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Ryder wasn’t asking for me to believe things would turn out okay, he was asking me to trust that Ethan would make sure he was okay and that he’d come back, and I wanted to do that so much, but all I could see was blackness.
“But where is he?”
“I don’t know. I’m sorry.”
“Ryder, with me,” Kayden snapped from the door, and I caught Ryder rolling his eyes before standing, wincing as he did so and favoring his shoulder.
“Kayden Summers: Man of few words,” Ryder deadpanned, and then squeezed my arm. I wasn’t sure I’d forgiven Kayden for stabbing Ethan yet, even if it was in a step in the grand scheme of things and had kept Ethan safe. Still, the way he snapped the instruction, and the way Ryder didn’t hesitate to follow him made me think I needed to be out there as well. I scrambled to stand and followed him from the kitchen, jogging to catch them up and slipping into the comms room before anyone could stop me. They were all facing the screens anyway.
“Ten,” Nik muttered from the main chair, “so far.” He glanced up at Kayden who nodded grimly.
“Ten what?” I asked. Ten more kids? Ten bullets? Ten minutes? Ten freaking dancing hippos? What?
“Ten, maybe more,” Nik qualified, and held up a hand to stop me from asking him to qualify. “Bodies. All dumped into the workings of old calcium phosphate deposits in the Ashley River region.”
“What bodies?”
No one answered because a chime from another screen caught everyone’s attention. It was some kind of shaky angle of nothing more than a wall, from a handheld camera. A disembodied voice filled the room.
“More. Many more than ten,” the voice said. “Jesus. So many more.” The camera panned to a mess of darkness, the viewer flicking from camera to what I assumed was infrared, or green, or whatever the military used to see in the dark. I still couldn’t make much out, but then the camera zoomed in on the nearestthing. “This guy. He’s new. Fresh kill. A bullet in his forehead, I’m checking for ID.” There was some movement, the camera swinging wildly, but I didn’t need to hear what the man had found by way of ID.
“Agent Danvers,” the voice said.
“It’s a burial site for cartel kills.” Ryder said next to me, his tone blank.
I crumpled, my legs going out from under me as I slid down the wall.
“Is Ethan in there?” I asked, my voice broken, and so damn soft.
No one answered—the report was ongoing as whoever was controlling the camera focused in on more, and I couldn’t look because I didn’t want to see Ethan there.
“Is Ethan there?” I asked again—louder this time.
Still, no one heard me, and tears choked my throat.
“Is it Ethan! Is he there! Is he fucking dead!” I yelled. Nik glanced my way, taken aback I was in the room, but he didn’t ask me to leave; nor did anyone else.
Everyone had a wide range of expressions, but mostly surprise. Nik was the one to answer, flicking to another screen, which showed an internal view of an apartment and video of Ethan in the kitchen making coffee.
“Ethan’s okay,” Nik explained. “He can’t hear us, but we can see him. He’s in an apartment in the city.”
“Why didn’t you all lead with that?” I snapped, because relief warred with fear, and I was irrational and messed up.
Nik cleared his throat. “I didn’t know you were in the room,” he explained.
I was pacified, but only a little. “Okay then,” I said.
He threw me a cautious half smile, probably worried I was on the edge.
He wasn’t wrong.
“Ethan’s okay,” he said. “As soon as his tracker re-engaged, we had an origin point to track him leaving, finally tracked him to the city, followed him back to his apartment, have tracking on Rouxier and this other guy here—Aubrey Mitchell, go-to for arms and trafficking, middleman between buyers and the cartel sellers.” He pointed to a screen, to an unassuming-looking short guy walking into a building. Another screen flashed with intel on the man, and even though it was a screen capture from a video I got my first look at this Mitchell who Ethan was working alongside. He was nothing—small, didn’t appear at all dangerous. I could have passed him on the street and not taken a second glance.
This was the man running the kids?
And Ethan was right alongside him?
I think I’m going to be sick.
