Page 88 of Exit Strategy

He grunted loudly as I put him in a head lock. “Move again and I’ll dislocate your shoulder, again.”

He tapped at my arm, the signal to release when we were sparring. But we weren’t sparring now, this was real. I turned so that he was between me and the sociopath. Would he shoot Kurt to get me? I didn’t really want to find out, but this confrontation, taser aside, had been really gun free.

“Madeleine?” I looked to see Calanthe standing at the doorway, her hand covering her mouth. I saw distress.

“Calanthe, I’m here to rescue you. I won’t let them hurt you! Let’s go. Get to the Range Rover in the garage, and they can keep the rest of this… mess.” The sociopath gestured for the brunette to stay where she was.

“I’m safe, Madeleine, they’re my friends.” Her voice was soft.

“C’mon, I don’t know how long I can hold this stalemate, let’s go.” I grunted. It was true, with little sleep, and hurting all over, the only thing keeping me moving was fury and adrenaline.

“Madeleine,” she said, leaving a pause. “Please, stop. Let Kurt go. I don’t want you to hurt anyone else. Stop being the bad guy.”

I blinked.

“What?”

“Stop being the bad guy. These are the good guys,” she said.

“No, New Eden are the good guys.We’rethe good guys. These people are murderers, they said as much. Please, Calanthe,please…”

“Let Kurt go. He’s turning purple,” the sociopath said. “No one is threatening you, and you’re destroying our house.”

I ignored him as Calanthe walked up to where I was still holding Kurt. Her eyes were big, like I remembered them. Everything else about her was small and perfect. This was why she was the First Among First Daughters. Why else would she have been a goodwill ambassador to the UN, and to Congress. Calanthe was everything we were supposed to be.

She was everything that I had wanted to be but had failed.

“Madeleine?”

“Yes, Calanthe.”

“Please let Kurt go. You’ve hurt him. You’re breaking things and hurting people, and that’s not what New Eden is supposed to do.” I felt a knot in my throat, and my eyes burned. Fuck. Hesitantly, I let Kurt go. He all but fell to his knees, and Calanthe, of all people, propped him up.

“I’m sorry, Kurt, let’s get you down on the couch.” Her voice was like silk.

I felt a new round of shame.

“I’m not mad at you, Madeleine,” she said. “We were lied to, all of us. We were lied to, and we were abused. Some of us in different ways. They didn’t touch you, like they touched and used me. But they didn’t insult me and treat me the way they treated you.”

“I’m not a victim,” I said.

“You’ve been wronged, and I’m sure you know the names of the people who’ve done the most harm to you, emotionally and physically,” she said.

I trembled.

I did know, Alexander Soren, the man with the audacity to call himself the Dragon.

Majordomo Maxson, the man who looked at me when I was twelve and decided that I was too tall to be a First Daughter, and that I wasn’t feminine enough.

Jacobsen and Cullen for abandoning me.

No.

This was just getting inside my head.

“Madeleine, you’re almost there,” Calanthe said. “Arik is a bad person, no matter how much money he gives to New Eden.”

I wanted to refute that, but I knew there was truth there.

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