it,” he says, and I don’t know if he’s trying to convince himself or me. It doesn’t matter, though. I haven’t felt movement in hours, and there’s no

heartbeat on the ultrasound screen. I’m not an idiot. I know what that means. The doctor enters the room quietly, and he searches for a long time for the heartbeat of the baby I already know is beyond this world. Finally, he turns the machine off and turns to me with a grave expression. “I am very sorry,” he says. “There is no heartbeat.” “Well keep looking!” Jase yells across me. I squeeze his hand, pull him down to me. As our eyes meet, I give my head a little shake, my lips quivering, and I pull him to me. A strangled cry comes from Jase, breaking my heart all over again. Jase pulls away from me and

punches his fist into the wall next to the bed, making the room shake. I put a hand to my mouth to try and stifle the noise coming from deep inside me, a noise between a sob and a scream. Our baby is dead. Our baby is gone.

I thought finding out our baby had died inside me was the worst possible thing that could ever happen to me, but I was wrong. Because she had passed away, her little heart still, but she was still inside me. And somehow, she had to come out. “Your waters broke with the bleeding,” the doctor informs me, peering at me as he holds a surgical mask over his chin. “You’re in labor. We’ll give you something for the pain.” His accent is even thicker than the

nurses, and I’m glad he’s pulled his mask away from his mouth to address me, or I’d have no clue what he’s saying. As it is, I nod numbly, dazed. Devastated. As the nurse pricks my arm painfully—her fifth unsuccessful attempt to get an IV into my arm—the doctor casts a suspicious glance over my bare arms. “Are you a drug user?” Humiliation wracks me. Humiliation and despair. I nod. Beside me, Jase tenses. I don’t even have to look at him to feel the anger and sorrow pouring off him in waves. The doctor asks me what I’ve been using, and as the word heroin falls from my mouth, I experience a rage deep

inside of me, a rumble in my soul, a battle cry rising from within my veins. Dornan. You did this to me. I hope you come here, you motherfucker. I hope you come here so I can kill you. “When was the last time…?” the doctor asks, massaging the veins on my arms. He taps the back of my hand and gestures to the nurse, who hands him the needle already slick with my blood. One pinch on the back of my hand, and it’s in. “A month?” I guess quietly, trying to think back through the haze of grief that’s squeezing my heart. I can’t look at Jase. I’m shaking violently, and part of that is fear and shame. I can’t look at him. We are all speaking around the tragedy

we’ve just discovered, speaking about things that don’t even matter. Maybe it’s because none of us can talk about what’s really happening. Your baby is dead. Your baby is gone. All of a sudden things get really quiet, and I start to zone out. Painkillers. They’ve given me something for the pain. What a blessed fucking relief. The pain at my back and deep in my womb starts to recede a little. The pressure is still there, lapping at me in steady waves, but the red, crushing pain is mostly tamped down. I feel woozy, and struggle to stop the room from spinning. “Try and get some rest,” the nurse says, patting my hand again before she

leaves the room with the doctor. Rest? How am I supposed to rest right now? But whatever they give me is strong enough that I virtually pass out, dozing between those steady waves of pressure that lap at me. I’m still struggling to catch up, still so confused. Our baby is dead? Jase doesn’t speak. His eyes are red and glassy, and I can see the rage that surrounds him like fire. “Jase,” I say suddenly, snapping out of my haze. “Yeah,” he says, back at my side like a rocket, obviously hearing the urgency in my voice. “I think I need to push,” I whimper,

already pushing down. The pressure around my back and lower torso has reached a crushing peak, and bits of pain start to creep through the artificial numbness created by the pain relief. I fist the sheets beneath me as I grit my teeth and bear down against the pain. Jase gives me one look and sprints into the hallway, yelling for a doctor. The nurse from earlier enters the room just in time to grab our baby as I deliver her in one push. She’s so small, she comes out so easily. Too easily. It’s not fair. She’s perfect. Tiny, but fully formed, a miniature button nose and little tufts of light brown hair. She’s beautiful. She’s ours.

The nurse wipes the baby’s face and wraps her in a white blanket before handing her to me, and it pains me how woefully small she is. Barely longer than a dollar bill, eyes closed, and completely unmoving. I hold her to my chest and sob. Jase gently places a hand on our daughter and I realize, of course, he wants to hold her, too. To see her, to know her. It kills me to let go of her, but I hand her up to him, her absence from me as harsh and as painful as the moment I realized she had passed away inside me. He sits on the bed beside me, cradling her in his hands, absolutely devastated.

He wanted this baby. He doesn’t say much, just looks down at her. Pulls her up in his arms and holds her close to his chest. It kills me, how much he wanted her. He wanted our baby so much. But she’s gone. Will he even want me now? Or will I remain the empty, tarnished vessel – unlovable, dead on the inside, forever alone? That’s what I deserve. Jase and I sit together on the narrow bed for hours, both of us in grief-stricken shock, studying every perfect thing about the child we will never get to know. The little girl who should chase butterflies and eat cake and finger paint. Gone.

Eight hours later, and the nurse comes in and takes her away. Jase helps me into new clothes, and I sit numbly in a wheelchair as he pushes me to the car, clutching onto a 3x5 piece of card with a tiny set of footprints printed onto it. The only proof we have that she even existed. And, it’s over. I am empty once more.

“Come here,” Jase murmurs. Moving slowly. Everything is slow and foggy in the midst of our grief. Deep inside me, I can feel a new seed beginning to sprout, deep in my belly, in the place where our child used to be. Rage. Pure, unadulterated rage. I didn’t know I could hate Dornan Ross any more than I already did. But I do. Now. I try to grab hold of that rage, to use it to keep me afloat, but the grief has

me drunk, vacant, and I lose my grip on the rage, sinking back down again as I drown in our collective despair. It’s not even the lack of heroin anymore that makes me sick. After the first couple of days back from the hospital, my body adapted, finally adjusted to life without a constant dose of something to sedate the demons inside me. Now, my only companion is the heart-rending grief that threatens to destroy me. I let him pull me off the couch, because I am a zombie. I resist nothing. I force a mouthful of food down when he tells me, I watch the steam billow from the tea he fixes me, and I lay like a little girl when he tucks me into bed at night. I am a ghost. I am nothing, and inside

me, that tiny seed of rage grows patiently, a little each day, and I know when I’m strong enough I’ll be able to harness it for my own survival. I need the rage to come back to me, because without it, I am a shell. Our future is gone. Our baby is gone. The promise of rage is all I have. He pulls me into the bedroom. Sometimes I notice he’s making an effort to look me in the eye, like a real effort, staring at me until I meet his gaze. Only, I never do. I avert my eyes to the floor, stuck in my own world, almost preferring that I’m alone in here. I don’t know what to say, what to do, how to act. I don’t know how to be this person

anymore. This person who was selfish enough, stupid enough to lose our baby. I lost our baby, and it’s all my fault. Mine, and his. Dornan’s. I repeat those words inside my mind. My vengeful mantra. Come and find me, you motherfucker. Come here and find me, so I can kill you. Jase has pulled one of the dining chairs into the bedroom, set it up in front of the floor-length mirror. He gestures for me to sit down, and finally, I do return his gaze. “I don’t want to look at myself,” I say quietly. His face falls. He squeezes my hand. “Trust me. You can close your eyes if you want.”

I sit. Look at the floor instead of the mirror. I can’t bear to see myself. To see what I’ve become. He reaches over and grabs something. “Stay still,” he says, one hand stroking my hair, and then he’s brushing it for me. It hurts at first, more than three months worth of knots in the wild rat’s nest atop my head, but he’s gentle, and he takes his task seriously. I watch his face, the subtle changes in his expression as he untangles strand from strand, and finally the brush glides through. It makes me think of my father. How, when I was a girl, he would brush my hair every day. It makes me think that Jase will never get to do that for his own

daughter, because I lost our baby, and now we have nothing. He puts the brush down and picks up something else. A hair straightener. My chest constricts as I remember the deal we had, the deal that if I ventured into the storm with him, he would straighten my hair for me. The straightener looks old, dusty. He must’ve found it when he was checking out the bathroom. “I told you I’d do this for you,” he says, his voice thick with emotion. “Do you remember?” His hands are steady but soft as he scoops up a chunk of my hair and runs the iron over it. As he releases it, warm strands settle against my cheek, and it takes everything inside me not to cry. He’s so gentle, so loving,

I wonder again to myself what I could have possibly done to deserve someone as beautiful, as capable, as unwavering as Jason Ross to carry me through this darkness that threatens to split me apart. That is splitting me apart. I nod in response. To speak would be impossible right now. But I meet his eyes when I nod, offer a pathetically sad smile, and that is enough for him. He continues the rest of the job in silence, and the feeling of him tending to me, taking care of me with this one small gesture is so fucking good, it floods me with warmth. A fragile warmth, a temporary one, but while it lasts, it is a blissful relief.

When he’s done, he rests his chin on the top of my head, so his face is directly above mine in the mirror. He angles his face into my hair, leaves a lingering kiss there. “I love you,” he says. “More than anything. Do you know that?” A lump rises in my throat. I nod. I know. “It wasn’t your fault,” he adds. My eyes slide back to the floor. “Yes, it was,” I reply.

My life becomes measured in days since we lost our baby. Two days. Five days. Eight. On the ninth day, Jase travels to the hospital, returning with a box full of ashes. A small white box full of fleeting memories like footprints, a Polaroid, and ashes. On the tenth day I contemplate suicide. I can’t do that to Jase, though, and I’ve still got something inside me that demands I stay alive. To wreak vengeance on Dornan, to drag him out to the desert, shoot him in the stomach, and

wait for vultures to pick out his fucking entrails while he screams. My dark fantasies of the ways I will torture him are the only things that keep me alive. Were it not for that, I would surely let this grief consume me, whole. Eleven days after I delivered our baby and left her still little body in a hospital morgue, I wait until Jase is asleep and slip into the bathroom. I’ve still got the bottle of pills I stole from Elliot, the Percocet for his gunshot wound that mysteriously disappeared from his bag before he left. Poor dude. I know Luis suspected me, but he didn’t find the pills, obviously. I don’t want to kill myself until I’ve dealt with Dornan, but I sure as hell want to get a nice buzz

for a couple of hours and get some goddamn relief from the pain that constricts around my heart like a vice. I reach around the back of the toilet cistern, where I’ve taped the bottle of pills. Unpeeling the tape as quietly as I can, I unscrew the lid and peer inside. It’s empty. Fuck. I choke back a sob as I peer inside the bottle. Not a single tablet! When I hid it there were twenty-three—I know, I counted them. The door bursts open as I’m shaking the bottle upside down. It’s Jase, and he looks like he’s been wide-awake for some time. Waiting for me to fuck up, I realize with a sinking

stomach. “Whatcha doing, Julz?” he asks me cruelly, snatching the bottle from my hand. He looks mad. “You found them already,” I breathe. Of course he had. He bunches his fists tightly. “You better tell me what’s going on. Or I swear to fucking God, I will leave you here and never look back.” I stare at him glumly. “I just thought I could—” “Thought you could what? Switch one habit for another? After you’ve already come so far?” A sob bubbles up in my throat. “It hurts, okay?!” I demand shrilly, my eyes wet with tears as I clutch at my chest. “It

fucking hurts.” Jase rushes me, taking me by the shoulders. “It’s supposed to hurt,” he yells. “Shit like this is supposed to hurt.” He wipes his eyes with the back of his arm. “You think you’re the only one hurting here?” “No, of course not,” I say quietly. “Jesus, Juliette,” he says, clearly disgusted. “This?” he gestures at me and shakes the empty bottle in his hand, “This is what you grew up with. You really want to repeat the past?” “No.” “Well then what the fuck are you doing? You’re past the worst of it, past the withdrawals, and you need to start

leveling with me, baby.” I raise my eyes to him. “I know. I’m sorry.” He rubs his stubbled jaw with his palm, clearly frustrated. “I don’t need your sorry. I need you to be fucking honest with me.” I nod. “I know.” “Tell me what’s going on,” he says, his dark eyes flashing in the dim light of the bathroom. “Tell me why you think you need this shit.” “I—” I lose it. Everything that’s happened, it all comes rushing around me like a flood, and I can’t hold on. “He gave it to me,” I say, my words quick and frenzied as they tumble from within me. “I tried

to stop him. I tried!” My heart starts pounding and I can’t see straight. I sink to my knees, coming to a sitting position up against the edge of the bathtub. A panic attack. I’m having a panic attack. “He killed me. I was dead. I said goodbye. I was ready. And then,” I can’t bear the memories of him shooting me up, oh, God I don’t want to go back there, “then he brought me back. I was dead. I was dead.” I’m hysterical. “Juliette,” Jase says sharply. “Stay with me, baby.” He gets to the cold ground beside me, wrapping his arms around me. He pulls me to his chest and strokes my hair until I breathe a little easier, until the chaos recedes a little.

Finally, I wipe my eyes and pull away a little, so we’re eye to eye. He looks exhausted. Exhausted and stricken with grief. “It’s my fault,” I whisper. “I’m so stupid. I should have known. I thought if I just got through that cold turkey, everything would be okay.” Jase opens his mouth to talk but I press on. I need to get this out now. “I didn’t know stopping all of a sudden would hurt the baby.” Would kill the baby. “You know what’s stupid? I was actually letting myself believe that it would all work out. That we could finally just be happy together.” Jase gives me a sad smile, plays

with a strand of my hair. “Julz,” he soothes. “Nobody blames you. I don’t blame you. You didn’t do this. This was done to you, you understand? It was a horrible accident, and you need to forgive yourself or it’s going to destroy you.” I nod. “I want to believe you,” I whimper. “I really do.” “One day we’ll have our own family, I promise.” He pulls me to him again, running his hands through my hair. “I have this feeling. Everything is going to be okay.” I wish I had the same feeling, but I don’t. Too much has happened. All I know is I can’t take much more before I break apart completely.

Because I know, any moment, he’s going to leave me for the things I’ve done. And I wouldn’t blame him. He’s going to leave me soon, and I’m going to be completely and utterly alone.

The next morning, Jase is already dressed and ready to go when I finally drag myself out of bed. “I’m taking you for a drive today,” Jase says, kissing the top of my head stiffly as I attempt to eat the eggs he’s made for me. Grief and trauma have wiped out my appetite, but I know I need to eat. I need to be strong again, because I intend to push forward with my quest for vengeance with a newfound passion. I intend to be strong enough again so I can kill Dornan Ross and the one

remaining son who violated me six years ago. “Oh yeah?” I ask around a mouthful of eggs. I swallow before continuing. “Where?” You’re going to leave me. Why are you being nice to me when you’re going to leave me? “It’s a surprise.” I hate surprises. I like—I need—to know what’s going on. But I bite my tongue. I said I trusted Jase. I need to put that into practice if we’re ever going to get through this horrid loss together. He’s going to leave me. We’re on the road for maybe two hours. I only burst into tears twice in the whole two hours - an improvement on

yesterday, when I don’t think I stopped crying from the moment I woke up until the moment I went to bed. So when we pull up to a collection of brick buildings with the word Rehabilitación emblazoned on the front, I raise my eyebrows, looking at Jase quizzically. “Rehab?” I ask dubiously. “Who am I, Lindsey Lohan?” “Who?” Jase asks. I roll my eyes. He never did keep up with the Hollywood gossip that was practically on our doorstep in L.A. “Never mind. But really, what are we doing here?” His expression is serious. “There’s

somebody I think you should see.” Oh, crap. My mother was a beautiful woman once. I’ve seen photos of her when she was a teenager, before she met Dornan and my dad. Before the drugs, before becoming my dad’s old lady, and definitely before she became a teenage mother. Before her life destroyed her. But life hasn’t been kind to her, and no amount of makeup can hide the heavy black bags under her eyes or the scars along both arms from missed veins and dirty needles. She looks brighter, though, and for the first time in as long as I can remember, her eyes aren’t bloodshot. When Jase pushes me into the small bedroom, I wince. I want to back away

from her, to turn and run, but that would be showing weakness. And I will never show weakness in front of this woman. “Julie,” she says, rushing to me. My name on her mouth sounds odd, because for once it seems to have genuine feeling behind it, instead of just the standard irritation or desperation that punctuated my childhood. I hold up my palms to stop her in her tracks. Don’t hug me, bitch . I will drop her faster than she can try and wrap those bony arms around me. She gets the message, slowing, and letting her arms fall to her sides. I glare at Jase. “Why did you bring me here?” I ask, not even caring she’s in

the room. He pulls me closer to him. “Just speak to her, okay? I think it would be really good for you, Julz.” I fight the burning urge to roll my eyes and glare at him as he steps out of the room, closing the door behind him. Great. So I’m stuck alone with the bitch. “You’re alive,” she says in wonder. I cross my arms over my chest, suddenly feeling like I’m five years old again. “Yeah,” I say quietly. “Apparently, so are you.” “The boys had to make it seem like I was dead,” she says, wringing her hands in front of her. I step back a little as she starts to pace in front of me. That’s where I get it from, I think. A little

voice inside me demands to know if she’s okay, and I push that voice down angrily. No. She doesn’t get to tell me if she’s okay. I don’t care if she’s okay. “Thank you for coming to see me,” she says, darting her eyes toward me before averting them to the floor. Pace. Turn. Pace some more. My resolve falters when I see a photo frame by her single bed, a frame of our little family in happier days. I must’ve been about four years old, and my mom was having a good run. I think she lasted a whole year that time. It was a good year, before it all went bad again. I haven’t seen a photograph of my dad in many months - I never got a chance to take anything with

me when I left for Nebraska with Elliot, and the photographs adorning the clubhouse walls aren’t exactly family snaps. I falter, and my mother sees that. She rushes to the photo, and holds it out to me. “Here,” she says. “Take it.” I take it from her slowly, bringing it closer so I can study our faces. It was taken in the nineties, before digital cameras were cool, and so the focus is slightly off, the lighting too bright. But it’s something I never thought I’d see us, together, and looking happy. I swallow thickly, my hatred for the woman fading just a little. “I’m surprised you don’t have a photo of your dealer next to your bed,” I

say, before I can stop myself. Her face falls, but she doesn’t look offended. Good. She doesn’t have the right to be offended after the childhood she dealt me. “It’s your fault they killed dad,” I blurt out suddenly, letting the photo hang at my side. “It’s your fault they almost killed me.” She starts to cry. “Don’t cry,” I say bitterly, backing as far away as I can from her. “You don’t get to cry.” She nods, wiping her cheeks, trying to compose herself. We both stand tensely, neither one knowing what to say. “Did I ever tell you about when you

were born?” she asks finally. I shake my head. I’m not sure I want to hear what she’s got to say. She opens the dresser next to her bed and pulls out a small photo album, flipping to the first page. She holds it out to me but I don’t take it this time. I can see it’s a photo of a newborn baby in her arms. I know that nose. It’s the nose I used to have before Dornan broke it. Before the surgeon smashed it apart and rebuilt it into something else. She studies the photograph, stroking the baby’s cheeks through the plastic film. “When they handed you to me, I knew I was supposed to feel something. Love or affection or something inside

that said I was meant to protect you, keep you safe. But when the doctor put you on my chest and I looked into your eyes, all I felt was dread. I was meant to love you, but I was terrified of you. I was seventeen years old.” Her words cut into me deeper than I thought possible, as I remember the grief and love I felt when I was handed my own baby just eleven days ago. A baby I would have died for a thousand times to ensure her survival. A baby I would have killed the whole world to protect. Clearly, my mother had not experienced that. “So, did you ever love me?” I ask stiffly. “Or did you hate me all along?”

She starts to cry again. “When you died,” she whispers, “when Dornan told me you were dead, I realized for the first time you were my gift from God. You were given to me to make me a better person. You were a miracle, and I’d wasted fifteen years trying to forget you existed.” Her words stab me deep, cutting criss-cross sections into my heart. I hate her, and that is the saddest thing of all. “I think about you all the time,” she says, her entire demeanor so full of sadness, it’s as if she’s been devoured by it, completely and utterly consumed by every shitty thing that’s ever happened in her life. I try not to take it

personally, try to see her as a victim. But hate still spikes deep in my chest at this woman who, for fifteen years, just wanted me to go away. “What are you going to do?” she asks finally. “Are you going to kill him?” Dornan. I know that’s who she’s referring to. I mean, apart from Donny, there’s nobody else left. I take a deep breath, steeling myself. I let my rage tamp down the sadness until the lump in my throat fades away. “Yes,” I reply. She cries harder. “I’m sorry,” she says. “I trusted him. I knew he was angry with your father that day, but I never knew he was capable of that.”

Of that. She can’t even say what that refers to. I nod slowly; none of us knew. Even at the very last moment, when I begged and Dornan wavered for a second, I had truly believed he would stop before he did what he did. My resolve breaks as I look down at the framed photograph I’m holding one last time. I look at the way my parents look at me as if they adore me. Maybe she did love me when this photo was taken. Maybe she was just as broken as I am now. She’s my mother, and I hate her, but I love her too, somewhere deep inside where that four-year-old girl lives. I wish I could just hate her because that

would be so much easier. I open the door, still not sure if I can trust her or not. I want to believe what she’s telling me, but she’s let me down every single day of my life, and I wouldn’t be surprised if she called Dornan as soon as I left the room. “You’re my mother,” I say, my words coming out in a harsher tone than I’d intended. “You’re my mother, and I forgive you for the past. But I’m going to kill Dornan, and if you try to stop me, I’ll kill you, too.” She nods in understanding. She looks relieved. “Wait,” she says, holding up a shaky palm. “Jason told me about the baby. I’m so sorry, Julie. I’m so very sorry. For

all of it.” She’s not just apologizing for the baby. She’s apologizing for everything. “Yeah,” I say, my mouth dry. “You and me both.”

After the brief but jarring experience of seeing my mother, we drive home in complete silence. Jase steals glances at me every now and then, but mostly, he stares at the road and holds the wheel with a white-knuckled grip. “You okay?” I ask him, touching his arm. I give silent thanks when he doesn’t flinch at my touch. After the things I’ve done and the way I’ve been acting, I wouldn’t blame him. He nods. “I didn’t know if I should take you there,” he says, his jaw

clenched tightly between sentences. “I didn’t know what else to do.” I squeeze his arm. “You did the right thing.” I needed to see that. To see her. I can never become like her. I will die first. I’m staring out of the window when I see out of the corner of my eye, his hands gripping the steering wheel. He’s squeezing so tightly, his knuckles are white and trembling. He sees me looking and relaxes slightly, but I can tell he’s still wound up. I’m nervous again, as I watch his fists, as I try not to panic. “Jase?” I ask quietly. He shakes his head angrily. I look at his face and my heart sinks. His eyes are red and his jaw

grinding soundlessly. He is a tortured man. “Why didn’t you tell me?” he explodes, slamming a hand into the steering wheel. “You should have fucking told me what he did.” I put a hand to my head, letting it rest there a moment as I close my eyes. I’m so tired. So worn out. So worn down with the burden of it all. “I was scared,” I whisper. “Of me?” he demands. He’s yelling, but I don’t shrink away, because I deserve it. I’ve been waiting for this for eleven days, since the moment I realized our baby’s heart had stopped. I welcome his anger. It’s more fitting

than his love. “Of everything,” I say thickly. “I thought you would leave me.” He growls in the back of his throat, slamming his hand against the steering wheel over and over again. I start crying again, watching his anguish finally unleash. “I would never leave you!” he roars. He stops hitting the wheel and squeezes it again. “Don’t you get it? You’re like a miracle! You survived death. I thought you were dead for six fucking years! Do you have any idea what that does to a person? Do you think anything you could ever do would stop me from loving you?” My mouth is open slightly, in shock.

I’m crying and I’m pretty sure under the manly bravado he’s crying, too. We are a mess. “What will it take, Julz? For you to believe me?” I blink tears out of my eyes. “It’s just – I saw the way my father hated my mother. How he wanted to take me away from her. And now I’m just like her. I’m just like her. Why are you still here with me?” “Juliette,” Jase says, reaching over and taking my hand, squeezing it tightly in his own. “You are good. You are a beautiful person and I love you. You are not your mother.” I lose it. I dissolve into a pile of

tears, refusing to let go of his hand as we continue to drive. You are not your mother. I think that’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me. *** It’s afternoon by the time we finally make it home. I’m walking into the kitchen when I hear the sound, the vibration of a cellphone against a hard surface. Fuck. Elliot! I rush to the dining table in time to see the phone has just stopped ringing, its screen still lit up in reminder. Seventeen missed calls. What the hell? Jase stands on the other side of the table and tilts his head to read the screen, raising his eyebrows at me.

It’s my burner phone. Disposable, purchased by Elliot, given to me the day he left just in case. And now it is ringing again, call number eighteen as it rests on the table between Jase and me. I pick up the phone and hit answer, holding the phone to my ear as my eyes remain locked with Jase’s. Static erupts from the other end, but no talking. “Elliot?” I say after a beat. The voice on the other end makes me wither and die inside. “Hello, Juliette,” Dornan says cheerfully. “How i s my baby girl?” Jase knows who it is by the look on his face. He watches as terrified tears

form in my eyes, terror that is punctuated with hate. He’s the reason our baby died. He’s the reason we continue to suffer. He’s the one to blame for everything. Jase motions for me to give him the phone and I do, thankful to be relieved of the responsibility. Even the sound of his voice is too much for me to bear. “How’d you get this number, old man?” he asks, his knuckles white as he holds the cell phone in a death grip. Dornan says something unintelligible over the line and Jase pales. “I don’t believe you,” he says. “You’re full of shit.” There’s a high-pitched noise on the other end of the phone. Jase looks like

he’s about to have a heart attack and die on the floor in front of me. More deep crackling on the other end. Dornan. I don’t hear what he says, but I don’t need to. A moment later, the crackling at Jase’s ear stops, and he stares at the screen, more worried than I think I’ve ever seen him. He roars, hurling the phone against the wall. He’s got Elliot. He’s got Elliot . He must. “He’s got him, hasn’t he?” I ask, horrified. “He’s got Elliot.” “No.” He swallows, and the next words to come out of his mouth make me wail. “He’s got Amy and Kayla,” Jase

says thickly, his hands shaking. No! He’s got Elliot’s little daughter and her mother. No. This.Cannot.Be.Happening. My hand is at my mouth, stifling a scream. I let it fall, feeling utterly hopeless. He has Elliot’s daughter. She’s not even three years old yet, and she’s in the grip of a monster. This is my fault. This is my fault, dammit! I lower myself into a chair, my insides filling up with dread. “What does he want?” I ask. Because with Dornan Ross, there’s always a reason behind everything he does. “Is it the money?” He can have the money. He can have every last cent. He can have anything if he just lets those

poor girls go. Amy’s my age, and Kayla is three. She’s fucking three, and Dornan has snatched her up with her mother in a bid to get to us. And it’s worked. Jase looks down at the table, lacing his hands behind his head, every muscle in his arms poised for a smack down with a person he cannot reach. “He wants us,” he says flatly. “He wants to do a trade. He’ll let them go if we give ourselves to him.” His eyes flash with rage. “He said he wants his baby back,” he seethes, fixing his eyes on my midsection. My hands go to my empty stomach as my eyes settle upon the box of ashes that

sit on the table. She was never his baby. The sick bastard will never get his hands on my precious baby. And now, because of him, neither will I.

I hear what sounds like a metallic click, and feel my eyes go wide. Jase whips his head to look at the front door, and before I can even draw a breath, that door is bursting open, wrenched from its hinges. I stand so fast my chair crashes to the ground, my jaw still open. What the hell? And then, before I know what’s going on, there’s a fucking gun in my face and an endless stream of what looks like identical cops, filing through the

front door, their weapons aimed at us. The room was always small, but now, teeming with trigger-happy dudes all dressed in variants of the same navy blue shirts and jeans, it’s tiny. I look at Jase across the table as he’s hoisted to his feet by two burly dudes. As one of them turns, I see CIA written in bright yellow block letters on the back of his dark blue polo shirt. I try to back up but there’s really nowhere to go. I struggle as hands clamp around my arms, yanking them behind my back. The cuffs are around my wrists before I can utter a single fucking word. “Juliette Portland,” a voice says at my right, and I turn to see the sea of CIA officers part to reveal a woman clad in

the same attire: black cargo pants, a dark blue T-shirt. Her blue eyes pin me to the spot with their ferocious expression. Yes. She is definitely in charge here. “You’ve been busy, boys and girls,” she says, making her way to me. “Kicking ass and toppling empires? Really? You thought we wouldn’t find you?” I snort. “I don’t even know who the fuck you are, lady.” She smiles; her thin lips make the expression, but it comes off as more of a grimace. “I’m reality catching up with you, Miss Portland.” “What the fuck is going on?” Jase

demands, still struggling with the four guys who have a grip on him. They can’t get the cuffs on him, and I suppress a snicker when I see his elbow catch one of the dudes square in the face. The bitch in front of me throws a look of derision at Jase before turning back to me. “Juliette Portland. You are under arrest for the murders of Chad Ross, Maximilian Ross, Anthony Ross, Michael Ross and Jared Ross.” As she continues to Mirandize me the room starts to spin. This can’t be real. It’s got to be a fucking joke. “…to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used in a court of

law.” “This is bullshit,” Jase yells, but I’m frozen. Holy fuck. After everything that’s happened, is this the way it all ends? With us rotting in matching prison cells? The bitch continues, “You have the right to consult an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you.” Jase roars, some superhuman strength apparently overtaking him, suddenly free and throwing punches. He doesn’t seem to care that there are at least a dozen high-powered assault rifles leveled at the both of us, or that we are grossly outnumbered. The bitch doesn’t stop talking,

though. She just raises her voice over the muffled groans as Jase is tackled to the ground with the help of a Taser. “Knowing and understanding your rights as I have explained them to you,” she finishes with a smirk, “are you willing to answer my questions without an attorney present?” “Go fuck yourself,” I spit. She laughs. “Thought so.” “Wait,” I protest. “What’s he under arrest for?” I nod my head towards Jase. The woman laughs. “Collateral damage.” “Whaa—” I begin, for once genuinely lost for words. “You can’t do that! It’s—it’s against the law.” She shrugs, her eyes narrowing

dangerously. She flicks a glance toward the officer sporting a bloody nose thanks to Jase’s well-timed elbow to the face. “Fine. Jason Ross, you’re under arrest for assaulting a police officer.” It’s a complete fucking farce. “You’re arresting the wrong people,” I scream, struggling now. She’s completely unfazed by me. “Let’s go,” she says to her team, and we begin to move with a pace that suggests someone is waiting for us. Oh, god. Why are they arresting us? Who told them we were here? “You’re probably not even a real fucking CIA agent,” I spit. “Who are you?”

As they drag us outside and shove us both into separate black Escalade’s with tinting so dark it’s almost as black as the paint, I am screaming inside. Because if they charge me with those murders and they stick? I am never going to see the light of day again. I’m stuffed into Boss Bitch’s car, a token meathead cop in the back seat with me. Not that I even need guarding. I’m cuffed and trapped. Fucking fabulous. But as Boss Bitch slides into the front passenger seat and fastens her safety belt, her shirtsleeve hitches up to reveal something. A small tattoo, two words that make my heart pound

painfully fast. Il Sangue. “You’re working for the fucking Cartel?” I scream. She turns and flashes me a dazzling smile, all white teeth and full cheeks, and my heart sinks. “Of course not,” she says, all shiny teeth and fuck you grin. “We’re the Central Intelligence Agency, darling. They work for us.” ***

A Final Note from the Author Stillbirth is a tragic and all too common occurance. While I have not experienced the loss of a child myself, I have witnessed the devastation that comes from the birth of a baby who does not make it. In recognition of this devastating and often unexplainable occurance, and especially given the events that occur in Two Roads, I was moved to take action in some way. I have donated a camera kit and an

inkless print kit to an organisation called Heartfelt, in the hope that some families may be comforted in some small way with the photographs and footprints of their precious baby who has passed away. Heartfelt is a volunteer organisation of professional photographers from all over Australia dedicated to giving the gift of photographic memories to families that have experienced stillbirths, premature births, or have children with serious and terminal illnesses. Many NICUs, maternity wards and social work departments have cameras that aren't great, and often due to

urgency or location, these cameras provide the only images a family have of their child. The heartfelt camera kit program provides a hospital with a quality compact camera, small printer and an inservice presentation/workshop from a Heartfelt member for the hospital staff about how to take better photos for families. You can read more about Heartfelt’s camera project here.

the seventh, and final book in the Gypsy Brothers series, will be released in November, 2014. To be notified as soon as it’s available, sign up here.

Lili, together with fellow dark romance author Callie Hart, is hosting an intimate book signing and masquerade ball in New York City in November 2014. Tickets are only $40 and there are plenty of opportunities to chat to Lili and Callie as well as get books signed and be entertained by live music!

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Lili writes dark romance. Her debut serial novel, Seven Sons, was released in early 2014, with the following books in the series coming out in quick succession. Lili quit corporate life to focus on writing and is loving every minute of it. Her other loves in life include her gorgeous husband, beautiful daughter, watching Tarantino movies and drinking good wine. She loves to read almost as much as she loves to write. If you want to get an automatic email

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