“He has her,” I say, and everything behind my eyes goes red. “He took Riley. I found the receipt. I found the fucking bar. She was there. He drugged her and carried her out of there like she was nothing. And I…” My throat closes, remembering the way Riley’s hand shook in mine, the last time I held her. The way she begged me not to go. “I need your help. Please.”
Silence.
Then Officer Alvarado’s voice returns on the line, steady and sharper. “I’m on it.”
I don’t even get the chance to say thank you before she hangs up.
I grip the steering wheel tighter with my good hand, driving who-the-fuck-knows-where, driving because all I can do is drive, pushing the dying engine harder, willing it not to fall apart before I reach her. Every second stretches like barbed wire. Every heartbeat is a countdown.
The phone vibrates against my thigh, a new text lighting up the cracked screen. I use my forearm — useless wrist and all — to steer, and snatch up the phone in my good hand. Alvarado’s name. The words:Found it. One hit. Address: 118 Pine Needles Ln. I alerted the MC. You’ve got a few minutes alone — move.
The address pops into focus. It’s not far.
I slam my foot on the gas. I barely notice the houses blurring past, the edge-of-town shacks and trailer lots, each more ruined and lonesome than the last. None of them matter. Only one address matters. The one Officer Alvarado texted, and the one that’s now burning a hole in my brain. I keep repeating it outloud as I drive, tasting each digit, making it real: 118 Pine Needles Lane, 118 Pine Needles Lane, 118 Pine Needles Lane. If I say it enough, maybe the universe will bend and put Riley there, alive, waiting, not broken.
The car fishtails as I whip off the main road onto a gravel drive; the engine howling. The trees shake their branches as if they’re warning me to turn back, but I don’t. I can’t. Not while she’s out there in the hands of that fucking monster who used to be my brother, and not while every second brings me closer to the point where maybe there isn’t even a Riley left to save.
I spot the house in a sudden clearing, hunched at the end of the drive like a bad memory nobody can evict. I slam on the brakes, and the car skids sideways and comes to a coughing, lurching halt between two ruts. The engine rattles, then dies. Smoke drifts from under the hood; it smells sweet, like antifreeze and rot.
I fling the door open and step out into the heavy stillness.
My wrist hangs useless, my ribs burn, and dried blood cracks along my skin.
I don’t fucking care.
Because she’s here, and he’s here.
I draw my gun and move toward the porch with long, determined strides. My boots hit the warped wood like thunder, while my heart is a drumbeat of rage and fear and love.
I plant my heel and kick the door in with everything I have. It explodes inward with a deafening crash, splinters raining across the floor. My voice rips from my chest like a battle cry.
“Viper, it’s over.”
The old house swallows my roar.
“You let Riley walk out alive,” I snarl into the dark, gun raised, breath heaving, “or you die here.”
The silence that answers me is thick, wrong, threatening.
And then, from deeper in the house, comes a laugh.
Chapter Forty-Five
Riley
At first I think I’m dreaming. Not one of the soft dreams I chased as a girl, but the kind that corners you and shoves your face into dread, makes you taste blood and iron and salt on your tongue. Yet somewhere in all that darkness, I hear Breaker’s voice, breaking through the blur of pain and confusion. That voice is my anchor, deep and rough-edged, and for a stupid, impossible heartbeat, I imagine it means safety.
But safety doesn’t belong here.
Not in this basement, with its stench of mildewed stone and rot, where someone’s sweat, blood, and piss have soaked into the concrete, and now, so have mine. Not with Viper, the monster still standing over me, half-turned away as if he’s already forgotten I’m there. My wrists are numb, my ribs sting with every breath, but I fight to keep my eyes open, to clear the sticky clot of blood dragging them closed, and when I do, Viper’s silhouette sharpens into something not quite human.
He moves until he stands at the far end of the basement, his body squared to the stairs, head tipped as if he can taste Breaker’s approach through the air itself. His knife is loose in his hand, but the rest of him vibrates with a coiled, boyish excitement. I see the tremor in his shoulders. The barely contained glee.
Breaker’s voice comes again, but this time it shakes the walls. The ceiling dust sifts down in a fine gray rain.
“VIPER — LET HER GO!”
The noise rips through me, a knife of hope and terror. I want to answer, to scream back, but my throat is packed with pain and fear. I swallow hard and instead watch Viper’s mouth stretch into a sick, toothy smile.
