Page 210 of Ruin Me Gently

I glared at him. “You’reabout to be a number. A body count.”

Silas exhaled sharply and gestured toward the display. “Everything on this screen? That’s Clark. His card usage, past purchase history, location data—everything we’ve managed to track.”

I squinted at the digits, brow furrowing. “Okay, and?”

“And it tells us one very important thing.” Finn said as he clicked another key. The data slowed, and then it just… stopped.

Silas’ jaw flexed. “Clark’s data presence went dark after that night.”

My stomach tightened. “No movement?”

He shook his head. “No digital footprint. No patterns. Nothing.”

Something uneasy curled in my chest. “Until?”

He tipped his chin toward Finn. “Bring up the GMS screen.”

Finn’s fingers flew over the keyboard, pulling up a new screen of endless columns and numbers.

I narrowed my eyes at it. “What’s that?”

“It’s a ghost-monitoring system,” Silas said.

“Right. That clears it up. Thanks.”

Finn snorted quietly but kept typing.

Silas kept going. “We built a passive surveillance net. It monitors public WiFi networks.”

I blinked. “Uh-huh.”

“Think of it like a spiderweb,” he said. “People with phones? They’re the flies. Every time someone’s device auto-connects to public WiFi, it pings. Leaves a tiny little footprint.”

That made a little more sense. “And Clark… he left a footprint?”

Finn clicked a few keys. More data scrolled across the screen.

Silas nodded, arms crossing. “We’ve been running this system for just over a week. Waiting for a match. And when…” he hesitated. “Yesterday, when I left you at the penthouse. Clark had made a mistake. He pinged at a motel. About seventy-five miles out of the city.”

My stomach twisted. “A motel?” That wasn’t like Clark at all.

“We went to find him,” Silas said. “By the time we got there,” he grimaced. “He was gone.”

Finn let out a sharp breath, shaking his head. “Yeah, and not to be obvious, but your ex? Disgusting. There was trash everywhere. Empty takeout containers on the floor. The whole place reeked of rot and smoke.”

My stomach turned.

He kept going, like he was listing off evidence at a crime scene. “Grime all over the room. Like, actual dirt. Cigarette butts on the nightstand. An empty phone box, no phone.”

I blinked, letting my gaze drift around Finn’s office.

He caught my look and immediately pointed at me. “No. I’m messy andclean. That place was just plain dirty.”

Silas stepped in, clearing his throat. “We traced him to a gas station, but the clerk didn’t remember him. We think he has someone on the inside. Helping him move. Hiding him. Maybe leading us on the wrong path.”

I shook my head. “No.”

They both exchanged a glance and spoke in unison. “What?”

---