Page 170 of Dark Endures

“You really didn’t kill him?” Vex doesn’t bother with the niceties.

Don’t I wish I had. “No. I was off grid getting inducted into the Linckester family.”

Ethan whistles. “That’s bad news. You couldn’t back away slowly and then run in the other direction?”

“Turns out Mindy’s mom married none other than Percival Linckester.”

“And now Filmore is claiming you.” Ethan shakes his head. “You got us all into a fair bit of trouble this weekend.”

“It gets worse…”

“Linckester isn’t behind the human trafficking,” Ethan says, after I shared everything I learned this weekend.

“But they’re both involved, and they are cousins.” Kissing cousins, as some would say, but still related enough for that has to be a factor.

“Linckester won’t sell women. He’ll kill a million people without blinking, but he doesn’t tolerate trafficking women. His mother was trafficked. Linckester’s father rescued her. I’ve seen Filmore beat a man until he was bloodied for joking about it. There’s no way he knew or was involved. Past that, any of them could be involved.”

“Marlie was sold to a prostitution ring?” Vex leans forward, tapping his fingers together. “It just doesn’t make sense with what I learned about the aliens.”

“Adonis and Plant sold those girls.” That I know for sure.

“We need to deal with one thing at a time. How are you going to deal with Filmore? He wants you. He’s always wanted to get his hands on one of the men I’ve trained. Before T&T was big, he tried hiring me. That was a job I wasn’t foolish enough to take, regardless of the money. And he has that and power.”

Both are dangerous.

“Not to mention, he has the US government practically in his pocket. The only man with more power is Kamenev, and I wouldn’t want to pit the two of them against each other to see who wins.” Ethan shakes his head.

“I say we just kill him.” Vex grins.

That’s always Vex’s solution.

“You can’t kill one without killing them all. Filmore is about to pick his successor. It’s going to be one of his sons, but my bet is he picks Percival. He was always the favorite child. The most twisted of the bunch. The question is, do we risk sending Maddox in to tear it apart from the inside out?”

My first instinct is to say yes. “I have Mindy.”

“She’s your in, but also your worry. If you get caught, it won’t be just you that dies. After he kills her, he’ll come for every person on The Street. This might not be a hive you want to kick.” Ethan shakes his head. “We need to wait. To listen and learn more. I’d say you turn Filmore down, politely.”

My phone rings. It’s Mindy! “One second, guys.” I answer the video call. “Hey—”

Tears stream down her face. “They told me to call you.”

“Who told you? Where are you?”

“The men. They said to tell you they want their money. And if they don’t get it, they’ll kill me.”

A knife plunges down, and Mindy screams.

The call disconnects.

I pull up the tracker on her phone. It moves for a second. Then blinks away.

Your Boyfriend

Mindy

If we had gotten in any later, I would have missed Waylon. When he couldn’t reach me, his last message told me to meet him at the park. The cab stops outside of it with ten minutes to spare.

Waylon sent six messages in the few days we were gone. Six messages.

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