Page 78 of Vega

It didn’t matter. I was pregnant, heartbroken, and emotionally unavailable to anyone who wasn’t buried beneath fresh soil.

When he finished, he handed me his phone. “Put your number in.”

I hesitated.

“For emergencies,” he clarified. “Security will call me if anything happens here. You should be able to reach me directly too.”

I entered my number and returned the phone.

“Can I use the bathroom?” he asked.

“It’s your house. Apparently, you don’t need permission to do anything, especially since you let yourself in.”

He smiled faintly. “I won’t do that again. “I only used the code because I didn’t know you were here yet.”

I smiled weakly, nodded, and he walked away.

I began unpacking the groceries. I was placing yogurt in the refrigerator when I heard his voice. It came from the other side of the bathroom door, too low for me to understand at first.

I stopped moving. He wasn’t using the bathroom; he was making a call.

Curiosity drew me into the hallway. I approached quietly and stood close enough to hear without pressing my ear against the door.

“I need you to find Arielle Banks,” Prodigy said.

A brief pause followed.

“I just need to talk to her.” His voice dropped even lower. “Find me an address, a number, anything.”

I stepped away before he caught me listening.

Whoever Arielle was, the calm man who had just stocked my refrigerator didn’t sound calm when it came to her.

SAL MORETTI

“All of this is making me so anxious, Sal,” Renee said, breathing heavily through the phone. “I can’t eat. I can’t sleep. Every time my phone rings, I think it’s Denise telling me that Prodigy finally found Renzo.”

I drove through the dark with one hand on the wheel, watching the narrow Michigan road disappear beneath my headlights.

Her breathing shook. “If that investigator finds Renzo—”

“I told you I’d handle it.” I turned onto the dirt road almost hidden between the trees. “Renzo knows what happens if he returns.”

“That’s what scares me,” she whispered. “What if he doesn’t care anymore?”

The house appeared at the end of the road, small, old, and tucked deep enough in the woods that nobody would find it, not even by mistake. There were no neighbors or streetlights. The only sound was the gravel beneath my tires and insects singing in the dark.

“I’m here,” I told my wife. “I’ll call you back.”

“Call me as soon as you leave,” she rushed out.

“Okay, my love.”

“As soon as you leave, baby.”

“I promise.”

I ended the call before her fear got inside my head worse than it already had.