Chapter Twenty-Nine
She’d taken her dress, her phone, and—and the gun he had built. The one he’d used to kill that man, the one he’d shot the van’s gas tank with, the one she’d learned to shoot with at the shooting range.
Scratch that, everything was gone except for the bag he carried—his phone, one handgun, his passport, some cash. Thank fuck he had that, at least.
Concern washed over him first, followed rapidly by fury.
If Jack had had a vehicle of any kind, she’d probably have taken that, too.
Just like last time, except now it was all immeasurably worse—because he had thought he and Ava had had something.
He’d never talked to anyone about Jay. He’d disappeared from his old life, ignored Jay’s friends when they tried to reach out, anonymously paid bills for Jay’s mom at the assisted living center, and built new versions of himself over and over again to do the job he’d decided to do.
But he’d let Ava in.
Jack kicked the small table in their hostel room over so hard one of the legs cracked. He let out a stream of curses and began pacing the small space. Where the fuck had she gone?
He had trusted her. He had started to—he had started to feel something, even. That had been so, so stupid of him.
He had even started to—
Love her.
Shit, shit, shit.
He called her phone, which went to voicemail immediately.
“Call me back now,” Jack said into his phone, his own tone sounding more harried, frantic, than it had in years. “Ava, what the fuck? Where are you?”
He slung his bag over his shoulder and walked out the door. He’d rent a car, or a motorcycle, or something. He’d—
The front desk attendant was sprinting out the door, waving their arms. “That’s my car!” they were yelling. “Hey, stop, that’s my car!”
Fucking Ava.
Jack slipped out the door, adjusting his mask a little higher over his fake beard.
In the distance, sirens were wailing.
Had they caught her already?
A second later, reality slammed into Jack.
No. No, the cops were not going after Ava.
He broke into a run, finding a park at the end of the block and ducking into the tree cover. The cops were coming for him, because Ava Cavalcante hadn’t just run off on him.
She’d sold him out.