AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Emilia barely spares the photo a glance before cringing and turning to look out the window. Hawk huffs out an irritated sigh before casting a quick look at it. “The bathroom,” he deadpans.
“But there’s no window in the bathroom. And look at the angle. It’s too high up.”
Hawk’s eyes dart back down to the photo, staring at it for a dangerously long moment, considering he’s driving, before muttering, “What the fuck? How is that even possible?”
That gains Emilia’s attention, and she deigns to give the photo another questioning look. “What?”
“That’s been taken from the security camera in my bedroom.”
The second he says it, I realize that’s what it is. The angle is from above, as though the photographer was clinging Spiderman-style to the ceiling.
Emilia’s eyes scan the photo again before she frowns. “How did she get a screenshot of security camera footage?” Emilia questions, putting words to my exact thoughts and obviously Hawk’s.
“That’s exactly what I want to know.”
I continue to flick through the pile of photos while he presses a few buttons on his steering wheel. A moment later, the sound of a phone ringing echoes through the car, followed by Kai’s gruff, “What?”
“Mel has access to our security cameras.”
“That's not possible,” Kai states with conviction.
“Well, the photo I’m looking at right now says otherwise,” I drawl.
“What the fuck is he talking about?” Kai growls.Ah, he’s so much fun when he’s in a pissy mood.
“There’s a photo here of the main bathroom. Given the angle, it could only have come from the security camera.”
“More than one photo,” I tell them. “It looks like most of these have been taken from our cameras.”
My words are met with silence before Kai curses under his breath. “Send me a picture of the photograph. Don’t go inside the house when you get there.” With that, the line goes dead, and I snap a picture of the bathroom photo and send it to him.
There’s an extra weight pressing down on all of us as we head toward the brownstone. On the one hand, we have the answers Emilia and Kai have been searching for, but on the other, it feels like shit is just getting started. Somehow, I don’t think this can end simply by calling the police and getting them to arrest Mel. She’s proven herself to be intelligent and resourceful. Cunning and determined.
In order to beat her, we will have to be better.
The good news is, I’m the kind of guy sane people know not to cross. Because not only will I fuck you up, but I’ll leave you irreparably damaged. Mel isn’t sane, however. She may be just as crazy as I am.
And we all know what happens when crazy collides with crazy.
Cataclysmic destruction.
Chapter4
HAWK
I’m numb by the time I pull up outside the house. Staring up at the structure I’ve thought of as a home for the last three years, it suddenly feels cold and foreboding. It’s incredible how knowing someone has been inside your house—even if it is just through the eyes of security cameras—can change the whole feel of a place.
It no longer represents a quiet, safe place to come to at the end of the day, where I can block out the outside world and relax in peace. Knowing that sick fuck has been using the very system we put in place to protect ourselves—to protect Em—to spy on us sickens me.
Is this our fault? Did we unintentionally give her the access she needed to keep tabs on us by installing cameras? I guess this explains how she somehow managed to be everywhere at once. She didn’t need to keep actual eyes on the house because our system did that for her. Leaving her free to stalk me, Wilder, and Kai every time we left and still keep tabs on Emilia and the goings-on inside these four walls.
There’s literally not a single thing that went on behind those doors that she wasn’t privy to. That she didn’t decimate by stealing for herself and plastering them all over that wall to taunt us.
None of us make an effort to get out, and why would we? We can’t go inside, and our only other option would be to stand out in the downpour. May as well sit inside the heated, comfortable car and listen to the loud pelt of rain all around us, making it sound like we’re trapped inside a tin can.
Ripping my gaze away from the house, my eyes land on Emilia. She has withdrawn into herself since we left campus, becoming even more subdued after discovering the extent of Mel’s violation. I wish I knew the right thing to say to her, but even if I did, she’d hardly be able to hear me over the battering of rain against the car, and I don’t think whatever I’d have to say would come across the same if I had to yell it.
So instead, I slide my hand onto her knee and give it what I hope is a reassuring squeeze, keeping it there until Kai’s car pulls up behind mine.
