Silver Lining (Diamond #3) - Skye Warren Page 0,32

Before that, I fucked her, hard and relentless, and she loved it. She was as pink and breathless as a doll when it was over. I focus on the feeling of my fingers between her legs. “It was an international crime. I raped her in several countries and forced her to cross the borders against her will. I forced her to do everything.”

I want to lose myself in thinking of her. It’s too early for that. Saying a confession out loud is only the beginning of the act.

I clear my throat and it brings up fresh blood. Not the most positive sign, but I should have enough time left to do what I have to do to save her. “Write it up.”

Blue Shirt narrows his eyes and glances over to his buddies. He looks like he wants to beat more confessions out of me. A goddamn hammer instead of a scalpel, this guy.

The government is getting sloppy, but it doesn’t really matter. Not when you have billions of dollars in a defense budget and enough nukes to destroy the world ten times over.

Even sloppy wins.

“Write it up and I’ll sign it.” I taste more blood along with the words. It tastes like the truth. I’d sign anything if it means Holly lives. I’d sign anything to let her go free.

14

Holly

The water has been running in the sink for so long that I’ve lost track of the time.

My kitchen sink. Running.

The sound snaps me out of whatever reverie I’ve been in. At some point, I came over here to do something involving the sink. I turned on the water. Something caught my attention out the narrow kitchen window. It has a partial view of the alley next to the building, and a partial view of the street.

I don’t know what I was looking at anymore.

Was it a white van that I saw or a postal truck? I have a hazy memory of both things. But, given the evidence of the sink, I’m not sure my memory is reliable at all.

I reach to turn off the water and find a mug in my hand. Right. That’s why I came here. To pour out tea gone cold and clean the mug and put it in the rack to dry. My plan was thwarted by my still-constant search for Elijah.

He’s gone.

There’s no trace of him in my life. It’s as if he never existed. As if I never hopped on a plane to France to find my sister. As if I never found him in the basement prison of a medieval church. All of it, erased.

Even the marks on my ass that perfectly matched his fingerprints have faded into nothing. I was sure they were there. I looked at them every day in the shower until they were gone.

I put coffee in the machine by the sink and set it to run. Now I’m the robot. I’m the one going through the ordinary movements of an ordinary life. It makes my skin crawl.

Everything about this life is fake, a facade, a charade. Or worse, everything that happened before was a hazard of imagination.

The part about being imprisoned by the government seems real enough. It ended with a knock on the door of the concrete room. The man who had been interrogating me walked out without a backward glance. Another man came in to unchain me from the table. He walked me to the back of the building, where a police car waited, and a cop who didn’t speak to me drove me back to my apartment.

No sorry about the part where we invaded a church and stole Elijah North from you. No apologies for chaining you to a table. It’s protocol. You understand.

Nothing.

Nothing except the days I spent afterward, sobbing into my pillow and shouting into my phone. I was probably on a watch list before but I’m definitely on one now. I’m the crazed woman who sometimes puts on a serious voice as she inquires again and again if there is any way to contact Elijah North. If there are any personnel records for Elijah North. If there is any possible clue that he once existed. I’ve tried everything. I’ve tried lying. I’ve tried impersonating a reporter. I’ve tried letting my voice go thick and pretending to be his widow.

I tried for days, then weeks, then months.

The coffee brews and I stare out the window, actively searching for a white van now. Even if he did show up here, he wouldn’t show up