Page 74 of Forged in Rain

Silently, I watch him go before exiting myself. I assume Hate’s around somewhere. I just need to find him.

I’m saved the effort when he pulls up in his matching SUV and rolls down the window.

“Get in,” he orders.

“Why?”

His glare shrivels my insides and, leaning out the window, he tips his glasses down his nose and stares at me with his icy, hard eyes. “I’m not asking. Get in.”

“Cyn—”

“Do you want him to live?” he barks. Shakily, I nod my head, willing back tears. “Then get in the fucking car.”

I limp around the front, glancing around and hoping Jig will appear, but he’s nowhere in sight, and I sag. Am I going to die?

Easing into the seat, I face what could very well be my death with a pathetic whimper.

Hate glances at me with a frown before pulling away. I quiver in my seat as I watch the world fly by, silently saying goodbye to Cyn, my parents . . . Joey.

Not ten minutes pass before my phone starts to buzz in my pocket. Hate glances my way with a sigh. “Give me the phone.”

I harden my jaw in preparation to argue, but he raises his hand so suddenly I flinch, and with a ferocious scowl, he says, “Give me the fucking phone.”

Quietly, I comply, my heart pounding double time in my chest.

“Wait—” I say too late when he tosses it out the window.

“Seriously?” I gasp, spinning in my seat to watch it bounce off the road.

Turning my wide eyes to him, I gape like a fish as he says, “Fucking nuisance. This is how it’s going to go down. You keep your head down and act like you’re fucking scared. Got it?”

“Where are we going?”

“To make an exchange.”

“What are you exchanging?”

He gives me a you-can’t-possibly-be-that-stupid look, and I frown, but I know better than to say anything. He’s not the type you argue with, not if you value all your limbs attached to your body.

After a while, I sink in the seat, exhausted as the time passes, and we just keep going. Remarkably, I doze, only waking when the vehicle slows, and Hate pulls into a dark lane, with trees surrounding us.

We were on a deserted highway previously, and I can’t see anything but forest for miles. We’re secluded, alone, and I’m fucking shivering.

A few feet farther, the trees clear, and a house emerges. It’s old, historic, with broken-down shutters and sagging pillars. A faint light glows in a window on the bottom floor, and another vehicle, an SUV, although not the same model as this one, sits beside the door.

Absently, I wonder if it’s a prerequisite that mobsters drive SUVs as Hate pulls to a stop and stares at the house with a grimace.

“Remember. Follow my lead and don’t fucking back talk.”

Nodding, I follow him up the front porch and inside, where he lets himself in without knocking. He glances at me impatiently as I hobble along on the crutches, but I ignore his cranky ass. Dickface.

The interior is furnished but covered in dust, and it’s like stepping back in time. Old couches line a fireplace to the left, and a grand staircase stands further in. I’m not given a chance to see much more because we step into what I assume is the parlor, and I spy an older man sitting on another ancient-looking couch.

He’s flanked by two goons who look just as deadly as Hate, both with shoulder holsters bulging under their arms.

The old man, easily in his eighties, stares at me through watery dark eyes, his face a map of lines and wrinkles that I suspect contain horrors I want no part of.

He’s frail, skinny, and hunched over, but his shrewd gaze tells me his body may be giving out, but his mental capabilities are just fine. He nods at Hate without bothering to look in his direction and brings his eyes to mine.

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