Page 100 of Double Bucked

“Claire, wait—” Everett says, but it’s too late.

I’ve already twisted the key and started to pull out the drawer.

But, idiot that I am, I forgot Daddy left his little, lethal traps all over the house.

When I pull the drawer out a quarter of the way, I hear a strange click from inside the drawer.

Something launches forward at me. I freeze in place and brace for an impact that never comes.

Everett is behind me suddenly. In his hand, he grips an arrow. The tip of the arrow grazes the hollow of my throat. The arrow, attached to a spring catapult inside the drawer, vibrates in his hand, itching to sink into my neck.

I can’t breathe. I can’t move. A thin, red line of blood pools in his palm.

Everett’s breath is hot in my ear. “Move aside,” he instructs me. “Slowly.”

Every hair on my body tingles as I inch away. The tip of the arrow lightly kisses my throat as I pass it. It’s not until I’m fully out of the line of danger that I let myself tumble away—and straight into Ransom’s arms.

“You okay?” he asks me. His hand cups me under my throat.

“Fine,” I say. My words shake.

Everett tilts his body out of the way and then releases his grip. The spring unloads, and it launches the arrow past Everett, sinking it with a thud into the spine of one of Daddy’s books.

Everett’s eyes meet mine. There a kinetic, dangerous calm in those blues.

“Claire,” he says, “I do believe you’ve found something.”

33

RANSOM

We’ve found a piece of the puzzle.

Or a piece of the piece.

Once we’re sure the damn desk isn’t gonna try to kill us again, Everett pulls out an old, leather-bound book.

He hands the book over to Claire. She sits on the floor and thumbs through the pages. Her cheeks are soft and pink, and her eyebrows furrow intensely.

“It’s a breeding record book,” she says. “But the prices are…well. Astronomical. Even our best studs don’t go this high. And they don’t have names. Only initials.”

I look over Claire’s shoulder, trying to help her make sense of it. “These don’t sound like any of the horses we’ve got in the stables. You think he was selling on the side?”

“Or he wasn’t selling horses,” Everett juts in quietly.

It takes me a second to realize Claire has gone very still and very quiet. She’s stopped at a page, and she’s staring down at it.

“What? Did you find something?”

“He wasn’t selling horses.” Claire repeats. Her voice is so quiet it’s like a whisper. She puts her finger on one of the dates. “Purebred mare. 6.5 pounds. Good health. Sold for two million on June 14th, 1995.” When her eyes lift from the page and meet mine, they’re blank, big as owl eyes. “My birthday. It was me. The day I was born, he sold me.”

Everett moves behind Claire, looking over her shoulder. His eyebrows furrow. “And now they’ve come to collect.”

The air goes still.

The silence only breaks when Claire snaps the book shut. She goes skittering out of the room, stumbling over her boots. She’s half crawling, half stumbling when I chase after her. I watch as she shoves through the bathroom door and barely makes it to the toilet.

I can’t fix this.

---