“Wow, she’s a cold bitch,” Sammy says on a laugh. “Reply and tell her that if she doesn’t meet him, he’ll tell us she’s involved when he gets caught.”
Clay glances at me, clearly looking for my input, before he responds. I nod once, swallowing thickly.
Spinning the laptop back around, he quickly types out a response, then turns it to face me again. Reading quickly, I nod, and he hits send.
Tom : How long do you think it would take them to track all of this back to you too? I want to protect you, but if I’m going down, so are you.
Clicking back into the security footage, we all watch as Courtney’s face morphs into an angry scowl. Digging through her purse, she pulls out her car keys, unlocks her car, and slides into the driver’s seat. Our view of her is restricted once she’s in the car, but her text reply pops up on Clay’s computer as her rear lights click on and her engine starts.
Courtney : On my way.
We watch as she backs her car out of the space and starts to maneuver out of the parking lot. My heart starts to beat a frantic staccato in my chest as I open the tracker app on my cell, and lay it on the table, watching as Starling’s dot steadily blinks on the screen, her location moving as Courtney exits the campus and starts to drive away.
“Holy fuck,” Sammy whispers.
“How long do we wait?” Hunter asks, his lips pursed into a flat line, his shoulders tense.
“Fifteen minutes. We need them to be far enough away from campus that it’s suspicious,” Clay says, the only one of us who still looks calm.
Picking up my coffee, I take a sip, and the cold liquid tastes like ash as it hits my tongue. When I lower my cup to the table, a hand covers mine. Looking up, I find Sammy’s worried eyes staring at me.
“She’s going to be fine,” she assures me.
I nod, because if I speak, I’m going to say something crazy, and I need to at least pretend to be calm, collected, and in control right now.
“In an hour, this will all be over, and you can spend the rest of the day fucking her into submission again. Maybe you’ll even knock her up,” Sammy promises.
“Do you think it’d be weird if our son fell in love with your daughter?” Evan blurts. “Are they actually cousins if Starling and I aren’t biologically related?”
“It’d be kind of weird. But if we all have kids and don’t do the gender selection our parents did to get us, then it’d make sense that some of them might end up together,” Hunter offers. “I’m working on convincing Bunny to get started on babies. She wants to wait, but I think I’m persuasive enough to convince her.”
“I think your idea of being persuasive is blackmail,” Sammy deadpans. “That didn’t work out so well for you last time.”
“Fuck you, Sammy,” Hunter snaps.
“No, fuck you, Hunter. Starling’s not here to keep you humble, so I’m taking up the mantle for the next hour until she gets back.”
Sammy’s reminder that Starling isn’t here drags us all back to the present and the moving dot on the screen that shows my wife’s location.
No one speaks again as we watch Starling get further and further away while the clock ticks down. The moment fifteen minutes pass, Evan hands me his cell, and I hit dial on Chief Turner’s personal cell number.
“Hello,” he answers.
“Chief Turner, it’s Sebastian Lockwood.”
“Sebastian, how are you? I’m afraid I don’t have any update on the situation with Mr. Underhill. He’s still refusing to tell us who he’s been working with?—”
“I think Starling is in danger,” I blurt, not having to fake the fear in my voice, as I interrupt him.
“What? Why?”
“About twenty minutes ago, my wife received a text message from an old friend, someone she only reconnected with this week but that she’s known since elementary school. As they’re both at Kingsacre, and since we were already on campus getting coffee, Starling left to go and meet her.”
“What makes you think she’s in danger?” Chief Turner asks.
“She’s not on campus anymore, and she’s not answering her cell phone. She doesn’t have any security with her. We’re all together, and we’re at school. We thought she’d be safe here.”
“How do you know she’s left campus? Maybe she just went to her friend’s dorm room or out for lunch?” The chief asks, clearly skeptical.
