Page 41 of Torch
Stitch shrugged. “I tried calling you, but your line was busy, and I needed to talk to you about something else. Can I come in?” I backed up and let him into my room, shoving the door closed behind him. It wasn’t normal for him to come into any of our private spaces, so it worried me. He cast his eyes around, a brief smirk appearing.
“Like what you’ve done with the place.”
Asshole. So I was a bit messy, so what? Oh well, except for the fact that I’d fallen for a woman who’d go into a fucking anxiety attack if she saw this. For once, I felt shame for how messy I’d become. When the hell did I start just leaving shit everywhere? Oh yeah, when I had a knife left between my fucking shoulder blades.
“What’s up?” Stitch dropped down on my only chair, and sighed heavily. Okay, I’ll just stand up then. I leaned against my dresser. My room was one of the smaller ones, but I didn’t need much space, did I?
“That burner phone we found in Tommy’s locker?” Oh yeah, the last big find of the fucking day. Great. I shrugged, knowing he’d get to the point eventually.
“There was some disturbing shit on there, man. Not just bookmarked pages with the most violent fucking porn you can imagine, but uh… notes. Details. About all of us. About… uh…”
I straightened up all of a sudden, a chill running down my spine.
“About what?”
He ran a hand through his hair.
“He’s been tracking everyone’s movements. There were detailed schedules of our comings and goings.”
“And?”
“He had your doc flagged as a potential lover, along with her work address.” What? Fuck! I took a step at him, rage filling me, before I realised that was the wrong course of action.
“You can’t bring her here, but you should get her somewhere safe. I’ll send Ryder with you.” I nodded dumbly, already starting to freak out about what could be happening to her.
“Is everyone accounted for right now?”
Stitch nodded. “Just Tommy we can’t be sure of right now, man. On the offchance it’s him, and not a set up, we should operate as if he’s a threat right now.”
I grabbed my cut and pulled it back on, stepping into my boots and heading for the door.
“Ryder’s waiting outside for you. Nick’s on the gate, and he knows to let you guys out, and to keep his mouth shut.”
“Fuck. Thanks, VP. I’ll get her squared away, and keep you posted.” On that note, I ran back to my bed and grabbed my phone, popping a quick text to Grace.
Me:Coming to yours right now. Keep your doors locked until I get there.
She hadn’t replied by the time I reached Ryder, and we hopped in the van, but as we were leaving through the gates, she replied.
Bossy doc:Gotcha. Booty call?
I snorted, but something deep in my chest wasn’t eased by her message. Did it sound like her? Was I just imagining that maybe it didn’t? Was I freaking myself out for no fucking reason?
“Breathe, brother. We’ll get there as fast as we can. I’m sure she’s fine though, yeah? Her home address wasn’t in the phone. Just her name.”
That didn’t exactly settle my soul either.
“This fucker has proved he can hack all kinds of shit. I mean, he’s been into Ice’s systems enough that I’m starting to wonder why the fuck he wasn’t our tech guy instead of Ice.”
Ryder snorted, slamming his foot down as we moved onto an empty stretch of road.
“Don’t let Ice hear you saying that. He and Tes… uh, Grease... are the shit, according to him.”
Yeah, that’s exactly what Ice would say. I sat up taller in my seat as we started down Grace’s street, and by the time Ryder was parking up, I was already halfway out of the damn thing, stumbling briefly as I hit the road before we’d even stopped. It wasn’t like I could see anything from the bottom of her drive, but I could feel it. Something was wrong.
“Grace, Jesus,” I hissed, running toward her door, horrified when I reached it, to see that it wasn’t closed properly.Fuck.
Ryder was right on my tail, but I wasn’t waiting for him.
