Page 61 of What's Left of Me

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Phoenix

These guys didn’t mess around.When I’d said, “let’s do this,” they’d jumped in. Noel left the living room for a few minutes and returned with all this stuff to wire Angel and Gabe up. Mini cameras, little microphones, it was unreal.

“Wow, what did I miss?” Matt asked as he returned from work.

“JJ tried to use you as bait with a serial killer, but thankfully Mason values your life, and so we’re going with Angel and Gabe instead.” Nick smiled, pecked Matt on the lips, and then continued taping a wire to Gabe’s chest.

Matt panned over to where JJ was gaping at Nick.

“What the hell, JJ?”

“Now, hold on a second.” JJ held his hands up. “Nick’s explanation was horrible.”

“But true.” Nick shrugged.

“All I said was to have Matt go into Sogni di Caffeina and order some coffee, get the baristas and employees talking and see if Phoenix recognized any of them. And I onlysuggestedthis…emphasis onsuggested, because we believe The Broken-Doll Killer knows what the brothers look like.”

I watched Matt’s eyes widen with each word out of JJ’s mouth.

“That’s absolutely bait. Oh, my God. JJ, have I angered you in some way? Is this about the time I accidentally left a red sock in the wash and your whites turned pink?”

JJ huffed. “No. You wouldn’t have been alone?—”

“Um, you literally said I or someone would be outside waiting, so technically he would be alone,” Nick made sure to add.

“It doesn’t matter.” JJ motioned to Gabe and Angel. “See? New plan.”

Matt pointed his finger at JJ and moved it back and forth between them. “You and I are going to have a discussion about this at some point. Be ready.”

“Okay, Angel, you’re all set.” Noel stepped away from his brother. “Cameras are in the buttons. There are three in case one fails. Under the shirt are the microphones, so we can hear you. This is yours. Put it in your ear, and you’ll be able to hear us.”

“Got it.” Angel slipped the tiny earpiece into his ear.

Once Nick was done suiting up Gabe, they did a bunch of checks and whatever technical stuff…I didn’t understand half of it. Then the two of them left as though what they were about to do wasn’t insanely dangerous.

“Is anyone going to follow them?” I asked as a million scenarios ran through my head.

“Nah. They have each other’s sixes, and they’ll be in a public place. Besides, if more than just the two of them leave, those cops at the end of the driveway will get suspicious.” Nick was typing on his keyboard, and visuals from Gabe’s and Angel’s cameras began popping up on monitors.

“Oh.”

“Are you okay?” Noel sidled up next to me and wrapped his arms around me.

“I’ll be fine.”

A small wrinkle formed between his eyes, one I’d seen before when he wasn’t convinced what I was saying was true. “We’re gonna get him, I promise.”

“This is so dangerous, Noel. I don’t like putting any of you in this situation.”

“You didn’t put us here, Phoenix. We want to help you, and this guy has got to go. This is what we do. Let us, and trust that we’re going to do everything in our power to end this for you and all his victims.”

He was so determined, and I didn’t want to burst his bubble with all my worrying, so I smiled and nodded. “I trust you.”

“Good. Now, why don’t you have a seat?” He guided me to one of the tables with four monitors. “You’ll see Gabe’s and Angel’s views here. The speakers work, so you can hear. Nick’s and my headsets can talk to them, so if anyone sticks out let me know and I’ll tell them, or you speak into the mic I showed you earlier.”

“Got it.”

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