With one hand pressed against his bleeding arm, Ezekiel ran through the forest that was located behind the Belmonts' residence.
Blood soaked through his fingers and it wasn't from the beating but because the skin he had worn had begun to turn unstable. His breath came harsh as he stopped against a trunk of a bare tree, his vision turning hazy. When he pulled his hand away, there was blood on his palm.
Damn it, Ezekiel cursed. Just one more hour was all he had needed for the treaty to break.
He regretted fleeing from the debt collectors now. Instead, he had endured the beating for Ruelle's sake, thinking he could still hold the dead man's face long enough. But right now, Harold Belmont's skin was turning unstable. He could feel his flesh burn as if something alive were chewing through the corpse from the inside. Rejecting him.
He had slipped out through the window before the ministers and others could see him.
