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Viper quickly showed Nick the photo of her destroyed place, then called her.

Nick kept close, a worried look on his face.

“You’re up early,” Lyric said by way of hello.

“I haven’t slept yet.”

“Me either.” The weary words made him even angrier.

“Are you okay? What happened?”

“The picture doesn’t do justice to what he did to my place.”

“I take it you weren’t there.” He breathed a sigh of relief.

“Best we can tell, based on the surveillance footage, which I didn’t know existed until my sister told me you went to Jax and asked him to set it up—”

“Because I was worried that asshole wouldn’t leave you alone. And look what he did.”

“It was very sweet. I appreciate it. But it didn’t help in this case because he had to have done it while I was at your place.”

Thank God she’d been safe in his bed with him. “You’re sure?”

“Yep. Cops think so, too.”

“Good. You called them. Then, this is documented and on the record. Did they arrest him?”

“No. He claims he didn’t do it. There’s no evidence yet to support my claim that he did. We’ll see if the cops get any fingerprint matches. Doesn’t really matter, though. After the threatening texts he left me last night and my interactions with him today, I know he did it.”

He went eerily still. “What happened today?”

Nick frowned. He could hear everything, since they were standing so close, even though Viper hadn’t put the phone on Speaker.

Lyric sighed but didn’t say anything for a second before she admitted, “I tried to be nice.”

He completely understood. “You’re too nice sometimes.”

“Yeah, well, it bit me in the ass again.” She told him about her day with Rick and how he reacted to her not wanting to write with him anymore or let him perform at the bar. “You know what I like about you? You never tell me what to do or how to feel.”

“You’ve got that covered, Angel. Where are you?” He needed to know she was safe.

“I just finished cleaning up my place about half an hour ago. There’s not much left. It’s going to cost a small fortune to replace my bed and furniture, all my dishes.” The words were so filled with grief and heartache he felt his chest tighten in sympathy.

“Who’s there with you? Aria? Melody? Jax?” He hoped one or all of them had stayed with her.

“Aria and Melody agreed to keep this quiet until the morning. They closed up the bar, helped me, then went home.”

“You’re alone.” He didn’t mean to raise his voice or sound angry, but it scared the hell out of him to think of her as a sitting duck.

“Me and the cop in his patrol car downstairs.”

He breathed a sigh of relief. “You shouldn’t be alone.”

“That’s what the first cop said, so he left another one with me.”

“Why didn’t Aria or Melody stay?”

“Because I don’t like to cry in front of anyone, and I needed some time alone to be angry without anyone seeing it.”