Page 49 of Edge of Control

Before snooping around, I went to his settings. His computer was linked to his phone. That allowed me to turn on Find My Friends and link it to my number.

There. Now I’d know exactly where he was.

Next, I went to his internet browser. Looked through his history. The usual. News sites, some social media searches, likely things from work, some porn websites. Nothing out of this world. Nothing surprising. He was into the same things I was. Amateur porn. Cumshots. Bros beating off other bros. Some dom and sub stuff.

Nice.

Next were his messages. They were all linked to his laptop. I saw our conversations, and I found the conversations he was having with that boring douchebag I rescued him from earlier. The conversations were as stilted over text as they probably were in person.

Boring fuck.

I clicked over to his emails. The first few subject lines were simple spam kind of stuff. Discounts and giveaways for a cruise. It was the fourth email—still unread—that gave me pause.

“Remembered something about Ricky. Forgot your number so found your email. Important.”

My blood turned to ice in my veins. It could be anything. Could even be more spam.

But I knew it wasn’t. Ricky. It had to be the Ricky I killed. Had to be about the Nevermore case.

I opened it. Each word hit me like a gunshot.

“Hey Jace, just remembered something Ricky told me. He said he was chatting with this one guy he was about to meet the night he died. Said he had all these tattoos. One of them was of a monarch butterfly on his forearm. He said he loved it. Jumped out at him and told me because he knew that monarchs mean something to me after my grandpa died. Anyways, hope that helps.”

I looked down at my forearm. The monarch tattoo was practically spotlit. My gut twisted. I nearly threw up all over the computer. Anxiety shot through me as if it were directly injected into my neck.

It’s fine. It’s fine. It’s fine.

It wasn’t fine. But I still had control. I still had a chance to cover my tracks. I knew I never should have sent that photo to Ricky. It was proof that I was real, something only he had wanted before we met up. I sent it through Snapchat so it could be saved, and it hadn’t been, but he clearly remembered it.

Fuck.

First, I had to reply. Couldn’t leave this thread hanging.

“Thanks for that info. I’ll be sure to look into it. Should be helpful.”

I sent the answer before I smashed the Delete button. The email chainpoofedinto thin air.

There. Hopefully, that would do it. That would cover my tracks.

I leaned back in the chair. Sighed. Rubbed my face. My heart raced inside my chest. This could have been worse. Much, much worse. If I hadn’t found that email in time,Jace would have certainly begun to connect the dots. It would ruin everything. All the work I’d done to avenge Marielle, all the work I’d done to win over Jace. Everything would have gone up in smoke.

But it didn’t.

I saved the day. Things were okay. They’d turn out to be just fin?—

“Theo? What are you doing?”

Chapter 19

Jace Holloway

The nightmare wasas vivid as an HD movie. Wings slowly pushed out of my shoulders, painfully shredding the skin, blood seeping down my back as I looked at myself in the mirror. Tears flowed down my face. My dad was reflected back at me, a gunshot wound bleeding from the center of his forehead, his eyes empty, glassy. I tried pulling the wings off. Smashed myself against the wall. Stumbled into the living room.

I felt like I could fly, like maybe that would take the horror away. I crashed through the window.

Didn’t know how to use my wings. Glass was everywhere, cutting me, falling with me. Down, down, down. An eternal fall. Until finally?—

I gasped awake. I was back in my bedroom.

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