Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 75792 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 379(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 253(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75792 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 379(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 253(@300wpm)
For that memory to now be tainted so badly because of what he’s done wounds me to my core. And worst of all … I will never be able to forget it happened to begin with.
I stare down at my belly, my hand hovering over my skin, wishing I could speak to the baby growing inside me. That I could tell it things will be okay, even though I know they won’t be. But this little white lie is the only thing that keeps me going.
I wonder if Eli knows. Maybe Dr. Audrey told him. After I screamed, I heard a door slam shut, and when I finally gathered the courage to open the bathroom door, she was already gone.
But the strangest part is that no one came to ask me anything else.
No one came to inform me of what’s going to happen next. Not the doctor nor Eli, which surprises me the most. If he knows I’m pregnant … wouldn’t he come running straight to my room? Tell me to be careful, tie me up to the bed so I can’t harm what’s growing inside me? His entire plan was to make me his wife … and now I’m going to have this baby.
A knock on the door pulls me from my thoughts. Mary steps in, clearing her throat. “Hey. How are you feeling?”
I shrug. Not worse, but definitely not any better.
“Good,” she replies. She closes the door behind her and quickly makes her way to the closet, fishing out clothes, shoes, literally everything that’s inside, and she stuffs it all into a big bag.
I stare at her and mutter, “What are you doing?”
“Packing,” she says, as she makes her way to the bathroom and swipes that clean too, stuffing it all into the bag, which she throws down near the door. “You look dressed well enough to go out.”
Out? Out as in out of this house?
Or out … as in … Eli wants to get rid of me after all?
I frown as she grabs my arm. “Out? Where? What’s going on?”
“No time to talk. We have to move. Now.” She drags me out of the room and along the hallway toward the stairs. Below us, an argument ensues.
“Are you insane?! No, this goes against everything we do. You told me this would work. That you wouldn’t fail!”
It’s Tobias.
“I know, okay?! You don’t have to remind me!” Eli quips.
What are they fighting about?
“But she changed me.”
Oh, no.
It’s about me.
My heart rushes as hard as we run down these stairs, and I can’t help but throw a glance at the living room where Eli and Tobias are having a heated debate. For one single second, Tobias’s gaze detaches from Eli’s and connects with mine. Rage and confusion settle in them, and I don’t quite understand what’s going on. All I know is that the look he gives me makes all the hairs on the back of my neck stand.
And then there’s Eli, who finally glances over his shoulder at me, and the look in his eyes is the exact opposite from Tobias, full of sorrow and misery … and regret. There are even tears in his eyes as he blinks them away, and it ruins me. Twists my heart into shapes I didn’t know it could take.
His lips part. But before he or I can say anything, Mary swoops me away, into the dark of the night. The clouds above us cover the moonlight, which forces us to find our way by touching the stone. Even though it’s cold outside, Mary doesn’t shiver like me. She’s relentless in her pursuit of a door, and when she finally finds it, she opens it wide.
“Get in,” she says, her energy infectious.
I don’t think asking questions is a good thing right now. Not when there’s obviously haste. But I still fail to understand why. Why was Eli fighting with Tobias? And why am I being whisked away in the middle of the night?
I swallow as Mary brings me to a car and opens the door, pushing me inside the back seat. Before I can say a word, she slams the door shut and gets behind the wheel. She starts up the engine, presses a button, waits until the garage door opens, and drives off.
It only registers after a few minutes that I’m being driven away from the House.
Away from the women who are still stuck there.
Away from Eli, who was fighting over me, who told me he still cared, despite everything I said.
Away from it all.
And something deep down inside me tells me this wasn’t how it was supposed to go.
How it was planned.
And for some reason, it feels like I won’t ever see this place again.
Chapter 23
Eli
“What the hell have you done?” Tobias growls. “Sending Soren off like that just to accompany some girl?”