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“Alastair and that sadistic freakshow over there are still handing out women to his men like they’re prizes. And the captives who aren’t locked in with his men? They’re slaving away in the kitchen and scrubbing floors. None of them are safe, or free, or happy. Alastair lied, and any moment of decency he’s ever shown is to manipulate you! He’s the worst man who ever lived, Eden—and you were a fucking idiot to ever believe he was anything more.” Her fingers curl into fists. “If I ever get the opportunity, I’m ripping his throat out.”
“Sullivan still thinks he’s doing the right thing, but he took Alastair and Mateo. All of them. It was a clean sweep. Heather didn’t even tell me until it was done, and she was supposed to take me, too, but she, fuck, I don’t know. Had a crisis of conscience?
“Sullivan wants to kill them, Eden, and your word won’t be enough.
Alastair . . . he’s done too much there to play his part. I tried to talk to Heather but I . . . I don’t know if she listened.
The Sinners have given us a lot of trouble. We thought it was better to steer clear of any friends of theirs, Arthur said.
The Reapers weren’t friends with the Sinners . . . except Sullivan . . . Sawyer. Yes. We’ve . . . encountered one another.
“The Reapers supplied Sam with a quarterly dividend of food—a generous one, in exchange for their safety from the Sinners and, occasionally, outside threats.” Alastair only pauses briefly, scanning my face before he adds, “Sometimes the Reapers fell short of Sam’s requirements, and to appease him, the Reapers would supply Sam with women. In some quarters, they provided only a few—in others, Sawyer would hand over more than a dozen.”
Alastair meets my eyes. “More than half the captives at the Den are there because of the men currently inside your home.”
I’m sick, and angry . . . and I don’t want to do this anymore. I’m so tired of being afraid. I’m so tired of guessing who is going to hurt me. I’m so tired of needing to be smart and perceptive and prepared . . . only for it to not matter anyway.
I wish my brutes had been better then. I wish Alastair and Mateo and Bentley were better. I wish none of them made this so damn hard. Because I’m tired.
“I freed nineteen women from a barn while Alastair attacked their main compound.
“Don’t laugh about Heather’s hate. She earned it,” Dom tells Alastair quietly. His eyes are as cold as I feel. “You killed Thomas . . . and he was my friend, too.” Alastair’s amusement dies hard. “He was in the wrong place at the wrong time,” is all he says.
told her your captain is alive, that I didn’t kill him, and she refused to believe me. I’ve told her, shown her in a dozen different ways that I’m protecting the captives here, that I’m keeping her safe. I’ve shown her the kind of future I want to build. Bentley has tried, Mateo has tried—the stubborn fucking woman won’t believe a word. I am her villain, Eden, and she will never let me be anything else.”
His protection doesn't look like anything I'd want to live through. A dog collar and leash, and running the gauntlet, really?
“There’s no truth I could give her that she’ll accept . . . not when the one truth she cares about is the one that broke her heart.” Alastair’s hushed voice is almost too soft to hear, like this is a confessional, and I’m his priest. “That one truth will condemn me.” Thomas.
you are a controlling, untrusting bastard who is letting his obsession with her risk everyone’s safety.”
“I don’t know why today went so wrong, but whatever it was, you’d better fix it. Because from here on out, anything you do to my people, I will be doing to you.”
How many women, Sawyer? How many women did you let into your home? How many women did you feed? How many women felt safe here before you trapped them and bound them out in the cold and then shipped them off like livestock to be raped?”
