Total pages in book: 166
Estimated words: 160042 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 800(@200wpm)___ 640(@250wpm)___ 533(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 160042 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 800(@200wpm)___ 640(@250wpm)___ 533(@300wpm)
“You promised you wouldn’t lie,” I blurt out after a while.
His eyes shoot up and I realize he was studying my features too. Specifically, my mouth, the jut of my chin. The pounding pulse at the base of my neck. Because all these places tingle and burn.
“What?”
“I know you want revenge on the Turners and taking their land is the perfect plan. But I know you don’t care about it,” I say. “You don’t care about the oil, the money. That’s not your end goal.”
Something flashes across his face, something like a mix of surprise and… satisfaction—for what reason, I don’t know—before he says, “You know me so well, huh?”
I look in his eyes, my heart racing. “Yes. I know you. You can fool Peyton but you can’t fool me. So tell me what you’re going to do with it.”
At this, his features close down. “You don’t need to worry about it.”
I twist my hands in his grip. “You’re planning something, aren’t you?”
“Again, not your fucking concern.”
“You said you’d let them keep their business,” I say urgently.
“And I will.”
“But—”
He tightens his grip on my wrists, his fingers finally digging into my bones, mashing my pulse. “Let it the fuck go, all right? It’s not your business. In three weeks, all of this will be behind you. All this bullshit. This war, this revenge, every single thing that I did to you. I ruined your life, didn’t I? Well, in three weeks’ time, you’ll have it back. All of this will be a memory to you. You’ll do what you always wanted to do. Help people. Change lives.” His jaw clenches here for a second before he says, “Fall in fuckin’ love. So why don’t you worry about your future more than what my endgame is?”
Right. In three weeks, when he’s done taking the Turners’ land away and doing whatever the fuck he wants with it, I can have my life back. It will be like none of this ever happened. And I should want that. I do want that. That’s all I’ve wanted since he took me.
“What about till death do us part?” I say ridiculously, knowing he never meant it.
At my words, his fingers tighten around my wrists even more. “What about it?”
“You said that,” I remind him like he’s forgotten. “You said you won’t let me go. You made me promise that I won’t run from you.”
He was already smashing my pulse with his thumb, but now he’s absolutely crushing it, slowing it down as he says, “Yeah, that was before I figured out you’re the wrong girl.”
It’s like he smacked me, kicked me in the gut.
The wrong girl. The girl who’s expendable. I am that. I know it. I’ve always known it. I don’t know why it’s hitting me so hard, him saying that. Why it hurts so much that I want to double over.
“Jesus, look”—he lets me go completely and scrubs a hand down his face—“clue the fuck in, all right? I said that to scare you. To make it look like there was no escape. To make you feel powerless. And honest to fuckin’ God, I liked it. I liked scarin’ you. I liked knowing I have power over you. And for a second, I liked the idea of never letting you go. Of keepin’ you once all of this was over. For myself, for my amusement. Even though, God knows, I don’t deserve it. I don’t fuckin’ deserve any peace in my shitty life after what I did eight years ago. But I’m a selfish piece of shit who wanted it anyway. All that disappeared though when I found out I fucked up. And I’ll be the big man here and admit that I fucked up big. I never should’ve dragged you into this. You’re not a Turner. You understand how fucking lucky you are? You’ve got no business being here. You’re not fuckin’ tangled up in decades of bloody history. You’re clean. You’re free. So that’s what I’m doin’. I’m setting you free.”
“But I’m not free!” I practically scream.
That’s the problem, isn’t it? That’s the entire problem. That I’m not free or clean. It doesn’t matter that I’m not a Turner. Because I still have a history.
I have a history with him.
A history of blood and lies. Of a cabin in the woods and meals around a fire. Of him scaring me and thrilling me and making me feel fucking alive for the first time in my life. We have a history filled with thirty-seven letters and sleepless nights. So no, I’m not free or clean.
I’m branded.
He branded me, and I can’t go back to my old life now.
I don’t want to go back to it. And Jesus Christ, this has to be the most insane thing that anyone has ever done. This has to be the worst case of Stockholm syndrome, and it’s all his fault, and I just…