Page 109 of River Wild

I know who it is. Marcus. The only person who has this number.

I’m part of a group called The Avengers of Injustice.

Marcus is the head of the group. He founded it. He’s also a Marvel nerd, hence the group name.

When I was nineteen, I discovered them purely by chance while browsing social media.

They’re what some might call a vigilante group.

To me, we’re the antitoxin before the disease.

Watching the videos they had posted, showing them entrapping and catching sexual predators before they even got a chance to hurt anyone, gave me a feeling that I’d never felt before … like, if I could do this, then I could make a difference. I could stop bad things from happening.

I remember how my hand shook as I typed out a message to the group via the social media page.

An hour later, a man called Marcus North wrote me back.

He asked how I would like to help. I told them entrapment wasn’t something I was interested in doing. Neither was being videoed while confronting these sick fuckers and putting it out on social media. But helping them was. Stopping the problem before more started was.

Marcus asked if we could talk offline.

Curious, I agreed.

I called the number he had given me.

That was when Marcus told me that there was a job that I could do for them.

But it was an off-the-books kind of job. Then, he explained it.

Without hesitation, I told him I was in.

And my life finally had meaning.

I had purpose.

So, I became an enforcer.

I keep down those who won’t stop.

Those who won’t listen.

I make sure they listen.

I do what needs to be done.

I’m a big man. I can be a scary motherfucker when needed. But, if you asked Red, she’d say I was nice. I’m not nice. Only to her.

I know what it’s like to be a terrified kid subjected to horrific things at the hands of one of those sick fucks.

I’m the right kind of man for the job.

The social media aspect of the group, they do the bait-trapping—posing as children online to trap the predators, arranging a meetup, and then turning up with their cameras and filming them before posting it online. And the namers and shamers post the details on local predators in their areas. They have no clue about the enforcers.

Not everyone would agree with what I do. We currently have thirty enforcers across the country. None of us know who the others are. It’s better that way. But more will join and become enforcers. Because of sick fuckers like my stepdad and the men and women we keep track of, there are more people like me in the world than I care to think about.

Marcus knows who I am.

But we never use our real names.