“You okay?” Eli sits in the chair next to me.
I shake my head. “I can’t lose her.”
Eli presses his lips together and puts his hand on my knee, squeezing it. “You won’t.”
I lift my gaze to his, but he doesn’t know what it feels like to have a person-shaped hole in his life. He still has both his parents. I never knew my mother, but I felt her absence more than anything else.
My phone buzzes.
Jack:
She just appeared in the park behind the Starbucks
Glitch, maybe
Be there soon
“We’ll figure this out, Luke.”
I raise my gaze to Eli and nod. Fuck, I hope so.
CHAPTER 54
The Moment with Death
Harper
I’m a little shell-shocked. I have so much to tell the guys. The walk back to the car is quiet. Drugs, sex trafficking, abuse.
My dad is dead.
I keep circling back to that. Like my mind can’t even process it. He left us. He abandoned me and he was a non-factor in my life. Mom was enough. I didn’t ask why he left us or how. I never questioned it.
“Why didn’t you tell me he was dead?” I can’t hold the words back. Even though they make my heart ache. We’re still in the park. Far enough away from anything that might have a bug on it.
Sighing, Mom turns at a boulder. “I couldn’t risk you slipping up. No body’s ever been found, but Sean’s never once contacted me to let me know he’s still alive. Maybe part of me wanted to believe he’s still out there somewhere watching out for us.”
“Do you still help the women?” I twist my ring. What if she hadn’t gone along with William’s offer? What if I was one of those women trapped? I’d want someone like my mom to help me.
“Not for a while. The drugs still go missing, but the women stopped years ago. I never asked William why. I prefer to stay off his radar.” A little shiver races over her, and I can’t help but agree.
He’s a cold, heartless man. I don’t like the way he looks at me, and I’ll do whatever it takes to get Luke away from him.
Starbucks and the car appear as we emerge from the trees.
I press my lips together, remembering her saying everything is probably bugged. Even our cars. “We can’t talk openly anywhere else, can we?”
Mom stops and blows out her breath. “It’s not safe. I thought it would be for a while. That they weren’t looking closely at us, but then you mentioned the evidence Sean left behind.”
I straighten the backpack on my back. It feels heavier than it is.
“If it were just us, I’d run, Harper. You and me. We can find somewhere else. I stayed in the hopes that someday Sean would come back. But I left both of us vulnerable by doing that. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have stayed.” A tear slips down her cheek.
If I thought for a second one of my guys might come back for me, I’d wait forever for them. I step closer and touch her arm.
“I understand why you did it. It might have been easier somewhere else, but I don’t think William Foster would let you go without some sort of fight. You know too much.”
Her brows pinch. “He’s a bully. But he’s wealthy and connected. I don’t know how Luke plans to get away, but I hope for all our sakes that he does.”
