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I’m showered and dressed and practically bouncing when I walk into the kitchen a few minutes later.
Logan is already there, and he hands me a travel mug filled with coffee already doctored exactly the way I like it. “You don’t want breakfast.”
I’m not sure if he’s asking or if he’s simply saying it to prove that he understands my state of mind. Either way, I nod in agreement, then moan with pleasure as I take the first sip of the coffee he made for me.
The sound makes Logan go utterly still, his pale eyes locked on me.
“What? It’s good,” I say, feeling self-conscious for no good reason.
He blinks, shaking his head slightly, and turns toward the garage. “I’m glad you like it. We’ll take the Audi.”
“Okay.”
I follow him out to the sleek, sexy car and slip into the passenger seat, extra grateful for the coffee as he silently pulls away from the house and heads toward the part of Halston we agreed to start searching in. Sipping it gives me something to do since Logan doesn’t say more than two words to me once we’re on the road.
The silence is pretty much what I’m used to with him by now, and even though I feared him in the beginning, I can’t help but wish things were different now. I can’t get a read on him, and it might be greedy of me, but after Dante’s confession last night and seeing what I thought I saw between four members of The Six—I want to.
Logan slows the car. “This is still Reaper territory,” he says, scanning both sides of the road. “But barely.”
He parks in front of a run down, empty storefront sandwiched between a sketchy corner store and a brick building pockmarked with what looks suspiciously like bullet holes. It’s a part of the city we decided to check because I know Chloe is familiar with it, but I’m torn between hoping she hasn’t been hiding out in such a sketchy part of town and hoping that we’ll actually find some clue about where she is.
Or findher, of course.
“God, this fucking city,” I whisper as we both get out of the car.
It’s one thing to worry about Chloe from the safety and comfort of the Reaper house, but out here on the streets, the danger she’s in feels even more real.
“So if this is your territory, that means West Point won’t have people in the area looking for Chloe, right?” I ask.
“They shouldn’t,” Logan says, a dangerous glint in his eyes. “But let’s go find out.”
We split up, Logan heading into the corner store with a comment that makes me think he’s familiar with the owner and might be able to get something useful out of him, while I start checking the other side of the street. I’m not sure what exactly I’m looking for—anything really, any sign that Chloe might have been there or any clue about where she would have gone—but after a while, I start to lose hope of finding it.
I tell myself it’s a good thing. Hopefully, she’s holed up somewhere safer.
I head down an alley a few blocks from where Logan parked. There’s a check cashing place with a backdoor that lets out into it, and the guy who runs it, Wayne, isn’t a total asshole. His cousin went to school with Chloe. There’s a chance she could have stopped by, but she’s too smart to have gone inside where the cameras they’ve got rigged in the front of the shop would have caught her. If she’s been here, she would have come this way.
The narrow passage is blocked off by a chain link fence, and it’s empty other than a dumpster and some garbage blowing around. I’m not sure what I hope to see exactly, but when I notice a distinctive orange wrapper for Chloe’s favorite avocado bacon burger among the trash, there’s a painful surge of hope in my chest.
Maybe she really was here.
Maybe she knocked on the back door of the check cashing place and hit Wayne up for a place to stay.
Maybe—
“Find something?” Logan comes up behind me, looking over my shoulder as I crouch down to poke at the wrapper.
It’s… a wrapper. I sigh. “No. Maybe? Chloe might have eaten this.”
I gingerly pick it up and Logan cocks his head to the side, as if he’s actually considering it as a clue.
A little frisson of hope goes through me. It’s ridiculous, but then again, this is Logan. His brain seems able to make connections that anyone else would swear don’t even exist.
Then again, itisjust a wrapper. Even Logan can’t pull miracles out of his ass. A wave of despair goes through me, and I crumple it up and chuck it toward the dumpster with a curse.
“Forget it,” I say, stomping past him, back toward the street.
A guy is standing at the end of the alley, blocking the way. He’s also clearly tweaking. Not surprising for this neighborhood, but since there’s a fair chance that he bought whatever he’s on around here, it means he may have seen my sister.
