“Are you sure?” Wendy asked.
“Of course. I’ve known her for almost ten years.” Lindsey pointed to the picture. “This woman’s eyes are different, and something about her chin. I don’t know, but it’s definitely not Megan.” She glanced up, her brow furrowed. “Who is it?”
“That’s the woman who crossed the border with Megan’s passport.”
“Fuck,” Todd said. A decoy.
“Unfortunately, it gets worse.” Wendy cleared her throat. “Lindsey, one of your neighbors called the police this morning because someone vandalized your front door.”
“Vandalized how?”
“The picture’s pretty graphic.” Wendy unlocked her phone, tapping on the screen before setting it on the table.
Lindsey gasped and her face turned stark white.
Todd came around and bent over the table to view the photo.Motherfucker.
Someone had tacked a bloody piece of gray sweatshirt—like the one Pete had been wearing at the cabin—to the door with a hunting knife. Scrawled in thick, wet red letters beneath were the words: YOUR TURN.
The tremors started in Lindsey’s hands and radiated out until she trembled from head to toe.
Megan wasn’t in Canada; she was in California.
She’d been to Lindsey’s apartment.
Nausea climbed her throat as the panic set in. “I need to call my parents, warn them.”
“Sure, but they already know.”
“How?” Lindsey looked up at the blonde, even more grateful that she was a friend of Todd’s and not some random bureaucrat.
“When the property manager couldn’t get ahold of you, they called your emergency contact. Your dad got in touch with Kurt Steele, who I guess had sent him an update on your status yesterday, and Kurt passed it on to your lawyer.”
What a mess. “Can I call them?”
Wendy nodded. “I’ll get instructions on how to call out from here.”
Numb, all she could do was nod.
Half an hour later, after an exhausting, tear-filled conversation with her mom and dad, during which they’d ridden the high of her and Todd’s freedom and the low of Megan’s threat, Lindsey laid her head on her arms and closed her eyes.
Unable to convince her parents to leave town, she’d at least made them promise to stay with her aunt in Long Beach for a few days. She’d also suggested they quit answering their phones, since reporters kept calling for background on their stories.
Would her business survive her becoming a headline?
Large, warm hands slid across her shoulders, kneading gently, releasing the tension in her neck. Her chest fluttered, and she wanted to give in, to let Todd work out every painful knot and ease the tightness in her chest with his loving touch.
But that way lay more heartbreak.
She wiggled to dislodge him. “I can’t.”
“Sorry.” He removed his hands, taking his warmth and comfort. “I just hate to see you suffering.”
Sitting up straight, she lifted her chin and watched him as he sank into a chair several feet away. “You can’t have it both ways. We’re either friends or we’re not. And since nothing has changed, we’re not.”
“Lindsey—”
“Which means as soon as we leave here, I’ll never see or speak to you again.”
