Page 169 of Priest and his Anarchist

But it wasn’t.

But it was all a lie.

My stomach falls and my throat dries. I drink more. The burn of whiskey does nothing to stop the insistent pulsing of my heart. I swear I can hear it thrashing behind my rib cage.

I drink. More.

“Sorry.” Nate smiles at me but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “And for this reason, we can’t risk him finding out the truth about you. Not until the very end, even after she’s gone.”

“You don’t need to tell me why.” I mimic Nate’s smile as spiderwebs form over my heart.

“My son is ruthless, Luna. There has only ever been one girl that could ever move him, and she was as crazy as him. Everyone else doesn’t exist. If he finds out that she’s a whole different entity, he’ll snap your neck on the spot and travel to hell and back to find her.”

“I don’t believe that.”

Brantley doesn’t move his eyes from the ceiling.

“I don’t believe he loved her. I know the love that kid craves.”

He finally shifts his head and when his eyes find mine, I’m reminded of why Brantley is who he is for the second time tonight. “And it’s not that. It’s not her. The one he’ll love, the one that will change it all for him, is the girl who shows him that he doesn’t need to hide himself in the dark to be with her, because she’s the light that paves the way.”

He shifts forward. “I’ve seen you both. You challenge him where she wouldn’t. She would have fallen to her knees and given him what he wanted. Hell, she did when she was a child. She pushed Halen off the Riverside bridge twice, and the third time, managed to link weights around her ankles to drown her. She wanted Halen dead. She’s pure and undiluted evil. She’d even kill Priest if she couldn’t have him. There is nothing to her. Not a single speck of good in that girl.”

I clear my throat. Well. That explains Halen’s hatred toward me. “One would argue that Priest is just the same. That they’re perfect.”

“One wouldn’t know what they were talking about,” Bishop answers, and it shocks me. I thought he shared the same view as Nate. “I know my son.” He holds my stare. “And what Brantley is saying is true. Has that bond he had with her helped keep you alive up to this point? Maybe. But something is changing there. Ijust don’t know what, and until we do know, we need to keep this a secret, or we run the risk of him killing you to find her.”

I drink more. This time, my teeth sink into my lip. “Noted.” He has a point. “And this favor?”

The hairs on the back of my neck prickle.

“Right. The favor.” Nate’s leg starts bouncing. “We need you to make a promise that when you find yourself back with them, that you’ll be as her. They’ve had her since you were swapped in Aspen. We’re still not sure if it was intentional, we’re guessing so.”

“But why—why was I important to them to do that? Her?”

“We don’t know.” Bishop blinks as he stares off into the flames. “We don’t know much about this organization, only that I’m partially to blame for the rise of it.”

“How so?”

He blinks as if remembering something painful. “Let’s just say I declined an old family tradition, and now it’s come back to bite my son in the face.”

I shuffle farther back in my chair. “And what happens when Priest takes the gavel? Will you fill him in? In all of this?”

Bishop’s finger traces his lip. “No. Because we can’t tell him that without exposing you. It will require timing.” His eyes fly up to mine. “And therapy. We need to find out who it is that hides beneath, and unfortunately, you’re the only one who can answer that.”

“Is that why Killian Cornelii has been seeing me, and all thein this house, there was a business?”

Nate nods. “Yes. It’s not to help heal your trauma of what happened that day, because I’m sure nothing can ever come close—” His jaw tenses. “But to see if you remember who exactly was in that house.”

I sip my drink.

His eyes darken. Bishop leans forward.

“Well damn.” Brantley whistles. “She already knows.”

“I do, and we have a problem.” I lower my glass. “Three I can get to, and when you find out who they are, it could risk you reconsidering, but the final one, I can’t get my hands on. I don’t know who he is. He hid his face beneath a hat, even when we were small. He’s around four years older than me, I’d say, but I never saw his face.”

“Well take out the first three, and the last one?” Nate leans back. “You need to fall.”

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