Page 36 of Finish Line

“Shit, I’m sorry.” Dom hangs his head. “I’m worried about Shelby. We need to find her.”

“She doesn’t want to be found,” Cin says, “Believe me, I tried.”

Luke looks at Frank. “Tell us where you took her, please. We need to talk to her and tell her how sorry we are.”

Dom steps toward Frank, violence evident in his body language.

“Don’t tell them!” Cin jumps up, stepping in Dom’s path. “I’m sorry, guys, but she needs this time to put herself back together.”

Mav jumps up from the floor. “We’ll be there to help her.” He glances at each of us. “Right guys?”

Cin walks over to Mav and puts her hand on his shoulder. “Her mom and I weren’t listening when Shelby told us she needed time. I thought I was doing what was right by trying to convince her to do things. That helped her the last time, but not this time. Every time someone tries to hug her, she cringes.”

“You love her,” Hannah says, “but she needs time.”

Mav’s body deflates. “How much time?”

Nick shrugs. “We can’t leave anyway when we have school.”

“Fuck school! Shelby is more important,” Mav snaps.

“Your father would disown you,” Nick states.

“I figured out where she is,” I say.

“You did?” Frank says.

“Good, then tell us, Cam,” Dom demands.

I shake my head. “I won’t betray her like that. I’m going to switch to online schooling and go to where she is. That way, you don’t have to worry that she’s alone. I’ll tell her you’re not hypnotized anymore and want to talk to her, but I won’t force her to contact you.”

Dom comes over and sits down. “I don’t like it, especially since that asshole is still out there.”

“Roger doesn’t know where she is. If everyone disappears, it would be easy to track all of us,” Nick points out.

“Do you always have to be right?” Mav sighs.

He smirks. “I try to be.”

CHAPTER TEN

CAM

We stay a little longer at Dom and Mav’s place before everyone grows tired. The deprogramming, as Louis called it, plus the bomb dropped about Shelby, hit everyone hard.

Hell, even I’m reeling, and I remember everything that happened over the last several weeks.

When Nick brought up him being able to track all of us if we flew down to Hawaii, it made me realize he could easily track my plane. For the first time in my life, I’m going to fly commercial.

The next available flight to Hawaii with an open seat is four days from now. I wish there was a way to arrive faster, but I use the time to transfer to cyber learning and catch up as much as possible.

I don’t look forward to calling my father to tell him I’m leaving.

But he can’t say much, considering he only stayed with me a week before he returned to racing, abandoning me at his place in Florida to recover with only the occasional check-in.

While I understand my father’s need to race, this experience made me realize it’s not the most important thing in my life.

Shelby has become such an important part of my life in such a short time. What would I do if something happened to her?

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