Page 22 of Selling Innocence

And I had no idea what out would look like.

It honestly didn’t matter. As long as I did what I needed to do, as long as Lorien paid, I didn’t care about a second past then. It was just darkness, just formless night, something I couldn’t even try to turn into a future.

“Do you really think she can help?” I asked to change the subject as I took the water bottle.

“Well, Lorien wants her. Since we’ve had her, he’s been reaching out to every contact he has looking for her. The auction house called to set up a meeting, too.”

I twisted the lid from the bottle and gulped down half the water. “He works fast, huh?”

“I still don’t get why he wants her, though.”

“Maybe he met her before? Became infatuated?” I couldn’t imagine that, especially not after meeting the girl. She was pretty, in a naïve and innocent sort of way, but she was just some rich kid. She wasn’t a supermodel, didn’t have any discernible talents as far as I could tell.

Still, people had weird tastes.

“Maybe, but he’s methodical about his work. I can’t imagine him randomly seeing her and going through all this trouble.”

Yeah, that’s pretty unlikely.

“She’s keeping things from us,” I admitted.

“Can you blame her? As far as she knows, we’re just some men who bought her from an auction. That doesn’t earn a lot of trust.”

I shook my head after taking another drink. “It’s more than that. Come on, you’re smart enough to notice. She should be falling apart right now. She should be crying and flinching and begging us to let her go. Instead, she’s going shopping with you and cooking meals and talking to us way too easily. She isn’t nearly as afraid as normal people would be in her place.”

“So you don’t trust her because she’s braver than you think she should be?”

“Experience toughens people up. From what’s on paper, that girl’s lived a perfect life. She was spoiled by her rich daddy until he died. She lived off her millions, only deciding to go to school for art, probably for shits and giggles. A girl like that should cower at the sight of us, but she doesn’t. It means she’s seen things worse than us, that she’s spent time around things scarier than us, and that’s what worries me.”

Hayden sighed as he sat on a chair on the deck. “People’s lives aren’t as perfect as you like to think. Money doesn’t fix all problems. Just because she seems like she’s had it easy doesn’t mean she has.” He stared off into the distance, shadows in his eyes reminding me that we each had our own past.

We’d come together out of pain and rage, had kept anything personal beyond that terrible night to ourselves, but moments like this reminded me we had our own scars.

“Just keep an eye on her,” I warned. “Pretty faces have a habit of making people stupid.”

“I didn’t think you cared what happened to me.” Hayden’s humor, as usual, was bone dry.

“I still need you to finish this. If you want to walk into her trap? Feel free, just don’t ruin my chance of revenge while you’re at it. I won’t let anything get in my way when it comes to Lorien.”

“Well, that sounds like a threat.”

“It’s a warning. I’ll remove any obstacle, and that includes you or that girl. There’s no price too high, nothing I’m unwilling to do, not if it puts Lorien in a deep damn hole.”

Hayden stared at me so long it made me shift in my spot. I lived my life in the shadows, being whoever I had to at any moment, which was why when his sharp gaze dug into me, I wanted to plaster a smile on and fall to one of my many disguises, to hide anything real.

Except, Hayden was way too smart to fall for that. He’d seen me at my worst already.

“You know, if you live for nothing but revenge, you’ll end up in the ground, too.”

“Fine with me,” I said before tossing back the empty bottle and dropping to do another burpee. “I don’t have any problem digging two graves.”

Chapter Six

Kenz

One week down…

I rubbed my eyes as I lay flat on grass in the backyard, staring up at the sky. Dampness soaked into the back of my shirt, and despite the warmth of the night, a chill ran through me.

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