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“I hope you die,” I croak out in a raspy, smoke-choked voice around the sock, sending Stacey a blast of my hatred with my expression. I’m not even sure she can hear me.
Stacey stops and glowers at me. “She should have given him to me. At least he wouldn’t have burned to death.” She covers her mouth with a bloodstained hand. “What kind of mother would rather her child die a horrible death in her arms than let another mother protect him?”
Bile burns up my esophagus as her words click inside my mind. Stacey tried to take Dawson, but Mom put up a fight, refusing to give over her baby. And now, Mom and Dawson are probably dead from the fire. More tears well and spill over.
Oh God. I can’t breathe!
My mother. My brother.
These people are monsters!
As the smoke grows thicker, we all start to cough more. Michael climbs into the front of the truck and starts the engine. Is he leaving? What about the rest of their people?
“Where is she?” Lisa, one of the other women from their group calls out. “Stacey, hon? Are you okay? Seth said you lost the baby.”
Not her baby.
Ours.
My baby brother, Dawson.
Good for you, Mom.
“In the truck,” Tee calls out. “She’s in bad shape. You should look after her up there. Have Seth bring your kids to me and Owen.”
Lisa disappears and then a few moments later shows back up with five kids all varying from around Dakota’s age to Destiny’s. The sleepy kids find places to insert themselves between tents, gear, and the rest of the people crammed in the bed of the truck.
Logan then shows up carrying Kristen, who is either sleeping or knocked out. He puts her up front in the extended cab. I can’t see around the heads and stuff piled up as to how many people they have up there.
I need to get free.
If I could just grab my knife that’s hooked to my belt under my shirt, I could take some of these assholes out. Or, at the very least, cut me and my siblings free so we could run away.
No such luck.
Michael shouts something to Logan and then starts slowly moving the truck from the thick smoke that’s causing everyone to cough all around me. He stops again when he’s about fifty yards away.
There are still many people from their group missing, including CJ and Jace. I hope those idiots burned to death. Maybe Ryder killed them. Thoughts of my brother have more tears falling. What if he’s dead too?
And where the hell is Dad?
My father would have died protecting his family.
Just like Mom.
It’s hard to believe that days ago, I’d been considering a life away from my overprotective parents. Now, I long for those loud dinners where everyone talks at once and there’s never a peaceful moment. I’d give anything to be grounded again so long as it meant we could all be together, safe and alive.
Ronan groans from beside me but doesn’t wake. He’s hurt. It’d been a blur of men in the darkness of Ronan’s cabin earlier as they urged us to throw on clothes and to keep quiet. Ronan tried to fight back—to protect me, Sadie, and Destiny—but he was just one young man against several. The loud crack of a weapon against his skull plays on repeat inside my head.
Several men come running through the dark smoke, carrying bags of food and have my father’s weapons slung over their shoulders. The first to come into view is CJ. A stupid boy I kissed. If I could cut out my own tongue right now to rid the remnants of him, I would.
These people are sick and rotten to the core.
Evil bastards.
“Tie it there,” Logan orders, materializing next to CJ. “Make it tight. I don’t want him getting loose.”
Him?
