Page 114 of Spooked

“Then what? What did you do after that?”

“Then…I took a job solving problems. And I can tell you that we’re not going to get a better opportunity to solve this one than we have with Meera right now. Thanks to Silvio, there’s an open line of communication, and the team is already here.”

“But what would the end-game be? Are you planning to chain Meera’s captor in a cellar and cut off his toes?”

“No, but if he quietly disappeared, the world would be a better place.”

That truth was undeniable, but the idea of Jerry disappearing him… Fuck.

Tulsa smiled brightly. “We can make it look like an accident.”

Zach had always said that if anyone in Blackstone House was capable of taking a life in cold blood, it was Jerry, but the cops had quickly ruled her out of having any involvement in Ruby’s death. What were the chances of two killers living in one house? Brax shuddered, suddenly chilled to the bone even though the temperature in the kitchen remained steady. Maybe Carissa had been right when she said the place was creepy?

“You’re overthinking,” Jerry said.

“Of course I’m overthinking!”

“You have questions?”

“What happened to Ruby?” Brax blurted before he could stop himself.

“Ruby? How did we get onto the subject of Ruby?”

“Because she’s dead. And now you’re talking about killing people.”

Too late, it occurred to Brax that if Jerry was capable of murder, then challenging her was probably a bad idea. But Jerry just shook her head.

“A logical question, but I had nothing to do with Ruby’s death. And truthfully, it’s always bugged me that I didn’t see it coming. That whole pentagram thing? Strangulation? Levi must have been high.”

When Brax didn’t speak, Jerry sighed.

“I know you don’t trust me, and in your situation, I wouldn’t trust me either. But if I’d had to kill Ruby—and fuck knows why I’d have done that because I liked her—then I wouldn’t have done it at home. That was just dumb, and I’m not stupid, Brax.”

No, she wasn’t.

“You think it was drugs? That’s why he did it?”

Like Grey, Jerry had distanced herself after the murder. While the rest of them—except for Alexa, who’d been in foster prison, as she called it—had discussed the case a number of times, Brax had never heard Jerry’s thoughts on the matter.

“All those pills he popped? He probably got a bad one. What good does rehashing the past do? We can’t bring Ruby back, but Meera’s still alive. We should focus on her.”

Another hard truth.

For years, Brax had dreamed of escaping from his old world, but thanks to Carissa’s antics, he found himself at the intersection of two new ones: Alexa and Jerry’s lawless enclave and Indi’s tangled wonderland. The difference between them? Until now, Indi had been a mere passenger on this ride, while Jerry drove like a maniac.

Past and present had collided, but how would the future look? If Indi stayed passive and six women disappeared, the guilt would haunt her forever, and Brax had seen what guilt could do to a woman. Dawson’s sister hadn’t been able to live with her mistake. He’d helped Dawson to arrange the funeral.

“How certain are you that you can get the women back?” he asked Jerry.

“Indi? Ninety-nine percent. I’m not going to lie and tell you a hundred because there’ll always be risk involved. Meera? The same. If the op runs into a problem, we’ll back off until you can buy her. The other women? If they’re being held at the same location, mid-nineties. If they’re somewhere else? Who the hell knows—it all depends on what information we’re able to extract.”

Ninety-nine percent. A one percent chance that they’d lose Indi. If Brax were gambling in Vegas, he’d play those odds, no question, but this was the woman he loved. Could he take the risk? The alternatives weren’t palatable either—sure, Brax could liberate Meera, hell, he could bid for all the girls, but then where would it end? The seller would only get richer, and no woman under the age of twenty-five would be safe.

CouldJerry pull this off? A month ago, he’d have laughed at the idea, but then he’d seen what she’d done with Carissa… He didn’t trust Jerry, not even a little, but he had to concede that she seemed competent.

“If this happens, the seller has to go to jail, not disappear. He should face justice. If those reviews on Amber Road are accurate, hundreds of other women have been taken. They need to be found, or at the very least, their families need closure.”

Jerry glanced toward Tulsa. “We can take the people at the house alive. Does that mean you’re on board with this plan?”

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