Page 213 of Perfect Pitch

Beckett Miller and Dr. Paige Kensington were spotted rushing with some urgency into the Hudson Investigation building. DJ Kensington was not in sight.

—StellaNova

“Body cam still at the penthouse,” Kane shouts.

“I have a ping on her cell phone,” Cal Sullivan—the current head of Missing Persons—calls out.

“Where’s it headed?” I growl as my fist slaps the console next to him.

“Getting a trace,” he snarls. “Don’t rush me.”

“Don’t fuck with me, Cal. That’s my woman.”

“And if you want her out alive, let me do my damn job. Rach,‍” he calls over to Rachel Akin, daughter of our company hacker, “pull up every piece of property Trevor has a financial interest in the area.”

“On it, Cal,” she replies.

The furor of activity in the ops center jumps even higher when Colby barges through the doors. Behind him, I spy Beckett and Paige being guarded by members of Beckett’s security detail.

I can’t focus on them. If I do, I’m going to crumble. I bark at Rachel, “Call my...”

Before I can get Charlie’s name out, my phone rings. The second I see it’s Austyn, I shout out, “Trace and record this!”

“Don’t you think I’m on it?” Cal snaps.

There are days I want to punch the shit out of the older man. Today is absolutely one of them.

Cal presses a few buttons before he informs, “We’re live.” When I answer, I can’t help but plead, “Beats?”

The entire room freezes when there’s no answer. Even though we can hear her voice, it’s tough to decipher individual words until Austyn murmurs something, and my brother proclaims, “See? I can take better care of you than Mitch ever could.”

She doesn’t respond, not that I can make out anyway. Not until I hear a distinct slap. “Damn you, Austyn. You never say no to me! I’m the one who gave you this life.”

That’s when she pants, “And you took the best part of it, didn’t you?”

Trevor’s voice edges into lunacy. “You were... cultivating him. I couldn’t bear to look at you.”

“What if you had killed me, Trevor?”

His tone turns petulant. “I wasn’t driving fast enough.”

Austyn vehemently disagrees. She shouts, “You killed my baby!”

“No, no, no! You couldn’t have that baby. You can only have mine.”

“Never.”

“I’ve already made plans. We’ll leave New York behind—just you and me.” My brother giggles. Fucking laughs, like having kidnapped the woman I love is some kind of joke. “I’ve waited so long too.”

“Have you really?”

“Austyn, I recognized you as mine from the first afternoon we met,” Trevor tells her earnestly.

“Tell me everything you’ve done,” she says. And it hits me I’m standing here listening when she’s doing everything but sending up a skywriter with a banner that proclaims Dumbass, are you ever going to come and rescue me?

“Yeah, Beats. I’m on my way.” Snatching up my phone, I turn to Rachel and order, “Patch everything through. Keep Paige and Beckett here. Caleb will have my ass.”

She glares at me. “Your brother’s going to lose his mind if you go off half-cocked.”

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