Chapter Eleven
“ W hat?” I shake my head, confused and slow to process, like I’ve misheard him.
“You have to hide,” LJ grinds out again. “They’re at the door.”
“Who are—”
But LJ doesn’t let me finish. He grabs my upper arm, gently but forcefully, and lifts me toward him. Behind me, Tuck gets to his feet, alarm etched over his features.
“What’s goin—”
“Sheriff,” LJ says. He pulls me to the door, glancing around in a wide arc. “Where’s Will?”
“Here.” Will strides in as if on cue.
“I’m taking her up,” LJ says. “Command center. Don’t breathe a fucking word.”
Behind all of us, distant but distinct, the front door raps with a knock I didn’t hear before. All three of their heads snap toward it.
“Nose goes,” Tuck says, and holds a finger to his face. “I’m not good with cops.”
“Oh, like any of us are?” Will rolls his eyes. He glances around, as if waiting for someone else to appear...
...but he doesn’t, of course.
“Fine,” Will grinds out. “Get her out of here.”
“Trying to.” LJ gives me another firm tug, and we’re off, slipping through the front hall and up the stairs.
“What the hell,” I pant, struggling to keep up with him as we hit the landing, “is going on? Where are we going?’
“Command center,” LJ says, the sarcasm dripping from his words. “Will’s security HQ. Stupid, but it’s the most secure place in the whole damn house.”
I swivel my head to both sides, trying to orient myself. The bedroom doors are here, just like they always were: Will’s, mine—or the room that was mine, and the other two that I know are Tuck’s and Rob’s. Unless there’s some kind of trap door or something—
LJ stops in front of a mirror—full length, gold frame, one I’d passed dozens of times before—and lets go of me. He presses his palm to the surface, at just about hip height, and from somewhere inside the glass, a green light blinks off and on. A little mechanical chirp and the mirror swings open; it’s a door.
“Whoa,” I say out loud. LJ flashes me the barest smirk.
“Impressed?”
“Well, yeah, actually,” I say, a bit defensively.
“You’ve seen an actual dragon, and this is what impresses you?” LJ scoffs and pulls me forward.
He does have a point. But I don’t have long to dwell on it, because we emerge into a room that distracts me entirely.
It’s small, maybe half the size of one of the bedrooms, and crammed with all kinds of security equipment: screens with CCTVs, a desk with a command center chair like in a Mission Impossible movie, and a variety of heavy-duty filing cabinets with thick locking mechanisms.
“Whoa,” I say again.
LJ barks out a laugh. “I’ll never understand you, Princess.”
He slips behind me to where the mirror door is closing and presses his palm to another reader on the right side. There’s a hiss and a click, and I get the sense that we’re locked in.
“So this has been here the whole time?” I ask. “The cameras, the...panic room?”
“I wouldn’t call it a panic room,” LJ starts, but then he cocks his head to the side and reconsiders. “Actually, maybe I would.”
“You think it’s a bit of an overreaction?” I ask.
LJ snorts. “The guys sometimes have more money than sense. Tuck likes his gadgets and Will likes security.” He shrugs. “But I can’t deny it does what it needs to, for the most part. Most secure room in the house—reinforced walls, completely soundproof. If we’re gonna hide you, it’s gotta be here.”
My eyes snap to the wall of screens, showing fuzzy images of everywhere on the property, mostly outside perimeter stuff: outside the fence, ghostly-looking tree trunks, and the occasional shuffle of leaves in the breeze. But there’s one screen that draws my attention immediately—the front porch, angled from some upper corner, where Will is speaking with a man in a familiar-looking uniform.
My heart plunges to my stomach. It’s him, the deputy—Deputy Rashad. The same one. The one who let me get away. I’d recognize him anywhere after that.
I creep up to the screen, like I’m magnetized, and look around for a knob or a dial. “Is there a way to get sound on this thing?”
“I think so.” LJ pulls out a hidden keypad from the side of the desk and taps a few buttons.
Suddenly, the audio comes in, surprisingly crisp.
“I’m telling you, he’s not coming to the door,” Will says. “No matter how many times you ask, and you have no right to demand it anyway.”
“I understand that, sir,” the deputy replies, “but we have reason to believe he may have information related to a missing persons case.”
At that, Will stiffens on screen, but credit to him, he keeps his cool. “And do you have any proof of his involvement?”
The sheriff says nothing, and I think I can see his jaw working, even on the screen. “Not to my knowledge, sir.”
“Pardon my French, but that’s what I fucking thought,” Will says.
“Sir, if you could just—”
“Come back with a warrant,” Will snaps. “Otherwise, Rob’s not talking to you. Good day, sir. Please leave the property.”
With that, he steps back into the house and shuts the front door resolutely.
Holy shit, they put that together quickly.
Next to me, I feel LJ stiffen. “God damn it,” he mutters.
We stand there in silence, watching as the deputy steps down the front steps and gets into his Sheriff’s Department SUV, the edge of which is just barely visible in the CCTV. The car departs, jumping from screen to screen as it drives down the long stretch of driveway and back into the woods. As soon as the exit gate seals behind him, LJ wheels on the door and practically kicks it open.
“Where the fuck are you, Will?” he calls.
THREE MINUTES LATER , we’re all sitting in the living room.
Well, all except Rob.
Tuck’s looking from face to face, anxious, while LJ stares Will down. Will, for his part, is rubbing his jaw and looking out the window, and I’m sitting on the couch, not sure what the fuck I’m supposed to do.
“That was close,” Tuck says after a while. “How did they even get in here?”
LJ rips out, “I thought your multi-thousand-dollar security setup was supposed to stop that, Will.”
“It’s not the security,” Will says. He shakes his head and turns back toward the room. “It did what it was supposed to, didn’t it? She’s still safe.” He nods at me. “And besides, what do you want me to do? Get tower-mounted rifles and shoot down any law enforcement who approaches? Don’t be stupid.”
“You could have done more than you did, though,” LJ fires back. “He flashes his badge at the scanner, and that’s all it takes to get through the gate? Jesus Christ. We’re lucky I spotted him driving up from my window. Otherwise, who knows what he could have—”
“He couldn’t have done anything,” Will cuts him off. “An LEO needs a warrant, and he knows it.” He shrugs. “It was a close call, I’ll grant you, but nothing more than that.”
“Except...” Tuck interjects, chewing his lip, looking at me, then Will, then LJ. “How did he know to come here? Why would he think Rob is involved? I’m not blaming you, Maren,” he adds hurriedly, “but maybe you left some kind of paper trail. I know your email here is encrypted, but—”
“I didn’t,” I interject. “I swear, there’s no way I could have. Gisbourne knew I was here before, but I told him I wasn’t coming back.” And I thought I meant it, too , I add mentally, but here we are. “I guess he could send someone out on a hunch, but that’s certainly not enough to get inside.”
“And that’s what I’m saying,” Will says with an exasperated sigh. “Whoever that kid is, he’s some rookie. He’s not gonna fuck up procedure just to show off. So if he wants to get in here, he’s gonna need a warrant. And for a warrant, he needs proof, and he’s got nada.”
“You’re missing the goddamn point!” LJ roars, getting to his feet. “He shouldn’t have been inside the property at all.”
“There might be something else, though,” Tuck says, scratching his head. “Some traces or hints you left somewhere. It’s so easy to do that. Maybe they got something from her cell phone—”
“The cell phone that you guys gave me,” I point out.
“It isn’t your fault, Princess,” LJ says, cutting off any further accusation. “No matter what Tuck says.”
“Hey,” Tuck says, lifting his palms in the air, “I definitely do not think it’s Maren’s fault. I want to be clear about that. If it’s anyone’s fault, I think it’s—”
“Don’t even,” Will says, pointing a finger at Tuck. “Don’t even start with—”
“ That’s enough. ”
The voice cuts through the room, drawing all our attention. My pulse pounds in my neck and temples, and a surge of heat floods over my body in spite of myself.
It’s Rob, standing in the doorway.
He doesn’t look better—doesn’t look like his usual self still—but he does look determined. His jaw is set, a light reddish-gold stubble shading his skin, his hair is mussed, and the flannel of his shirt is a little rumpled, but his eyes are serious and hard.
“Y’all need to stop arguing about whose fault it is, and we need to figure some shit out,” Rob says, striding into the room. Even the heavy footfalls of his boots sound familiar, sending a pang of recognition through me, and with every step he takes, it’s like I can feel his aura reverberating, drawing nearer and nearer to me. “We’ll finish this pissing match up later.”
It’s not painful, being this close to him, not sharp and acute the way it was when I first found out what he did, but it’s still there, that awareness, that blunt edge of truth—intense, strong, distinctly uncomfortable.
“LJ, follow that guy on your bike,” Rob orders. “Leave now and you can catch up. Figure out whatever you can about him.”
LJ grinds his teeth, throws me a glance, but I give him a nod. He nods back and jogs out the door. Seconds later, the roar of his motorcycle revs outside, then fades into the woods.
“Tuck.” Rob nods at the couch. “I want you to dig for breadcrumbs. Public records, the dark web, whatever it is you need to do. Figure out who knows what about us—and about her.” He doesn’t look my way when he says it, but I feel my heart squeeze all the same.
Tuck nods and scrambles to his feet. “What are y—”
“I’m doing what I need to do,” Rob says. He looks at Will, long and hard, then pivots on his heel, staring at me with those green eyes burning. “I want to talk to Maren.”