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“Who’s Mylandra, Gia?”

“She’s hell come to reclaim an escaped inmate”

“Where are you going?”

“Anywhere but

here”

He stepped closer to her slowly “And what are you going to do there?”

“Becoain, as many times as I have to”

“No, baby” He took the shirt from her hands and tossed it behind him “You don’t run from the kind of trouble that can follow you across an ocean You’ll always be looking over your shoulder and no h”

Her eyes flashed at him “What the fuck do you know, Lefty? You know bullshit about what

I’ve been through I won’t do it again Nothing you or De around like a fucking sitting duck Do you knohat they do to girls who run and get caught?”

Her words were a sucker punch he’d never seen co

“Do you, Lefty?” She turned his name into a mockery

His voice box stopped working What do I say to that? Did she expect an answer? He shook his head no

“That’s right, you fucking don’t I’ve lived through shit, seen shit that would curdle your stoaze on hiainst your will? Over and over until all you could do was retreat so far into the back of your ive a shit what happened to you, or even know if you were dead or alive? You ever wake up with so many bodily fluids on your skin you throw up and it’s all you can do to drag your bruised and battered body out of the bed to the shower?”

The ies painted in his head made him want to wretch How could someone do this to