Page 191 of Without a Trace
I don’t know what made me check her drawer. Maybe instinct. Maybe desperation. Maybe the kind of paranoia that starts creeping in when you know the universe’s favorite game is taking things from you the second you start to believe they’re yours.
Her things were still here—but she wasn’t. I checked her drawers anyway—like an idiot. Like maybe she’d left something. A clue. A goodbye. A reason.
But there was nothing.
Not even a scent.
Just the hollow echo of what used to be.
My fist slammed the edge of the dresser before I even felt it coming. Pain burst up my arm. I didn’t care. I needed it. Something real. Something sharp. Something I could feel that wasn’t the hollow ripping through my chest.
Scarlett fucking Monroe.
Of course she’d vanish like this. Not because she’s cruel—but because she’s chaos. Because when she’s afraid, she runs. And I should’ve seen it coming.
Ididsee it coming.
I just didn’t want to believe she’d do it again.
Zeke’s voice echoed in my head.
“She’s not a prisoner, Trace.”
No.
I knew better.
I knew Scarlett was a fucking earthquake in human form. And I loved her anyway.
And here he was—
The one who lied.
The one who followed orders.
The one who thought love could survive a half-truth if it was told gently enough.
The old me.
The one I buried the second she touched my hand and made me want to be better.
The door creaked open behind me.
“You looking for clues?” Rhett asked, voice low.
I didn’t turn around. “You already know.”
He stepped inside, letting the door click behind him. “Zeke tracked the plane.”
I exhaled hard. “No note. No message. Nothing.”
Rhett looked around the room—at the glass, the unmade silence. “That’s the message.”
I stared at the floor. “She’s been asking questions. Dreaming shit. Digging deeper than we wanted her to.”
“We handed her lies wrapped in half-truths,” Rhett said, crossing his arms. “And hoped she’d be too distracted to rip the seams.”
“She did.”
