Chapter 57
fifty-seven
By the time I realize what the fuck is happening, the sun has set.
Tris is with me at the police station Uptown, where the chief immediately leaped into action when I called. He has units combing the city while I contact everyone I can think of who might have a clue as to where Alice might be.
Juliet calls four times before I finally answer, ready to roar a reaction and hang up.
Her panting panic cuts me off. “Primo?” she cries.
“Listen, you need to go to Queens. Your mom never came home from her night shift last night. Abuelita is freaking out. Esme’s phone is off. We don’t know where she went.”
The room around me goes silent as my ears buzz. Pieces snap together.
Alice.
My mother.
If they’re both missing, this has nothing to do with the Strykers.
It’s me.
I’m the common thread.
I’m the one they’re after.
The one my girl needed protection from.
“Fucking hell,” I yell, unable to contain my fury. “This can’t be fucking happening. Alice is gone, too. Nowhere.”
Pierce is at home, but I’ve had him log in remotely and check every camera in the entire damn city. Twice.
Juliet is a powder keg. Anytime someone else’s temper erupts, hers does, too. When I tell her I have my best guy on it, she shouts, “Well, you better call his pimply ass and tell him to start checking every motherfucking camera in Queens as well, primo, because your mother is missing!”
Oh God, what is happening? A swell of panic hits, so strong it locks me in place. I can only hear my own gasping and the sound of Juliet’s heels as she runs.
“I’m getting in a cab,” she huffs. “I’ll find you when I get there.”
It doesn’t make sense that I can hear myself breathing, because I can’t feel it. My brain resembles a snowstorm—a blank expanse of white, howling wind, and chaotic flurries.
A long-fingered hand gently grips my chin and brings me back to reality. Tris turns my face toward hers, hovering only a few inches below me.
“Hey. Big guy.”
She sounds like a chain smoker; her usual husky voice grated down to nothing from all the crying she’s done since we left her apartment. I blink at her slowly, trying to focus eyes that have gone blurry.
“I heard what you said. And I can see you’re freaking out.
But you can’t do that right now. Because if someone took them both, that person is after you.
And that means you’re the only one here who can save them.
” Her nose twitches as her lips pinch around a ragged breath.
“Please, Marco. Save my best friend. Because I need her, okay? And I’m pretty sure you do, too. ”
Her plea snaps something inside of me. I move, clipping across the main floor of the station to the holding area in the back. I push my way past clusters of officers, meeting Barnes as he comes in off the street.
“I went to Pierce’s address,” he reports. “He wasn’t there. But this was.”
The elder Brit shows me his phone screen. I blink at the smear of dried, dark blood he took a picture of. Proof that someone had been dragged from one vehicle to another.”
Alice.
She got a ride from him. In—
“His company car?”
Barnes’s jaw sets. He swipes his screen, revealing a photo of the Mercedes’s familiar cream interior. Splattered with red.
My mind whirls. Misshapen shards finally fitting together.
Holy fuck.
I thrust his phone back at him. “We will find him,” I intone, staring the other man down. “And when we do, he’s mine.”
If my demons want to dance, they’re sure as hell not going to do it with my girl.