I want to believe Alec. But it’s hard.
“It was that bitch, Amy.” Owen scowls at the mention of her name. “She was trouble from thestart. Fighting back, kicking, biting…” He shakes his head. “She’swhy.”
Because, in her panic, Amy claimed I knew everything.
She said I knew the name of the man she was meeting. Where he lived. What he looked like. Amy claimed that as soon as I discovered she was missing, I’d figure out everything.
“She said if we let her go,” Owen recalls, “she wouldn’t go to the police. She said we’d be caught otherwise. That we’d spend our lives in prison.”
But they didn’t let Amy go.
They sold her, instead.
And then they decided they needed to kill me to ensure my silence.
Before I can stop myself, I croak, “I didn’t know. She never gave me a name. She never said where she was going. We weren’t… we weren’t close like that.”
I don’t even realize I’m crying until I taste the salt in my mouth. “I didn’t know,” I repeat. “If I had, I would have?—”
But I didn’t know. I didn’t even realize Amy was missing. And now… she’s gone. Trafficked to some foreign country where she’s being abused. Tortured. She might even be dead.
A gentle hand lands on my shoulder. I glance up to see Gage standing beside me. His face is creased with concern. “Maybe you should go in the otherroom,” he suggests in a low tone. “We’re nearly done, anyway.”
My tears flow faster as the terrible truth sinks in.
Human trafficking. Amy. Those other women. All missing.
I was almost killed because of it.
Wendy was hurt. Jess was threatened. Alec could havedied.
Intellectually, I know it’s not my fault. That it was all just a chaos of coincidences. That I didn’t do anything wrong.
Still.
“We need to call the cops,” Knox says. “We can’t wait any longer.”
Alec scowls. “Fine.” He flicks the safety back on and re-holsters his gun. “I think we have enough to go on, anyway.”
Wyatt blinks at Alec. “So you’re not going to kill us?”
“I’d like to,” Alec replies. His voice is sharp with anger. “But I won’t.” A beat, and then in a more threatening tone, “But if I find out you lied to me, if I discover there’s anything you left out… I will. And trust me. I have the resources to do it.”
Knox speaks quietly into his phone, then ends the call and says, “The police are on their way.”
Alec nods. “Okay.” He looks at Owen, Wyatt, and Kyle once more before turning his attention to me.All the anger drains from his expression as worry replaces it.“Hazel.”
“I’m fine,” I choke out. But it’s obvious I’m not.
“Go,” Ronan tells Alec. “We’ve got it.”
With a short jerk of his chin, Alec rushes to me. He pulls me up from the couch and into his arms. “Come on, sweetheart.”
I bury my face in his neck as he leads me out of the living room and back to the bedroom. Pressure builds in my chest, making it hard to breathe. Waves of hot and cold pulse through my body. My head throbs from the effort of trying to stifle my tears.
Once we get into the bedroom, Alec shuts the door behind us and brings me over to the bed. Then he sits down and pulls me into his lap. Hugging me close, he presses kisses to the top of my head as he murmurs, “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have let you be there for that. I’m so sorry.”
It’s not his fault. I insisted on being there. But I can’t seem to form the words to reassure him. Instead, I just keep crying as the dam holding back my emotions overflows. As all the fear and worry and guilt crash into me in punishing waves.
