Twisted - Esme Devlin Page 0,107

that, I wonder?”

“Damn, you’re pretty good at this,” he says. “So it’s sorted then. The show is tomorrow so we’ll need to be ready. I was thinking you could send me ahead, and maybe I could convince Hum, then maybe we can—”

“Ah, ah,” I cut him off with a finger. “I didn’t say I was going.”

When I go, nobody will know about it. Least of all him.

“But you need to go! Once she has the baby, she’ll be sold off to some—”

“What?”

His mouth shuts quickly, and he stares at me with wide eyes.

“What did you say?”

“Oh. Yeah. She’s pregnant. That’s why Maxim’s so pissed.”

I spin around, giving him my back.

How?

She showed me she bled the very night before she left…

Hmm.

I click my tongue a few times. Clever little girl. I really must stop underestimating her.

“Boss?”

I turn back around to find him staring at me as if I’ve lost my marbles and realize I was speaking my thoughts aloud. “Very well. Maybe we shall fetch her. But we will do this my way. You must do everything I say, and you must do it well.”

Scout grins at me like the cat who got the cream. “Whatever you say, Boss.”

36

Sapphire

The small mat on which I sleep shifts with the weight of the person who sits down at the end of it.

I don’t bother looking up.

Whoever it is, I already know what they’re going to say.

Maxim told me. And no amount of begging or pleading from me changed his mind.

Men and their revenge.

“Sapphire?”

It’s Denim.

I don’t feel like going with him. I don’t feel like doing anything other than closing my eyes and falling asleep for a long time.

Besides, my name isn’t Sapphire anymore. Maxim told me that. Now, my name is Pyrite. Fool’s gold. It’s actually rather poetic, if you think about it.

Eight fools in an arena behaving like fools in order to win fool’s gold.

“It’s time,” he says. His voice breaks on the second word.

Does he even care, though?

“I just want you to know… I need you to know that I tried, okay? I sent Scout to see him…”

I haul myself up and turn around to face him. The single candle gives off barely any light, but I can see enough to wonder if he’s aged ten years in the time I’ve been away. He looks hollowed out.

“Scout saw him?” My heart rate picks up and my insides contract as I choke the words out.

Denim nods, but it looks nothing other than solemn. “I’m so sorry.”

I shake my head. “What? What did he say?”

“Only that he wouldn’t be manipulated.”

That sounds like something he would say, but at the same time it doesn’t. “He told him about the baby? His baby?”

He nods again. “Something about making your bed and lying in it.”

I let out a hollow laugh and close my eyes. I’d perhaps take that option, if that option merely involved lying in a bed. My hands shake as I attempt to bring them to my cheeks. Or maybe I want to run them through my hair. I don’t know. The room feels too small.

I think I need to throw up.

Pushing the threadbare blankets off me, I shift on the bed, making for the corner, but Denim grabs me before I can make it.

I can’t tell if he’s restraining me or comforting me.

His hand comes to my hair, and I decide not to fight him. I don’t have the strength anymore. But a shushing sound comes from his lips, and I’m glad I didn’t fight him when something snaps deep inside me.

I wasn’t even aware there was anything left to snap, but I feel it like a tidal wave.

My knees buckle as a sob shakes its way to the surface.

“Come now,” he says, in a low, hushed whisper. “We need to go. You need to stay strong for me, Sapphire.”

I shake my head. Can’t do it. I can’t do that anymore.

When my legs don’t move, he plucks me up off the ground and carries me in his arms. I hear his footsteps like they’re happening somewhere else, somewhere far away, and occasionally he sniffs back something as he leads me through the dark tunnels.

Nobody’s coming to save me this time.

He’s not coming to save me this time.

That hits me harder than the thought of what is about to happen.

A laugh escapes from me as I swipe my hand below my eye, catching the moisture there. I used to think Baron treated me like a possession, and I hated that. I hated being a