Chapter 52
GONE DARK
SEVEN
For someone who told Elijah and me not to panic, Atticus is one hairpin trigger away from a total emotional collapse.
He's hiding it well, but his face has been twitching for the last thirty minutes straight, the vein in his neck has only thickened, and I don't think he's blinked once in the last ten minutes.
"We should've heard from her by now," Elijah says for the third time in the last hour, pacing the tiled floor of our small, rented villa on the Costa Brava. We got here three hours ago, even though we had a longer than planned drive from the Barcelona airport.
And by Atticus's timeline, Ro would've landed after we did.
But her tracker, the one we followed from the hotel in downtown Charlotte to the airport, stopped tracking her location data somewhere over the North Atlantic.
At first, Atticus didn't seem concerned. Something to do with flight-control interference and a lack of cell towers, or some other shit that's not my area of expertise.
But that plane should have landed hours ago, and yet the spot where her signal dropped over the ocean hasn't budged.
"I told you this was a bad idea," Eli groans, fists in his hair. "I fucking told you."
"Not helping, E," I mutter, gripping the edge of the cement countertop where I stand.
From here, I can see every screen of Atticus's makeshift control center atop the dining table.
While he's busy trying to find any trace of Aurora's arrival on Spanish soil, I watch the little trio of camera feeds that show the entry points to this villa.
Someone needs to make sure we haven't been made, even if I don't even want to imagine what that would mean for Ro.
We couldn't bring our whole arsenal, but I'm armed enough to handle anything that might come at us here in case shit goes south.
I haven't said it out loud, but if we don't hear from her in the next thirty minutes, I'm pounding pavement. We have intel that Ambrose's estate is near the ocean. That it's in the Costa Brava region, and is fit for a king.
It's enough for a start. And if I have to break into every rich fuck's vacation home until I find her, that's exactly what I'm going to do.
A window on Atticus's monitor chimes and Elijah and I nearly trip on each other trying to get a closer look.
"Is it her?"
Atticus sighs deeply as the mirrored view of Céline's phone fills the middle of the screen. "It's her."
Aurora
Hi Céce, sorry, it was a long drive from Girona-Costa Brava Airport. Almost two hours! But the villa is so pretty. It's right on the cliffside. I'll see if I can get a photo for you tomorrow when it's light out.
Atticus is already opening several windows, cross-referencing any and all intel we have with the locations of the airport, and a two-hour driving radius.
"We need to reply." Eli tries to take the mouse from Atticus, and is shouldered off as Atty reopens the mirrored cell phone window in time for another message to pop up.
Aurora
I think Ellie's chicken toy might be lost.
"No, it isn't," Atticus grumbles at the screen as if she can hear him. "I made sure Céline grabbed it from her apartment."
That message was something he said to try to get her phone to go off again so she'd reply.
"She isn't talking about the chicken toy," I realize. "She must mean the tracker. She lost it somehow."
Eli's hands are back in his hair again. "Fuck. This isn't good. Can you trace her phone?"
Atticus already tried that and Eli knows as much. "They must have a similar jamming system to ours. I can't get through. When she uses her laptop, I might be able to follow the IP data. And it's still cloned so we should be seeing anything she does on it. We need to get her to turn it on."
Atticus starts a reply as Céline.
Céce
Glad you made it there safely. I'd love to see the house. Ellie does seem sad about her chicken. Maybe you can order her a new one from ?
"That's good," I agree, and he hits send. "Hopefully, she'll pick up on the hint to use her laptop."
Atticus is ready to track her IP through her account, but no data comes through. And no more messages, either.
"Should we say something else?" Eli presses.
"No," Atticus and I say at the same time, but I add, "we can't risk too many questions. It'll look weird coming from her dog sitter."
"Worst case, we still have her English lesson with Alfie, aka Eli."
Eli unfolds to his full height, eyes dark like I've only ever seen them when he's about to lose it. "That's not for days yet!"
While I don't like the idea of not knowing exactly where she is for days, as long as she stays in contact with us, we have to assume she's okay.
"What do we do?" Eli's voice rises another octave and I rifle through the bag by the counter until I find the whiskey bottle. I thought we might be back to Elijah needing this to settle his nerves.
I twist off the cap. "We wait," I say, and hold out the bottle for him.
He shakes his head.
"E," I press. "We need you grounded, not flying off the handle. Take it."
His teeth clench. "I don't need it. I want to stay sharp."
"Ro can do this," I tell him, watching the tension wind tighter in his shoulders and knot in his brows. "I know she can."
"It's not her abilities I'm questioning," he snaps back. "It's his motives. She hasn't seen it, Sev—who he really is. He hasn't shown her yet, and maybe he never will, but if he does—"
"He won't," Atticus growls, like he can keep her safe from sheer force of will alone. "She's his daughter. He's not going to hurt his own flesh and blood."
Eli heads for the balcony, muttering to himself with his fists clenched.
"We don't know that," I whisper to Atty when he's gone. "His wife is still missing. Probably dead. What if it was him?"
"So, what? He kills her, and then spends the last twenty-something years looking for her? It doesn't make sense, Sev."
"He fooled us once, Atticus. He could do it again."