Page 58 of Make Them Cry

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NINETEEN

RIVER

I find it by accident.

I’m digging through my desk drawer for a spare charger when my fingers hit something solid and metallic, wedged beneath a stack of sticky notes and half-dead pens.

A USB drive.

Black. Scuffed. Labeled in white marker:Psalm88.

My breath catches.

I haven’t seen this thing inmonths. Not since I moved desks, not since before… all ofthis.

For a second, I just stare at it, every instinct screamingdon’t touch that.

Then the other part of me—the one that’s been living off adrenaline and curiosity for weeks—whispers,What if it’s a clue?

Psalm88.

The same tag from the Cathedral files. The one Mask traced.

The one linked to Mason.

My heart lurches into a nervous gallop.

I glance around the office. Everyone’s heads are down, buried in code or coffee or both. No one’s watching me. Not even Gage.

I slide the USB into my laptop.

The screen flickers once. Then again.

The file directory loads—one folder. No name, just a symbol. A tear drop.

When I click it open, there’s a dozen audio files.

Each one labeled with a date.

The first one:Therapy_09_12.mp3.

No.

I freeze, my stomach bottoming out.

No, no, no, no, no?—

I double-click it anyway, because apparently I like pain.

My own voice fills my headphones.

“I don’t think I’m broken, but I feel like I should be. Sometimes I wish I was. It’d be easier to explain why I can’t sleep. Why every noise sounds like a warning.”

The air leaves my lungs.

It’s me. My voice. My real voice. My words. The ones I toldDr. Linin confidence. Sessions that were encrypted, password-protected, backed up only on my personal drive—never shared.

How did they get these?

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