Kandace removed the folders from her underwear and walked quickly to her bed, slipping them beneath the mattress. She’d have liked to read them more closely, but the room was dark and she didn’t dare turn on a light. There would be no more risks tonight. She had a feeling, she’d used up all her luck for the moment.
She got beneath her covers and lay there, thinking about the absolute evil she’d discovered. The girls, their children, supposedly marked by the sin of their parents. She could hardly wrap her head around the fact that these people had convinced themselves of such a thing. Not only convinced themselves, but fucking acted upon it.
Yes, Kandace needed to leave. But she needed a plan. She was in the middle of nowhere. She didn’t even know which direction to head. And even more concerning, she had a feeling the three girls who’d escaped had tried that too, only they were never heard from again.
Another chill went through Kandace and she brought her hand to her swollen belly again. “I’m going to figure this out,” she whispered into the silence of the room. “I’m going to get us out of here.”
She didn’t know how, but she’d just made a promise, and she intended to keep it.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Scarlett opened her eyes, turning toward Camden in the dark and finding his side of the bed empty. She sat up slowly, catching sight of him standing at the balcony, his masculine form outlined by the glow of city lights. As her eyes adjusted, she saw he wore only his boxer briefs and held a water bottle at his side. She took the opportunity to watch him unaware, to drink in the athletic grace of his body, the beauty he seemed almost completely unaware of. She understood why now. He’d practically reached adulthood without ever being taught of his appeal. Instead, he’d been isolated, shamed, a terrible vision of what sex was presented to him in his tender, formative years. He was damaged, yes, but he was also strong. Stronger than he realized. He was good and honorable. Loyal.
Scarlett got out of bed, wrapping the bedsheet around herself and approaching him from behind. When she slipped her arms around his body, he startled slightly, then chuckled, the sound low and deep. She turned her nose into his back, breathing him in and then kissing the smooth skin of his shoulder.
“I didn’t wake you, did I?”
“No. Well, maybe. I think I sensed you were gone, even in my sleep.”
He smiled down at her as she dropped her arms and came around his side. He lifted the bottle of water, still half full and offered it to her. “Thirsty?”
She shook her head and he draped his arm around her, pulling her into his side. “What are you doing out here all alone?”
She heard his smile even though he was turned away. “Just reliving what we did in that bed in there.”
“Yeah? What part are you at?”
“I’m stuck on the moment you did that swirly thing with your tongue.”
She laughed. “That swirly thing, huh? You liked that?”
“Like doesn’t seem like quite the right word.”
She laughed again, dragging a finger down his chest. “You know, there’s a small chance you can relive it in body, not just in thought.”
He grinned and her chest constricted. Even in the dimmest of light, he was so beautiful he made her heart ache.
“Come back to bed,” she invited.
He followed her into the room where they made love again, the sounds of the city drifting softly to them from the open balcony door, the cool night breeze whispering over their heated skin.
Camden gathered her in his arms and they lay in silence for several minutes, his fingers running up and down her arm. She sighed. “I assume this isn’t what they meant when they asked you to keep tabs on me,” she said wryly.
Camden let out a soft laugh that quickly faded. “No.” She looked up at him, his features etched in worry. “What’s going to happen when we get back?” she asked. She hadn’t wanted to burst their happy little bubble with talk of guilds and missing girls, but it was reality, it was his reality especially, the one he’d lived most of his life, and this was no time to bury their heads in the sand for too long either.
Camden sighed, unwrapping his arm from around her and sitting up. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and leaned forward, stretching his neck. “We can’t be seen together, Scarlett.”
She sat up halfway too, bringing the sheet to her breasts and leaning back on one elbow. “We can’t be seen . . . why not?”
He looked back over his shoulder so she could only see his profile. “Because if I have any hope of becoming a guild member, a woman like you wouldn’t make an acceptable prospect.”
Hurt spiraled through her and it took a moment to swallow down the lump in her throat. He turned before she could speak. “They’re not my rules. But I have to play by them if I have any hope of gathering the information I need, if there’s even any information to gather.”
Scarlett took a deep breath. She had to be reasonable about this. She had abandonment issues; she acknowledged them. But she couldn’t let her own self-doubt get in the way of the bigger picture. Camden had been honest with her when it could have cost him everything to do so. He’d trusted her not only with his secret, but with the secrets of two people he’d grown up with. Two people who craved the same justice he did. She chewed her lip for a moment. She wanted to help, but she also wanted to be clear about where she stood. Especially if it was going to mean pretending she didn’t know him in public.
“The woman whose house I saw you leaving that morning, you said she’s a good friend—”
“Georgia.” His back was still to her so she couldn’t see his face.
“Yes, Georgia.” She paused, considering her words and in the end just diving in. “She considers you hers.” She’d seen the look on her face both at the hardware store, and as he’d left her house the morning she’d driven by. She’d replayed it in her mind. Far too many times.
For a moment he was silent, still, but finally he nodded. He looked back over his shoulder and she saw the conflict in his expression. “Sometimes I think she’s right to, you know?”
Scarlett’s ribs tightened.
“It seems like . . .” His words faded away, as though he didn’t know how to finish that sentence.
“Like you owe her?” Scarlett asked. She tried to imagine what it must have been like for them, those three against the entire world, bonded in a way she probably couldn’t even imagine.
Camden let out a staggered breath. “I don’t know,” he finally said. “Someone does.” He paused for several moments. “We were told one of the reasons our mothers gave us up was because we were born damaged. Our mothers’ sin was passed along to us in the form of something physical.”
“Something physical?” She frowned.
“Georgia was born with a cleft palate. The man who became Georgia’s guardian paid for her surgery. Mason has heterochromia.”
“Those are signs of sin?”
“In Farrow they are.”
She shook her head, trying to wrap her mind around what he was telling her. This was all so unbelievable. So . . . outside anything she’d heard of before. Were there other places like Farrow? Towns still lost in time, operating under archaic, irrational beliefs like the ones that had fueled the Salem Witch Trials? Even laws? Did they really believe such things? Or were their physical abnormalities an easy excuse to treat them in any manner they pleased and in whatever way was convenient? “And you?” She’d seen every perfect strip of him. “What in the world is your sign of sin?”