I’ll make sure you remember it this time.
I’ll make sure we finish.
Tell your stalker we’re coming for her, too.
“No,” I breathe. “No, I’m not…”
I can’t cry right now. Idon’tcry. I wasn’t the one who was attacked. I wasn’t the one drugged on the bathroom floor. I wasn’t the one who had their safety ripped from them—
I’m just the person who failed her.
“They’re. After. Her.”
The words blurt in breathless hisses, the thickness in my throat making it nearly impossible to get them out.
A muscle feathers in Kade’s jaw, his eyes fluttering as if he’s trying to hold in his own emotion.
“I know,” he breathes. “I know. We’re going to take care of it.”
I chew on my bottom lip for a beat as I try to slow my throbbing heart, and I know Kade can already guess what I’m about to say.
“Where is Rad?” I ask.
Because I want this done.
And maybe if I find him, I’ll find the other two.
I want all three of her attackers.
“I don’t know,” Kade admits, his voice breathless. “I don’t fucking know. I haven’t been able to nail him down since I got out. His trail disappears around the same time as Lance and Trevor’s.”
“What about the number he used to text Reed?”
“It wasn’t a number. It was on one of their socials,” he replies.
My teeth clench, emotion burning behind my nose. Still, I try to blow out a breath in the hopes that I won’t break down right here.
“Did you find where he was during the stream the other night?” I manage.
“Cafe downtown,” Kade answers. “Something is off… I don’t feel like this guy is smart enough to cover his tracks the way he’s covering them.”
“Do you think he has another person telling him what to do?”
“I think he has someone helping him be this strategic,” he says. “And, for all I know, that could very well be Lance or Trevor—especially with what’s coming to light about their track record. Being friends with Damien and any of his crew, outstanding gambling debts—”
“Have you found any?” I ask. “That’s what the woman at the front desk mentioned. She said the only people who ever came by looking for them wanted money.”
“I’m looking,” he says. “That’s what I was going to look into today. That and scour for any news on our friend.”
“Which one?”
“The one you shot,” he says plainly.
“I will not be accepting any slander about that decision,” I tell him. “He was a fucking pedophile.”
“I’m not arguing,” he says. “My only worry is if he was on someone’s watch list.”
I squint at him. “Like the FBI?”
