Page 66 of The Ashes of Summer

I crouch until we're level and make him look at me.

"She is." Soft. The softness is deliberate. "And you are going to tell me exactly how to get her back."

That’s when I realize, the fear that moves behind his eyes isn't for himself. It's for her.

"And the longer you sit here repeating the same bullshit," I say, "the longer she's trapped with him."

His face tightens. "He won't hurt her." There's a certainty in it that drives something ugly through my chest. "As long as she gives him what he wants."

The club. The girls. The auction list. Heat goes through me so fast I feel it behind my eyes.

Kurt catches whatever moves across my face and forces himself higher against the bed, wincing at the cost of it. "You don't understand. I tried. I went to get her. I was trying to take her away before Jackson⁠—"

"You tried taking her from me." My words are primal. They’re out before I can stop it.

The monitors jump. Adelaide flinches. Behind me Tamara mutters something I don't catch. But all I can see is Summer vanishing into the dark with another man's hands on her while I ran across the gravel but was too fucking late.

Kurt shakes his head and pays for it with a wince. "You hurt her, Jacob."

It lands exactly where he aims it. Because he isn't wrong. Summer crying in my kitchen. Summer begging me to take her back to her parents. Every time the fear surfaced in her eyes and I looked straight past it, because looking cost me something I wasn't willing to pay.

"She deserved better than both of you." He tries to laugh, but the effort drags a wince across his face.

Constance is the one who looks away, because everyone in here knows there's truth in it.

I drag a hand down my mouth and straighten.

"I'd carve out my own fucking soul for her," I say. "Without question."

And I mean it. I still mean it.

"Now tell me about Rivers Ridge."

His face changes. Pure fear.

"That's not where they are." It comes out fast. "How do you⁠—"

"He took her to Sebastian Vale's. I chased him down. They escaped on a bird."

His eyes closed like it confirmed something he'd been praying against. "Fuck." Quiet. Honest. And every instinct I've got sharpens, because that reaction means something.

"What?"

He opens his eyes slowly. "If he took her to the Ridge..." His throat tightens. "He’s already started his plan."

Cold crawls down my spine. "What the fuck does that mean."

He holds my stare a long moment before he answers.

"There was a girl before Summer."

"What girl?" Adelaide asks, quiet, stepping closer.

Kurt drags a hand down his ruined face. "Her name was Annalise."

The name settles into the room and stays there, heavy, like it already means something terrible before any of us understand why.

"She worked at the club. Jackson noticed her, and after that..." He swallows. "Nothing was normal again."