Okay, I know everyone's been waiting for this chapter, so let's get into it.
One note, I think the life that the guys end up trying to save here is Varrick's, because I think he lost his life a long time ago. The song "How To Save A Life" is a look at Matt's natural sympathy for Varrick...the younger guys probably are too caught up in their emotions to see as much at Matt does.
Leed
I'm doing one of those stupidest fucking things I've ever done.
I'm not talking about convincing Dev to help me commit B and E and risk both our careers and potentially incarceration.
I'm not talking about hiring a high-tech cat burglar to slide us into Varrick Von's smart house by completely hacking his computer controls.
I'm not even talking about dragging Trace into this and leaving him with the technically legal but maybe most dangerous part of this whole dealâkeeping Von occupied while we toss his house and later, probably his office too.
No, the stupidest thing I'm doing right now is ignoring my instincts.
They are screaming at me that I'm off track.
There's something I'm not seeing.
And yet I don't know what else to do but finish what we've started here. I'm standing over the professional thief, who's hacking into Varrick's PC, and it's not squaring with the reality I'm expecting.
There are no videos of Ashlynn. No videos of any Subs. No homemade porn at all. Hell, even his porn viewing is just standard stuffâa mix of random videos, most of them not even BDSM.
But there are a shit ton of articles about Megan's disappearance on his browser history. Also a lot of research about Costa Ricaâparticularly gorges, lakes, landfills and very remote trails with driving access. All hits within the last six weeks. It also looks like his recent trip to Brazil was actually a cover for visiting Costa Rica, because his emails show car rentals and hotel confirmations in Costa Rica.
It doesn't make sense. If he killed her twenty years ago, why is he suddenly obsessed with revisiting the event in the last six weeks?
Unless he knows that we know about Megan.
How could he know that?
He could only know if Ashlynn or maybe Laurie contacted him.
Orâif he was having us followed in Costa Rica and realizes we met Laurie Davis.
Fuck.
Dev comes loping back into the room, looking all too comfortable in a ski mask and gloves. He pulls the mask off. "I don't get it. If he's a Domâwhere's his fucking play room?"
Dev's right and that's another thing that is wrong here. There are no tools of a Dom's trade, anywhereâand we've tossed the whole fucking place. There's not even so much as a set of restraints or a flogger.
"Fuck," I mutter and shove past Dev, shouldering down the stairs to his basement. I don't know why, it just seems like the place to keep secrets.
There's nothing here but an expansive home gym. We've already searched it, but there has to be something more down here. I pace in front of the wall of mirrors.
I'm angry, hostileâcriminalâI don't even look like myself. I don't feel like myself either.
"What are we missing?" I round on Dev. "What the fuck are we missing?"
He rubs his jaw. "Well, there's the obvious, mate. Maybe we've got the wrong guy."
I shake my head. "It's him. Ashlynn admitted it."
Dev sits down on a workout bench, squishing his ski mask between his hands. "Leed, I've done a lot of reckless and stupid and illegal and just plain mean shit in my life. I can tell you, when you go down a shady path, lying becomes second nature. It doesn't stop being second nature when you try to walk back out of the dark, you understand? Do you know how many times I've already lied to Bridge del Marco, so she doesn't know what a bloody awful person I am?"
My gut clenches at how true Dev's words ring. "You're saying Ashlynn lied? She fingered the wrong guy? She's still protecting her Dom?"
He shrugs. "Protecting him? No, mate. Protecting herself. Maybe she even thinks she's protecting youâfrom doing exactly what we are doing."
He's right. Ashlynn is still keeping secrets. That's what kept her from me for the last six weeks. As hard as she tries to be my Sunshine, the girl she became in the last two years is still a part of her. She's still a thief and a liar. She's stolen my heart and she's wrapping it up in a cloak of lies and omissions.
I don't even care. One look at her at the Grammy's tonight is all it took to know I can't be without her. Her taste on my lips and her scent soaking my soul...goddamn. I love that little thieving liar. I love her light and her darkness.
At the same time cold fury burns through me. How much harder can I fight for this girl? What will it take for her to trust me with all her secrets?
This girl is still running, but I'm standing firm. In this moment, I feel like I could kill. For her? Because of her? I don't know.
I stare at my rage-filled reflectionâso dark. Deadly.
I pick up a twenty pound weight and hurl it at my reflection.
"Bloody Fucking heâ" Dev's curse stops midstream as the glass shatters far too easilyâbecause it wasn't mounted on solid wall, it was on hinges. It falls away, revealing a sleek pocket door with a keypad.
"Brilliant!" He exclaims, jumping up and slapping me on the back. "He has a playroom after all! Who says blind rage can't solve problems?"
Dev dashes back up the stairs, returning in seconds with our high-tech professional criminal. He shorts the door's key pad and it slides open.
"Well, bugger me with a fish fork!" Dev exclaims.
It's not a Dom's play room.
We exchange a shocked glance, then walk into a closet sized room that is a cross between 007's personal arsenal and a criminal profiler's workspace.
The two end walls are covered in an impressive array of handguns and assault weapons.
The entire back wall is covered with a map of Costa Rica and pictures of Megan Davis, articles on her death, transcripts of police reports from twenty years agoâ Varrick's own interrogation, those of their traveling companions, and even people who worked at the night club where she disappeared.
There's an expanded map just of San José with pins. Dozens of blue pins retrace Varrick and Megan's tripâthey are date and time stamped with notes like...market trip,bought M butterfly necklace or hiked this trail with Ace and Yvonne or met the local at lunch...name? Benicio? Bernardo?
There are three red pins on the board. One at the airport, one downtown with a label at some store, and one on the German embassy. They also have dates and labels. Viggo in country, Viggo's credit card used, and Viggo enters German embassy.
There are scribbled post-it notes all around the edge of the board with questions.
How many times did Viggo meet Megan before Costa Rica? Impressions? Ask friends...
What did Viggo say to me about Megan's disappearance?
Check Viggo's visits to Bethel. Did he visit there before or after Costa Rica?
There are partial answers scribbled to some, there are other notes in German.
There's one old photograph of a young couple at a scenic jungle overlook, pinned to the center of the map. A very young Varrick with a girl that looks so much like Ashlynn it makes my skin crawl with anxiety. Varrick is kissing the girl's cheek and she is beaming into the camera, fingering a wooden necklace. There's a post-it note slapped over the corner of the picture. It readsâ
Where Are You, Megan? Help Me.
Question marks scratched in heavy sharpie dot dozens of gorges, lakes, remote trails. All places where a person might dump a body.
All my feelings clog in my throat, and I feel like I might puke or scream or choke or all three.
I put my finger on the photograph and manage a few words. "Varrick Von didn't murder Megan Davis."
"No, I don't think so, Mate. But it looks like he thinks this Viggo bloke did."
"That's a weird name...Viggo," I finger one of the red pins. The only Viggo I've ever heard of is the actor, and I'm pretty fucking sure Mortenson didn't murder Megan Davis.
"It's more common in Europe...particularly in Scandinavia, Germany, the likes." Dev notes. "As is the name Varrick."
I finger the pin that says, Viggo enters the German embassy. "Varrick is German. His father is a German diplomat."
"Seems like Viggo is somehow a part of his German set." Dev shakes his head. "And they both have diplomatic ties. That's bloody lucky. Even better for getting out of international scrapes than being the son of a British peer." He gives me a meaningful look.
I rub a hand over my face. "One thing Ashlynn did tell me was that she didn't think Varrick Von murdered Megan. She said she had seen Megan's picture in the trophy room of 'another Dom.'"
Dev grunts. "This shyte is way more fucking complicated than we thought. Leed, I think it's time to go. You need to have a serious talk with your darling. I think we've perpetrated a crime on an innocent man."
"Whatever Varrick Von is, he's no innocent," I say, slinging a hand at the wall of guns. "He threatened Ashlynn at the Vision Party. Scared her, fucked with her head."
Dev lifts his shoulders and his hands, "Alright, he's still a suspect as her Dom. Maybe he doesn't shit where he eats. Maybe he's got his torture chamber in a penthouse somewhere. What's the play then?"
"I want to hear it from the fucker's mouthâwhat his relationship with Ashlynn is. I want him to explain this shit," I trace Megan's wall with my hand.
Ask and the Universe delivers. I believe that, because in the moment I need answers from Varrick, my phone rings. Trace. I listen. I swear. I hang up. Dev stares expectantly.
"I think you should try harder to get along with Matt," I say solemnly.
"What the bloody fuck does that mean?"
"It means you met your thug match," I say, jogging around him, and heading up the stairs. "Come on!"
Two minutes later, Matt is rolling Varrick's car into the garage and Dev is once more exclaiming, "Bugger me," as we stare down at Varrick's prone form, bound and gagged in the trunk.
Ten minutes later, we've got the still unconcious Varrick tied to a chair in his secret closet but we're mostly ignoring.
Four freaked out alpha males trying to manage an unmanageable situation?
It's bedlam. And Matt's idea of restoring order is beyond bedlam.
"Look, here's the play," he says calmly, examining an assault rifle he pulled down from the wall. "We're gonna find out exactly what Varrick has done to Ashlynn. If we're wrong about himâthough after the message I overheard him leaving Ashlynn I don't see howâthen we're going to apologize for this clusterfuck. Real nice. Talk him into overlooking the fact that you've burglarized his house, and destroyed his property and that I cold-cocked him with a brick."
"And how are we supposed to do that?" I growl.
"We make him see it our wayâya feel me? Be prepared to pony up with whatever green and favors you are banking to express our genuine regret." He stares down at the still slumped Varrick,. Matt's eyes alight with the wrath of God and the visciousness of Lucifer himself.
"But if we are not wrong, I'm about protecting my familyâand everyone of you is that now." He gives Dev a narrow grimace. "Well, maybe not you."
Dev gives him a devilish grin. "Not yet."
"You want in my circle? Then let's talk about how you can help out in this situation we are in, Dev." Matt stalks over to Varrick and pulls his head back roughly by the hair. Varrick moans and his eyes move behind his lids. "Like I was saying, if we're wrong, we'll make it right with him. But if this shady fuck is the one that carved Ashlynn up, then he's a pychopath, and I'm definitely not leaving a pyscho with a grudge against my own family walking around. So in that case, we kill him. We kill him and we chop him up and feed him to the sharks and we never speak of it again. It's that's simple."
"Your father is fucking crazy," I hiss at Trace.
"Which one," he mutters, as his eyes roam the board.
"You're not actually contemplating committing murder," Dev scoffs.
"Not me," Matt crosses his arms. "You're the gangster. Shouldn't be a problem for you, right?"
"Fuck that," Dev pales. "I'm not killing anyone."
"I thought you were a legit thug," Matt sneers.
Dev jerks the unloaded assault rifle away from Matt and snaps it back on the wall. "I'm not a murderer, you arrogant bloody wanker."
"Nobody's killing anybody," I snarl at Matt. "Are you insane?"
Matt shrugs. "I'm not crazy, I'm just an overprotective father, ok? And we're only fucked beyond fucked right now because you started this chain of felonious events, Lawson." He kicks Varrick's leg. "I know you're awake, asshole. Let's start the show."
Varrick slowly rights himself in the chair and stairs first at Matt, then at every one of us. His eyes linger on me, and they look pleading. He gives me a head jerk...that's all he can manage with his hands tied behind his back.
I untie his gag and he vomits on the floor, then spits. "Untie me," he says very neutrally, like he's not even scared. I guess he isn't, with his background.
I sigh. And look around at the other guys. "This is crazy, you know that right? We have to untie him."
"Fuck that," Trace says. "Untie a pychopath with CIA training in a roomful of guns? We'll be the dead ones. All of us."
"I'm not a pyschopath," Varrick says hoarsely. "I am a dangerous person, but with a lot more control of my emotions than any of you have. I have no intention of making this situation any worse than it already is. If you won't untie me, can I at least get some water?"
I nod to Dev, who exits and returns with a bottle of water. "Let him drink," I say, turning my back while Dev carelessly pours more water down Von's face than in his mouth.
I pull a service pistol from the wall of weapons. It's not loaded.
I exchange a look with Matt. He gives me a raised eyebrow, then a shrug like, "It's your show, kid."
I open a drawer, looking for ammo. Varrick has it all carefully labeled, but I'm not exactly sure what model this Glock is.
"That's a Glock 45. The magazines for that one are next drawer down," Varrick says helpfully.
Fucking prick. He's not scared at all, but he should maybe be a little more scared of me than he is. He's fucking right about one thing...I feel out of control.
"Shut the fuck up," I tell him. "You'll know when I want you to talk."
I find what I'm looking for, shove the magazine in the gun, load a plus one in chamber and drop the slide.
"I knew you were OG," Dev says lightly.
Trace blinks at me. "What the fuck? Put that down before your dumbass shoots somebody. You don't anything about handling a firearm."
I roll my eyes at him. "Of course I do."
"You do?"
"You don't?"
Trace looks nearly green with nerves. He shakes his head and I sigh. "How the hell did you grow up in Georgia and your father didn't teach you how to shoot his guns?"
"Ross knew better than to keep guns," Trace says. "Shit got way too hot in my house to have guns in the mix."
I feel a pang of regret that Trace is mixed up in this shit. Violence agitates the fuck out of him, unless he's already lost his mind and he's the one delivering it.
"Well, your father was a sorry drunk but mine was a shady fuck, remember? After our house got robbed when I was twelveâprobably by somebody he did shady business withâhe taught me how to shoot, how to protect Mac." I look at Von. "By the way, I shoot like I perform, motherfucker. I never miss my mark."
Varrick actually smiles at me. "You're not going to shoot me, Lawson."
"Probably not unless I have to," I agree. I give Trace a head jerk. "Untie him."
Varrick rubs his wrists and eyes us all in turn. "You guys are quite a squad. Lawson, you put on a helluva good show, handling the gun like that. I know men, and you are the kind that could kill, but not in cold blood. Only if your back was against the wall, and I have no intention of putting your back there." Von looks at Matt and shakes his head. "You're the same, but more calculating. All that bullshit you said about killing me you only said because you knew I was awake, and gathering intel on you." Varrick tosses a head at Dev. "That one likes to play the thug, but the only thing he's ever shot is damn deer on his father's Scottish estate. And Trace?" He gives Trace a sympathetic look. "Trace, your hands are shaking. I've seen your profile at Sentinel. You know you have PTSD from the abuse you suffered as a child, right? And this whole unpleasant scene is triggering you and bringing your trauma to the surface. You should walk away, Son. Call your therapist."
Trace gives that tight laugh he makes when he's pissed off. "I'm good, Asshole. My hands might shake, but that would only make the revenge carving I give you hurt worse."
"Right," Varrick says. "Tough talk, but it's not in you, Son. And even if your Old Man here did have it in him to torture and murderâwhich he might, out of all of you, he might be the one with enough balls for my line of workâhe would never do it front of you, his wounded child. So let's cut the shit. Untie me and I'll tell you what you want to know. It's time, anyway. I've done all that I can alone."
This dude is pissing me off, thinking he's running his own damn interrogation.
I pull a chair in front of him and cradle my gun hand with the other. "This is some serious shit we are in here, Von. I'm done fucking around. Tell me how you know Ashlynn and what you've done to her."
He doesn't flinch. "I met Ashlynn in LA almost three years ago at a party you two drunk dumbshits brought her to, but you were both too altered to notice. It's true, the moment I saw her, she reminded me of a girl I once knew."
"A girl you killed?" Trace says with deadly calm.
"A girl I loved. A girl I'm now sure is dead because I loved her," Varrick says, looking at the picture of him and Megan. His eyes return to me. "But I never hurt Megan. I can't say the same thing about Ashlynn."
"You fucker. Were you her original Dom or one of the pieces of shit he loaned her out to?"
"Neither. I've committed enough dark acts in the service of my adopted country. I'm not interested in sexually dominating scared, strung out girls with brutality. I've never had sex with her, and I've never given her any kind of physical discipline, and I certainly did not cut her flesh with a knife."
"But you just said you hurt Ashlynn."
"I hurt her with inaction. I didn't intervene, when she began to explore a submissive relationship with my brother. I didn't see the danger to her. I...had a blind spot when it comes to him."
Every part of me tenses. I squeeze the gun in my hand. I understand nowâwho Varrick is to Ashlynn.
"Your brother was her Dom, and you're the asshole that stalked her for him."
"Yes. I have a certain skill set, and occasionally my brother would ask for help tracking her down. You must understand, Ashlynn was very reckless, very strung out and vicious sometimes in her behaviors. At first I believed my brother was trying to help her. I thwarted her attempts to get drugs, and I also gave my brother information on her whereabouts. I have at times...strongly suggested she return to his care, but only when I felt she was likely to overdose and die at the hands of other men she was with, who took were addicts like she was and took no responsibility to manage her drug habit."
Hate for this man is pouring through me. Matt is squeezing my shoulder, but I shirk him off. I take the safety off the gun, cock the slide.
"Did you watch the things he did to her?"
He is staring at the gun as he speaks in low tones. "Not at first, no. Ashlynn was by no means her first sub, I was never much concerned with what my brother did with his partners. But he'd never had one like Ashlynnâso young, so troubled. The truth was, even though he had met her through me, even though I had no romantic interest in Ashlynn...I felt an affinity for her, because she reminded me of Megan. I began to worry about her. I viewed some of the videos he made. Sometimes, I felt he was crossing lines with her, not giving proper aftercare. He was obsessed with trying to cure her addiction with discipline, which I thought was...strange. He had never treated his other subs with such swings of obsessive, then callous behavior.There were times I encouraged her to leave him, in order to set better boundaries with him. There were times I bullied her to return, because I was afraid without his oversight she would end up dead from drugs. They had a...very bizarre relationship, even for the Dom-Sub dynamic. I was trying to...understand them. I failed, clearly."
"You failed to understand them? What was there to understand, you sick bastard? I saw the video. That was not pleasure. That was brutality. You witnessed that and you let it happen. You sent her back into that darkness over and over. You are as guilty as he is."
Cold hate floods me. My arm extends almost against me will, and I find the gun in my hand pointing at Varrick's forehead.
Someone says my nameâTrace, I thinkâbut my attention is on Varrickâthe despairing, almost pleading look, in his eyes. My hand holds the gun steady, but my finger tremors on the trigger.
"I've killed people for much less than you are feeling now. For duty. For country. It's not that hard to pull the trigger when you think you are in the right," he says. "The hard part comes after." He pushes forward, leveling his forehead closer to the gun. He looks me dead in the eye. His voice is flat. "Do it, if you think I deserve it."
"Don't tempt me, fucker."
"I mean it. Do it and you take the hard part away from me forever, and you make it your own to carry." He stares past me, to the wall behind me, and I know without having to see, that he's looking at the picture of Megan. "Do it. It's the only way I will ever find Meganâon the other side." One long tear races down his cheek. "Do it!!! I'm fucking tired of not knowing where she is!!!"
One long moment in which I squeeze, testing the trigger. One long moment in which I don't know right from wrong, vengeance from mercy, the extent of my own brutality or the depth of my humanity.
One long moment before I lower the gun, before Dev swears and hauls Varrick to his feet, pushing him out of my line of sight. One long moment, before Matt takes the gun carefully from me and one long moment before Trace is gripping my shoulders, forcing me to look at him.
"Hey. Look at me," he says. "Look at me. It's okay."
I just nod mutely, breathing, the shock of how close I really was to pulling that trigger finally hitting me. Over and over, Trace tells me it's okay, like he's in shock too. I don't which one of us is more freaked.
Finally, Matt pulls Trace away, telling him to help Dev keep an eye on Varrick. Matt grips the back of my head roughlyâmuch more roughly than Trace grabbed me, but something in the way the way he's grabbing me makes me feel...steadier.
I focus on his calm grey eyes. He's nodding to me. "You did right, putting the gun down. Varrick is...fucked up, but he's not what we thought he was. This ain't about vengeance. You can't do right by Ashlynn with a gun, you hear what I'm saying? You do right by staying the man she loves, not turning into...a...a...Varrick Von. You did right, you understand?"
"Yeah."
It's some time before Matt and I seek out the others. I need more than minute to get my balance, and Mattâhe just sits with me. When we finally trudge upstairs, Varrick is sitting on his couch, head bowed to his hands.
Dev takes over the role of interrogator. "Tell us what you haven't told us yet. About the dead girl that has you so fucked in the head."
"Megan." Varrick keeps his head bowed. After a long time, he says almost casually. "I can't remember what her voice sounded like anymore. Or what her smile looked like. I have pictures, but seeing a smile bloom is different than a still shot, and I can't remember what that looked like on her.
"I still remember what she smelled like, though. She used this vanilla lotionâloved it. She always smelled like sugar cookies. Sometimes I wake with my heart pounding and the smell of vanilla is so strongâit's like no time at all has passed. It's like those first few days after she was missing, and I was frantic, but I still believed she was alive.
"The police thought she had been kidnapped for ransom. That happens occasionally in Central Americaâlocals targeting and kidnapping what they perceive as rich Americans. Even after no ransom was demanded, the police still labeled her case as a kidnapping gone wrongâthey figured the kidnappers had accidentally killed her before they could ask for a pay-off. For twenty years, I thought so, too. I had accepted the hole, you know?"
He claws at his chest and shoots me a look, and for the first time, I understand why Ashlynn has been trying to shield this man. She feared him for how he treated her in the past, but now she pities him. How could she not, with a wide open heart like hers?
I sit down across from him.
"I'm sorry for what happened to your girl. That's...fuck...I can't imagine."
He winces. "I could. It was all I could imagine, for a long time. What she might have gone through. How scared she must have been. What...what was done to her. It's why I went into the military. It's why I excelled at special ops. I wanted to hunt down and kill the kind of people that inflicted random terror on innocents."
"Yeah, I can see that." I say quietly.
No one speaks. Finally, Trace asks, "Did it...help? Your line of work, I mean?"
Varrick shrugs. "I learned not to feel anything. So yeah, it helped. Until six weeks ago, when Ashlynn came back from Costa Rica with Megan's missing flyer and told me that she had seen a picture of Megan beforeâlocked in a safe in my brother's playroom. When she told me that, everything changed. I had to see for myself. I did just what you have done here tonight, but with a lot more stealth. I made sure my brother was occupied with other matters, broke into his home, hacked the security on his playroom, and found Megan's picture in the safe. Along with a necklace I had bought her the day before she disappeared. The pin on the safe was the date of her disappearance. That's how I know for sure, he killed her. He killed her and he keeps the secret locked away in a safe, locked away from even himself, I think."
"Fuck." Matt and Dev utter the word in unison and Varrick looks into the distance.
"Why would your brother kill your girl?" Trace asks bluntly. "Jealousy? Was she with him first or something?"
He shakes his head. "No, nothing like that." He rises, goes over to a desk, and unlocks a drawer. He returns with an old picture of a blonde woman that looks a lot like both Megan and Ashlynn. She's wearing a white, old-fashioned cocktail dress with a full skirt and floral green trimânot unlike the dress Ashlynn wore tonight to the Grammy's.
"This is our mother. I think...Viggo is...like her. I think he's very disciplined and he's managed to keep himself under control most of his life by sheer force of will, but I think...I think he's mentally ill. Our mother is schizophrenic, and she had a psychotic break when I was a baby. She's in a mental institution beyond help, and my father divorced her and remarried years ago. I don't remember her, but Viggo...he remembers. Remembers her stabbing him, then chasing him with a knife, telling him she had to save him from a witch-whore by sending him to heaven."
"Mother of god," Matt's voice is filled with horror and his face completely white. "Viggo? Viggo is your brother? Jesus fucking Christ!!!"
I look at Matt with mild surprise. I feel his horror over the crazy mother attacking her own child with a knife, but he looks like he's about to have a damn heart attack. I feel like I'm missing something.
Matt grabs Varrick by the collar and drags him to his feet and punches him hard. Varrick staggers back as Matt screams. "You motherfucker! You let him walk around like a sane person! He's at my house right nowâwith everyone I love! Where my fucking babies are sleeping!!!"
Matt rushes forward like he's going to jump Varrick for real, but Trace and Dev react quickly, pushing him back.
"He's my brother, he was all I had," Varrick says without feeling, wiping his busted lip and staring into the distance.
"Get off me!" Matt yells, shirking them off roughly and lookly wildly from one to the other. "Jesus Christâwhat the fuck is wrong with you all? Why are we still standing here like stone and not on the way to my house? His brother is there! His brother is Viggo!!!"
The rest of us are looking at each other. We all knew the name Viggo from the board downstairs. I forgot that Matt's eyesight is not that great anymore. He probably didn't even try to read those tiny handwritten notes dotting the map.
"You know him?" I demand.
Matt looks wild with confusion. "You all know him! Viggo Schlater? Also known as Slade? The President of our fucking label?"
Dev curses, Trace growls, but I am speechless for one long second, remembering the unreadable expression on Slade's face as he slid Ashlynn's picture in front of me and said, so very coolly, "Tell me about Ashlynn Ballard's drug habit."
I see it now for what it was. The expression on his face was pure hatred. Not toward Ashlynn. Toward me. Because I love her, when he can't. Because I helped her, when he couldn't. Because I saved her, and she couldn't save him from himself.
In his fucked up brain, he will justify hurting her to hurt me.
While the others are still ranting and raging, I'm on the phone, dialing her. "Pick up, baby," I plead. No answer. I shoot a text.
Call me as soon as you get this. Life or Death.
I'm already dialing Ben Sullivan next. He doesn't answer me either, but that's no surprise, he fucking hates me right now. While his outgoing message is playing I point to Trace. "Call Ashlynn. Call Kat. Call John Rourke. Call everyone."
Ben's voicemail beeps, I start right in. "Dude, I've been playing you for weeks but it has nothing to do with me and Tam. I thought your boss was a bad guy who hurt Ashlynn and I wanted to keep you out of it. The bad guy is actually his brother, Slade, the President of our label, and he's got a big grudge against me. I know you took a leave of absence from work and you aren't on the job right now, and I know you hate me right now, but I fucking need you. I need your help to make sure Tamara and Ashlynn are safe. They are both at Matt del Marco's, where Slade is. Meet me there."
Everyone is on their phone now, calling somebody, except Varrick who seems to be...lost.
Adam is my next dial. "Where the fuck are you, man?" he answers with irritation.
"Where's Ashlynn?" I bark back. I put him on speakerphone so everyone can hear.
"That's a very good fucking question, that Bodie and I are trying to answer at this very minute. Because the last time I saw her, oddly enough she was with the president of our label, and now I can't find her anywhere. You know else we can't find? Mac. Kat. Marley. They slipped security somehow. I can't even find Marianne to put me next to her head of security. Something feels...wrong, here, man. Bodes and I are worried."
I feel like there's no air in the room. Like I'm at the bottom of the ocean, with thousands of pounds of pressure weighing on every molecule of my existence. I can't even speak.
"You're right, Adam, some thing is major wrong." Matt barks, interrupting his own call with his head of security. "Slade is Ashlynn's ex-Dom. And most likely he murdered a girl that looks like Ashlynn, but it happened awhile ago. Ashlynn only recently became aware of the missing girl. Ashlynn and Varrick Von have been trying to find out more about the Slade's involvement in the girl's disappearance. Slade is Varrick's brother."
Adam must have us on speakerphone too, because it's Bodie's voice that rips an angry tear through the air. "Fucking Marley! She thinks she so goddamn gangster, always in the middle of some shady shit!"
"What?" I finally find my voice.
Adam, now. "I think Bodes is right. I think Ashlynn already told the girls about Slade. I think Ashlynn left with him willingly and I think all our womenâmaybe even Marianneâfollowed her."
I round on Varrick. "Where would he take her?"
Varrick suddenly recovers himself. He's on his feet, "Wait, you guys are saying Ashlynn is here, in LA? Why? I told her to stay away for now."
"She's not one to take orders. I thought it was sketch the way she just showed up at the Grammy's." Trace says grimly. "She's very very smart. She's...working some plan, some angle with Slade, if she went willingly. Maybe she's doing exactly what we were...looking for more evidence that he killed Megan."
Von nods. "I think you're right. She knows exactly what she's getting into with Slade. She's walking right into the fire, hoping to trap the devil in his own game."
"Where would he take her!?!?" I repeat with more growl.
Varrick is moving back to his desk, pulling a handgun and stuffing cartridges in his pockets. "He has two playrooms. His penthouse near Colossal and his house in the hills."
"Which one?" I growl.
"His house, I think, but the Penthouse is closer to Matt's."
"Adamâ"
"We are already on our way to the car. Text us the address."
"Take John Rourke with you," Varrick snaps. "I'm calling him right now to tell him my brother is a danger and I'm authorizing take-down and restraint."
"I see John now...he's on the front lawn. He's giving me the no-joy signal on finding Mac. If he can't find her, she's not here, for sure. She followed Ashlynn, I know it in my bones. They had some weird undercurrent vibin' earlier, when we were talking to Slade and Ash. Yeah, Mac is in on Ash's deal. Either they all are or Mac just drug all the rest along. I can feel it."
"Fuck!" I swear. "Goddammit, Ashlynn!" And my fucking lunatic sister! Do they even know what they are doing to me right now?
Apparently Trace does, because he growls to Varrick, "Give Leed that fucking gun, your regular piece is in the car." Trace is cracking his neck and squeezing his fists. "I'm going to beat Kat's ass when I find her. Is she fucking crazy?"
"All women are crazy," Adam reminds us. That's a strongly held belief among the male Heartley clan. "But they're not stupid. They've got some diabolical plan. Let's go find 'em before it goes wrong, okay?"
"Whoever finds Marley tell her she's fucking fired because she's the complete goddamn opposite of a sobriety companion. She's jacking up my fucking nerves so bad I need a fucking bowl," Bodie growls.
"Regulators, mount up!" Dev yells, almost gleefully. The dude may stop short of murder, but he loves a fucking rumble.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Matt barks, swiping the gun Varrick just handed over to me and tossing it back in the desk drawer. "Our women are in the middle of this. There ain't no blaze of glory happening here. Everybody needs to find their fucking chill. You too, Varrick" he points at Von.
"We walk our crazy-ass women off whatever stupid shit they think they are doing, and then we deal with Slade. Civilized-like. So help me god, I'm going to disappear him from my record company, even if I have to spend my fortune buying up Colossal stock and stacking the Board with my band," he points to Varrick, "and you and I are going to have a talk with your psycho brother. Dev too, if he's game. When Slade tells you what you need to know about Megan, then you can decide what price you are willing to pay for her justice." He slaps Varrick on shoulder. "But you're going to take some time, not a gun, to think it over, okay?"
Varrick nods solemnly at Matt, but I'm already out the door. I'm done talking. All I can think of is getting to Ashlynn before Slade puts his psycho hands on her.
Next chapter, Ash & Slade. And some..."ghosts" from his past....