Chapter 32
Chapter Thirty-Two
Henry
My eyes burned from staring at this damn monitor.
Hours had passed since I’d returned from the horse property.
Since I’d learned about Blake’s past.
And about his connection to Sarah’s mom.
The sun now shone brightly, filling the pool house with light. I’d officially been awake for over twenty-four hours, but I refused to sleep. Instead, I’d spent the past several hours scrolling through pages of property listings and obituaries.
While I had more information than I did hours ago, this was still essentially a shot in the dark.
I was operating under a fairly big assumption that whoever had taken Ariana was somehow connected to the man who’d taken Blake and Chandler all those years ago. In my mind, he had to be. Why else would he trace the same symbol branded on Blake’s chest onto the floor of the stables?
At the very least, it was a lead to follow. The only lead I currently had.
“His real name might not even be Isaac,” Blake offered as I clicked on yet another obituary from around the time Blake would have killed him.
I glanced away from the screen, meeting his gaze as he lay on the couch, Cato curled up on the floor beside him.
“What makes you say that?”
A humorless laugh escaped him. “He gave us all new names when we were reborn.” The bitterness in his voice was impossible to miss.
“Reborn? What do you mean?”
His jaw tightened. “When he branded us. He told us the people we were before were dead.”
“What was your name?”
He didn’t answer right away. Just stared at the ceiling. Finally, he said, “Luke.”
“And Chandler?” I asked hesitantly. “What was her name?”
“Esther,” he said, his voice softer.
Sadder.
“After I escaped, I struggled to remember that my name used to be Pierson. I’d been Luke for so long, it was the only thing that felt familiar. But I did know I wanted nothing to tie me to that place. Nothing to tie me to him.”
“So you gave yourself a new name.”
He heaved a sigh. “Something like that.”
I studied him for a long moment, sensing there was even more to the story. Escaping was probably just one short chapter in his life, and now that he was finally talking, I wanted to know more.
“What happened after you escaped? What did you do?”
“Whatever I could to survive. I was living on the streets. No identification. No family. No money. I was essentially right back to where I was before Isaac found me. But this time, I was even more hardened. Had even less to live for, so I was pretty impulsive. Got into a lot of fights. I eventually heard about an underground fighting tournament with a big cash prize. I figured I had nothing to lose, so may as well enter. The guy running it doesn’t just take any fighter though. I had to prove myself.”
“And did you?”
“Let’s just say, not many guys wanted to get into the ring after they realized what I was capable of, especially since the rules for this tournament were more…suggestions than anything.”
“I take that as a yes,” I mused.
Blake gave a curt nod. “I ended up winning. Because of that, the guy who organized the tournament approached me with an…opportunity.”
“What kind of opportunity?” I arched a brow, although I had a feeling I already knew what it was.
“He needed someone who didn’t mind getting their hands dirty, so to speak. He had clients who sometimes needed help…cleaning up a situation. So that’s what I did. Made problems disappear.”
It all clicked into place. From the beginning, Blake had a unique ability to clean up a crime scene and leave no evidence behind.
“And now? Do you still make problems disappear for him?”
He shrugged. “I sometimes still have to do odd jobs for him. I wish I didn’t, but there are certain people you can’t say no to.”
I nodded, silence settling over the room once more, apart from the hum of the computer and the distant crash of waves against the shoreline.
One thing was certain. I now saw Blake Ford in a completely different light.
Never in a million years would I have expected to learn he’d gone through something like this.
I knew he’d been through some shit. You don’t end up in our line of work without going through something. But I never could have predicted this.
“Shit. That’s him,” Blake said, his determined voice ripping me out of my thoughts.
I snapped my eyes back to the monitor where a Florida driver’s license was currently displayed on the screen. I studied the information contained on the license, but it couldn’t be. The age didn’t add up.
“Are you sure? This guy’s only ten years older than me. You made it sound like Isaac was much older.”
Blake vehemently shook his head as he pushed himself to his feet. “Not Isaac,” he said, limping toward me. “That’s Josiah.”
“Josiah?” I glanced at the license once more. “Says here his name is Corbin Black.”
“That may have been who he was before, but I knew him as Josiah. He was like me. Some kid Isaac pulled off the streets to ‘redeem’. But he was one of the people Isaac got to. Who started to believe in the bullshit.”
His jaw flexed, his fists clenching in anger. I got the distinct impression he wasn’t seeing the photo anymore. He was seeing the past.
“In some ways, Josiah was even worse than Isaac. More disturbed and brutal, especially as he got older and Isaac gave him more privileges. More authority. More opportunities to hurt people.”
“Do you think he’d form his own following after Isaac died?” I asked, my mind spinning. “Take over from his predecessor?”
“With how Isaac brainwashed everyone, I think anything’s possible.” He moved closer, resting a hand on the corner of the table for support as he leaned over my shoulder. “Can you pull up that address? See what it looks like?”
I typed in the address. Seconds later, satellite imagery popped up of a large, remote property about thirty miles east of Fort Myers.
It looked to be fairly isolated, mostly hidden by dense tree cover.
The main house looked like an actual castle with a moat around it.
Set farther back were a series of nondescript buildings, thin and long.
If I didn’t know any better, I’d think it could have been a boarding school or some other educational institution.
But based on the look on Blake’s face, his expression growing pale, I had a feeling that wasn’t it at all. He barely resembled the intimidating man who’d become my closest confidant. Instead, he looked like the terrified boy who’d been forced to do unspeakable things.
The boy who sacrificed himself for his sister, then spent every day for the next thirty years trying to find her.
“Is it…?” I began.
“That’s it,” he interjected. “That’s where he kept us.”