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Prologue

Chicago, 1922.

I don't suppose you've ever had one of those kinds of gut feelings, an instinct even. You know what I mean, surely? As though something heavy's weighing your insides down prior to a bad event. It's like you know something undesirable's going to happen, and that's exactly what I felt before I left for my Uncle's party. Dread. Real apprehension.

Hours before it even happened, I knew it would. I won't tell you how: I couldn't even if I wanted to, believe me. But now I've been taken. He calls it a fair negotiation. I call it kidnapping. He tells me to stop talking. And I fume over his arrogance, blaming everything and everyone on this evening's events.

Had it been left to me, I would have stayed at home and offered society my excuses, but it doesn't work like that. And as a result, look at me now.

We're speeding off to God knows where, about to do God knows what. My mind can only imagine the horrors awaiting me when he slows this awful beast of a car to a halt. The police are after us, or, well, him to be exact, but I know that the longer I remain in his company, the higher the chance of being caught out in a massive stand-off between the two.

And still, he refuses to wipe that smirk off of his face.