Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 101985 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 510(@200wpm)___ 408(@250wpm)___ 340(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 101985 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 510(@200wpm)___ 408(@250wpm)___ 340(@300wpm)
Besides, if she doesn’t regret it by now, I’m afraid she will soon.
There has to be at least a hundred photos here. What am I looking for? A clue as to where he would take her. There’s a photo of him with three guys he refers to as foster brothers, all of them smiling and holding up beers. There’s one of him fishing and a few at the beach, but nothing to give me any idea about where he lived before he enrolled at Blackthorn.
Clearly, his old man left him money. Probably money he stole from the family, but nobody was ever able to find it. He wasn’t as smart as he thought, though, because he got found out. Hence agreeing to work with the feds. He was scared out of his mind knowing Bruno Morelli doesn’t take well to being robbed. No one does.
But he is a guy with plenty of muscle behind him, which most people don’t have at their disposal.
I’m halfway through Dean’s photos when the messenger box pops up. Who is this? I know it isn’t Mia. Mia’s with me. I don’t have time to respond before he follows up with a second message. Let me guess. You think you can help her, don’t you? Haven’t I already told you? You can’t protect her.
“Motherfucker,” I mutter, drawing Chris’s attention. “He knows I’m on here.” What am I supposed to say? If it was just me, I wouldn’t care. I would dare the bastard to come and find me, to fight it out like men. Hell, I don’t even hold it against him. If I watched somebody blow my dad’s head off, I’d want to kill them, too.
But this isn’t that simple. If only it was.
This is between you and me, I type. She has nothing to do with it. You know that.
It’s your turn to see what it means to lose.
No, no, not like this. Where are you? If you want me, you’ve got me. Face-to-face. Whatever you say. Leave her out of it.
Why should I?
Because you know she has nothing to do with this. The family. She’s innocent.
I was innocent, too. That didn’t stop you.
“I didn’t know!” I’d smash the fucking computer into dust if it wasn’t for Mia needing me. I didn’t know.
Would that have changed anything? he asks. Never mind. I don’t want your excuses. I want your suffering. His account goes from active to inactive, telling me he’s logged off. And I still don’t know where the hell he is, where he’s taken her.
Until a ping rings out from where my phone sits on the table. A new alert.
Front Door Open
“The condo!” I leap out of the chair and take off at a run with Chris shouting questions behind me. I hardly hear him. She must have somehow convinced him to take her there, knowing I would find out. Either that or this is the way he planned it all along.
He wants me to watch him hurt her in the one place she was supposed to be safe. Just like he was supposed to be safe that night when I showed up.
“The condo!” I shout to anybody who can hear me. I don’t know if they understand what I mean, but I don’t care. All I care about is the motorcycle sitting outside, waiting for me. The truck won’t do right now—I can cut in and out of traffic much quicker with this. It would take ninety minutes to get to the condo if I drove four wheels. On two? I can make it in half the time.
And I need to be even quicker than that. Every minute she’s with him is a minute she could be hurting, and it’s all because of me. If we both live through this, I’ll never stop trying to make it up to her.
That’s the last thought I have before tearing down the driveway, wind rushing in my ears.
Hold on, Mia. I’m coming.
32
MIA
“You didn’t even think to wonder why I was able to get to you as fast as I did, did you?” Dean laughs at his own question before I have the chance to answer. “Of course, you didn’t. I was waiting in a hotel ten minutes from your house because I knew you would come running. You were too busy thinking about yourself to think about it. With your head so far up your ass, you practically threw yourself into this situation.”
Now is not the time for me to be a smart-ass. I have to keep him calm and level. All through the drive to school, he slowly went deeper and deeper down the rabbit hole. Telling me all about how miserable his life was after Zeke murdered his father.
Murdered. It’s an ugly word. How would I feel about Zeke if I watched my father die because he pulled the trigger? What if I was ten years old, crouching in a closet in a cramped motel room, peeking out through the barely open door? “I was there with his body for hours until somebody came.” I lost track of how many times he said that. “And that wasn’t anywhere near as bad as things got.”