Page 111 of Unmask
“I’ll check the security footage,” Raine stated, steadier now, falling into the familiar rhythm of problem-solving mode.
“You don’t think they were ballsy enough to come here and take her, do you?” Maddox asked, and the question hung in the air like smoke, heavy with implications none of us wanted to consider.
Raine shook his head, his pale eyes moving from the mugs on the coffee table to mine. The empty ceramic vessels sat there like evidence, chocolate residue still clinging to the bottom of each one. Four mugs. Four of us. But only three had been drained. “No.”
We were thinking the same thing.
The realization hit us simultaneously, settling over the room like a shroud. The way we’d all fallen into such deep sleep. The chemical taste still coating my tongue.
She wouldn’t have. Would she?
But even as the thought formed, I knew the answer. The cold certainty of it settled in my chest, heavy and undeniable. She would. She had. To save her friend.
And we’d let her.
“We were drugged,” I whispered, the truth tasting bitter on my tongue, matching the chemical aftertaste that still lingered in my mouth. “She spiked the drinks. Look around. Do you feel rested? That wasn’t fucking just hot cocoa.” I gestured wildly at the room, at their sluggish movements, at the way we were all still blinking like we were trying to clear fog from our vision.
“No way.” Mason shook his head. “Kaylor is too…naive for that shit. Besides, where would she get the stuff to knock us out?” Disbelief warring with the mounting evidence.
“I believe it,” Maddox said, sitting forward now, elbows on his knees, staring at the empty mugs on the coffee table like they held all the answers. His jaw worked silently, grinding his teeth as the pieces fell into place.
The four of us stared at each other, sharing a holy-shit look that spoke volumes.
“That little minx,” Raine murmured.
“I’m going to kill her,” I muttered. Right after I kill whoever had her.
I turned and stormed back into her room, my bare feet slapping against the hardwood with each furious step. I was retracing every inch, every clue, my eyes scanning the pristine surfaces like a crime scene investigator.
That’s when I saw it.
The burner phone.
Sitting right in the middle of the bed like a final goodbye, its black screen reflecting the pale morning light filtering through the curtains. The sight of it confirmed every terrible suspicion that had been building in my chest.
I snatched it up, my fingers flying across the screen. There was only one message.
Tomorrow. Midnight. The old train yard off Route 19. Come alone. No Crew. No Corvo. No Cops. Or Kenny dies.
“Fuck.” The word exploded from my throat as I punched the headboard hard enough to feel it crack beneath my fist. Pain shot up my arm, but it was nothing compared to the agony tearing through my chest. Wood splintered, and a sliver embedded itself in my knuckle.
“She went alone,” Raine muttered behind me. I hadn’t heard him enter the room, not over the roaring screaming in my head, but suddenly he was there, his light-green eyes scanning the same message over my shoulder.
“She was never supposed to go at all,” I ground out, pacing now like a caged animal. My feet wore a path in the hardwood, back and forth, back and forth. “I promised I’d keep her safe. I vowed I would get her friend back, but she didn’t trust me. And now she’s fucking gone.”
Every step sent another jolt of adrenaline through my system, but there was nowhere to channel it, no target for the rage building inside me like a nuclear reactor about to melt down.
My phone vibrated in my back pocket, the sensation cutting through my spiral of self-recrimination. I whipped it out, studying the number with narrowed eyes. It was local but not from anyone I knew. The digits stared back at me, anonymous and somehow ominous.
“Are you going to answer that?” Raine prompted.
I swiped to accept the call and put it on speaker with mechanical movements. “Who is this? And you better have a damn good reason for calling me.”
“Kreed?” The voice was frantic.
It took me a heartbeat to connect the voice, to place it among the chaos of my thoughts. “Carson?”
“I—I have Kenny,” he rushed out, the words tumbling over each other in his haste to get them out. “She’s here. She’s safe.”
