Upstairs, Doc shouted for someone to bring more towels.
That broke the room enough for Shaniqua and two women to rush up the stairs.
But most of us stayed frozen below, trapped in what Destiny had hidden.
Tris hugged herself. Her voice went small.
“She just couldn’t take it anymore,” she said. “Tonight, she told us everything, and it was like something snapped. She said they wanted Mandy’s daughter, so she’d give them Mandy’s daughter.”
Tarak flinched.
Regan closed her eyes.
Tris looked up at Edge, tears slipping down her face. “She didn’t go there because she wanted to be bad. She went because they made her feel like she already was. Then somebody gave hersomething. A blunt, but it wasn’t just weed. I don’t know what was in it. She started talking like she was cursed. Like Destiny meant she had to finish what her mother started. Like Mandy was inside her.”
I remembered her in the brush.
Mandy?
I’m not her.
I’m not her.
My hand curled into a fist.
Jake’s voice roughened. “We tried to get her out. We did. But she was gone. Not normal gone. Whatever she smoked hit her fast. She was drunk too, but this was different. She looked right through us.”
Nyla nodded. “They were filming her. Laughing. Even after she was messed up.”
Regan’s head snapped up.
“What?”
Nyla held out her phone with shaking hands. “I took some videos too. Not to hurt her. To show what happened. To show she was drugged. To show them laughing before everything went bad.”
Hacker moved instantly, but Edge lifted one hand.
Everyone stopped.
Edge walked to Nyla.
She looked like she might pass out, but she didn’t lower the phone.
He took it carefully.
Not gently, exactly.
Carefully.
Like he knew this girl was handing him one of the only things standing between his daughter and a noose.
“Thank you,” he said.
Nyla started crying again.
Edge looked at Hacker. “Copy everything. Every phone they have. Now. Then wipe their location from here.”
Hacker nodded and moved.
