Page 90 of Endeavor

“Emma, why don’t you start,” Dean encourages as a police officer turns on a recorder.

She begins with the restaurant, and then everything that happened once she woke up in the trunk of the car. I add in the details with the cars and cliff and we both share our versions of the last few minutes of my brother’s life.

When we finish, Dean stops the recorder and looks at us. “The forensics we did on the early sticky notes came in right after you left, but we couldn’t get you on the phone. We were able to pull a partial off one that the cops hadn’t been able to match previously, but with new technology, we got an eighty percent match to Gerald Hogan. He was caught stalking another Indy driver’s house and went to jail a while back. He died in there from a heart attack. The new notes, while very good copies, had subtle differences that our team was able to pick up on. When we ran all our suspects from your mother’s apartment back through the system and widened our search, we came across Jason’s military background. He had been training as a medic when he got a dishonorable discharge for stealing supplies. He was also hacking computers and that’s how he got copies of some of the evidence from the original stalker case. Gerald was more interested in your dad than you, thus the reason the notes stopped after your father died. Everything else recently was a copycat case. Looks like Jason got out of the military three years ago and has been slowly planning all of this. We found a fingerprint at the garage and matched that. Cops just picked up a Billy Whitaker about an hour ago for vandalism. The kid says some guy paid him five hundred to trash the garage. We assume it was a distraction so Jason could take Emma.”

“Fuck,” I mutter.

“D-does this mean it’s over?” Emma asks. She looks incredibly small, the blanket still wrapped around her.

Dean gives her a warm smile. “Yes, Miss Baldwin, it’s over.”

She nods and looks over at me. “I—”

But her thoughts are cut off as the door flies open and my mother comes into the room. “Oh, thank God! I was so worried,” she says as she pulls me into a hug. “I just…I can’t believe this.”

“I’m OK,” I assure her.

She pulls back and puts her hands on my face, searching my body for injury. I touch her cheek and she looks back at me.

“I’m OK.” I pull her back to me and we stand there hugging for a long time. I know she will soon learn of everything that happened, and I dread her finding out about Dad. But right now, at this moment, I have the two most important women in my life next to me and that’s all that matters.

Chapter Thirty-Three

Eight weeks later…

Emma

I stare at the screen, letting the video clip play again. It’s from my final interview with “the” Andy Westin and Blythe Daniels. They sat down together last week and gave me an hour-long interview that itself could be a documentary. I hit save on the final cut of my documentary.

Closing my laptop, I look over at the giant floor-to-ceiling window. Blythe insisted we take a few weeks at the Malibu house. I finished exams last week. I have three more weeks until my summer classes begin.

I smile as I watch Grady dive into the pool. Looking down, I cringe at the small scar on my wrist. It’s the only permanent reminder I have of the terrifying experience only two months ago. I trace the line, remembering the details of that night. As much as things have gotten back to normal, they’ve also changed.

I get up and walk over to the sliding door, watching as Grady swims laps in the pool. It’s hard to believe that it’s only been three months since we met. It feels like yesterday and a lifetime ago all at the same time.

I slide the door open and walk outside, sitting down on a chaise lounge, while watching my boyfriend. My boyfriend. I still pinch myself thinking about it. I never thought I’d love someone so much. He hasn’t said the words to me, but I know he loves me. He’s had so much to deal with since we met. It’s only been the past week or two that the paparazzi has started to back off and the articles about his brother have become more infrequent. Blythe has been a superstar, even more than normal. She gave one interview and only one interview about a month ago. Grady gave a brief statement and has not spoken anymore about it since then. I know he’s still reeling from all of this. I’m still reeling from it all. Blythe insisted that we both see her therapist. It’s helping, slowly. Kate, having been through trauma before, has been encouraging me to talk to her whenever I need to, which also helps. She’s flying us out to see her in a few weeks. Quinlan has been great at distracting me. She’s brought me to a number of events so that I can network. She’s not only been a great mentor, but I would also now consider her a friend.

The nightmares are less frequent, but I still have them. Grady’s had a few, too. I know things will get better as time goes on, but I’m not sure I can ever forget the vivid details of that night.

It’ll stay with me forever. It changed me forever.

Grady gets out of the pool and walks toward me. My phone buzzes in my pocket, and I see a text from my mom. My parents have checked in daily with me. They wanted me to take the rest of the semester off and come home, but I felt like that would make it worse. At least here, I’m distracted and busy.

“You OK?” Grady asks as he approaches me. A towel wrapped around his waist, revealing his perfectly sculpted abdominal muscles. I look up at him and smile.

“I’m alright,” I reply, and I mean that. I’m not fine, but not bad. But as long as I’m here with him, I know I’ll be alright. Our therapist thinks we are using each other as security blankets for our trauma, but I believe it just brought us closer in a way others will never understand. I can’t imagine my life without Grady in it, and I don’t want to.

“Shall we go for a walk?” he asks, motioning to the beach. I glance back in at Dean, who is sitting at a small desk off the kitchen.

“You think our keeper will let us?” I ask him.

Grady huffs, pulls out his phone, and types a text. A moment later, Dean is at the door.

“Seriously?” he asks.

I pull Grady’s phone from his grip and read the text.

Grady: Dad, can we go out and play on the beach? I promise that we’ll behave and won’t go far.

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