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His gaze moves over my shoulder briefly, checking our surroundings before locking onto mine. "The sender used a burner."

Disappointment settles in my chest. "So, nothing?"

He shakes his head. "Not exactly. Tyler managed to pin down the general location where the messages were sent from." A pause. "They're coming from Vanessa's neighborhood."

My stomach drops so hard I nearly hear the crash.

Vanessa Chase.

I know that name. Everyone in Willow Creek does. The infamous ex-girlfriend. The one who tore through Liam's life like a wrecking ball, leaving nothing but speculation and sharp whispers in her wake.

I meet Liam's gaze, my throat suddenly dry. "As in your Vanessa?"

His expression hardens. "She's not mine."

I ignore the simmering of something in my chest at the way he says it. "But you think it's her?"

Liam lets out a slow breath, eyes flicking away for the briefest second before landing back on me. "I don't know."

I narrow my eyes. "That's not a no."

"It's also not a yes," he counters, his voice smooth, but there's something guarded about it.

I cross my arms. "So you're telling me that some mysterious sender, who has a weirdly personal interest in my life, just happens to be sending messages from the same neighborhood as the woman you used to date?"

Liam's jaw clenches. "I'm saying it could be a coincidence."

I press my lips together. "Right. And I suppose next, you'll tell me the sky is green and that Nate doesn't secretly cry at Pixar movies."

Liam exhales through his nose, clearly already tired of this conversation, but too bad. He's the one who just dropped Vanessa Chase into it like a grenade and expected me not to go digging through the wreckage.

Because of course, I know who she is.

Everyone in Willow Creek does.

Vanessa Chase isn't just the ex. She'stheVanessa Chase—the former high-society darling who used to strut around town like she owned it. The kind of woman who looked at you like she was calculating your worth in real time, her smiles as sharp as the stilettos she never seemed to take off.

And she had been everywhere with Liam back in the day.

I remember seeing them at fundraisers when I was younger, back when I used to tag along with my brothers to the kind of fancy events I had no real business attending. Vanessa had been perfect in the way that makes your stomach turn—polished, poised, always draped over Liam like she was claiming him. I didn't know Liam well back then, but even at seventeen, I could tell he was different with her. Quieter. Tenser.

And my brothers?

Oh, they had opinions.

Dean had hated her. Ryan had tolerated her at best. Even Nate, who got along with everyone, had once mutteredI don't trust that womanunder his breath after one too many scathing looks from her across a dinner table.

Not that it had mattered. Because Liam had stayed with her. For years. Long enough for Vanessa to sink her claws in. Long enough for the breakup to be as public as it was messy.

I don't know all the details—no one does, except Liam and Vanessa themselves—but I remember the whispers. The rumors about how she had tried to control everything in his life, how she hated when things didn't go her way, how she wasn't the kind of woman who let go easily.

And now, somehow, she's tied to this.

I cross my arms, tilting my head. "Tell me something, Carter. When you finally broke up with Vanessa, was it amicable?"

Liam lets out a humorless laugh. "What do you think?"

I study him, his sharp profile silhouetted against the soft glow of the porch light. There's something in his expression—something dark and unreadable.