Page 94 of Inside the Wicked

“Do you think it would be in D.C.?” he asks gently.

I try to think back to that long-ago conversation when we’d dreamed about the future. “He spoke of Boston,” I recall. “He said he grew up there until he was sixteen. I don’t know if that’s where he’d want to go back to, but it might be a start.”

“He wouldn’t have used his own name if he wanted it to be untraceable. Xoid is good, but we have barely anything to go on.”

My phone rings, and I dip my hand into my pocket for it. “Shit. It’s my dad.” I pick up with a forcibly cheerful greeting, but he rambles right over it. His speech is fast and panicked, but also relieved, and I try to focus on the actual words. “I’m fine. What are you talking about?” I try to cut in.

“Your apartment, Ana. Your mother and I stopped by, and it was a wreckage. We’ve been worried sick.”

I blanch, not considering the state Alistair’s guys might have left my apartment in, nor that my parents might come by.

“I didn’t know,” I lie, and it burns my throat like acid. “I-I decided to take a break away. Some spa resort just outside the city. I’m safe. I promise.”

Rhett’s expression is pulled together in concern and question.

“We’re coming to get you,” Dad says.

“Don’t. I’m okay here and have no idea what happened there. Likely some thieves watching the apartment realized it was empty and decided to see if there was anything of value in there.”

I scrunch my eyes, propping my elbow on the car door and holding my head. It hurts to lie to them so badly, but the truth would be catastrophic.

“At least tell me the resort,” he says.

“Lakomora,” I say. I’ve been there once. I’m terrified he might go there regardless. “But I check out tomorrow.”

“Then I’ll arrange you a stay at one of our hotels in the meantime, and I’m assigning you a guard.”

“I don’t need one,” I protest.

I want to scream with how unfair this is. That I have Rhett back and he’s the best protection I could have, but my dad would have him arrested and be utterly outraged at his fraudulent death on top of his credentials now.

Rhett rubs my thigh, and while I want the comfort of him, I’m in pain that he’s my secret.

“I’m not arguing with you on this,” Dad says firmly.

He’s changed so much. We both have, and this friction between us cuts deeply. When he assigned Rhett last year he fully sympathized with my resistance to having a guard, and we talked a lot. Now he doesn’t negotiate. I get it—his job is more intense than ever. The threat against his life and mine was real once, and there could be far more out there with a vendetta against the president.

I want to disappear again, shrink slowly back into who I was before I met Rhett—one who would have hidden from the world rather than face it.

“I’m texting you with the details, Ana. Go there tonight, and your guards will be there.”

I don’t answer, just hang up, because I think my voice will crack.

“We’ll work through this.” Rhett tries to comfort me.

I watch the buildings zip by, and all I want is to go back to the warehouse apartment. “It’s not fair,” I whisper. My throat becomes too tight for anything more.

“I’ll try to find a way to sneak by them,” he says.

“I want to go home. To our home. After these past few torturous months, we’re owed that.” I swipe away a resentful tear.

“We’ll have endless months to come.”

“Of secrets and lies and sneaking around.”

The stretch of silence weighs heavy between us.

“What can I do?” he asks, pained.

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