Page 207 of Everything Under the Sun

“Ravinia!” I called out, hoping she would stop Kade.

But the resolved look on Ravinia’s face told me there was nothing she could—or would—do.

“You’ve proven your worth,” Ravinia said. “And your demand was met: the fight was stopped. But Kade is still your protector. That is until you can protect yourself.”

“Let’s go,” Kade said with a grunt, and dragged me away from Atticus.

I wanted to gut Kade with the knife, but he took it from my hand before I could. I wanted to continue fighting him, but in the end, I chose to submit and not create another scene. Use your head, Thais, I told myself. Struggling and screaming never set you free before—use your head.

And so I walked alongside Kade through the crowd toward an exit, looking back to watch as Atticus was being carried away by two men toward another exit.

I will find you, Atticus. I will find you tonight, and we will leave this place together if I have to burn it down.

63

THAIS & (ATTICUS)

Kade kicked open the door to his room; it smashed into the wall. “Do you have any fucking idea what you’ve done?” He shoved me onto the floor and then kicked the door closed behind him.

I scrambled to my feet, held my fists out in front of me, my heart pounding, my legs shaking. I started to answer, to brazenly tell him I saved Atticus, but he marched toward me with repercussive intent, his dark eyes blazing in the lamp-lit room. Instinctively, I tried to back up toward the wall but was stopped by the sofa.

“Now every person in Paducah will want to fight me for you!” he growled into my face.

I shrank away from him, feeling the heat of his breath on my mouth.

“Should’ve kept your mouth shut!” he ripped out the words. “You could’ve had freedom here with me—safety!—but you royally screwed that up! There’s no telling who you’ll end up with—do you know what you’ve done?” His voice thundered in my ears.

A sharp pop sounded as my hand smacked across the side of his prickly face; his hand flew upward near his eye in reaction to the sting.

I glowered at him, my teeth gritted behind tightly pressed lips. “What I’ve done,” I growled, “is figure out how to change my situation”—(Kade’s mouth snapped shut, and his eyes narrowed with regret for the things he’d told me)—“My limitations are what got me into this mess, remember?” I stepped up to him daringly, now my eyes blazing in the lamp-lit room. “Well, my limitations will not define or confine me. And no one—no man or woman or city full of people—will ever own me!”

A white-hot pain shot through the left side of my head and silver spots flashed across my vision when he struck me with his open hand. I fell backward against the arm of the sofa; the decorative wood gouged into my hip and I bounced off it and fell onto the floor.

Kade was on top of me before I could shake the spots from my eyes. “I do own you, you mouthy little bitch,” he barked. He straddled my waist; one hand moved to lift up my skirt, the other fastened around my throat. “And because I own you, I can take whatever I want from you”—he pressed himself against me between my legs—“and you will do whatever I tell you to do. And when someone challenges me for ownership of you, you’re gonna tell them you want to stay with me, and that even if they won a fight against me you wouldn’t cooperate with them, that you’ll never share your knowledge and skills with anyone but me!”

His fingers had become so tight around my throat I struggled to breathe; my eyes fought to stay open; my hands clawed at his arm, trying to pry it away, but it only made him squeeze tighter.

“IS THAT UNDERSTOOD?” he screamed into my face. Then he smiled like a madman, his teeth bared. “How are those limitations now? How are—”

His ferocious face shifted in a blink to something eerily relaxing; his eyes fluttered as if he were drunk and shocked simultaneously; his lips parted and his hand around my throat loosened. I gasped—I didn’t even have time to let the breath that rushed into my lungs settle—as blood poured down Kade’s neck. His body swayed on top of me; his hands probed robotically at his throat and blood covered his fingers and dripped onto my clothes.

Drusilla pulled back her hand from his throat, the wet blade glistening in the semi-darkness, and then she plunged it deep into his back.

“Limitations are an illusion,” Drusilla said to Kade, her mouth next to his ear; one hand still at his back, the other wound in the top of his dark hair.

Kade choked, and his eyes rolled into the back of his head; he coughed and blood spattered his face and my face.

With a tremendous cry of anger and retribution, Drusilla shoved Kade from me; he fell onto the floor beside me, dead before his body settled.

“We need to leave now,” Drusilla said, and she held out her hand.

Still in shock by the events, I had a difficult time getting my words together. But not my actions—I knew better than to stall. I took Drusilla’s hand and went to my feet quickly, and then Drusilla practically dragged me out the door.

There was no one in the halls as everyone from the arena probably had not made it back into their homes yet, so Drusilla and I dashed, hand-in-hand, down to the bottom floor without being seen by anyone other than a few drunk, uninterested men. Rushing out a back door, we darted into the parking lot, weaved our way between the school busses and then small buildings and finally we came to the fork in the road. When we made it to the accounting office, Drusilla stopped beside a dumpster, got down on her knees, and slid her arm underneath it. She stood up with a pair of heavy-duty bolt cutters in her hand.

“Hurry!” she told me, grabbed my hand again, and we headed for the Humane Society building.

There was one man sitting outside guarding the door that led into the kennels. When he saw us, he stood from the cement block he’d been sitting on, gripping a baseball bat in his hand.

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