Page 203 of Phobia

“Clothes?” I asked as he walked away. He shook his head. I supposed the blanket was better than nothing. “Thank you,” I called out after him.

***

After another two days—I was guessing because I had no clock—the men started to get impatient. They argued with each other more and more. Fifty grand said they were not professional criminals. Not that I knew what a professional criminal looked like, but this wasn’t it.

“Okay,” Devil said as he stood in front of me. “It’s become obvious that you need some motivation to start talking. So, we figured what better way to get you going than a little visit from your boyfriend?” He pressed a button on a remote that he held in his hand, and a screen I hadn't noticed before lit up on one wall. What appeared to be a video feed of another area of the warehouse came into focus.

And my heart dropped.

Lying on the floor in a curled-up lump was Kellen, and he appeared to be unconscious.

“Oh God. What did you do to him? Why?” I sobbed out each question.

On the screen, one of the masked guys approached him and drew his foot back, aiming to kick Kellen in the ribs. Devil pressed another button, and the screen went black.

“No! Don’t fucking touch him!” This could not be happening. While I didn’t understand why this was happening, I had begun to accept that I’d probably die here. I didn’t have whatever answers they were looking for, and even if I did, I highly doubted they’d let me go. But the thought of Kellen getting caught in the middle of this, it was heartbreaking. He didn’t deserve it.

Devil clasped his hands behind his back. “So, you see, it’s simple. Tell us what you did, or we start taking things out on your boyfriend. I’ve got a new pair of bolt cutters I’m just itching to try. Pliers too. I’m still happy to smack you around too though. Don’t worry. You won’t miss out on any of the fun.”

To underscore his point, he punched me in the mouth. Blood from my split lip splattered over my chest and onto my blanket. After he walked away, I curled up into a ball on the cold concrete floor, wrapped the blanket tighter around my body, and quietly cried myself to sleep.

Chapter 7

This was not working. No matter what we did, what we said, who we threatened bodily harm to, Graysin wasn’t talking. Once or twice over the last few days, I’d wondered if we were perhaps in over our heads and thought about giving up and just letting Graysin go.

But then I’d flash back to the night Livy died. To the physical, emotional, and psychic pain that had brought Hudson to his knees with Livy clutched in his arms. He’d cradled her limp body against his chest and rocked back and forth, pressing kisses to her forehead as tears endlessly streamed down his face. No matter what I tried, I couldn’t block out or forget the screaming. The unanswered pleas. The sobbing. And eventually, the silence.

And so, we continued with our plan.

“Have we considered the fact that perhaps he’s an idiot, and he needs some sort of prompt to get him talking about what happened with Livy?”

Hudson’s question was fair, but Graysin Thorne was no idiot.

I cleared my throat and asked the question that had been weighing on my mind for the last three days. “Have we considered the fact that he’s maybe somehow…innocent?”

Hudson’s hazel eyes shot daggers my way. “He’s a manipulative bastard, Zane. You saw the text messages. The pictures of him and Livy. The threats to post the photos of her online. The way he talked to her. All of it.”

“I know. But what if they’re somehow fake?”

Malin rubbed his temples and yawned. We’d been taking shifts, with at least two of us always awake. “There must be a way to substantiate it. Which, incidentally, is something we should have done more thoroughly before. Bring in the Blaine idiot. He’s Graysin’s best friend and a real piece of work.”

“Let’s save that for last. We can try Hudson’s suggestion first,” I muttered.

***

We pulled our masks back on and walked over to where Graysin was huddled on the floor. A fresh wave of guilt washed over me. He looked so broken and pathetic lying there on the floor. His spark was gone. It seemed to have died when he saw the video footage of Kellen. I felt a little bad, but what could I do? The guy would not talk.

“Thorne, wake up.” Hudson shoved him in the side with his boot. I glared at him and shook my head. Graysin mumbled and sat up. The blanket fell open in his lap and he made no move to cover himself. “Ah. There he is. Reporting for duty.”

Sometimes I really wanted to smack Hudson.

“You know what I find fascinating, Thorne?” Hudson said. “Karma. That shit will be working in your favor one minute, and then turn around and stab you in the throat the next. It has a way of catching up with you, always. No matter how far you run, or where you try to hide. No matter how much money you have, it finds you. It grabs you in its clutches, looks you dead in the eye, and demands payment for your sins. Occasionally, it needs a little nudge to get things moving. Think of us as your friendly neighborhood karma dealers.”

“Okay,” Graysin said in a dull, lifeless tone. “Where’s Kellen?”

Ignoring his question, I picked up where Hudson left off. “Now here’s a hint for you, Thorne, because you can’t seem to figure this out yourself. Might there be something you did, say, last spring break, that karma may have a thing or two to say about?”

Graysin’s eyes widened as he soaked in my words. His gaze swept from me to Malin to Hudson, and back to me. He looked like a wreck. His face was swollen, and crusty, dried blood was caked in the corner of his dry lips. There were bruises on his neck.