Page 90 of Taking

My woman. My other half. My goddamn everything.

Deep satisfaction had come from watching Lloyd’s body burn and tending the fire then stirring the embers to continue burning. Burying what remained, mere ash, put my past completely behind me.

Me and my princess moved forward. Together.

We packed up all our things, cleaned the cabin, and left Twinkie’s place exactly as I’d found it—minus the woodshed, the burned ground covered by a fresh couple of inches of snow.

But if he ever got lucky and managed to escape jail, he would understand.

Without a key, Addilyn was left knocking on her own home’s door two hours later. The housekeeper answered, her dark eyes wide and her hair cinched back in a tight knot as usual.

“Miss Addilyn!” She shuffled backward and pulled the door open, her hands twitchy like she wanted to hug my princess.

Addilyn noticed and went to her, showing affection I hadn’t ever seen in our months living together in the Reed house by throwing her arms around the Latina woman.

“Everyone thought you were dead,” the woman whispered. “And then Mr. Lloyd disappeared as well.”

Addilyn stepped back, her eyes wet while glancing around the massive foyer with its marble and garish white everything. Sterile. Lacking in color. But she shone like pure beams of radiant yellow, a shade I used to despise for good reason.

But my princess wore it well.

“Gideon got out of jail, and we took off together,” she stated what we’d agreed upon. “Reconnected.”

The housekeeper eyed me over Addilyn’s shoulder, glancing at the bulk I hadn’t carried the last time I’d been beneath that roof.

“It’s good to have you back, sir,” she said to me, her chin lifting. “The house staff appreciated you looking out for Miss Addilyn all those years ago.”

“My pleasure,” I grunted.

Her lips twitched, and I remembered Addilyn talking once about the breathing shadows in her mother’s employ knowing everything, but they’d signed papers to keep their mouths shut. They had probably taken note of every step I’d taken to rile the princess’s feathers. Every word I’d spoken to make her wet, to get her hissing and spitting at me like a cat.

I fucking grinned, sharing a moment with the woman who’d seen more than Addilyn’s own mother.

“You said Lloyd isn’t here?” Addilyn asked, drawing the housekeeper’s gaze off me.

“He went missing ten days ago. No word, no trace.”

“Nothing?” Addilyn asked, wrapping her arms around herself.

I stepped forward to tuck her beneath my shoulder, my hand on her hip.

The housekeeper’s focus slid to my possessive hold and back up to glance between the two of us standing side by side, a team. “Can I be blunt?”

“Of course,” Addilyn answered quietly.

“We saw what he did all those years ago.”

Addilyn stiffened against me, but we’d discussed the possibility her abuse hadn’t slipped past their eyes from the darkness and beyond.

“Your father wasn’t a good man.” The housekeeper eyed me without judgement.

I nodded at the woman’s statement. She’d get no argument from me.

“Personally—and I can speak for all of those in your employ—I hope he never returns.”

Of course they knew.

“My employ?” Addilyn asked, her tone wary.

---