Total pages in book: 113
Estimated words: 110360 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 552(@200wpm)___ 441(@250wpm)___ 368(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 110360 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 552(@200wpm)___ 441(@250wpm)___ 368(@300wpm)
But Brooke and Zoey were invisible.
No Wikipedia page. No pap shots. No public footprint. Two people who existed entirely outside the machine, which was exactly why we’d kept them separate from Lofton in the first place. Safer that way. Harder to reach.
The logic had been sound.
Except we’d gotten it exactly backwards.
Because Jason didn’t want Lofton.
He’d clearly only wanted Zoey. So he’d waited it out. Chosen his moments. And then let Lofton lead him to her.
She was never the target.
She was the map.
And the figure outside the Doodle Bug Café? The hooded silhouette I’d been absolutely certain was Sebastian, the face I’d seen in that alley and built an entire investigation around? That had been Jason. Testing the perimeter. Checking whether Brooke and Zoey were with her. Trying to smoke them out.
Leo had flat out told me I’d put a face on that man.
I’d pushed back.
I’d been so certain.
And I’d been wrong in the most expensive way a man in my profession could be wrong.
Not wrong about a detail.
Not wrong about a timeline.
But wrong about the fundamental architecture of the entire threat.
Brooke and Zoey had been living with Lofton before all of this started. Same address. Same routines. Same doors. Jason had known exactly where to look and exactly who he was looking for.
We’d separated them to keep them safe.
And all we’d done was make Jason work a little harder.
He’d been patient.
He’d been trained.
And the moment we’d brought Brooke and Zoey to that soundstage and ultimately that restaurant, we’d handed him the opening.
And he’d walked right through it while I sat in a fucking car guarding the wrong person.
30
LOFTON
Within seconds of the police arriving, the men of Guardian Protection had raced into the parking lot.
They’d scattered. Jude had come straight to me, trying to help Devon rush me inside before the chaos fully descended, but I refused to go without Brooke.
Lark and Leo had gone to her, physically restraining her so the paramedics could look at her head while she fought them both. She didn’t want her head looked at. She wanted to chase a car that was already gone.
Johnson had gone straight to Alex.
Through the window, I’d watched the color leave Johnson’s face not gradually, just gone, like someone had pulled a plug. When the paramedics loaded Alex onto the gurney, Johnson had nearly bulldozed two of them getting into the back of the ambulance. Nobody stopped him. The doors closed, and it pulled away fast, lights already going.
Alex was alive, but the speed at which the ambulance left made everyone aware just how bad it was.
My name must have been all over that police scanner, because the paparazzi descended upon that small sushi joint like a swarm of locusts. Devon moved us to a back corner table, mostly hidden, while Jude got to work taping cardboard over the windows.
Brooke sat beside me spinning a bottle of soy sauce on the table.
Around and around. Her eyes fixed on the wall as if she could see straight through it, back in time to before any of this had happened. The gauze the EMT had wrapped around her head had soaked through on one side. She’d refused to let them take her to the hospital. I think a part of her was just hoping he’d bring Zoey back.
Nothing felt real. The world moving in slow motion and fast forward at the same time, every detail either blurred or unbearably sharp with nothing in between.
The cops drifted in and out, asking questions I must have answered because they kept nodding and writing things down. We were waiting for the detectives. That was all anyone would tell us.
I kept thinking about Zoey.
Scared out of her mind, with a man she didn’t even know, who had already killed two people and shot a third.
It had to be a nightmare.
It wasn’t.
The soy sauce went around and around.
When the two officers finally stepped outside, Devon sat down across from me and Brooke. Lark took the chair beside her. Leo and Jude stayed standing, close enough to hear everything.
When Devon took my hand in both of his, a tear rolled from my eyes. It was the first time since I’d met him his touch wasn’t enough to cast out the fear.
“Hey, babe,” he called, gentle but pointed, like he needed my full attention. “I need you to tell me everything you know about Jason Horton.”
I opened my mouth. Closed it. “He hasn’t been around in so long. I don’t really know where to start.”
He released one of my hands long enough to gently still the soy sauce under Brooke’s fingers. “Okay, let’s start there. He’s Zoey’s dad, used to work at Arrow, knew Marty. I got that. But why hasn’t he been around?”
Brooke’s empty eyes lifted to his. “He left her in a car.” Her voice was hoarse from screaming. “It was either I ran over him with mine, or he gave her up. Those were our options.”