My mind riots, and I wonder if he knows something, if he saw her, or if she never made it home. “Are you the only one here?”
There’s something odd about the way he looks me up and down, but he nods. “Yep.” Lifting the can to his lips again, he takes a swallow, then carefully sets it on the counter.
“You haven’t seen Elliot, then? In the last”—I grit my teeth—“half an hour or so?”
He works his jaw back and forth. He takes so long to answer, I’m two seconds from walking over and slapping the truth out of him when he finally begrudgingly admits, “Yeah. She was here.”
The impact of his words slams into my chest. “What do you mean ‘was’?”
“She left with her boyfriend or whatever.” He rolls his eyes. “I don’t claim to know what sort of kinky shit you’re into, but if you wanna bring another dude into the mix… fuck, it’s your life, ma—”
“Stop,” I bark, though I’d mostly stopped listening after the first sentence. “Tell me about the guy she left with.” My entire body is strung tight, and I’ve no doubt I’ll snap if he doesn’t start talking right the fuck now.
He shrugs, giving me a look of disdain. “Like I paid attention,” he mutters, getting up to leave the room.
“Don’t fuckin’ move.” I advance on him, the rage stealing up from my chest and ready to burst from me. And he does move, but it’s backward, five excruciating paces. When I follow, his eyes get bigger and rounder by the second, that cocksure attitude of his fading into anoh, shitconstitution in about two seconds flat. When he slams into the wall behind him, I follow it up by clutching his neck with one hand and getting right in his face. My fingers squeeze involuntarily, as if they’ve been waiting forever for a chance like this. Alec has been an asshole since day one. It’s time he understood I’m done putting up with his particular brand of bullshit.
He rises on tiptoe, trying to get away, but all that does is hook him even deeper. “W-what the f-fu—?” His words gurgle up from the depths of his gut and get stuck behind my palm as I apply pressure to his windpipe.
“Don’t be a fucking asshole. Tell me what you know!” I pull him slightly away from the wall, only to knock his head back into it.
His eyes cross a second, his hands clawing at my forearm. He nods rapidly, and I grimace, almost wishing he’d refuse so I could choke him a bit more, but knowing I need to find out everything he knows or saw… and fast. Because if it really was Nick…
Fuck. I can’t think about that right now.
Behind me, the door flies open, and Archer and Cannon enter, their eyes immediately taking in the scene with Alec, the way my chest is rising and falling in far too fast a rhythm for everything to be okay. Before they can say anything, I heave out the only question I care to know the answer to. “Have you heard from her?” My gaze leaps quickly from Cannon’s to Archer’s shell-shocked faces, my grip on Alec not letting up one fuckin’ bit.
Archer drops his bag at the door and takes a step toward me, his brow furrowing. “No. Not since the text she sent. There’s been nothing.”
Cannon’s jaw twitches and grinds, his lips pressed so tightly together that the skin is leached of blood. His eyes now bore coldly into Alec’s. Because if there’s one thing Cannon knows, it’s that if I’m pissed, he’s probably going to feel the same. He gestures to the asshole in question with a jerk of his head and a lift of his brows, silently asking if he can give me a hand.
Archer, though, steps directly behind me, putting his hand in the center of my back. “K, let up. We need to know whatever he knows. I assume there’s something with the way you’re going after him here.”
Shifting my jaw to the side, I glare at Alec, squeezing once more. “You’re going to tell us everything. Got it?”
He gurgles again, pleading with his eyes.
“K,” Archer’s calm, deep voice rasps. “We need him talking.”
I glance over my shoulder, first at Cannon, who gives me a brief nod, and then at Archer, whose hand remains on my back in a show of support. Breathing hard, I reluctantly let go of Alec, and he promptly sags as I allow him down off tiptoe. “Dick,” he gasps out, clutching at his throat, each inhale a harsh struggle.
“Watch your fuckin’ mouth, Alec.” I shake my head, watching him. “I don’t know when you went from being our initiate to someone I have absolutely no faith in.” I grasp the front of his shirt in my fist and give him a shake. “But you’d go a long way to mending fences if you were to open your goddamn mouth and start talking.”
His chest jerks as he draws in a breath, his eyes narrowing in irritation. “Some guy came to the door earlier. When I answered, he asked for Elliot.”
I lean close. He flinches once, then a second time as his eyes flick to Cannon who has also stepped closer. “More detail, Alec.” We’ll have a look at the footage from Archer’s cameras later, so he’d better not fuckin’ lie.
His chin juts forward. “I don’t know why I’m helping you. The bitch is a pain in the ass.”
Never have I wanted to annihilate someone so desperately in my entire life. Right now. In fact, I could squeeze the life out of him and feel zero fuckin’ remorse. Just before I’m about to lunge at him, Archer grasps my shoulder and Cannon’s. I’m sure it would seem companionable to an onlooker, but I feel his fingers clamping down and digging into my skin. He chuckles darkly. “Alec, you fuckwad. You’d better rid yourself of that irritating fucking attitude, my man. Because these two are about to put their fists through your face. And to be honest, I don’t know if I’ll do anything more to stop them than I already have. Spill now. Details. Before I let them loose and you end up eating your meals for the next year through a straw.”
I glance at Archer, catching the glint in his eye. He means it. And I’m not so sure he wouldn’t take a swing or two himself. He’s carefully restrained for now but building up a whole lot of mad—the kind that quietly simmers and stews until it finally reaches the boiling point and blows up, wiping out everything in its path.
I exhale sharply. “College-age or older, Alec?”
He lifts his hands in silent surrender. “Our age.”
“Have you ever seen him before?”
