Every time I tell Liam I’m ready, he says I’m not. So we wait and keep training. I heal physically. I become fast and strong. Stronger than I’ve ever been in my life.

Liam eventually stops holding back in our sparring sessions. It’s a rough transition, with more than a few panic attacks and breakdowns. But with each new bruise, I revel in the knowledge that I’ve chosen this path. Icepacks and ibuprofen are prices I’m willing to pay to learn how to defend, attack, and immobilize a man twice my size. And the times I succeed, landing kicks and punches that bloom angrily on Liam’s skin? Icing on the cake.

I still have nightmares, but I don’t always remember them in the morning. Other times, Maria or Liam have to rouse me in the dead of night because I’m screaming in my sleep.

On one such night—roughly eight weeks post-basement—Maria wakes me. She sings to me in Spanish until the echoes of my terror fade. After, as she runs a wet cloth over my sweat-soaked face, I ask if she’d be willing to hear what happened to me.

She doesn’t hesitate. “Of course I will listen, mi hija.”

So I purge my body of memories by voicing them. Once I start, I don’t stop. I recount every vile moment, every abuse, every time I wished—begged—to die. I talk until I’m hoarse and dawn begins to brighten the room.

When there’s nothing left, Maria bends forward to kiss my forehead. She hasn’t spoken or moved or let go of my hand once in the last hours.

Now, she says, “My abuelita told me that the purpose of a storm is to force trees to take deeper roots. Sleep easy now, Eden. Your roots are strong and deep.”

It’s the last time I wake up screaming.

* * *

Finally, ninety-four days after our arrival, Liam takes me into Los Mochis to get a passport photo. Then we take the photos to a dumpy stucco building with sagging doors, and in a locked, air-conditioned room with an abundance of computers, a harried man produces my documents. One with my real name for the bank in Cook Islands, another with an alias I’ll use to disappear.

I hardly recognize myself.

The woman in the small photo is unsmiling, her eyes too big in a face with sharp, feline angles. Morning runs have given my skin a light golden tone. Freckles mellowed by age and Seattle’s weather have reappeared, a sprinkling across my nose and cheeks. My hair, long since I was a teenager, is now trimmed to my shoulders. Though Maria had tried to repair it initially, it’d been so badly matted we’d had no choice but to chop it off.

“I look mean,” I tell Liam as I stare at the image on our drive back to Maria’s.

He snorts. “You are mean.”

I roll my eyes, closing the little booklet and holding it in my lap. Staring out the window, I watch the passing scenery without really seeing it.

I’m distracted. Not in the way I should be—with thoughts of leaving tomorrow—but with the man beside me. I blame the dream that woke me in the middle of the night, flushed and panting. I’m used to the nightmares by now, but this wasn’t a nightmare. Far from it. Nor was it anything easily dismissed, like a fantasy of our former selves. That, I could understand.

In this dream, it wasn’t the old Liam but the new. With arms covered in whorls of what I’d discovered were words. Gaelic script woven into beautiful Celtic designs from shoulder to wrist of both arms.

Those arms were stretched above his head, wrists bound in red rope to a headboard.

“What are you thinking about?”

I blink rapidly and shake my head to clear the disturbing—and arousing—image. Grabbing one of the many disjointed thoughts tumbling through my consciousness, I say, “Elizabeth. It occurred to me that she might be waiting for us.”

His hands tighten on the steering wheel. I try not to imagine them straining against a rope. I fail.

“I hope she is—she’s got a lot to answer for.”

It’s an old argument. I sigh. “We had an understanding. I don’t blame her.”

“She left you to rot!”

I don’t say anything. Though I’ve tried, I can’t put into words why I don’t resent Elizabeth for leaving me to my fate. She did what she had to do, just as I did. In that last moment of eye contact, I’d seen her belief that I would live. Not for one moment had she doubted me.

Be smart. Be brave. I know you’ll figure it out.

“If I see that woman—” Liam begins threateningly.

“You’ll do nothing,” I snap.

He grunts. “I can’t believe you told her about the money.”

“You weren’t there, Liam! She was. She came for me when you were too busy digging your father’s grave to realize you’d put a target on my head.”

His knuckles go white and a muscle in his jaw ticks. “I know. Don’t you think I know that?”

I huff in disgust. “Yeah, it’s no secret you’re doing penance.”

The car swerves violently off the road and jerks to a stop. Another car honks angrily as it speeds past.

Liam rips off his seatbelt and swivels toward me. I meet his stare defiantly. Inside me, the ugly wound of betrayal seeps into my blood.

“Get it all out, Eden,” he growls.

“You want to know? Fine! That first week, Chris told me when he was going to rape me. He said he was giving you ten days to find me and that when the time was up, he’d take what belonged to you. I knew you would come. I believed. Right up until he stripped me, hosed me down, blindfolded me, and tied me to the fucking wall. Right until he called me dove and told me to pretend it was you. Until he… he…”

Liam reaches for me, but I jerk back, my shoulder hitting the window. I taste salt on my lips but can’t feel myself crying.

“Even after, I still waited for you. Through everything, a part of me always thought you’d come. But when it was finally time for me to die, Chris told me you were dead. I thought you were dead!”

“I’m sorry,” he breathes, tortured eyes tracking my features, the tears that drip from my chin.

“This is your fault,” I seethe. “You gave the FBI the USB drive. You took the diamonds.”

“Why didn’t you tell them it was me?” he demands.

The horrible truth opens like the mouth of a great beast, ready to swallow me whole. My chest convulses on a sob; the jaws of truth snap closed around me.

“I was protecting you. Not Alexis. You. I was ready to die for you, to keep you safe from them.”

The confession hurts. More than anything I suffered in that basement. More than his abandonment six years ago. More than the revelations about my sister. More than everything, anywhere, anytime.

Tears fill Liam’s eyes, turning them a surreal turquoise. He knows what I can’t say—that the worst wound of all is his broken promise.

“I didn’t protect you, Eden. When you needed me most, I wasn’t there. I know it doesn’t mean anything, not after all you’ve suffered, but those six weeks were the worst weeks of my life. I did what I do best, and I failed. They beat me at my own game. However much you hate me, know that I hate myself more.”

His words purify my wound, but don’t heal it. I don’t know if it will ever heal. Calm washes over me, numbs me.

“It’s my fault,” I say, staring over his shoulder at the brown terrain. “I made you the sun. The center of my universe. But you’re a man, not a god. Men aren’t meant to be worshipped.”

“No, we’re not,” he agrees mutedly, “but I still failed you. I don’t expect you to ever forgive me. And yes, I’m doing penance. But not for the reason you think. I’m here because I belong to you. Because I love you. I have always loved you.”

I shift my gaze to his face. See the truth in his eyes. But all I feel is emptiness where the sun used to be.

I shake my head. “I’m broken, Liam.”

“No, little siren. You’re breaking free.”

Then he refastens his seatbelt and puts the car in gear.

Another silent drive.