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“Helpme,” I whispered, glancing down to the crimson-stained shard of glass still on the floor.The murder weapon.“I was seen in a tense altercation with him. I was seen leaving right after him. And, the murder scene, his body, all of it will have my prints andmyDNA.”
“No one is going to drop his body at a station—or report the crime.” Liam rose to his feet, stalking toward me.
I turned, rolling my shoulders back. This was my stand. I had to make a choice here. I wouldn’t be a victim of my circumstances anymore. I wouldn’t be the scared, hungry little kid who stole from the wrong man. I let Samuel dictate my entire life that day, and I wouldn’t let the Widows—or him—do so any longer. I had lost too many people, and seen too many innocents slaughtered.
“Iwill.” Anger boiled in my veins. Carson would help any woman who asked. I had seen the soft side of Logan growing up, and Liam wasn’t all bitter and violence. They were multifaceted and downright fucking stubborn. “I will drop it off at that station. I’ll report it.”
“There are only a few more payments we need to make, and then we’re out,” Liam reminded. “We will beout.”
I pressed my lips together slowly, feeling the smooth flesh roll inward, before meeting his intense stare. I wasn’t going to let someone else suffer because of my inaction. I refused to be that little trapped kid again, waiting for someone else to stand up. This time, it would be different. We would all be different.
“We won’t be, and you know it. The moment we are paid up is the moment things go back to what they were before Laila’scrash. We will be paid up for the product she lost, but Samuel still owns us.”
I took another hard step forward, drilling my eyes into Liam. He was the one Laila swiped the keys from that night. He was the one stupid enough to leave an ungodly amount of product in the car while he went to the club. He was the reason for all of this.
My anger burned as I let it flow through me, channeling it into courage. “We help her. All of us,” I ordered.
Liam locked eyes with me, his pupils dilated as his gaze intensified. The air around us felt heavy and tense, charged with an electric energy. The faint sound of our breathing filled the silence, shallow and quick. Despite the tension, there was a glimmer of respect in Liam’s eyes, a small flicker that gave me a sense of relief.
“If we get caught…this time, it won’t be a payment plan. Samuel will demand blood as blood was spilled,” Liam said. “The girl will become beholden to my father.”
I nodded slowly. “We won’t get caught.”
“Fine, but you suck at hiding bodies.” He shrugged his shoulders and grabbed the keys to Carson’s car. “Let’s go, Logan. You have bodies to hide, and I have some cleaning up to do.”
Logan stared at me for a brief moment. His lips tugged into a thin line before he took off after Liam. The sound of their footsteps was heavy down the steps, each thud banging in my chest.
Carson licked her lips before stepping closer to me. Her eyebrows drew together, and pity rounded off her shoulders. “Laila isn’t the only one we’ve lost, but all anyone ever talks about is her, and that’s not fair. To you, or to any one of us.” She stepped closer to me, her voice lowered to a hushed whisper, “You know, Audry isn’t Angel?—”
“Don’t say it,” I said, my hands clenching into tight fists.
“Kai.”
“I saidno,” I yelled.
Carson flinched away.
“I don’t talk about the reasons you help women escape, and you don’t get to talk about mine.”
Carson’s gaze hardened, the pity and sympathy disappearing. “You weren’t the only one affected by it, you know.” She parted her lips with a soft pop, the sound reverberating in the stillness between us. The scent of her perfume wafted over, a sweet addition to the air. Her gaze met mine, and a cold shiver ran down my spine. The way she could effortlessly bring me to my knees without even punching me was a power that no one should possess. This girl weaseled her way under my skin and stayed there since I met her. Another annoying little sister I didn’t ask for, but refused to let go of.
“I’m sorry.” I crumbled before her.
“It’s fine. Don’t ask, don’t say. Business as usual around here,” Carson muttered through gritted teeth. She turned on her heels, the sound of her boots echoing against the hardwood floor as she slammed the door to her room. The sudden noise made the framed photos rattled on the wall, their edges clinking against the glass.
The room fell silent once more, the only noise being the soft hum of the air conditioning and the distant chirping of birds outside.
Laila wasn’t the first one we’d lost, and she wouldn’t be the last one. But I was going to do everything in my power so the innocent weren’t the one’s paying our tolls into hell.
Chapter 9
Audry
The darkness was suffocating, enveloping me like a thick, heavy blanket. I strained my eyes, searching for any hint of light, but there was nothing. The silence was deafening, broken only by the sound of my own labored breathing.
I expected to see his eyes, hard and unforgiving, staring back at me through the darkness. Or maybe I thought I would relive that night—the fear and pain replaying in my nightmares. But as I laid in the spare bed Carson had offered, my heart pounding in my chest, I realized I couldn’t remember.
The memory was shrouded in darkness, a black void that swallowed everything in its path.
