Page 72 of Crash

Despite everything, I smiled. “Stop trying to protect me from having feelings.”

She traced slow circles on my abs, each touch sending warmth from my skin to my heart. “Promise you won’t do anything rash?”

“Tessa.”

She sighed. “He sent another letter.”

Every muscle in my body went rigid with two more words:anotherandletter. I recalled what she’d been mumbling incoherently before her MRI. Something about police not being able to prove it was him, about wishing they used handwriting experts.

“What do you mean, another letter?”

The silence stretched so long that I thought she wouldn’t answer.

When she did, her voice was carefully controlled, like she was defusing a bomb. “After I filed the police report, he started showing up on campus, demanding I drop the complaint. Then he went quiet. Long enough that when the letters beganappearing, the police said there was no way to prove it was him. Especially since the first ones were typed, self-sealed, slipped directly into my mailbox. Untraceable.” She drew a shaky breath. “Years later, when they turned handwritten, the police visited him, but again, no proof. No fingerprints. No explicit mention of that night. Just him, finding ways to remind me he’s still out there, still watching.”

My vision burned red. The only thing keeping me from leaping up and hunting him down right now was the weight of her against my chest.

Knox was in prison with people like this predator. The type of guy who wanted control over his victim, and when she dared speak out against him, the only way for him to maintain a sense of power and control was to continue to dominate her through threats and fear. It was like reliving that attack over and over.

And putting Tessa through hell.

All while, evidently, keeping track of where she lived. He had to have her address to send that letter.

“Tess, have you seen him since the attack?”

Tessa yawned. “No. I just hate it when another letter comes.”

A letter. How did he get her a letterhere? She hadn’t even had mail forwarded yet, just grabbed the stack of mail on her counter from?—

I glared across the room at a piece of paper, a typed letter sprawled on her dresser.

Motherfucker. It took a massive—massive—amount of control to hold her until her breathing evened out, until I was certain she’d fallen into safer dreams. Only then did I ease away, tucking the covers around her shoulders, and then snatched the letter off her dresser.

I read it in the hallway. Twice, each word a bottle of gasoline to my wildfire of rage. How dare this piece of shit! The image of a man forcing himself on Tessa made me want to break everysingle bone in his body, find every nerve and cut it with a dull ten blade. Finding out he’d been taunting her this whole time, refusing to let her move on with her life?

Storming into my bedroom, I fired off a text to the guys. Time be damned.

SINNERS & SAINTS GROUP CHAT

Me: 911. Meet me at the mansion. Now.

Jace: It’s 3:30 a.m.

Me: Yep, I can tell time.

Axel: If this is about your car getting keyed, I swear to God …

Me: Nothing I can put in writing. You coming or not?

Ryker: Is Tessa okay?

Ryker didn’t know she was staying with me—still didn’t know about her medical condition—but he knew I was trying to find Voss. And knew Tessa was the only person in the world that would be worthy of a 3:30 a.m. 911 from me.

Me: She’s safe. But I need everyone. Tonight.

Axel: I’m literally in bed with a supermodel.

Jace: Your cleaning service deserves hazard pay for those sheets. Now Blake said move, so move. And, Blake? You STILL owe ME a favor, don’t forget.