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“But I had a reason to change. I was held against my will, forced to submit to horrific acts with strangers. I can’t possibly be the same person.”
“We don’t know what she’s been through in the last six years.”
“She didn’t deserve this.”
“We don’t know that.”
She pulls back from me then. “How can you say that? No one deserves to die like this.”
“Most people don’t. I can think of a few who do.”
I keep my mouth shut then. He’s right. The people who abused me on that island—I wouldn’t mind seeing them dead in a pool of their own blood. And I can’t even imagine the horrors that Buck has witnessed.
But Gloria is not in the same category as those people. Those people can’t even be defined as people.
I cast my gaze around the room. Buck is right. Nothing seems out of place. I’ve never been in this room before, but wouldn’t we see some signs of struggle?
Unless…
“What if someone came in while they were sleeping, injected them with something and then went for their throats?”
“Edgar would’ve alerted them.”
“But Edgar was outside.”
“He clearly doesn’t sleep outside.” He points to the blue fleece dog bed in the corner of the room.
“Right. Maybe one of them got up and let him out.”
“Then they would’ve been up. Whoever came in, they didn’t see them or hear them.”
He’s right, of course. I know what I’m saying makes no sense.
I just want to believe—for a moment—that my ordeal on that island is over.
But it’s not over. I’m not allowing it to be over. As long as I’m bent on discovering who did this to me, it will never be over.
And now I involved Gloria. She may be dead because of me.
“How can I forgive myself?” I rub my forehead.
“This is not your fault, Aspen. You have to believe that. Tell me you believe that.”
“But is it Gloria’s fault? Just because she didn’t report a conversation she heard after I disappeared?”
“That’s what she told you, baby. You have no idea if it’s the truth.”
“But let’s assume for a moment that it is the truth. This is a woman I knew—”
“Operative word being knew. You knew her. You don’t know her.”
“Okay. But let’s forget about that for a moment and assume it’s the truth. That all she did was fail to report a conversation she heard. Then I’m to blame. Because I got in touch with her, and I stirred the pot.”
I rub my upper arms to ease the shivering—shivering that makes no sense in LA. The muscles beneath my flesh twitch, and my stomach tumbles. I’m going to be sick again…
“Damn it, Aspen. This is not your fault. I’m not going let you take any blame here. It’s not a crime for you to want to find out who set the whole island thing in motion.”
I pull away and meet his gaze, forcing my nausea back down my throat. “What do we do? Do we call 911?”
47
BUCK
I pull Aspen back toward me and kiss the top of her head. “Let me think.”
She pulls away again. “What exactly is there to think about, Buck? Two people have been murdered in their sleep. We need to call 911.”
“In a perfect world, yeah. We call 911. The problem is… If this does have something to do with the fact that you got in touch with Gloria, that means there are other things at work here.”
“Yeah, it does. And if the police can find out who did this, it might lead us to who orchestrated my kidnapping.”
God, I love this woman. But I’ve been around a block that she hasn’t. She was held captive on an island, sure, and God knows she’s been through hell. But she had to go inside herself to survive, and she’s not thinking clearly right now.
The evil of people. The pure and unadulterated evil…
Aspen pulls her phone out of her pocket.
I grab her hand. “No, baby.”
“We have to. We can’t just let them…rot here. And what about the dog?”
She makes a good point about the dog.
“All right, here’s what we do. We’ll call 911 from their landline. The call will be traced, and someone will come.”
“Still… They won’t do anything about the dog.”
“We’ll leave him inside. They’ll find him, and someone will care for him.”
“No! They’ll leave him at a shelter where he’ll be killed. No. Absolutely not.” She picks up a squirming Edgar and brings him to her chest. “I won’t let them. I won’t let them kill this dog.”
“We can’t take him with us, baby.”
“Why not?”
“Because if we do, someone will figure out that we were here.”
“I don’t care. I’m calling 911 now.”
She yanks her hand away from me, letting Edgar go as well, and before I can stop her, she’s punching numbers into her phone.
I grab the phone out of her hand before she hits send, thank God. I brace myself, stay in control despite what I’m feeling, and force my voice to remain calm.
