Page 49 of Claiming Liberty
Angel shakes his head. “Sawyer will stop you. You have to leave without him finding out you were ever here.” He flicks his gaze at Elsie. “I’ll figure something out to—”
“No,” I cut him off. “I’m not leaving anyone here this time. All the women get to leave.”
“Sawyer would—”
“Sawyer will be dead.”
Angel’s face drains like he’s just been given news of a terminal illness before he wanders back a step, turning to look away.
“Angel, please,” I beg, going to him and taking his hands. He doesn’t pull away, but he also doesn’t look at me.
“If we had you on our side, we could do this. We could save so many people. You could right your wrong.”
I squeeze his hands, but Angel tugs them away. I whimper at his absence when he takes several steps back. “Please.”
“I can’t do that,” he says, his voice low. “I’ll figure something out, I promise you, but I can’t help you kill Sawyer. He… He, um...” Angel pauses a moment. “He’s coming around.” He gestures at Elsie. “He was just telling me he knows bringing Elsie here was a mistake. I’m pretty sure he’s already planning on letting her go.”
“Bullshit,” I groan. “Even if that is true, it isn’t enough. No one should be forced to be here.”
“Then I’ll figure that part out.”
“No, you won’t!” I say, my hands flying desperately in the air. “Youcan’t.”
He frowns, and I slowly give my head a shake. “Angel, I love you. You’re a good man. If you love me like you say you do, you’ll do this for me.”
His eyes narrow to slits. “That isn’t fair.”
“None of this is.” I take a deep breath and let a moment pass. “If you could just… Just tell Sawyer that Chaffer is the one who poisoned the alcohol. That would be huge.”
He eyes me skeptically. “Why?”
“Because then he’d retaliate,” Layan answers for me, taking a step toward Angel. “Do you remember me?” she asks.
Angel pauses a moment, rolling his bottom lip into his mouth with discomfort, but finally, he nods.
“If you don’t want to help us take down Sawyer, fine. I understand.” She shrugs as if it isn’t a big deal, but her expression is as serious as I’ve ever seen it. “You could even tell him about us and stop all of this… But Eli Colley is the type of man you would be helping us get rid of. He deserves to die. If you want to stop us later, you can. But at least let us take some of the sadists out first… You’d be helping their slaves, even if that doesn’t mean they get to leave the island.”
This, he considers. I see the wheels churning behind his eyes, see him calculating the risks. Still, after everything, he doesn’t fully turn against Sawyer.
“Just think about it,” Layan says. She picks up the flashlight and turns to me. “We need to go.”
Kingsley must agree because he goes to Peter, and he and Layan help Peter up. His eyes barely open, and he lets out a low groan while they each put one of his arms over their shoulders. As they help him down the path, I swing my gaze between Angel and Elsie, unsure how the hell I can leave either of them.
We didn’t plan on taking Elsie. We all agreed it would be too dangerous, that they’d search for her and would kill us all once they found her with us.
But now… Now it doesn’t seem possible to leave her behind.
“It’s okay,” Elsie says, seemingly reading my mind. She presses her lips together, and her face pinches like she’s trying not to cry. “Sawyer would freak if I left.”
I look at Angel, silently imploring him as if he has the power to change things. “Do you think Sawyer would buy you wanting to keep her for a few days?”
Angel sighs and lifts his hand to his hair, wincing when he touches the gash Peter left. He brings his fingers in front of him and eyes the blood.
“No,” he says, his hand dropping to his side. “He’s already made it obvious he doesn’t want me around Elsie. He only let me take her because his mind’s too busy thinking about…” Angel’s mouth stays open like he just caught himself. He closes it and clears his throat.
I attempt to finish for him. “About what happened tonight, in the playroom?”
He nods. “Yeah.” I get the sense that I’m missing something but let it go. Elsie is here, and I have to leave her. I don’t have time to read into Angel’s cryptic response.