Page 50 of Break

“Yeah, well, she’s the one that reported us. We werepissedat her, and thought she deserved a little revenge.” His laugh is borderline hysterical. “We sneaked into her bedroom while everyone was at school to teach her a lesson. I don’t remember much of her room, but what Idoremember is that when we looked around, there was barely anything in there. Bare walls, bare shelves, bare floor.”

Dread fills me, even though I don’t know where he’s going with this. I know it’s bad, though. “I’m not following.”

“What shedidhave in her room was this massive house.” Holding his hands out, he shows me roughly the size and shape. My eyebrows lift in surprise at how huge the thing must have been. “It was as big as a dollhouse, all made out of paper. Newspaper, colored paper; some she’d even drawn and decorated herself with pencil to add details like wallpaper and outlets and stuff. Clearly, this thing was important to her because it was the only thing in there aside from a stuffed animal on her bed.”

My shoulders tense and I growl out, “What’d you do?” I don’t remember either of them telling me about this when we were younger.

He looks tortured as his eyes beg me to understand. “We destroyed it. Cut it up with the knives we got in trouble for having, dumped water on it to ruin the paper. We left that fucking thing in a pile of mashed pulp.”

Taking a deep breath, I control my anger at the younger version of Max and grit my teeth so I don’t say something I regret. “Man, that… I don’t even know what to say!”

“Walking into her room just now, seeing what she’s been doing in there andFUCK.How much she’s gottendonesince she’s been here? It hit me like a fucking train when I realized why she does it in the first place and I… I took that away from her when she was a goddamnchild.”

Closing my eyes, I think through our next steps. It’s no wonder that this woman sees us as her enemies. As her fuckingbullies. “Look. I’m not excusing what you did because Christ, Max… that’s some next level psycho shit right there. But you were a stupid kid. Talk to her about it and apologize. You can at least do that.”

Nodding, he looks back down at the counter. “Yeah, I know I have to do that, at least. I’m going to give Vince a call, let him know Danny showed up unannounced after I call Coop.”

“Vincent needs to move here for a bit. You’ve got another room, and I’d feel more comfortable with extra eyes. Especially now that we know he could come sniffing around,” I tell him. Bouncing the package of paper against my thigh, I catch Max looking.

Pointing his chin at it, he asks, “You gonna take that up to her?”

“Yeah, she’s almost out.”

He quirks his lips at me. “I’ll make sure she gets more. Some real pretty stuff.”

Snorting, I decide I’m done with this conversation and head to the door. Over my shoulder, I call out to him. “You should do that. Small first step toward a bit of groveling.”

Chuckling, he agrees. Then stops me before I’m out of the room. “Hey, Ethan? I don’t think we should pretend with Danny anymore. I can’t do that again. I’ll fill you in later on everything he said, but his entire purpose of showing up was to ask me if I can find her location from my contacts at the station. He’s absolutely looking for her.”

“I have no problem with that. Let’s push to get her stuff from their house and be done with his bullshit. He’s dead to me in my book already.”

“Let him dig his own grave and all that?”

Striding out of the room to head back to Mina, a dark feeling passes over me. “I plan to dig it for him.”

Chapter 22

Making my Move

Vincent

Sitting in the meeting room while Coop briefs the whole station about the last weeks’ worth of cases, I pull my phone out when I feel it vibrate in my pocket. I slide my finger across the screen and notice I have two missed calls from Max. Knowing I’ll be calling him back as soon as I get out of here; I read the short text from Ethan.

Ethan: We’re going to need you to move in here while Danny gets sorted out.

Me: I can do that. What’s going on?

Ethan: Danny showed up at the house today.

Gripping my phone in my hand, I snarl my lip at Ethan’s message.Fuck!

Me: Goddamnit! What did he do when he saw her?

Ethan: We saw him coming, so she hid upstairs. Didn’t let him in the house. Max is going to call Cooper and you if he hasn’t already. He’s looking for her.

Me: I missed the call, but I’ll grab Coop after the brief and we’ll call Max. Thanks for the heads up. I’ll run home after my shift and grab some shit to stay there.

Ethan: Also, change in plans. We’re not pretending with Danny any longer.

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