No.
No.
God damn it.
I look over the photos on the desk again, a final, last-ditch idea coming over me.
Typing in the date of the worst night of my life, I hold my breath, hoping the universe can be kind enough to give me this.
The loading icon appears, and I have to refrain from jumping out of the chair with joy.
As tabs and open applications autoload onto the screen, I remind myself that there are things in here that are probably going to terrify me. I have to take myself out of the equation.
I’ve compartmentalized my emotions for years. I can do it for another 30 minutes and then go have my feelings about whatever I see in the safety of my home.
The first thing to fully load is a mirroring app, showing a black screen in the shape of a phone.
There’s no way.
I tap my phone screen twice, and the second it lights up, the mirror app does too.
Breathing through my heartache, I keep going.
Cameras in my apartment.
Angry, hot tears threaten to spill.
I can’t let the emotions in. Ican’t.
But they just won’t stop.
Seeing it all in vivid detail on the screen, I can’t keep pretending my fury is just about the violation of having cameras and watching my every move.
I thought what we had wasreal.
That our connection was real. Not that he’s been watching me and cataloguing everything about me, so Cormac knows just how to manipulate me into falling for him.
This changes everything about us. None of it was real for him. It was all a choreographed, targeted strike. And I fucking fell for it.
Devastation sits heavy in my stomach, fueling the rage threatening to boil over and destroy everything between here and Cormac.
Exiting out of the apps without tearing apart the whole computer takes everything in me, but I can’t make him pay for this if the police or death get to him first.
Searching through every folder, every open tab, I scramble through the endless mess of the computer until I find what I’m looking for.
Six cameras across the bottom level of the townhome, one facing the street from above the exterior door, and one facing each window upstairs, both inside the bedrooms and in the hall.
It seems like overkill, but I guess after what happened, I’d be extra cautious too.
Dressed in plain clothes, I find Steele ripping through everything in the kitchen, throwing plates and coffee mugs onto the floor. If I didn’t already know who he was, I might just assume he was a robber or something. I guess walking around uniformed would draw too much attention.
But plain clothes means no camera, which means he knows what he’s doing is well outside of the law. He’s not afraid of there beinganyconsequences for this, which likely means he’s not counting on leaving Cormac alive if he can find him.
He’s already turned over one of the couches and emptied the entertainment center.
All I can do is sit and watch him destroy Cormac’s home, terrified that he’ll find something that helps him get in here, and I’ll be stuck without a way to defend myself.
There has to be something in here.
