“Ha. Good thing you won’t have to find out.”
A smile tugs at my lips. “Have fun tonight.”
Parker assures me he will and we hang up. About ten pounds of weight lifts off my chest, though I’m trying really hard to not be insulted with that bit about my worldview needing to be fucked up. Something about falling in love with my best friend’s little brother before he got kidnapped and attempted to kill himself is really exposing all my insecurities, which is incredibly odd to me.
I’ve spent years carefully compartmentalizing everything down to a perfect little science, and it worked fine. Until one day, they started exploding like land mines. I’ve made damn sure to never leave myself in a position to be this raw and vulnerable. But love—whether familial, friend, or romantic—has a way of leaving you with nothing left but smoke to hide behind as you watch who you thought you were go up in flames.
It’s all right if the ones left standing in the rubble beside you help rebuild. However, the task is daunting alone, and it’s probably a good thing it took this long for the kindling to catch.
I do text Em, and not just because Parker suggested it. I don’t know if telling him I appreciate him coming to look after me while Easton was missing will fix his hurt feelings entirely, but it’s certainly a start.
Sometimes even the smallest amount of progress is a shit ton of work, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t need to be done.
Blakely texts me that my presence is required for a family meeting, and when I go downstairs, I find our little group gathered in her office. I don’t know how this many colors don’t give her a headache after days on end. As long as she’s happy, I guess.
“Oh, good. There you are,” she says upon my entrance. I join Easton on the couch while Brady sits opposite of her looking grim. “I’ve got bad news.”
My heart drops. That something better not be that kid’s body. “I already hate it,” Brady mutters, and based on Easton’s face, they’re in perfect agreement.
She frowns. “I have the autopsy for one of the boys Aaron had before Easton.”Oh, fuck. That is bad.“There’s a couple of levels here that concern me,” Blake continues. “Obviously that would mean that he’s committed murder before, so he’s likely to do it again. However, according to this, the boy was starved to the point of death, then he was strangled.”
Easton’s breath is careful and measured, like he’s having to think about how to do it. I wrap my arm around him and pull him to me. He comes easily. “What’s his name?” he asks after he’s gotten himself back together. In record time, I might add. I’m no expert, but I’m almost positive art heals him in places nothing else could reach.
“Oliver Darlington. He was fifteen when he was taken and approximately twenty when he died. Chief Brooks sent me the file that they have on Aaron to confirm, but he was on my radar already. I just couldn’t get ahold of the autopsy report until now. He was found almost five years ago.”
The math is unfortunately quick. “So he killed Oliver then took Easton to replace him?”
Easton shivers. “I think you were the missing link here, lovebug. The FBI has been trying to track him down for a long time, and when Chief Brooks was able to tell them about Asher and you, they had a lot of information to share. Apparently, it’s not uncommon for him to balance two victims at a time, but hangs onto them for a long time. From you, we know that he likes to break people down psychologically first, which is fairly time-consuming. Since he’s surviving off fake identitiesand impressive financial fraud, when anyone starts sniffing around about those things or paying too much attention to his ‘boyfriends,’ he ditches all of it and starts over somewhere else. Rinse, repeat.”
Brady tugs at his hair from the roots. My jaw aches from how hard I’m grinding my teeth together. How much longer would Easton have survived if he hadn’t randomly stumbled onto that engagement?
“Where did I fall in the suspected timeline?”
After a few clicks, she has an answer. “Before Oliver, there was Gabriel LaFontaine. That’s the first person they can tie to Aaron. They were kidnapped within a year of each other, like you and Asher.”
“That was enough time to get me under control. He trusted me to stay home when he left by then. Before, he would obsessively check on me even when he was just at work. Wanted to know exactly where I was and what I was doing. He was only happy with me when he knew I was inside the apartment.”
A growl tries to force its way out of my chest. I manage to shove it back down, but only barely. “Where were the first two found?”
A few more clicks. Given the pallor of her face, she hates knowing these things, but it’s better that we all know exactly what we’re dealing with. “Gabriel was found in northern Michigan, but from the looks of it, they were living in Detroit. Oliver was in Illinois. Probably had them living in the same city, though, if it was the same as Easton and Asher. More convenient, I guess.”
“Does that mean the total is two dead, two alive?” Brady asks, jaw setting afterwards.
“That we know of. If there are others, they either didn’t make it out or never filed police reports about him. Probably wouldhave had to change their names too, knowing him. I certainly hope there aren’t more, though.”
All eyes slowly shift to my Chaos, who has gone concerningly quiet. He sets the tone here. If this is too much for him, we’re all jumping ship. Leave it to the professionals and focus only on how we move on. He tugs restlessly on the hem of his pants, but doesn’t dig his nails in. Certainly a step in the right direction. “However many there are, that’s all he’s going to get. Me and Asher are coming out of this, one way or another.”
There we go then.
Easton slinks off, back to his former bedroom—now art studio—after reassuring us that he’s okay. I’m choosing to believe it. Brady doesn’t wait long before dragging me back to our newest project. I hate him a little more with each passing day.
Well, that’s what I tell him, at least. He doesn’t seem worried. Such a dick.
By the grace of some higher authority I’m not in contact with, the damn gazebo is actually coming out okay. Maybe we learned from our unrecoverable mistakes with his deck. That thing still lives in my nightmares, knowing it's still in shambles waiting on us to do the impossible.
My problems are diverse in nature.
We work in companionable bickering for a while, nothing of significance until Brady has a horrible realization. “Paul must think I died,” he says suddenly.
