Four Crows Read online

  Table of Contents

  Author Note and Disclaimer:

  Other Books by Lily White

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chaper Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty One

  Chapter Twenty Two

  Chapter Twenty Three

  Chapter Twenty Four

  Chapter Twenty Five

  Chapter Twenty Six

  Chapter Twenty Seven

  Chapter Twenty Eight

  Chapter Twenty Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty One

  Chapter Thirty Two

  Chapter Thirty Three

  Chapter Thirty Four

  Chapter Thirty Five

  Chapter Thirty Six

  Epilogue

  This is a work of fiction and any resemblance to any person, living or dead, any place, events or occurrences, is purely coincidental. The characters and story lines are created from the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Four Crows: Copyright © 2017 by Lily White

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced, scanned, distributed in any printed or electronic form or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

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  A romantic thriller by Lily White

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  Author Note and Disclaimer:

  This book is intended for entertainment purposes solely. This novel discusses sensitive subject matters. Readers who sensitive to triggers are advised to proceed with caution.

  Other Books by Lily White

  (Book title hyperlink directs to purchase page on Amazon)

  Her Master’s Courtesan

  (Book 1 of the Masters Series)

  (Available on Smashwords and Barnes & Noble)

  Her Master’s Teacher

  (Book 2 of the Masters Series)

  Target This

  Hard Roads

  Asylum

  Wake to Dream

  Dear Katie:

  Maybe this is a stupid way for me to start this letter. You’re so much more than dear, but I can’t wrap my brain around another way to begin. It may even be stupid for me to be writing you at all. There’s no place for me to send this. If there were, I’d be standing with you in person taking you back from whatever evil has stolen my life away.

  For the first time, I don’t know what to say to you. We never had that problem before. From the moment we met as kids, we were each other’s safety net. We laughed easily. We smiled brightly. We kept each other warm during the winter storms, and we played in the sun during the long summer afternoons.

  I’ve done something wrong, baby. I’ve done many things wrong because I’ve lost the sounding board you’ve always been in my life. I’ve lost my confidence, my strength, and my common sense. You were all those things, and now that you’re gone, I’m wandering lost.

  Without you to guide me home, I fear I’ll never be found.

  My actions have hurt a girl. I’ve hurt her without remorse and in ways that would make you hate me if you could see what I’ve done. I don’t want to think of myself as a monster – but maybe I am. I’m not done hurting her, and when I’m finished, I know she’ll be destroyed.

  She’s so young, this poor creature that I’m dragging through my insanity, the one who’s trapped and helpless to a man who lost his mind fourteen years before she met him. I held a gun to her head. I kicked dirt in her eyes. I threatened her life until she was cowering beneath me begging for me to forgive her for everything she’d done. But even her tears weren’t enough to smother the rage that pulses inside me, they weren’t enough for me to let her go, to give her a safe place to run to while I annihilate everything she’s ever known.

  You never knew her because she was just a child when you disappeared. If Michael hadn’t been taken away from me when I was off at war, she would have been the same age as our son. Maybe they would have met in a sunlit field as kids like you and me. Maybe they would have grown up together, their bodies developing and changing as their hearts taught them what it was to truly love one another. I should feel protective of this girl, should feel a need to watch over her as I’d intended to watch over Michael, but the drive inside me to return the pain I’ve lived with has led me to use her in the worst possible ways.

  Please don’t hate me, Katie. I couldn’t live with myself if you turned away. Seeing your smile disappear would shred my heart. Hearing the disappointment in your voice would force me to my knees. Not seeing the bright blue of your sparkling eyes because you lost your faith in who I am would absolutely destroy me.

  But I can’t lose those things, can I? I can’t see your smile, I can’t hear your voice, and I’ll never see the light in your eyes again.

  I’m a rabid dog off his leash, a hungry tiger uncaged, a feral wolf that’s been injured and abused, only to be set free. Without you to hold the leash, I’ve become focused and intent on destroying everything in my path.

  They took you from me. They stole you and they stole my son. They stole my heart, my soul, my happiness, and the perfect beat that pushes blood through my silent and broken heart.

  I wasn’t given the chance to save you from the shadows. They took you when I wasn’t there to protect you.

  Who does that? Who waits until a man is off at war to come in and steal away the only thing that gives him the ability to breathe? They could have stolen my arms or legs, my heart or lungs, my teeth or any other part of me and it would have hurt less than taking you. The pain is unbearable. It’s never ending. And over the years that I’ve endured the agony, it’s developed into something far darker, far more deadly, than anything I knew could exist inside me.

  If I could crawl to you just to hear your voice once more, if I could drop to my knees just to see one last glimpse of your face, if I could give up my life just to hear the love that was always in your voice, I would forgo my pride, my strength, my entire being just to have you in my arms for one second longer.

  All that’s left for me to do is confess the sins I’ve committed, to confess the sins I still have left to do.

  I know you will disapprove of the man I’m becoming, but I don’t know how else to ease the aching that consumes me every second of every hour of every day. Not even sleep relieves me of the agony. And not even death will allow me to forgive this world for the pain that remains when you’re not
there.

  A man is dead because of me, and three more will die before I’m done.

  A young girl is crying because of me, but my heart can no longer care about the tears I’ve caused.

  I haven’t hurt her in ways that make me pure evil, not like the men that stole you away. However, every day has me inching closer to the line that separates a good man from the monster I’m becoming.

  Vengeance has blinded me to my actions. More blood will spill once Maggie leads me to the men that stole you from my life. All I can do now is ask you to understand me, and to beg you to forgive me for my crimes.

  Forgive me for the heartache that consumes me.

  Forgive me for not having the ability to let you go.

  Forgive me for the pain I’ve caused Maggie, and for destroying a girl who’s too young to know what it means to live.

  The world has made you a woman shining among the stars, and left me behind as a broken and crippled man.

  For that, I won’t stop, Katie. I won’t relent, not until all three of the Crows are dead and gone.

  And you’ll just have to forgive me, Darlin’, for all the messed up and unforgivable things I’m about to do.

  Do you remember what you were doing an hour ago?

  How about a day ago? A week? Or even a year?

  Or how about when you were four years old, on a warm summer day, hours after a rainstorm had washed away the languid heat just enough to cool the breeze that blew in from an open window?

  I do.

  But I wish I didn’t.

  On that day, and with small, fat fingers, I awkwardly gripped a red crayon in my hand. Situated on the dirty linoleum floor in the kitchenette, I stabbed at the white rectangle of construction paper in front of me, worrying my bottom lip between my teeth, a habit I had when I was trying to concentrate.

  The paper crinkled each time my fist flew down. Another dot. Another splash. Another spray of liquid ruby that twinkled on the blades of grass in my front yard in bright and brilliant sunlight.

  The wash of gemstones was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen, but it was as scary as it was pretty, I just didn’t understand why.

  “Well, there she is, my little slice of pumpkin pie. Why don’t you get up here and give your daddy a hug?”

  A wooden chair creaked to accept my father’s weight. I squealed a delighted sound, my small body pushing up from the floor to climb in the lap of the biggest person I knew. I’d seen other mommies and daddies in the parks as they hovered over their children, but none of them were as big and strong as mine.

  With a smile on my lips, I clasped the drawing in my hand and laid my head against his chest to listen to the steady rhythm of his heart. It was always warm and safe when he held me.

  “What did you draw, Maggie Pie? Let Daddy have a look.”

  His fingers brushed over the mess of black curls that framed my cherubic face, his heart beat slow and strong beneath his ribs. The paper rustled as he pulled it from my hand, a smile creasing his lips to look at the rubies I’d scattered across a field of green.

  “Well, would you look at this?” A smile tilted his lips as I pulled my head away to look up into his proud face. Grinning down at me with a gleam behind his eye, he barked out a laugh before asking, “Do you know what this is, angel?”

  Nodding so hard the curls bounced around my skull, I looked at my father with wide green eyes and said, “Red rain.” My chubby finger pointed at those pinhead dots of color scattered across the grass. “Rubies.”

  “Rubies, huh?” His mouth pursed, a shrill, loud whistle cut from his lips before he looked at me again. “And why do you think they’re rubies?”

  “They sparkle,” I answered.

  Heavy steps rattled the floor beneath the chair where my father sat with me in his lap, my brother, Finn, answering my father’s whistle. “What’s going on?”

  Finn was big like my daddy, leaving me to often wonder why my siblings weren’t close to my age. I’d seen other brothers and sisters in the park where they played together and were the same size. But my two brothers were too big to play. With me, at least. They always played with their friends at night with no problem.

  Holding up the drawing for Finn to see, my daddy laughed and said, “She says it’s red rain. And rubies. Didn’t I tell you to run that damn wood chipper at night when she’s sleeping?”

  Finn crumpled the drawing in his hand, his narrow eyed gaze slicing down across me. Palpable anger from someone much larger than myself caused me to shrink against the only person that made me feel safe.

  “Daddy?”

  Strong arms held me tight as bitter words that I didn’t understand, much less care for, were exchanged between the two men. Eventually, Finn let out a bark of disgust before stomping his feet out of the room, disappearing into the dimly lit interior of the small home.

  “Now, don’t you worry about your brother, Maggie Pie. He’s just mad because he got caught breaking the rules. It’s not your fault he’s a dumbass.”

  The vibrato of his baritone voice soothed me. Settling against him, I pressed my ear to his chest to feel the familiar rattle that happened when he spoke. His voice was so big his lungs and ribs could barely contain it. When he talked, the words came out of his mouth, but also vibrated along his entire body.

  “I’m taking you to the park today, little one. Do you remember that new friend you’ve been talking to? Michael, I think, or Mitch?”

  “Michael,” I answered, the hint of a smile in my voice because I loved going to the park. I made new friends every time I went, and daddy made friends as well. Daddy was so lonely. I wished he’d make friends for longer than just a night.

  “Yeah. Michael. I can drop you off, little one, but I won’t be able to stay that long today. I have to get everything hitched together for the long drive we’re taking tomorrow out to old man Maxwell’s farm. You like that farm, don’t you?”

  “Yes,” I answered.

  I did like it. The horses were pretty and the goats were funny. But I hated the hogs. They had high-pitched, keening squeals that threatened to make my ears bleed. It scared me, the way they threw themselves at the gate of their pen desperate to eat whatever came their way.

  Daddy and my brothers liked the hogs, but I didn’t.

  “Maybe we can take Michael to the farm. He’d like that, too. Don’t you think?”

  Nodding my head, I cuddled closer.

  “When Michael’s mommy comes to get him, you should ask her to give you a lift home. That way you don’t have to find your way here in the dark all by yourself.”

  “Okay, Daddy.”

  It wouldn’t be the first time I brought a friend home. And their mommies always had a good time.

  It was perfect weather to be at the park that day. Two peas in a pod, Michael and I played like we’d known each other our whole lives. We both liked bugs, liked to swing so high on the swing set that its feet would lift off the ground, Michael’s mother reprimanding us every time the chains went slack and sent us into free fall.

  I loved the thrill, and so did the friend that was so much like me.

  Eventually, dusk settled around our shoulders and Michael’s mother told him it was time to go home for dinner and bedtime. He was a good kid, didn’t argue, and when he took her hand to walk to their car, he turned back to see me sitting alone in the sand, the only child left in a park that had been deserted to the brilliant color of the setting sun.

  “Where’s your daddy, Maggie? Is he coming to pick you up?”

  She’d been so worried and I knew that despite the late hour, his mother would drive me home.

  “Why is she screaming like that?”

  Shrugging my tiny shoulders, I scooped two fake sugar cubes into Michael’s cup. Teal with pink rims and tiny sparkles, my tea set was one of my favorite things. Beside me sat Cuddle Bear, and next to Michael was his stuffed rabbit, Floppy Bunny.

  “They’re just having fun, I guess. Grown ups are so weird,” I answer
ed. “You don’t have to be scared. As long as your mommy gets enough sleep tonight, she’ll wake up in time to go to the farm with us tomorrow.”

  It’s when the mommies didn’t wake up on time that was really bad. My friends were always scared when that happened - too scared to smile when they saw the farm the next day.

  “Does Floppy Bunny need more sugar in his tea?”

  Staring at Michael with wide, expectant eyes, I ignored the loud music they always played when there was company. With loud guitars and pounding drums, the music was sometimes happy and a lot of times mad.

  The mommies would make a lot of noise, but I knew it was just in fun because Daddy and my brothers would always laugh. Not the quiet kind of laughter either. They laughed like someone was tickling their sides until they couldn’t breathe. I was glad they always had a good time, and often wondered if I’d get to see the party when I became a grown up.

  There was one thing I hated about these kind of nights. Every time they made new friends, I knew it wouldn’t last.

  One night only, my Daddy always told me, and then we move on to a new place for a while and make friends there.

  He’d always ruffle my hair.

  We’ll come back, Maggie Pie. This is our land and we’ll always come back to it.

  Fourteen Years Later…

  “Man, it’s good to be home. I never thought I’d miss this place as much as I have over the past two years.”

  Nudging my shoulder with his own, my father smiled at me with exhaustion shadowing his eyes and the sweat of late summer heat tacky against his skin.

  “What do you say, Maggie Pie? Did you miss it?”