Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 82949 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 82949 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
Five seconds and these shitty plane wheels will be touching the tarmac. I need to get out of here. Fast.
The plane jolts as it hits the tarmac, and I shoot up from my chair, tearing off the belt. Pulling out my phone, I hit dial on Trevor way before Sparrow’s plastic flight attendants can ask me another bullshit question.
“I’m coming through the gates now.”
I don’t bother answering, hanging up my phone and jogging down the stairs that lay out onto the tarmac. The familiar black grill comes into view, and my heart slows.
“Mr. Malyk!” Her high-pitched tone stops me just as my hand touches the door handle. “Please, if you need—”
I slide into the passenger seat, slamming the door behind me. Silence surrounds me as I lean my elbow on the windowsill, the buildings passing by as Trevor drives us out.
“Have a good trip, sir?” he asks.
He and I both know that neither of us really gives a fuck what the other has to say.
“Yeah.”
“You manage to find her?”
I ignore his question. It isn’t that I don’t trust Trevor. It’s that I know how close he is to my father. “No. Close, though.”
The ride home is long, and I fucking wish I had just ordered my own damn car, but as soon as I land back in London, I know he’ll find me. It’s only a matter of damn time. The man knows where I am twenty-four-seven. With good reason.
“Take me home.” I turn to face Trevor.
“Can’t, sorry. Your da and ma wanna see you.”
I bare my teeth, my knee jiggling beneath the weight of stress. Trevor side-eyes me but keeps his focus on the road. I know I make him uncomfortable. I always have. I like it that way.
He drives us onto the main road that leads to my family estate, and I pull my phone out of my pocket, flicking through social media apps. She is too close for it to not be suspicious. She isn’t stupid, but maybe a little too brave. Shiloh is almost like a child who has never been let out into the big bad world.
Opening Instagram, I tap the search bar and spell out her name. A small photo with a girl smiling at the camera while holding her surfboard pops up, and I push on the username. Boneyardtides
I chuckle, shaking my head. So fucking fitting, Little One. I skip over her followers and go straight for her photos. The last one she took was the night we sent her to the island.
I snicker under my breath, enlarging the photo of her and Cooper Quinn, a.k.a. her best friend. She’s on his shoulders, her tongue sticking out of her mouth and her hair wild around her shoulders. My eyes shift to the guy behind them, and it’s the little fucker we saw her with on the beach the first day we were at Hades Hollow.
“So much about you we just don’t know,” I whisper to myself under my breath, going through her photos. Just as I’m about to tap out, my phone lights up with Dion’s face.
I swipe it to answer. “Yeah?” The closer we get to our gated driveway, the more my skin crawls.
“We leave Sparrow unattended for a few hours, and he’s throwing a fucking party on the island.”
“Without us!” My mouth curves up in a smirk. It falls when we pull up to the gate.
“Yeah, well. I’m heading back to Hades Hollow tomorrow. How long do you need to be there for?”
I shuffle in my seat, the silence enough to tell Dion what he needs to know.
“Be back when you can.”
The lingering question continues to stick to the silence between any conversation we all have. “You think it’s her?”
“I don’t know. At first, I thought no, but now…”
“What do you mean now?” I ask, ignoring the fact that in under five minutes, my father is going to be in my face.
“I don’t know, bro. It just feels…”
“Like it is.” We both knew what the other meant. I just wasn’t sure if Sparrow was on the same page as us. After hanging up the phone with D, Trevor’s voice comes back through, reminding me where I am. Fuck.
“It isn’t anything bad this time, Malyk. Just hear him out.”
I snort, shoving the door open. Even now, as a twenty-five-year-old man, I hate the one who made me. I hate everything about this fucking house and what it reminds me of.
The heavy marble doors open, and my father stands with his hand in one pocket and his other holding a cigar. “Whatever you’ve got going on couldn’t wait?”
I shake my head. “No. I had to go back to Hades Hollow.”
“Why?” he asks, and I stop on the third step, staring up at him. “Your mother never went back to that town. I struggle to see why you would want to.”