Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 78598 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 393(@200wpm)___ 314(@250wpm)___ 262(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78598 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 393(@200wpm)___ 314(@250wpm)___ 262(@300wpm)
Again, I couldn’t object. Ivy found out the truth and immediately jumped off a bridge. Doc Nash wasn’t spinning bullshit.
“Cavendish backed off after that and I didn’t receive another letter, so I assumed— I hoped,” he corrected, “that it was over.”
“Still don’t understand why Cavendish backed off,” Roan said.
Ivy pushed up, moving to the window. “My guess is after Jack made it clear that fake will would never see the light of day, he gave up any idea of controlling my inheritance through me. That’s why it didn’t matter if I went down for Cairo’s murder. Or why he didn’t care if I knew he ordered Rainey’s death. He was done with the de Souza sisters, and onto something else.”
“Suicide?” Arsenio scoffed. “The afterlife? That was his grand plan?”
“We’ll never know,” I said, steering the full truth of Cavendish’s death away from my father’s ears. “But he gave up on that plan, and now his devoted lunatics have one of their own. We know it starts with the Ellises, not Ivy.”
“And there it is,” Ivy said. “That’s how we got here.”
“I’m sorry we did, Ivy. You’ll never know how sorry.” Tears collected in the corner of Jack’s eyes. “I thought I was protecting you from the Sisters who couldn’t know the deed survived, and that monster Cavendish who knew it did. I hated that your grandmother’s killer lived free all that time but all I had was a lack of evidence and a threat hanging over my head that his friends would carry on in his place if anything happened to him.”
He wasn’t lying. Cavendish does keep his word.
“I got it all w-wrong,” he cried, voice cracking. “I made life so much worse for you.”
“You didn’t, Jack. It wasn’t you. Amazingly, the man I hated most of all was the only one who tried to help me. No, the people who ruined my life are Scott Cavendish, Steven Ellis, the Black Letter Crew, Eileen Stone—”
Jacques snapped his head up.
“—Marjorie Creed, Cynthia St. James, Josephine Banks, and Nora Keller.” A suffocating, pressing silence blanketed us as Ivy turned... and smiled. “It’s them who’ll pay.”
I was too numb to stop her walking past me. Arsenio recovered quicker. Sliding into her path, he blocked the door and grasped her chin. Tipping her up, he placed a slow, thorough kiss on her lips. Ivy responded easily.
“Where exactly are you going?” Arsenio murmured, tracing her lips. Only someone who knew them both would sense the growing air of danger.
She smiled sweet. “To get the deed, of course. Where else would I be going, baby?”
Roan half rose. “You know where it is?”
“Jack told me before you got here. I won’t be long.” Ivy made to go around him. Arsenio sidestepped in her way.
“We’ll go with you.”
“That’s very sweet.” That smile didn’t fade. “But the five of you are currently on the run from the police, who happen to be on their way here right now.”
I shot to the window. Two police cars came straight at the bungalow, their sirens lighting the way.
“Sheriff Jack will be easy to explain, but not the two hostages. You guys have to get them and yourselves out of here. Quick. Text me where you are and we’ll meet up there.
“I love you guys. Stay safe.”
Ivy tried again to leave and was promptly tossed over his shoulder. “Let’s move,” Arsenio barked. “Roan and Legend, grab Quinn. Cairo and Jacques, get Davidson. We’re parked out back.” Arsenio bolted carrying a suspiciously docile Ivy.
“Dad, tell them what Davidson did to you. He’s corrupt and our arrest was an abuse of power. Make them believe it. We don’t have time for this on-the-run shit.”
“I’ll take care of it, son.” Dad never looked weaker or less able to take care of anything. “I’ll make it right.”
There wasn’t time for more. I hauled ass down the stairs where Jacques hefted Davidson. Taking his other side, we dragged him out the back to the waiting car, and Ivy.
She sat in the passenger seat, looking wholly content as Arsenio leaned on her car door and prevented any chance of escape. Locking eyes with me through the windshield, she winked.
Chapter Eight
Roan
Ivy burrowed into Legend’s side, the picture of content with her head on his shoulder and fingers running up and down his chest. His tight arm around her looked less like a lover’s embrace, and more like a precaution to keep her from jumping out of the car at the next red light. If that’s what she was thinking, her face gave no sign. I couldn’t tell what was going on in her head.
“Are you going to kill our mothers?”
The car jolted forward, rocked by Jacques’s sudden jolt to the gas. We got away with two hostages in the trunk, but only barely. Right then, we were circling the back roads while we figured out where to lay low until our names were cleared. A heavy silence choked the car the entire time.