Page 181 of Unorthodox
A body.
Bodies don’t have souls. Bodies have nothing. No pain. No fear.No life.
Oliver is dead.
Oliver is dead.
I can’t hold on anymore. I can’t stay awake. I can’tsave her. Him.
The last thought I have before I close my eyes is what worse I’m going to do to Addison’s uncle when I fucking find him.
Fuck. Him.
Three DaysLater
“His name is Jeremiah Rain—”
“I don’t give a fuck about a punk kid trying to play God.” I know about Jeremiah fucking Rain. Being in Alexandria for three days and rubbing elbows with the grimiest criminals this city has to offer, it’s been impossiblenotto know about him.
Mamie clears her throat. “He’s not a kid.”
I narrow my eyes at her as she covers the speaker of her phone with her hand, waiting for me to give this fucker a green light. “How old is he?”
“I don’t know, Max. Twenty-four, twenty-five—”
“Like I said. A fucking kid.”Oliver’s age. Oliver’s age when he…I don’t let myself think about it. Not now. Later. When Cade Jameson Cole—a DEA informant with a name change,anda trafficker for the biggest cartels in Mexico—is at the mercy of my hands. Then I’ll think of Oliver.
“He said he can get you a new passport, on the flight and in the air by tonight.”
I curl my fingers around the empty glass, staring down at the table in the suite we rented, not far from Addison’s father and her brother, who isnotworking with the DEA.
Instead, he’s been surrounded by people far worse. The same people that got to Luca.
The same people that got to Evora.
Cade’s people.
“What does he want for it?” I ask Mamie, not meeting her gaze. Mamie should be dead, but with one arm in a sling and nerve damage in my hand that might never go away, I need someone.
I fucking hate needing someone.
Mamie turns away from me as she talks to the kid, heading toward the balcony’s sliding glass doors and staring out at the noon sun, her voice hushed.
Three days Addison has been gone.
Three days since Oliver died.
A bullet between his eyes.
Bound and gagged in the trunk of Mamie’s car, blood soaked through the interior. Cade hadn’t bothered to cover him.With anything.
And the bruises on his body…his missing tooth…
My stomach churns.
I clench my good hand into a fist, hang my head and close my eyes. I can’t think of him. I can’t do it.
I can’t fucking do it.
