This was my wife. This was Mackenzie. She had disappeared. I needed to know where she was. I needed to know what my game was. I was going insane.
As soon as I was on the road, I found myself obsessing over her in my thoughts. I hadn’t called her since last night, and all my texts were still unread. She wasn’t checking her phone, but I had to try.
I expected to hear her voicemail message, but instead got an automatic one:
“We’re sorry. Your call can’t be completed as dialed. Try again later.”
When the three beeping sounds of the call being dropped rang through my ear, I nearly drove off the road.
SHE CHANGED HER FUCKING NUMBER?!
I dry heaved. I swerved into a gas station, not giving a fuck that I was driving like a maniac. I called her again.
“We’re sorry. Your call can’t be completed as dialed. Try again later.”
FUCK.
She had. She had disconnected her phone. She had cut me off.
I immediately went to Instagram to message her. I typed in her handle @soccershotsmacmckinnon and went cross-eyed when it said NO USER FOUND.
No. Fuck, no. Had she deleted her Instagram?
Had she blocked me?
Had someone erased her?
I fucking burst into tears. I was… heartbroken. I was pathetic. I deserved this, but the pain was unbearable.
I felt my chest crack open, my ribs splinter apart, my breath stagnant and rabid. I was dying. Had to be. That was the only explanation for this feeling.
This overwhelming feeling of pure, terrifying sadness. I didn’t know how to get in touch with her. I was losing my mind, even becoming psychotic. I hadn’t gone a single day without talking to this girl since I was twelve years old. She was thegoddamn center of my entire life. She was my whole fucking soul.
And in the blink of an eye, she was gone.
Like someone had cut her out of the world and left me in the empty space where she used to be.
35
MAX
Islammed my fists into the steering wheel again and again until my knuckles split open. Blood smeared across the leather, the metallic scent filling the car. My breath came in ragged bursts, hot and shallow.
I couldn’t see straight. Couldn’t think. The world narrowed to red.
Grief blurred into fury, and I hit harder, until the wheel rattled like it might tear loose from the column.
This wasn’t anger anymore. It was torture.
I didn’t hear it, not at first.
The screech of the tires beside me.
By the time my head snapped up, it was too late. Glass exploded across my face, shards slicing into my arms as my hands flew up on instinct. Two men in black masks were already there, swinging golf clubs at the car. Metal screamed against metal.
The door was yanked open. Rough hands grabbed me, dragging me out and slamming me onto the pavement. The air shot from my lungs as my shoulder hit the ground.
I shot up to my feet in a blur of rage. My fist collided withthe first man’s jaw. Bone cracked beneath my knuckles. He went down, but the second was faster. An arm snaked around my chest, yanking me back before slamming me into the side of the truck. Metal groaned. My skull bounced off the frame, and for a split second, the world went white.
