Chapter 23
SYDNEY
Mara and Danny remain in Cy’s room with him while I make up an excuse to head back to mine so I can send a quick note to Sawyer and Cole.
Scarlett struck again.
She left a note on Cy’s bedroom mirror.
I wish I’d taken a picture of it. With any luck, Mara did, and she’ll forward it to me. Without the visual, I’m left typing out the message from memory.
She also took a dress from my suitcase. It was shredded in the middle of Cy’s bed.
She definitely didn’t appreciate that he and I were stranded in that cabin together.
Neither man responds. It’s not surprising. It’s late. I drop my phone and stare at the ceiling, my mind racing.
I’m nowhere near tired enough to sleep, and my core fucking aches, still in denial. On top of that, the implication that I’m in Scarlett’s crosshairs now has my heart racing.
Isn’t this what you wanted?
As frightening as it is, this is the first emotional reaction we’ve seen from her. She knows about Cy and me, and she isn’t happy.
But no matter how hard I try, I can’t fit all the pieces of this puzzle together. I’m still operating on a bunch of shadows with no clear answer about who she is.
The light tap on my door startles me, and I surge to my feet, wincing once again. I chide myself for being so jumpy. It’s not like Scarlett is in the hall knocking on my door.
I move as quickly as my ankle will allow, and when I open the door, I find Cy once more. He slips in like last time, but this isn’t déjà vu. Instead of kissing me brainless, he pulls me into his arms protectively.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. Better now that you’re here.” What I’d give to push up on tiptoes and close the distance between his lips and mine. Damn this sprained ankle.
“I hate this. Hate it. Fuck. Looks like the cat’s out of the bag.
I have a stalker,” he murmurs. “An obsessed fan who thinks she’s in love with me.
She sends me letters…and pictures. She, um, she told me she’d be a contestant on the show.
So far, I haven’t been so sure. Actually, I was starting to think that was a lie. But tonight proved it.”
Right. He doesn’t know about the other note. The one she left him when we were still at the mansion.
“Do you know who she is?” I ask.
Maybe he has information I don’t.
He shakes his head, pulling me closer. “No, I fucking wish I did. You’re in danger and it’s my fault.”
He leans his forehead against mine.
Fuck. I’m an asshole. He’s terrified for me. The fine trembling is almost unnoticeable, but the strong grip he has on my arms isn’t.
“I’m fine. It’s okay. It was only a dress.” I reassure him as best as I can without confessing that I’m actually here to find her.
He buries his head in the crook of my neck, breathing deeply.
My heart cracks, a flood of emotions filling the void. “Come here.”
With his hand in mine, I lead him to the bed and guide him to sit down. I comb my fingers through his hair in hopes of soothing him, and he closes his eyes, leaning into the caress. I drop my mouth to his, then lick along the seam of his lips.
A physical reassurance that I’m fine.
It’s like he’s in some sort of emotional shock. I should Google it. Find out if that’s a real thing.
But not tonight. Tonight, I need to remind him I’m here. That I’m okay.
Slowly, I work his shirt over his head, then move to the button of his jeans. Once he’s down to his boxer briefs, he lies in my bed, pulling me into his arms.
“I just need to hold you,” he murmurs.
With my cheek resting against his chest, his heart thumps rhythmically in my ear. I trace lines along his chest, listening to the steady beat as his breathing grows deep and even.
I’m not supposed to catch feelings for Cy Darby.
So why does it feel like I am?
That question drifts through my brain as my eyelids grow heavy.
When I wake up the next morning, he’s gone.
“It’s for the best,” I murmur.
Otherwise how would he explain being in my room?
Yet the case of blue bean I’m suffering is still just as fierce. I refuse to relieve the ache myself. It would only give me momentary relief, anyway.
Once I’m dressed, I hobble downstairs for breakfast, where the rest of the women ignore me. At lunchtime, I get one of the staff members to bring lunch up to my room, claiming my ankle is hurting.
Cy isn’t around. But all the contestants are in the lodge, as far as I know.
Where is he?
Maybe the people renting the cabin got in touch with him. That would make sense.
I check for new files or notes from Cole, but nothing has been updated. Dammit. I’m on the brink of boredom and there’s nothing I can do about it.
I’ve never been so glad to get ready for a compass ceremony as I am when it’s finally time to take a shower.
After I return to my room, I find a message from Cole.
COLE
Can you talk?
The text is from a few minutes ago, but it’s the first I’ve heard from either him or Sawyer since I texted last night. I still have an hour and a half until the compass ceremony starts, so I tighten the towel wrapped around my body and stand at the far side of the room and call Cole’s cell.
“Hey, Sawyer’s here too.”
“Are you okay?” Sawyer’s voice is a calm reassurance that I didn’t realize I needed.
I’m not scared of Scarlett.
But his question and his tone show how much he cares. He really is like the big brother I always wanted. And that makes my chest ache.
“I’m fine. Pissed but fine. Scarlett doesn’t scare me.”
“I saw the pictures of the dress. She should scare you. At least a little. Clearly she feels like you’re standing between her and what she wants—Cy.” Sawyer’s tone is firm but not condescending.
If it were, it would be easier to ignore him.
For the first time since I saw that shredded dress, the tiniest prick of unease shivers along my spine.
Whoever Scarlett is, she was in my room. When I wasn’t here.
She took the dress, but she easily could have found any of the contraband electronic devices I brought with me.
With Scarlett being so quiet, I let my guard down, and I haven’t been as careful as I should be.
“What about Jade/Lena? Why did she change her name?”
Who was Jade before she was Jade? The curiosity has been eating at me since yesterday’s phone call.
“Prior to her name change four years ago, Jade/Lena was a resident of Soundview Psychiatric Hospital. It looks like she was a resident there for at least two years. Over the ten years before that, she’d stayed there for shorter stints as well.”
My head spins. “Jade?”
Cool, collected, more than a little condescending Jade—a resident of a psychiatric hospital? How the hell did the show miss this?
The two images don’t match up.
“She was released on her twenty-fifth birthday when the conservatorship her family had in place ended,” Cole says.
“Do we know why she was there?” Sawyer asks.
“Not yet. I dug into the Calder family’s social media, and it’s almost as if Lena never existed.
I found news articles that include pictures of her and her family, but they’re all from when she was young.
She disappears from media sources at about ten or eleven years old.
Right around the same time her maternal grandmother passed away. ”
“Have you logged into the records database at Soundview?” Dammit, I wish I had my damn computer setup.
“You can do that?” Cole asks.
Fucking hell. I bite back a growl and take a deep breath instead.
“I can. And if we switch to a video call, I can probably walk you through it, but you’ll need to use my setup to do it.”
Excitement tingles along my arms at the thought, zipping into my fingers, bringing to life that itch to connect to a keyboard that’s been plaguing me.
“It sounds like you two have this figured out. Keep me posted. And Sydney?” Sawyer adds.
“Yeah?”
“Be careful. I don’t like that you’re on Scarlett’s radar now.”
He hangs up before I can respond.
A shiver works its way down my spine, and when gooseflesh pops up on my arms, I realize I’m still only in my towel.
But the need to get to the bottom of this overrides the need to get dressed.
“My office setup should work,” I tell Cole.
“It’s going to take me at least thirty minutes to get there. Syd, it’s Saturday.”
I frown. Damn. I’ve completely lost track of time since being here.
“I’ve got time.”
I’ll get ready for the compass ceremony while Cole gets to my setup.
“Call you back.” With that, he hangs up, and I’m left alone again.
A dangerous place to be mentally, given all of this week’s developments.
With a sigh, I stand and hobble to my closet. I take my time looking through the dresses I haven’t yet worn, eventually landing on the teal one, remembering the expression on Cy’s face when I came out wearing a bikini the same color.
“Gah, since when do you let a man’s opinion dictate what you wear?” I shove the hanger back onto the rod and rifle through the other dresses again.
But my focus keeps coming back to the teal dress.
“Fine, fine. I’ll wear you,” I say to the garment. “Are you happy now?”
It may be concerning that I’m talking to a dress.
But it’s better to talk to it than to analyze my growing feelings for Cy.
I drape the dress over the end of the bed, then step into the attached bathroom to blow dry my hair and do my makeup, my mind instantly going back to Cy again.
Tonight is the third compass ceremony. Will Cy ask me to stay?
We had sex. He slept in my room, clinging to me even in his sleep.
But maybe his feelings are freaking him out too.
What if he sends me home?
My stomach sinks. Why would he do that?
Stranger things have happened, right?
Like having the best sex of my life with Cy Darby.
I spend the next forty-five minutes overanalyzing every interaction, so when Cole sends me a video call request, I’m more than ready to talk to someone other than myself.
“Took you long enough,” I grumble.
“Have you forgotten what LA traffic is like?”
My shoulders sag. No, I have not.
And I don’t miss it.
But time is running out.
“Just log into my system,” I tell him.