Chapter Twenty-Two
Maren
“ B ut I don’t have anything!”
As soon as I say it, I feel stupid. Like it matters. John just smirks, flicks the folder open with a fat finger.
“You already have all my money,” I remind him. “All the...accounts. Whatever there was. You got that. There’s nothing more to get from—from killing me.”
I hate that I’m begging him for my life. Hate it.
But I don’t want to die.
I don’t want to die in this sad, cramped, mildew-stink room.
I don’t want to die young.
And I don’t want to die without the four of them.
I’m afraid, and I have no reason to deny it.
I know these two would see it through, too. Maybe not them specifically dirtying their hands, I’m sure, but I know the sheriff and my piece of shit fraudulent lying motherfucker of a guardian and I know they are not going to lose sleep over my body in a ditch.
Hell, they might sleep better.
“I’m afraid you’re mistaken.” John tucks the front flap behind the stack of papers, revealing the neat printout, produces a pen from his jacket pocket. “There’s always odds and ends. Best have my t’s crossed and i’s dotted. And you wouldn’t name anyone else sole beneficiary of any future receipts, would you? A dead great-aunt. A life insurance policy. A refund on a parking ticket.”
He narrows his piggy eyes at me and lumbers to my side, takes my chin in his damp hand. I resist, straining and craning my neck as far as it’ll go, just to not let him touch me, but it’s pointless.
He can, he will. He wants me to know that.
“And a pretty face like this, well.” He looks back at the sheriff. Shares a little chuckle. “Tragic story. Nice girl, wrongfully killed. They’ll have you on every news special in the country. Documentaries. Those what-do-you-call-ems—”
“Podcasts,” supplies the sheriff.
“Yeah. The whole nine.”
“TV movie.” Wheatley rubs his chin. “I wanna be played by Dennis Quaid.”
“Denny better pack on a few ell-bees, then, playin’ your wide ass.”
Guffaws, making me sick to my stomach. My eyes flutter shut. They are joking as they’re about to kill me.
“Anyway. You just gotta sign.”
My eyes fly open. “Are you fucking crazy?”
John hauls off and backhands me. I see stars. It smarts.
“Don’t you backtalk me now!” he roars. Breathing hard, he draws back. Composes himself. Ever the southern gentleman. Even as I can feel blood trickling out of one nostril.
He smooths his hair. “I don’t like that it’s come to this either. But I’m afraid you’ve really give me no choice, girl.”
“I’m. Not. Signing.” I repeat. The blood from my nose crawls to my lips, wet and sticky, and I suck it into my mouth. Spit at his feet.
“You little—”
But he checks himself this time. I glare at him.
“What difference does it make, anyway? Just forge my signature if you’re going to murder me.”
John winces at the m-word. Well, good. I’m shaking, talking to him like this, but I have nothing to lose.
And secretly, deep deep down, I’m hoping. Praying.
That a wolf will crash through that tiny blacked-out window.
A dragon will melt down that door.
A bear will maul their sorry faces off.
And a fox will tear these things off my wrists.
Hands. I’d have to have my hands free to sign. Maybe—
It’s stupid to do it, even so. Bad to worse, probably. But I have no other ideas.
“You think we’re not going to put this through every official channel?” Now the sheriff smirks. “Notarized. Clean and proper. Drag us onto the stand and we will not even have to lie—that girl signed that will.”
It smells like bullshit to me. But I see the gleam in John’s eye, and I suddenly get it—maybe.
He wants control of me. To the very end.
Sex. Money. Power.
Getting rich off a pretty little dead girl kinda wraps all three into one.
My skin itches under the binding.
“Sign,” John says, thrusts the pen at me again.
“I’m tied up,” I say flatly. “Remember?”
John swivels from me to Wheatley, glaring, and Wheatley bumbles forward, flicking out a blade and slicing away the bonds—just my wrists, not the ones fixing me to the chair by my waist. I flex my arms, the raw skin on my wrist stinging.
Take the pen.
I sign, slowly. My full name in a shaky hand: Maren de Mornay.
Too quickly, I’m done. I try to think, try to move—your hands are free, do something, Maren—and then I do.
Hand to my face, smear the streaming blood off my upper lip, wipe my wet fingers across the bright white front page of the stack.
Clean and proper my ass. Good luck making that look official in court.
John’s mouth opens. The sheriff blinks.
That’s all I need.
I lurch up, awkward, stumbling, the chair still tied to my back like a turtle shell, and spin, hard. The back leg catches knees, the sheriff, sends him sprawling sideways into John.
His knife clatters down.
Mine.
I drop to a crawl hard enough to fracture a kneecap and scramble, scramble , close my fingers around it so hard the keen edge slices into the pad of my thumb. No time—I fold to the left and shove it downward, blade pushing rope, giving way, loosening enough that I can jump to my feet and run.
Run.
I catapult to the door, slam it into bodies as I fling it open, trip up the concrete stairs that it reveals and out into the light, the air. I surface—the forest. Still. Swivel around—it’s a cabin. Small porch, red trim—a rental. Leisure cabin—the Fox Hunt Club’s. Woods and ravine in front of me. Sheriff’s cruiser, John’s hideous fucking Jaguar, and unmarked van parked a stone’s throw away.
Away. I just have to get away.
I leap out of the stairwell, blood pulsing out of my nose and hand and arm as I whip myself into a run. Leaves slide under me—boots too loose. I kick them off, somehow, keep running, pounding my feet into rocks and pine needles.
I don’t care.
“Fucking...get her, you fat piece of shit!” A voice bellows behind me. John. “Now!”
Pop. I barely recognize the gunshot. But then more come: pop. pop.
I duck, but nothing hits—three misses. Confusion—yelling. But heavy footsteps pounding after me.
I don’t look back. Barrel straight into the brush.
I raise my arms to shield my face and it’s almost worse, thorns and thin branches finding the open wounds, tearing and jabbing enough to make me cry out. But I push through, I have to—
Something hard crashes into me.
A tackle from behind, slamming us both forward, over the edge of the ravine. We fall, two untethered seconds of sheer weightless adrenaline, then slam the forest floor, knocking the breath from my lungs.
I’m trapped. Crushed. I thrash, scrape, snap my teeth like an animal, wild with panic.
Somehow I see it’s not John, not the sheriff. A stranger. Hired muscle—the same one who grabbed me from the truck. He’s big, much bigger than me. Swats away my scratches and elbows and squeezes both my wrists in a single hand.
“Please!” I gasp, writhing. “Please. Please don’t. Please—”
I catch his face—broad, rounded, deep-set eyes and a scraggled beard. Baseball cap. Something in his stare like fear, almost.
“ Please, ” I wheeze. “Don’t. I—we’ll pay you. My guys will—whatever you want. Anything. You don’t have to do this.”
The fear in his eyes turns to pain. Apology. Like I’m a runt calf, too small to survive, and he’s got to put me out of my misery.
“ Please ,” I repeat. “If it’s money—”
“They already paid me,” he mutters, like it hurts him to say. “And if I don’t, they’re liable to...” His voice breaks. “I’m sorry, lady. I got kids.”
The underbrush crackles—John and the sheriff crashing closer, shouting over each other, voices echoing down into the ravine. I start to cry in earnest, sniveling and pathetic, wrenching my head from side to side as I try to escape, blood and snot and tears sliding everywhere. My ears ring, terror blotting out my senses even as my thoughts seem to sharpen.
Gun? I wonder. Knife? Bare hands?
How are you going to kill me?
How am I going to die?
My sobs grow frantic, ugly, as he holds me down with a farmer’s practice, pinning me with a thick leg on the side of either hip.
The dots connect before I realize.
Instinct. Memory.
One knee tucks. My other foot flat. I shrimp, hard, to to the side, the edge of my hip scraping mud and pine needles. Wedge my shin.
Arm grab.
Bridge, then—
Twist, thrust, and flip.
There’s an unh as his back hits the ground, and I lose my balance backwards, falling flat on my ass again but free. Free.
Up. Up, Maren. I scramble to my feet, almost tripping again on a root, clutching a sapling for balance.
There’s yelling—he’s lunging for me, I have to run, when—
Thunk.
A thin, swift missile splits through the air and slams into tree trunk, inches from his head, spraying bark and splinters. He jerks back as it quivers there, stuck fast.
A crossbow bolt.
“Maren!”
At the top of the ravine, I see him. Bow raised.
Rob.
My whole body collapses. I crumple into the dirt, my legs giving way as someone wails—me, I realize, something between a sob and a scream.
And just as quickly, I hear them.
Growl. Roar. Flap of wings.
They found me.
Behind them, Wheatley screams something incoherent and bolts for his vehicle.
But Will’s already there.
Flames rocket through the windshield and windows in a shower of safety glass and rippling heat. Then calm, rushing in as the blueish pieces fall, the metal frame warps, and then—
Boom. The chassis blasts outwards in every direction as the fuel tank explodes.
The force nearly knocks John over as he stumbles, backward, hands up—but it’s too late. LJ barrels into him like a freight train, muscle and teeth and rage. John yelps as the bear rears back, roaring, slams both paws down on the ground inches from his face—
But Wheatley’s moving. Hand to his belt, going for his gun, aiming at—
“Tuck!” I scream.
The shot rings out.
Tuck leaps. Pale fur rippling in the breeze.
And lands, feet away from me. Unhurt. A miss. Barely. He’s a white blur in front of m vision until I see teeth sunk deep into the mercenary’s arm, tearing him away from me.
The man cries out, dropping me, stumbling back with blood dripping down his sleeve.
“Get out of here, friend,” Rob shouts down to him, voice like steel.
The man doesn’t need to be told twice. He bolts, uneven and half-limping, up the slope. Through the trees. Gone.
Wheatley swivels as the man dashes past, his eyes darting between the blaze, the dragon, the bear, the wolf.
Then he runs, too.
Fucking coward.
Will’s narrow head pivots, tracking him, his wings tense for flight just as Rob shouts “Scarlet! Stand down!”
And then he comes to me.
He slides down the ravine like it’s nothing, bow in one hand, feet steady and even on the loose dirt giving way beneath him. I don’t even wait—I run, throw myself forward, and he catches me with one arm. Pulls me in.
“You’re all right,” he murmurs into my hair, and I realize I’m sobbing again. “You’re all right. We got you. It’s over.”
Something nuzzles under my arm—Tuck, like he’s trying to hold me steady. I lean on him, dizzy, barely upright, and clumsily climb up the slope and back to level ground to where John’s a crumpled mess beneath the bear’s weight.
He wheezes, arms thrown up in a pathetic attempt to shield his face, while LJ growls low and brutal, swipes his massive paw across John’s chest.
Not a killing blow. But he doesn’t stop, either.
“LJ!” Rob calls out. “Stop!”
The bear doesn’t even twitch. Keeps growling, keeps slashing and pushing John further into the mud like he could pulverize him out of existence.
Rob’s grip tightens around me. Then he lifts the crossbow again, aims.
Thunk.
The bolt zips past LJ’s ear and buries itself in a tree.
“I said stop ,” Rob says. “She’s safe. We don’t kill no one unless we have to.”
LJ stills.
Slowly, the great head turns. He looks at me—fur bristling, sides heaving—and then backs off with a snort, leaving John sprawled in the muck.
It’s ugly.
He’s barely conscious, his usually ruddy face a pale sour-milk color where it’s not bright with fresh blood or torn flesh. His clothes are tattered, his lips bubbling with something halfway between spit and a whimper.
I stare down at him from Rob’s arms, and all I feel is disgust.
The heat under my skin rises again. Raw and electric.
Could I kill him?
Could I channel this differently, somehow, pump pain and destruction into his body?
The thought frightens me, too much to dwell on. Instead, I yell, through the burning in my chest.
“You still think you run this place?” I cry, voice ringing against the trees. “Do you? Because you don’t. You never have. It’s always been him. And people like him.”
John wheezes, tries to lift his head, but he can’t even hold eye contact, and suddenly I’m not frightened anymore. I rip myself out of Rob’s arms, step closer.
“You know how I know?” I say. “Because they’re the ones who are gonna choose whether you live or you die .”
Something catches my elbow—Rob. Half-smiling, even now.
“All right, pretty lady,” he says, softly. “Except one thing.” He tips his head toward John. “On that last part, I listen to you.”
I glance back down.
John’s a wreck. Quivering, filthy, pale from blood loss, barely breathing.
He’d kill me if things were reversed. Almost did kill me. And spent years— years —doing everything he could to bleed me dry.
He deserves to die.
But now that I’m here, and he’s there...
I won’t do it.
“I’ll give you your life,” I say shortly. “But you’ll give me mine.”
He nods frantically. “Yes. Yes, anything. Whatever you want, just—just don’t let me die out here—”
“Quiet.” I crouch beside him, press my hand to his chest. “And don’t fucking move.”
I push out just a flicker of the power humming under my skin, enough to fix damage and nothing more.
He gasps, color returning in pulse-point waves.
That’s it. Done. I stand.
“I never want to see you again.”
Around us, Sherwood Forest crackles. Smoke curls from the wreck of the sheriff’s car, the tang of scorched metal wafting.
Then—screaming. No, sirens. Distant at first, then louder, closer. Lights flashing red and blue across the trees as a broad vehicle barrels down the road. My heart seizes, seeing the SHERIFF blazed across the white side panels, but the driver’s door opens before the thing even fully stops and I relax.
Zayn, in full dress, jumps to the ground. Gun drawn.
“Freeze,” he roars. “Do not. Fucking. Move.”
He sees me first. Sees I’m breathing, and relents—only a split second, really, swiveling his aim to John.
“You good?” he calls to me, eyes locked on his target. “She good?”
I nod, too tired for speech. Just nod.
“Yeah,” Rob says. “We all are.”
Zane holsters his weapon and strides the remaining two steps, whipping cuffs from his belt and locking John’s wrists with quick, practiced motions. “John Lackland, you’re under arrest for conspiracy, kidnapping, and...and a whole bunch of other shit I can’t even think of right now.” He jerks John up by the cuffs. “Get in the fucking car.”
John doesn’t argue. He just moans softly as Zayn walks him over and slams the door shut, the flashing lights pulsing against the trees.
My body goes limp, suddenly, exhaustion knocking me over like a rogue wave, but I only stumble two steps back before I hit him—Rob. He just grips my upper arm, holds me upright. Behind us, I can feel the rest of them—Tuck, LJ, Will—close enough to touch, silent and steady.
I close my eyes and let myself believe it, really believe it, for the first time in what feels like forever. In what maybe is the first time, ever.
It’s over.