Page 53 of The Darkest Chase

I’m expecting another protest. Another denial.

Instead, I get a low, almost betrayed whimper.

Not at me, though.

Her fingers clench the binoculars as she lets out an almost heartbroken whisper. “Oh my God. Is that… the chief?”

I turn my head, looking down at the almost mechanical assembly line getting everything in working order with terrifying speed.

Sure enough, there’s a familiar figure there, portly belly in plainclothes, standing with Ephraim Jacobin and another figure I don’t see too often. An older woman, who stands there like a witch in a black shroud, her face like death.

“Yeah. I told you he’s part of it,” I whisper.

“Holy shit! But I didn’t know you meant—”

“I know. Keep it down. I’m the only one who knows. He’s someone you’ve always thought was safe, right? Someone who’s part of your everyday life. But even the people you think you know can lie their asses off.”

I can’t take my eyes off Bowden. There’s something different about the way he carries himself tonight. The hardness of his face is so at odds with his usual jowly smiles and bumbling pleasantry.

“This is where lies are born. Lies people tell themselves, that maybe if they take this powder, they can be superhuman. They can feel amazing. They can forget their worries, and they’ll never stop feeling that way; the consequences will never catch up to them… their bodies won’t eat themselves alive for another hit.” I trail off, hatred bubbling on my tongue. “But karma always comes around. The lie always has empty promises. And thousands of people on the East Coast alone die every year thanks to those assholes down there, who think it’s all fine and dandy just as long as the plague they unleash doesn’t touch their little town too much.” That hatred turns into a lump in my throat. “Like the people they never see suffering don’t matter. Like my brother didn’t matter.”

I can hear the moment it clicks for her.

The shudder of her breath, the noise in the back of her throat.

I can’t look at her—but I know she’s looking at me.

Her big blue eyes pull on me like she wants to help me when I don’t want to fucking feel better.

I want to hate.

I want raw and ugly and real.

I want this bloodlust fresh on my tongue until the day I demolish them.

“Micah,” she whispers, her voice full of a hurting sympathy I can’t stand when it tempts me to be weak, to fall into the comforting distractions of her softness and scent.

“Don’t,” I bite back bitterly. Rolf lets out a low whine and presses himself against my calf. “I don’t want to hear it. It won’t bring him back. All I want to hear is whether or not you’ll help me after seeing this. I know Xavier Arrendell is the final key. He’s what makes this possible. I just need to prove it.”

“We,” she answers with firm conviction. It rips through my grim focus, my fury, and forces me back to her. “We need to prove it.”

I stare at her.

She looks back at me with glassy eyes that seem like they could swallow the whole sky.

No matter what an anxious little thing she is, she has heart.

She has a spine.

More importantly, she has the strength to stare at me, determined and firm in her decision, even though she’s shaking and I don’t think it’s the cold.

This woman might be the key to everything.

And if I’m not careful, she could be my undoing.

7

DARK DAYS COMING (TALIA)