Page 42 of Bound By Blood
“It is, but thesepeople—”
“Will befine.”
She glowered athim. “Don’tcut me off like that.”
Intent on makingsure their enemies followed them, Saber didn’t pay attention to thetone of her voice until he felt her eyes boring into the side ofhis head. He looked down to discover her scowling at him with herchin raised.
He almost saidsorry for being rude, but he didn’t apologize. Instead, they glaredat each other until the line started moving. Caro broke eye contactfirst, but her shoulders remained back as she edged forward.
Saber stared afterher, confused as to why he cared so much about her anger. Then, hisattention shifted back to the Savages, only two people back inline. When he smiled and waved, they stared dourly back at him.
These two weren’tany fun at all.
Finally, they madeit to the front of the line. Saber threw down some money, and theyeach got a stamp on their hand before pushing through the metalturnstile to the park beyond.
Once inside, Saberstayed close to Caro’s side as they mingled with the crowd. Itwasn’t as big as he would have liked, but that was probably betterfor them. Less temptation for the Savages meant they would be lesslikely to kill.
“Lead the waytoward the woods,” he told her.
Caro tried not tothink about all the children here and the monsters walking amongstthem as they weaved in and out of the crowd. The Savages were neverfar behind.
While before thatwould have been bad, she was glad to see them. It meant theyweren’t off killing some innocent person.
CHAPTER 31
“Were you reallyone of them?” she asked.
They made theirway around the funhouse with all its glass mirrors. The musicplaying inside was almost as creepy as the giant clown face loomingover them and laughing maniacally as it encouraged the bravest ofall to enter.
“Yes,” Saberstated.
The fact he wasperfectly okay with this baffled her. He wasn’t a Savage now, sohow could someone who refrained from killing innocents be fine withhaving done so in the past?
“You killedinnocents?”
“That’s how onebecomes a Savage, but to be fair, the first people I killeddeserved it.”
“No one deservesto die.”
“They murdered mymother and, at the time, I believed they also murdered myten-year-oldsister. So yes, they deserved it.”
Caro gulped, butshe couldn’t argue with him. She probably would have lost it andkilled them too. But… “Did you have to keep killing afterward?”
Saber gritted histeeth against her judgment of him. “Yep.”
The flippant wayhe answered sent a small chill down Caro’s spine. Who was this manshe was working with to stay alive and molesting in photobooths?
“Once you startkilling, it’s not a switch you flip off,” he said, though he had noidea why he bothered to explain it to her.
“But youdidstop.”
“I did.”
“Was it hard?”
That questionrevealed more of her innocence than she would ever know. She’dnever experienced the urges that drove him after he matured or thebloodlust that plagued a Savage. And she never would; he would makesure of it.
“Yes,” hesaid.
