Secrets of Mine (Of Mine #2)

21. Freya

21

FREYA

I ’m terrified we’re wrong. I trust Jude, I do, but what if my dad is halfway to Eli’s father’s by now? What if he kills Eli’s dad like he killed his mother? Eli hates me enough as it is, I’m not sure we could survive that.

My leg jitters up and down in the passenger seat footwell. It’s dark out but I stare at the front door of the house we’re watching like if I look hard enough my dad will appear and we can finally put an end to all this.

“Eli doesn’t hate you.”

I whip my head around to look at Jude. “I wasn’t thinking?—”

“Yes, you were.” Jude rests his arm on the steering wheel, twisting to face me. He taps a finger to his forehead. “Profiler, remember. Reading people is what I do.”

I sigh and tip my head back against the headrest. I forget boy genius reads micro expressions like they’re subtitles.

“My father’s threatening his dad, Jude. Even before that he was barely looking at me.”

“Eli’s dad is safe. Maxwell is hunting here in L.A., and we’ve got every potential victim covered. This ends tonight.”

I let Jude’s voice soothe me, grounding myself in its soft surety. He’s right, our plan is solid. A horrifying number of people called the domestic abuse helpline in the last month, but we’d used the rest of the victim profile to narrow the pool down to eight women. Eight mothers. Eight targets.

Jude and I are sitting across the street from Amelia Falcox’s house in an unmarked police car. The rest of the potential victims have been split between Eli, River, and LAPD. Oz is on the other end of our comms back at the station, coordinating all the teams. At the first sign of Maxwell, we’ll all converge on his location. Everything has been planned out in finite detail, but my gut still twists itself into knots.

Something doesn’t feel right.

I press down on the comms device in my ear. “Anything, Oz?”

His voice crackles through. “That’s a no go for the murder show.”

I scoff a laugh, but his dark humor calms me a little. We’ve been waiting here for almost three hours now and the longer nothing happens the edgier I get.

“Do you get along with your brother?” I ask Jude, partly to distract myself and partly because I’ve seen photos of the two of them around his parents’ house. His brother looks like a neater, more formal version of him. Instead of Jude’s curls he’s got his hair cropped close to his head and he looks as at home in a suit and tie as River does.

Jude grimaces.

“We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want.”

He sighs. “No, it’s okay. Landon is complicated. He was the golden child, still is I guess, and our parents made it very clear their affection was earned through achievement.

“To be honest, I think he was scared that if he got too close to me, they’d disapprove.” Jude laughs a little, the sound short and bitter. “Hell, he was probably right.”

“You know that offer of me going all stabby on your parents is totally still on the table. I could use one of your mother’s heels.”

He gives me a wry smile. “Landon’s actually called me a couple of times. Once when I graduated from the academy and then when I landed the job at the FBI.”

Jude’s fingers fiddle with one of his stones and I slide my hand into his, the smooth surface of the pebble pressed between our palms. “That’s kind of nice,” I say. “What does he do?”

“He’s a lawyer. The respectable side of law enforcement, according to my parents. Never mind the fact I’m pretty sure some of his clients are, at best, Mafia adjacent.”

“Oh.”

Jude shakes his head and screws up his face. “I can’t figure him out. He’s not a bad person. I don’t think he’d ever defend someone who did anything really horrific, but I guess I don’t really know.”

I run my thumb across the back of his hand. “He’s your brother though. And there’s a whole shade of gray between good and bad.” If anyone knows that, I do.

My whole life exists in the gray. I’m not innocent and I never will be but that doesn’t mean I’m not a good person. Jude’s one of the people who helped me understand that.

“We should invite him over for dinner,” I say, “when we’re back in Quantico. Oz can cook—I made a deal with him.”

Jude arches a brow. “Oh yeah? Does it involve you sending him more photos?”

I blush and press my lips together to hold back my smile. “Maybe.”

He lets go of my hand and slides his palm around the back of my neck.

Shivers skate down my spine.

“I want to get some pictures of you later tonight, before all the ink fades.” His thumb brushes against the drawing on the side of my neck. I didn’t notice it till this morning, but he drew a tiny dagger nestled behind my ear. River threatening to make the cuffs permanent may have been disturbingly hot, but I think it’s the dagger I might keep. Somehow, Jude has taken a blade, something which should bring nothing but bad memories, and turned it into something that makes me feel safe, protected. Jude always makes me feel this way. I forget about the horrors of the world when I’m with him, which is why I don’t think anything of it when my phone buzzes.

I pull away from his hold and look at the screen. It’s only when I read the message that the panic comes flooding back.

Unknown: Shouldn’t you know by now, Little Star, dear old Dad’s always one step ahead?

“No. No, no, no.” The endearment ‘Little Star’ makes my blood run cold. My brain doesn’t recall ever hearing it before, but my body does. It’s like when you wake up from a nightmare you can’t remember, but I don’t have time to figure it out right now. Not if this message means what I think it does.

“What is it?”

I ignore Jude and press down on my comms. “Oz, can you send out an alert to all the teams?”

“Yes, doing it now.”

“Ask them to make contact.” The air struggles inside my lungs as I wait to hear back.

Jude grips my jittering thigh. “What’s going on?”

I look over at him and shake my head. “We screwed up.”

The comms crackle. “Only one team hasn’t responded. Two LAPD detectives on Whitmoore Street. They’re supposed to be covering Lexi Best.”

“Can you get a visual on her house?”

“One sec.”

I bring up maps on my phone and type in the street address. “We need to go, now,” I tell Jude.

He doesn’t ask questions, just turns the engine on and pulls out. “Tell River to get someone to come cover Amelia.”

I send River the message and tell him to head to Whitmoore.

“Okay,” Oz says in my ear. “There’s a traffic camera on her street. I’m hacking into it now. Shit.”

“What?” I ask, dread curdling in my stomach.

“The officers assigned to Lexi just responded. They got called to an active robbery but they just got there and there’s no robbery.”

“Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

Jude steps on the gas and we speed down the road. “I need you to tell me what you read on your phone, Freya.”

The words don’t come out. My throat hurts like there’s a rock lodged in my windpipe.

It sinks in just how much I’ve fucked up. I stare out the window, watching the streetlights blur, and I don’t know whether it’s because we’re going so fast or because I’m on the verge of crying.

“Freya,” Jude snaps. “What did you read?”

“A text from my sister,” I whisper. At least I thought it was her.

Jude goes quiet. I see him turn to look at me out of the corner of my eye but before he can say anything Oz is talking.

“He’s there, Freya. Maxwell is there.”

I stop breathing. My entire body starts to shut down and I have to force myself to blink, to slowly move my fingers and stop my mind from disassociating.

“I just watched him go inside,” Oz says. He must have created a group channel because River’s voice comes through next, strong and demanding.

“Jude, how far out are you?”

“Five minutes.” Jude flicks on the siren and we keep going.

Oz’s breathing filters down the line. My heart squeezes so hard it hurts. I think I’m going to be sick.

Too much time passes.

Oz’s voice is quiet when he speaks again, and he’s got that tone like when you tell someone their loved one’s dead. “River, get LAPD to shut down the area. He’s just left Lexi’s house.”

My hand covers my mouth. This can’t be happening. We can’t be this close and not get him.

“Vehicle?” River asks.

“No. He’s on foot. If he has a car, it’s out of range of the camera I’m using.”

“See if you can get another camera angle. Freya, Jude, go to the victim. Call an ambulance. Eli and I will find Maxwell.”

I do as he says and radio for an ambulance. A minute later and Jude’s yanking the car to a stop outside Lexi’s house. The front door’s still open.

I stumble out of the passenger side and run to the house. “Lexi!”

A gurgle comes from the first room off the hallway. A young woman lies on the floor, blood seeping into the cream carpet. I sprint over and drop to my knees by her side. She’s got a hand to her neck, her eyes wide as she stares at the ceiling, choking on her own blood.

She should be dead already.

Jude flicks on the light behind me and I realize why she’s not. The cut isn’t complete. He’s only sliced the side of her neck. Something or someone must have clued him in that we were on our way.

I take off the zip up hoodie I’m wearing over my vest and press it to the open wound. “It’s okay, you’re okay, Lexi. The ambulance is coming.”

Tears slip from her eyes and her hand goes limp.

“No. No!” I say, moving her hand so I can put more pressure on her neck. “Do not go. Do not let him do this.”

Lexi blinks up at me as if to say she’s still here, but she’s losing color fast. Blood soaks through my hoodie, turning it warm and sodden under my hands.

I was seventeen when I last saw someone die. I swore to myself it would never happen again. I would never stand by and watch it happen.

“Do not make me break my promise, Lexi.”

The ambulance sirens drift down the street just as Lexi sucks in a rattling breath and her eyes flutter closed.