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“And your mother?” he presses.
“The fact that she wanted Chance to get rid of Hunter is pretty damning, but she didn’t do it alone if she did. Believe me. She’s not that self-reliant.”
Jax returns and sits next to me, elbows settling on his knees, his body angled toward the conversation. “What are we talking about?”
“My mother not being able to pull off something like murder on her own,” I say. “And just so you know,” I add, eyeing Savage, “Chance said he hired someone to find a financial link, but he couldn’t.”
“Whatever,” Savage says dismissively. “I don’t trust his ‘someone.’ We’ll look again ourselves. The question is, what happens if we find something?”
Jax answers before I can, shutting down the topic. “We’ll deal with that if the time comes. Right now, my concern is who took Emma and is she still in danger?”
“Until we have answers,” Savage says, “yes, she’s in danger.” He pins me with a hard look. “That’s the only way we can look at this and keep you safe. Fortunately, you’ve proven to be a smart enough little girl to let us help you.”
“Thank you, little boy.”
“Good to see you still have your bite,” he replies. But he’s still not himself. He’s still not fully present, not in that “Savage consumes the room” kind of way, and it’s unsettling.
So is the flash of that clown mask on the plane that rips through my mind and has me folding my arms around myself as if that offers some sort of shelter. “They broke my locks to get into my apartment and then left me there naked.”
Jax’s hand settles on my leg, and I drop my hand to his, only to have it folded into his. He’s holding onto me, the way he’s promised to hold onto me. The way his race to find me proves he will, always. “I don’t want to push you on this, baby,” he says, his tone gentle, unassuming, “but we need to know anything you can remember.”
“I’m fine. I don’t mind talking about any of this, but I just don’t have much to share. I woke up on a plane, and a man in a clown mask jammed another needle into my arm. That’s all.”
“A plane is an important detail,” Savage assures me. “There are flight records. This helps. What else?”
“If you’re asking me if I was raped? I don’t know, but sitting here now,” I consider a moment, “I don’t feel like I was, and I know this sounds crazy, but I think I’d know. Though a stranger undressing me and seeing me naked feels pretty shitty. Did he touch me, even if he didn’t rape me? Did he take photos?”
“The York situation is public,” Savage says. “A professional could have staged it to look like it was some sort of revenge he plotted to fuck with your head.”
“Could he have done that from jail?” I ask.
“Yes,” Savage agrees. “He has people who work for him who are just as dirty as he is, but I don’t think he’d bring you home and put you in your own bed.”
I frown and glance at Jax. “I dismissed the idea of York at first. Leaving me at home truly didn’t feel like him, but now I’m rethinking. You two clashed. He hated you. What better way to torture us both than grabbing me right from under your nose, and then leaving me naked? It’s the ultimate fuck you.”
His expression burns with anger. “If I find out he did this, I will throw every resource I have at him to ensure he goes to jail for a very long time.”
“Let us work the plane angle,” Savage says. “You were drugged for a reason. Among those reasons, you weren’t supposed to remember your method of travel.” He starts to get up.
“Wait,” I say, and when Savage settles back into his seat, I ask, “Do we know how he got to me?”
“The elevator. It wasn’t really broken. It was connected to an underground tunnel where it was controlled.”
“I didn’t know about the tunnel,” Jax adds. “And I’d ask Brody if he knew, but he’s now in rehab.”
I blink. “What? Rehab?”
“He got wasted on drugs and booze,” Savage says. “He had a seizure a few hours ago, and Jax had us check him into rehab.”
Jax gives a grim nod. “I talked to the doctor an hour ago. There’s some thought that he might have had a grief-induced nervous breakdown.”
“Oh, God,” I whisper, squeezing his hand. “I’m sorry, Jax. I’m really sorry, but at least he’s getting help.”
“There is that,” he agrees. “And clearly, he wasn’t the one who brought you here and undressed you. If he had been, I don’t know what I would have done.”
I swallow against the tightening in my throat. “We just really don’t know who did this,” I say, and the implication is clear: we don’t know how long I’ll be looking over my shoulder.
