Page 87 of Pretty Threats

“All right.”

I end the call and look up. Jamie and War are both staring at me.

“Someone took her.” My voice sounds strange. Strained. Almost… worried. “I might have the guy’s name, but I don’t know where or why—I could use…” I stop short of the word help. That word is not normally in my vocabulary.

“Yeah, mate,” Jamie says, leaning in. “Give me the name. You get on with finding her phone and car. I’ll start hunting down the guy.”

For a second, my mind’s blank. My memory that holds a repository of every detail of my life, big and minute, suddenly feels empty.

I’ve gotta go. I need to find her right fucking now.

Where my mind usually lives, there’s only a churning sound. My heart pounds. I realize what I’m hearing is the sound of my own blood pulsing. What the fuck?

War’s deep voice booms through the haze. “Killer. The name?”

“Yeah, I know it. I wouldn’t forget. I don’t forget things.” My hand grabs my forehead and squeezes. “Something’s fucking off with me.”

I can feel my arms and legs and still control them. This is no stroke or seizure.

Slowly, it dawns on me. This is what fear does. I’m so desperate to know where she is and that she’s all right I want to race the Corvette all the way to Boston, doing a hundred and fifty miles an hour. The urge is so strong it’s all my brain can focus on. Adrenaline overload. I shove my fingers against my hammering pulse.

“Get a mother fucking grip,” I whisper to myself.

To find the fucking guy who took her, you won’t use your legs or your car. To find him, you have to outrun him electronically. Come on. Focus.

Even though I know what needs to be done, it still takes another ten or fifteen seconds for me to smother the wildfire my emotions are lighting in my skull.

“His name is Josh Jones. He’s a Lambda Delta alum.” Once I start talking, I spew out every fact I know.

Jamie and War listen until I finish and then they go into the house to use Jamie’s laptop. I follow, talking to myself like I’ve got an IQ of fifty, which it feels like I fucking do at the moment.

It takes a few minutes for me to drill down on an organized plan and to see things clearly. Two-factor authentication is required to change her personal email login, and a long time ago, I changed the verification phone number to mine. Which means she didn’t change her password to that because she couldn’t.

I log in, so I can locate everywhere else she’s been logged in for the past day. She was last connected to wifi in or near the Hanley Bank building. And that connection was after I talked with her. Then nothing. She either logged out or her phone went dead. When I check the tracker I put under the back bumper of Peter’s car, I find it’s parked in the structure right next to the high rise.

I send a text to Aiden.

Killian: Dropped a pin. Raine’s car parked next to Hanley building. She was taken from street or parking garage. Check for CCTV camera locations around the structure n building. I’ll get footage.

“Killian,” War says.

I look up.

“Your guy is a ghost. No address in Foxgrove or in GU graduate housing. And the bio from the Lambda website is bullshit. The high school he listed has no record of him. We looked through the yearbook pictures for all the years he was supposed to be enrolled. Not there.”

“Could he have just skipped having his photo taken?”

War shakes his head. “The names of the kids without pictures are listed. No one by the name Josh Jones was in that school six to ten years ago.”

“Tell Jamie the guy’s on the WildSide app. Have him check the database for username NightOn.” I spell the username and nod. “If we can get his phone number, we’ll find him. Even if he’s got his phone off right now, in the past few days, he’ll have been to wherever he’s taken her because if he’s turned himself into a ghost, he’s organized, not acting on impulse. If he plans to keep her for a while, he’ll have a private location. He’d stock it with supplies. If he plans to kill her, he’ll have scouted locations to dump her body. Either way, that’s his electronic tell. It’s how we’ll find him.”

My mind is clicking along now. This is a puzzle, and I’m great at puzzles. Also, I’ve stalked Raine for the past three years. I’m fucking great at that, too. All that practice means I know exactly what to do now.

My phone pings with a series of texts from Aiden. He’s got pictures of cameras and street addresses.

His last text, though, is ominous.

Aiden: Found car. Locked tight. No signs of trouble. Building has coffee shop. Closed at five pm. Lobby locked since six and empty. Street deserted. No sign of Raine.

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