Page 46

Alex

Noah’s getting his ass handed to him right now, which is what he deserves after staying at our apartment a couple weeks ago and then revealing that his sticky fingers left with a brand-new bottle of bourbon from my liquor cabinet. I pick up my phone and casually swipe and tap a few times, waiting for him to notice the notification flash across his phone.

“What the fuck is this?” he asks, squinting at his screen.

“Asshole tax,” I reply with nonchalance.

“What?” he mutters, peering closer. “ No! ” he wails when he realizes what he’s looking at.

“Play bitch games, win bitch prizes.”

“Yo, are you kidding me, dude? How the hell did you do this?” he shrieks, gaping at his phone screen.

“Don’t fuck with me, bruh.”

My own phone buzzes on the desktop, notifying me that Noah just made a $100 mobile payment to me. Correction—that I transferred $100 to myself from his account.

“ Did you hack me? ” he shrieks.

“I don’t need to hack you,” I chuckle. “You’re so careless with your online security that I’ve been saving it for just such an occasion.”

“Fuck you!” he whines, much to my delight as he gives a swift kick to something out of frame.

It’s nearly 10:00 and I decide that this wraps up our weekly gaming date quite nicely. I also notice that Dallas isn’t home yet. I figured she’d be out later than usual because Shelby just returned from a summer in Colombia, but still, something feels off.

I check my phone again and don’t see any new texts.

ME (9:53PM): Still partying, Angelína?

10 minutes goes by without a response, which isn’t like Dallas who never has her phone more than an arm’s length away. Pacing back and forth across the living room, I call her. It goes straight to voicemail, which puts me on high alert. So, I call again, and again, and again with the same result. Then I pull up the phone locator.

Dallas’s phone is gone. There’s no signal being transmitted from anywhere. Panic rising, I swipe to the next screen linked to the GPS on her car.

What the hell?

I blink at the map, trying to figure out what I’m seeing.

The purple dot is right smack in the middle of the map, but nothing else is around her. I swipe to the next screen, which should tell me where Dallas’s physical person is.

It's in the exact same spot as her Mazda. But there are barely any roads, much less any recognizable structures. I zoom out to try and get my bearings. It’s a location at the county line and there’s no reason why Dallas should be there. I check the time stamps and my adrenaline goes into overdrive when I realize Dallas hasn’t been in the city for nearly an hour.

In an instant, I’m in the closet, pulling on my boots and loading my Glock. I’m about to run out the door when I pause and glance over my shoulder at the far corner. It only takes a moment to turn on my heel and decide to go back. I slide my dress blues away from the wall to reveal the body armor I haven’t worn since I died. I still have it, the rip in the seam still visible from the knife that almost sliced into me during the scuffle.

Grabbing it off the hanger, I sprint out the door and I’m in my truck and speeding through town in 60 seconds. I don't have time to call Colson, to explain everything, to tell him his sister— my wife —is missing and the only indication of her whereabouts is a dot in the middle of fucking nowhere.

And what the hell could he do from Colorado, Alaska, Canada, or wherever the fuck he is right now? I can’t stop. Because every second I don't search for her is another second toward a possibility I can’t bear to think about. So, I do the next best thing.

I call Aiden.

“What do you mean, missing? Didn’t you say you put a collar on her?”

“I can see her,” I snap. “She’s somewhere on the county line, 20 minutes away.”

“In Dire Ridge?” His voice hitches with intrigue. “Are you sure she didn’t just go back to Scott and Christy’s. Did you piss her off again?”

“ She didn’t go to Dire Ridge! ” I roar into the phone. “ Just get the fuck out here! ”

Aiden’s tone turns serious. “Send me the location.”

I don’t have time to question him before he hangs up and I send him the coordinates. I hope she’s there. She has to be there. Alive.

The city lights fade in my rearview mirror and the highway descends into the vast open landscape. The moonless sky feels just as foreboding as each mile I leave behind with no more answers than when I started. I follow the map to a desolate road hidden in the inky shadows of the night. It seems like it wants to hide from everyone, tucked between sporadic clusters of forest.

I slam on my brakes at a stop sign to avoid hitting a speeding vehicle, only to realize that it’s Aiden’s Lexus tearing across my path. Two motorcycles scream after him, engines roaring as they race toward Dallas’s location. I follow them the rest of the way, coming to a halt along an access road that leads into the forest.

Dallas’s Mazda sits at the edge of the path, tucked behind the brush enough not to be seen from the road. But when I jump out of the truck and throw open her door, she’s nowhere to be found.

I start combing the area, searching for her, and it doesn’t take long to find what I’m looking for. My heart sinks when I realize that she’s not here, but her amethyst pendant is laying haphazardly in the dirt with the micro-tracker still attached. I pick it up, the delicate chain dangling from my fingers as I examine it.

Heavy footsteps crunch behind me as Aiden approaches. And when I look over my shoulder, I see he’s brought Brantley and Wesley Rhoden with him. They flip up their visors as they approach, dressed all in black with matching armor vests.

“I don’t know where she is,” I murmur in despair, glancing around the black abyss.

“More importantly, where is he? ” Aiden asks.

Aiden doesn’t even have to say his name, I know who he’s talking about. And when I check his GPS tracker, I’m even more surprised to find that Bowen is 100 miles away in the opposite direction, somewhere near Salt Fork State Park. And that can only mean one thing.

The second man. I never found the second man.

“Not here,” I reply, looking down at the purple gem stone in my palm. “It’s not him. And if he didn’t take her, then who the fuck is it? Where is she? ” I reel back and slam my heel into the bumper of my truck.

“Wait,” Brantley interjects, “let me see that.”

He motions for my phone and I hand it over, eager for any shred of insight, even from one of the Rhodens. Brantley studies the map and then starts dragging his finger back and forth over the screen like he’s looking for something.

“And Bo Garrison is after your girl?” he asks, not taking his eyes off the glass.

“Yeah,” I reply with exasperation, “maybe.” Because now I don’t even know who I’m looking for anymore.

An airy chuckle drifts across the space between us.

My jaw tightens and I’m about two seconds from breaking his skull when he finally says, “I know where she is.”

Wesley grabs the phone from him and peers down at the screen. Then he jerks his head up.

“ Hell yeah! ” he growls with excitement.

Brantley swipes the phone from his brother and holds it out in front of me. “Judging by the tire treads around here, someone might’ve switched vehicles and headed further north.”

The map is zoomed in on a random green block with a non-descript square structure set closer to the unmarked road. Again, this tells me nothing.

“That’s where she is?” I ask dubiously.

“Not there,” Brantley points to the blank space further away from the structure, “somewhere around here.”

“How do you know?”

Brantley lifts his chin, dropping the phone in my hand with a smirk.

“Because we run these towns.”