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By the time he disappears around the bend, I lose the breakfast in my stomach, my body trembling and covered in a cold sweat.
My men don’t leave my side, but the gloom over my head gets worse.
Chapter
Forty-One
It doesn’t take us long after the cops depart to decide what to do. We’re leaving, and now. They know where we are, and it was a clear threat. They’ll be back and probably with backup. I know it won’t end well. Men like that with guns have been killing people like us for far too long. They also have the power and means to get away with it.
We’re just freaks, after all.
I won’t let my family be hurt, nor will I be dragged back to Roger.
Diamond gave the command, but my plea made him do so. We could stay and fight, but something in me knows that won’t end well. The cards are still hanging over my head, the warning of death . . .
Is this it?
Maybe if we are fast enough, we can escape it.
My hands fist the costume Club gifted me, and I look beyond its bright silks to the cards. I can feel them pulse, still feel their intention.
Death, death, death.
It repeats in my mind like a mantra, and my fear only grows. Closing my eyes, I thrust the silks away and cover my ears. “Please, stop,” I beg the cirque. It doesn’t relent, only grows stronger.
Even if we run, he’ll come after me no matter where I go. I thought he would let me go, but I was wrong. Has he been planning this all along? He’s a doctor. He has money. He can get away with just about anything. There’s no telling what he’ll do as payback for not only me leaving him, but also for what my guys did to him. They embarrassed him, they scarred him, and worst of all, I stood up to him.
The cirque’s presence tightens around me until I gasp. Is it him? Is he the death that’s coming?
It’s a possibility, and the idea that the man who tormented me for a large portion of my life is the reason I might lose my happiness, my new home, fills me with a terror and type of fury I have never felt before. It darkens my soul, calling to the cirque.
I should have killed him. I should have ended it when I had the chance.
I realize now what Hilda meant about kindness being my weakness. I let a man who hurt me, raped me, beat me, and tried to kill me go. I thought it made me better than him, but it only made me a weak fool.
It didn’t make me stronger; it made me stupider. I should have known only death would stop a man like him, and now it might be too late.
Is there a place in this world where we can run to escape this promise lingering in the air?
Worse yet, will they run with me?
I don’t know, and that scares me. We are strong and powerful, but there is something infinitely more dangerous about a man who has nothing else left to lose while I, on the other hand, have everything.
No, I can’t let it end like this.
We’ll go. We’ll escape him and this warning. We have to.
I won’t lose my home again.
He won’t take another thing from me!
Chapter
Forty-Two
We travel for two days, but Ember doesn’t seem any more settled. It worries us. I know all too well the fear she’s experiencing, so we hold her at night in her tent. We offer her the comfort and strength she needs when she’s feeling weak. No matter what she’s thinking right now, he can’t have her, and neither can the police.
She’s ours. She’s our queen, our heart, our everything.
