AllFreeNovel
Share Us
CLARA
I woke with a start, less than an hour after I’d fallen asleep. Candice was fast asleep with just a bit of blonde hair showing under the pink comforter. I lay still for a second before picking up the faint sound of conversation in the kitchen.
Slipping down the hall, I peered around the corner.
My stomach roiled.
Caden stood in the back door, smoking. He was bare chested and flecked with blood, a crimson handprint on his neck. Yale was at the table, his body blocking my view, but I knew Merrick sat on the other side.
I stepped into the kitchen, forgetting I wore only a cami and a pair of panties. Caden glanced over and averted his eyes quickly.
“Merrick,” I whispered.
Yale turned sharply, revealing Merrick sitting at the counter with his palms flat. His hair was tousled, falling over his forehead. He was soaked with blood, staining up past his elbows, flecking over his throat and jaw. I took a step closer and my eyes fell, my head spinning.
His knuckles were split open, leaking blood onto the counter. His right hand was halfway sewn up, the black stitches stark against his skin.
The back door slammed. Caden was gone, clearly not interested in sticking around. Yale took another step back and set the needle and thread down.
“You may go,” Merrick said softly. “Wait in the living room.”
Yale walked past me without a word.
Silence fell. Merrick’s eyes met mine and the look in them cut me to the core of my being.
This wasn’t my Merrick who had taken me to bed and been so gentle with me when he’d slid down between my thighs. It wasn’t the same man who kissed me softly and told me he adored me.
This was the man who had fought in the arena and I didn’t know him.
He was frozen, blood leaking down his hands and pooling on the table. I stared at his knuckles as it sunk in what he’d done.
It was thirteen now, thirteen men dead by his bare hands.
“I—are you hurt?” I whispered, backing up.
“Clara,” he said. “Go back to bed.”
My heart broke when he said that. His voice was cold and it sat low in his chest. Like he didn’t know me at all.
Heart aching, I turned and fled into the hall and locked my bedroom door. There was only one thought left in my head.
What happens now?
My heart wasn’t just aching, it was tight and getting tighter. I could barely breathe and my heart was beating at an odd, hysterical rhythm. My lips tingled and I couldn’t feel my legs.
Panic set in. I needed out. I needed space to think. To recover.
I squeezed my eyes shut and into my mind swam the image of the pine forest in New Hampshire. Spread out below the window, silent beneath the starlit sky. Witness to the first time I’d loved him.
They went upstairs. I heard their footfalls and then his office door shut. I shoved some clothes and my phone in my bag and crept through the house and out to the attached garage.
The door slid up soundlessly, revealing a hot, muggy night. My hands shook as I stowed my bag in the back and slipped into the front seat.
Merrick tracked my car, I knew that. But where was it?
I slid my hands beneath the wheel and by some stroke of luck, I felt it. A little disk with a blinking red light. It came away easily and I threw it into the back of the garage.
Then I put my car in reverse and drove out into the night. Knowing he would be alerted when I opened the gate.
