Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 93002 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 93002 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
“I knew it,” I said, my voice catching as I sifted through the detached doll limbs and torn clothes.
“What are you doing in my room?” Brax demanded, his voice low and oddly flat. His eyes were a mix of fury and glee. He’d hidden these things, but I saw that a part of him was thrilled I’d found them. All these years later, his eyes flared with greed as he wrung out one more drop of my pain.
I wanted to throw the box in his face, but I couldn’t abandon the wreckage of my toys now that I had them back. They were little more than trash, but they were mine.
“We’re leaving,” I said and tried to elbow my way past him.
Brax’s hand shot out and closed over my upper arm, his fingers painfully tight. He shook me, almost knocking me off my feet. “I said,” he spat in my face, “what the fuck are you doing in my room?”
Forrest stepped out from behind me, looming over Brax. Beside Forrest, my brother looked like a teenager, not a man.
“Don’t ever touch her,” Forrest said, his voice low.
Brax looked up at Forrest, his eyes wide, his cheeks gone pale. Abruptly, he let go of me. “She’s in my room, going through my stuff,” he said in protest.
“I don’t care. You never touch her.” Forrest shoved Brax to the side, guiding me out of the closet.
“What the fuck is going on in here?” Hawk growled from the door.
A quick glance told me Griffen was right behind Hawk, looking just as furious as our security chief.
“Sterling, you were supposed to be in my office ten minutes ago,” Griffen said, his voice strung tight like a steel wire.
“We were on our way,” I said. I swept out of Brax’s room, the box clutched to my chest, Forrest at my side, Hawk, Griffen, and Brax trailing behind me. The short trip down the main stairs and through the front hall felt like it lasted an eternity.
“All right, Sterling,” Griffen said once we were all in his office. “Why were you going through Brax’s closet? I thought Hawk was clear that you should come directly to my office when you got back.”
“I don’t have anything to do with whatever trouble she’s in,” Brax said to Griffen.
“Somebody left a decoy clue in my room,” I told Brax, “sending us to a root cellar out in Henderson County. They locked us in. We could have died.” I watched Brax’s face closely for some hint of guilt. Nothing showed but aggravation. He opened his mouth to say something.
“You wait,” Griffen said to Brax, holding up a finger before turning back to me. With a level tone I could tell he was struggling to maintain, he said, “Please explain to me why you and Powell thought it was a good idea to chase this new clue without letting us know where you were going.”
Forrest answered before I could. “In retrospect, it was dumb, but it hadn’t occurred to us that someone was trying to kill us. At least not before we find the money.”
“You’re sure the intent was to kill you?” Griffen asked.
“Hard to say,” I had to admit. “They left some water and granola bars. Maybe they didn’t realize how cold it would get underground. Maybe they were going to come back.”
“Can I go?” Brax cut in. “I don’t know what I have to do with any of this.”
“What do you have there?” Griffen asked, nodding at the box in my arms and ignoring Brax.
I shoved it in his direction. “Look.”
Griffen peeled back the flaps, shuffled through the contents, and looked at Brax.
“Why do you have Sterling’s old toys in your closet?” he asked, his steely tone much more pleasant when it was directed at Brax instead of me.
Brax rolled his shoulders back and shook his head. “Because I was a shithead of a kid, okay? I took her stuff all the time. I’d break it. She’d accuse me. I’d lie. Everyone would tell her to stop being such a drama queen, and she’d start crying. It was fun,” he said. He crossed his arms over his chest. “It was fun when I was twelve. I guess I never got rid of the stuff, but it doesn’t mean anything now.” He hooked his thumbs in his pockets and turned to me with the perpetual sneer I was so familiar with. “I’m not twelve anymore, not that you’ve noticed. Did you and your boyfriend find anything in my closet other than that?” he asked. His tone made it seem like I was the crazy one.
I shook my head, forced to admit that we had not.
Hawk looked up from his phone. “Logs show Brax was in Asheville all day, at his office in the morning and north of town in the afternoon. Showing property or playing golf is my guess, based on the coordinates.”