Total pages in book: 117
Estimated words: 112398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 562(@200wpm)___ 450(@250wpm)___ 375(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 562(@200wpm)___ 450(@250wpm)___ 375(@300wpm)
“Good, because I’m never giving up on you.” He let go of the handle with his left hand and splayed it across my belly, pulling me closer against the rippling strength of his body. “I have too much planned for you, Aria Rialta, for you to start looking like you’re ready to surrender.”
I turned in his hold, and he stopped moving. The two of us just stood in the middle of the cereal aisle, staring at each other. That energy wisped between us, the connection that bound.
“I’m not surrendering,” I promised.
“Good girl.” The words were a brush of air that he exhaled.
I fiddled with the collar of his tee as I gazed up at the ruthless beauty of his face. Heat danced just under the surface of my skin. “Are you trying to seduce me?”
“Is it working?”
“I think it might be,” I said, playing along.
His smile turned to greed. “Think we should get back to the motel and put some of this time to good use.”
He shifted me around so he had his left arm slung over my shoulders, hugging me to his side as he maneuvered the cart to the checkout.
More people were up front than in the rest of the store.
The voices crowding in and growing louder.
Pax could sense it as he grabbed the few things we’d picked up and ran them through the scanner, working quickly and precisely, the way he always did.
His eyes were keen, but today, they were keen on me.
Reading me.
Knowing me.
Getting me.
His voice was hushed as he covertly looked around, as if he were trying to figure out who I might be drawn to. “You have work to do? Not gonna stop you, Aria, but you need to try to conserve your energy if you can.”
My brows drew together in concentration. “I don’t think so. I don’t think anyone is in crisis.”
Those were the ones I couldn’t resist. The ones that compelled me to do something.
“Okay . . . You just say, though.”
“I know,” I told him as I helped place our purchases in a bag.
Two minutes later, we’d paid and were heading out into the day. A heavy chill sagged in the dense air. The clouds were so thick it almost felt as if evening were approaching, though it was the middle of the day.
A shiver rolled through the chill.
Something ominous that coasted down my spine.
I trembled, but tried to ignore the foreboding that swept through me.
Pax pushed the cart out to the car, and he clicked the locks. We piled the few bags into the trunk while I struggled against the sensation.
Against the awareness that pulsed.
“Mommy?” A scared little voice suddenly carried on the wind, and I straightened from where I was bent over the trunk to look out in the direction it had come from.
There was a young boy, wandering by himself at the far end of the parking lot. Up close to the sidewalk.
The street beyond it was busy.
Cars, trucks, and buses whizzed by, their drivers unaware.
Dread grabbed me by the throat, though my mind wavered, uncertainty pulling through me like threads driven by a needle that tugged at my spirit.
“Do you see him?” I wheezed, terrified I was hallucinating the way I’d done the night when I’d been coaxed from the hotel room. When the little girl hadn’t been a little girl at all, but a manifestation of Ambrose.
“Where are you, Mommy?” The child inched closer to the street as his distress increased.
“Fuck . . . Yeah, I see him,” Pax said. He didn’t take the time to shut the trunk. He started sprinting in that direction, calling, “Hey, buddy, why don’t you come away from the road, and we’ll find your mommy?”
The child turned around. His eyes grew wide when he saw Pax running toward him. “No. You’re a stranger.”
“I won’t come near you . . .” Pax stretched out placating hands. “Just . . . come this way so you’re not so close to those cars. How’s that sound?”
I jogged to catch up to them, but Pax was already at the end of the lot when I was only halfway.
Shock hacked through me when arms suddenly wrapped around me from behind. A scream tore up my throat, but a hand clamped over my mouth and stopped any sound from getting out.
Terror locked tight, and I flailed and struggled to get loose, kicking my feet into the air since I’d been ripped off the ground. Shouts bowled up my throat only to hit the barrier that kept them trapped.
A man who had to be twice my size snarled venom into my ear. “You little bitch. Where have you been hiding? He’s been looking for you.”
I gasped and choked against the scent of him. Something vile and offensive.
He dragged me between two cars, quickly and steadily moving across the lot. I could hear the immorality of his thoughts, the heinousness he’d fully given himself over to. “He promised I could have you once he was finished with you.”