Page 48 of Edge of Heaven

“No. I don’t think so,” I interrupt him. “The abuse is emotional. Verbal. But I know he’s wildly jealous, and I’m afraid he found out I was there and is keeping her prisoner or something.”

“Prisoner?” Jonny, who rarely takes off his headphones when we’re on the bus, has apparently been listening as well.

“Guys, for real—if you talk about any of this, it could make her life a lot harder. Please keep this to yourselves.”

Jonny scowls. “You think we’d do anything that might impact her? You don’t think much of us, do you?”

“It’s not that. It’s just…he’s not a normal guy. Things that are completely innocent—like me being in New York for the same damn photo shoot—could send him over the deep end.”

“I’m going to call her,” Ryleigh announces. “I’ll know by her voice if she’s okay. All of you be quiet!”

She makes the call, and it seems to take a long time for Taryn to answer.

“Hey.” Taryn sounds… subdued.

Fuck.

“Hey! Are you sure you don’t need soup or anything? You guys are already in Denver, right?” Karnal Death flies from city to city—they just didn’t invite us to join them. Well, they did, but the amount of money they wanted for the extra weight on the jet was exorbitant and Sasha said it wasn’t cost-effective. Which is fine with me. The last thing I want to do is spend more time with them.

“Yeah.” Taryn doesn’t sound sick—she sounds…defeated. “And no, I’m fine. Callum… is taking good care of me.”

“Damn straight I am!” he calls out.

Somehow, his voice sounds more amused than concerned.

Asshole.

“Okay, well, if you need anything at all, you can call me. We definitely don’t spend enough time together.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I’ve had a lot going on.”

“No worries. Anyway, I’ll talk to you later.”

“Bye.”

She disconnects and no one says anything for a beat.

“She sounds tired,” Jonny says. “But I didn’t hear anything that was a red flag.”

“Well, what is she supposed to do?” I grunt. “Tap out SOS in Morse Code?”

“Look, if you think there’s abuse going on, I’ll be more cognizant of it,” Ryleigh says. “But there really isn’t anything we can do unless she asks for help.”

And I already know Taryn isn’t going to.

Not for four more months.

But that’s one of the things I can’t tell them.

I hate the position I’m in because I don’t want to betray her trust, but I also don’t want anything to happen to her.

“You hooked up in New York,” Angus says after a moment, narrowing his eyes a little. “And you’re worried Callum somehow found out. Or guessed.”

“We didnot,” I say firmly. “We had dinner and talked. That’s it.”

Well, she slept over, but since nothing happened, they don’t need to know that.

“I feel like there’s more to this story.” And now Tate jumps in.

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