Heart Thief - Ker Dukey Page 0,41

sorry,” Mona implores.

“It’s not your fault,” I assure her.

“Cash…” she murmurs, reaching for him. He embraces her, squeezing her to him like she’s a lifeline and he’s drowning.

Eli squirms in the sand like a crushed worm.

“Fucker,” I growl. I lurch forward to go back to him, but Mona stops me, grabbing my arm.

“No.” She shakes her head, then hobbles over toward large rocks scattered on the sand. Picking up one almost the size of her head, she shuffles over to Eli. His breathing is labored as he coughs blood. “Your heart belongs with me,” he sputters.

“You belong in hell. You never had a heart, that’s why you stole hers,” she sneers, and with all her might, she smashes the rock down, an angry, broken roar tearing from her lips as she lifts it, again and again, hammering it down until her arms give out. Crimson splatters up her face and into her hair as the impact split his skull open with a gruesome crunch, his face now resembling mulch.

His body convulses, nerves twitching before he stills. Blood seeps into the sand beneath him, the moon our only witness, the tide drawing in to wash away the evidence

We were right. The killer was from this place—and our mother’s son, of all fucking people.

“What now?” I ask, wanting to throw her over my shoulder and run home with her keeping her there forever but she’s not my prisoner she’s no one’s prisoner, now or ever again.

“Now we free everyone else. It’s time to end my father’s reign.” She tells me, strong and confident despite the fact she looks like she’s been hit with a truck.

Twenty-Six

Mona

Closure leaked from within me as I drove the rock into Eli’s skull, his warm blood sticking to my skin almost in reward for finally getting justice for Clara.

All those nights I lay with him, those hands that stole my sister’s life touching me…I’ll never forgive him for what he stole from me. Ending his life was a mercy. I should have locked him in Father’s prison and let him rot.

“That cut looks nasty. We’re going to need to wrap it.” Colt frowns down at my leg, blood still trickling from the open wound.

“My mother is imprisoned in my father’s dungeon. We need to free her and find Claudia.”

“Who’s Claudia?” Colt asks, ripping off his shirt and bending to tie it around my leg.

“She was Clara’s friend.” Cash nods. “She was the one who helped Clara get to and from the island. Lead the way.”

“My father won’t take too kindly to you being here.”

“That’s his problem, not ours.” Colt swoops me up, bridal style. “Let me hold you for a while. You look like you’re about to collapse.”

“Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For loving me,” I whisper. His face clouds with an array of emotions. “This is what love is, right? The kiss of your scent, the strength in your grip, the taste on your lips.” I palm his cheek. “Through the darkness, light is visible here…” I lower my hand to cover my heart. “I feel you living here.”

“I feel you everywhere,” he says, closing his eyes briefly. “I never want to not feel you.”

“You don’t have to. I’m yours,” I breathe. Turning my head, I reach out to clasp Cash’s hand. “I’m both of yours. We belong together.”

As predictable as ever, we find my father in his church planning my cleansing.

His eyes widen in shock when I walk in, my hair hanging in scraggly, wet strands down my shoulders, bruises and cuts painting my face a kaleidoscope of colors. My clothes tattered and torn, a piece of shirt wrapped around my shin, the blood soaking through it.

He rounds his pew, halting when my two soulmates follow me inside, large, bloody, and menacing, like attack wolves ready to tear him into pieces.

“You won’t get away with this.” He clenches his fists. I jerk my head in command, and my wolves attack, tackling my father to the ground with little effort. “Not as easy as beating little girls, is it, Father?” I mock.

As he’s frog marched outside with his hands tied behind his back, like the criminal he is. I’m grateful for the cloak of the night keeping us camouflaged.

When we get back to their boat, they drag him on board and then lift me inside, taking us far enough out for privacy.

“I’m not the enemy, Mona.” My father struggles against the makeshift bindings of robe rope from the church.

“Yes you are.” I snort.

“Why do you treat this as a war?”