WHEN BOOKER TOOK OFF after a panicked call from Brysen, I had planned on settling in for the rest of the day and doing nothing. I was getting real sick and tired of doing nothing. I had never had the opportunity to just sit around idle while someone else took care of me, and I didn’t care for it at all. Especially since I woke up alone and bereft every morning knowing that Titus was purposely putting space between us during waking hours. We needed to figure out a way that I could be out in the open that seemed like I was on my own without actually flying solo. I needed to be someplace where Conner could get closer to me. This condo was like a fortress and there was no way he could get his hands on me if I was cloistered behind the impenetrable walls.
I was messing with my hair in the bathroom mirror because I was that bored when the cell phone Titus had given me rang. Only two people had the number, Titus and Booker, so I froze when neither one of those names came up on the display. I thought I knew who would be on the other end, that a deadly and lyrical Irish lilt would hit my ears when I answered the call. I was so surprised to hear a voice I hadn’t heard since my family was whole that I actually went weak in the knees and had to sit down before I fell over.
My mom sounded so much like Rissa over the phone it was like talking to a ghost. I was shaking so badly that I was having a hard time holding on to the cell and her words were getting lost in the rushing of blood through my head.
She said something about a federal agent stopping by the house and letting her and my dad know there was new information on Rissa and her boyfriend’s murder. She told me the agent had been so nice, so handsome and polite. She told me that he thought she should be the one to call me because it was information the entire family needed to know. My mother hadn’t had that much life in her since my sister’s body went into the ground. Her words stabbed through me like broken and jagged shards of glass. She asked me to come home. I hadn’t been home to see her or my father in almost six years. Too much time and such a huge secret kept me from going back to them, and now Conner was manipulating the situation so I had no choice.
He wanted me to tell them what I had done. He knew that admitting to my parents my part in what had happened after Rissa’s death was my worst fear. He was using things I had told him, shared with him, when I thought I was in love, against me. He was pure evil and really tricky. It didn’t escape my notice that he was guiding me away from the security of the condo while both Titus and Booker were away. I wondered if he had yet to pick up on the marshals that were supposedly keeping an eye on me from the background or if he just didn’t care.
I promised my mom I would try and make it home soon. She cried, and when I hung up I knew without a doubt the phone would ring again. I don’t know how Conner got the number, but I was done questioning how he managed to always be a step ahead. Instead I needed to focus on luring him closer.
I would never understand how such a terrible man could have such a beautiful voice. It was without a doubt one of the greatest weapons he had in his arsenal. His accent just a shadow under his hard words as he said my name.
“Reeve. Pretty, pretty Reeve. It’s a shame it had to go this way. I had such big plans for you.”
I stared at the phone like it might bite me. His words coiled tight and threatening around my throat.
“Because you loved me, Conner? You had plans because you loved me?” I sounded bitter and scorned, and I kind of was. I hated that he had fooled me so badly. I hated that he had just brought more bad into my life when all I wanted was good. I hated that I was going to kill him, and this beautiful thing that was unfurling between me and Titus would wither and die.
“I love you about as much as you loved me, Reeve. One user can usually spot another from a mile away. I thought that’s what we were doing . . . using.”
I scoffed at him. “I thought we were starting a relationship. I thought you were something different.”
“That makes two of us. I thought you would understand why I’m doing what I have to do. I thought we spoke the same language of revenge, of doing what had to be done to right a wrong.”
I flinched at the word revenge and how powerful it could be in the wrong hands. I shoved my fingers through my long hair. “Why did you go to my parents’ house, Conner? What are you trying to do to them?”
He laughed, and it made my stomach turn over and over. I wrapped an arm around my waist and bent over. I felt like there was a good chance I might get sick.