by Lucy Auburn
It's not until we're about to pull up to Coleridge that my mind leaves the lust-fueled nirvana I've been in and I hand the camera over to Blake, telling him to take a look at the photos and video I took.
"There should be enough to at least get a detective you guys trust to get a warrant and investigate further, but I'm not sure how much audio I got." Reaching the gate, I pull over to punch in the after hours code so I can park Cole's car in the lot, my mind racing as I think about how it'll feel to watch Hass get arrested. "Do you think he'll be doing the perp walk by noon tomorrow? God, I hope so. It would be the best belated Christmas present ever."
"Brenna..."
There's something strange and empty in Blake's voice, so I look over, wondering if he's going to tell me he regrets all that kissing. He keeps acting like he thinks it'll bother the other guys, but from what I can tell none of them felt more than a passing attraction towards me, even Lukas.
That isn't it, though. Blake is holding the camera between his hands, a stricken expression on his face, and the screen is black.
"The photos." My mind knows what he's going to say before he says it, and I white-knuckle the car steering wheel so tight that my fingertips go numb. "Brenna, they're gone. They're all gone."
Chapter 17
I walk towards Carthage Library in a stupor, Blake trailing behind me with the camera in his hands, muttering as he tries to figure out a way to recover it. There's a dim hope that the SD card will have the data on it once we pull it out, but it's such a long shot I don't dare to even consider it for more than a moment or two.
I know how this is going to end.
In my mind, I can already see Cole's angry face when I tell him that I'm the one who fucked up. I'll have to admit that I fell and dropped the camera, which was probably when the photos got fucked up.
Briefly, I wonder if Georgia is going to show up at my door demanding to know what happened. She had to have sheltered me from Hass for a reason, just like there's a reason why he "found" me in that trunk on the side of the road. I suspect Georgia has a better motivation than Hass, but even then I don't dare trust her as far as I can throw her—which would be, admittedly, not far at all, even though she's toothpick thin.
My mind is wandering. I don't want to think about what's going to happen when I tell the others how it's all gone wrong. Maybe they'll demand I leave Coleridge anyway, because their part of the bargain is up. They helped me, after all, even though Hass won't be arrested based on our ludicrous story about girls and a plane. No doubt if we go to the cops now, without any proof, he and his family will just sweep it under the rug, and it'll be like the girls never existed at all. Blake didn't even see most of it, and I doubt the word of an identity thief like me will sway the cops into getting a warrant for the house of foreign dignitaries, which Hass's parents are. I'd be laughed right out of the precinct in the middle of trying to make the report.
We have nothing, which means that girl will be trapped with Hass until he gets bored of her. No, I decide, as I take the steps to the library and grasp the heavy door handle. If I have to I'll break into Hass's vacation house and free her myself while he's out—she shouldn't have to suffer for my stupid, clumsy mistake.
"I'm sure we can do something with this," Blake says from behind me, holding up the scratched SD card and squinting at it. "Lukas knows way more about computers than you might think. Despite how much time he spends on his hair. He can probably reformat it or whatever they do with these things."
Blinking, I stare at him, mouth slightly agape. "Re...format it?" Blake stares back at me. "Do you know nothing about computers?"
To my shock, he flushes at the collar, looking genuinely embarrassed. "It's not that I'm a technophile. It's just that the written word on paper is so much more... clean. Why would I rely on computers when pulp and lead have gotten it done for thousands of years?"
I shake my head at him, truly surprised to discover Blake Lee has a flaw—other than, of course, being a general asshole with a cold personality and the inability to smile, all of which I've been proven wrong about from just a simple kiss that electrified everything.
"Leave the computer stuff to Lukas," I tell Blake. "He's the expert on this kind of stuff."
"That was the plan," he says defensively. "I leave the tech stuff to DuPont, and he leaves the being-devilishly-handsome to me."
It's the first time I've ever heard Blake preen, much less watched him do it right next to me, and it's fascinating. He throws a rogue one-sided smile at me, practically tripping over his feet as we go up the stairs to Carthage's second floor, and my stomach does a little flip-flop at the sight of him becoming awkward because of me.
Unlike him, though, I don't think Lukas will be able to fix the SD card. It's clearly scratched and bent beyond repair; nothing will help us recover the photos if the physical card is lost. The only hope we have is that Lukas somehow managed to get into the encrypted partition on my brother's laptop, which he's had all day and been working on diligently, using the notes I took on possible passwords my brother may have used. If Hass is somehow connected to the men who took me, then the partition could very well hold information that will take him down—along with all the other men involved. Without getting some sort of evidence soon, I might just go crazy walking these halls with Hass day in and day out, knowing he should be in prison but unable to make it happen.
As we walk through the stacks upstairs, heading towards the wide-open study area where we're meeting the guys, I cross every finger and toe that something can be done about the SD card or the partition or, simply, any of it at all. If all else fails, Mariana could choose to release the video of Hass and testify against him, but I know I could never ask her.
It'll be up to the five of us in this room to take down Hass.
Looking from Lukas, to Tanner, and finally to Cole, I wonder if it'll be enough. So much privilege under one roof, combined with my burning need for revenge, and even then we might not be able to pull it off.
"Well?" Cole leans forward, an eager look on his face that reminds me uncomfortably of what it was like when he teased me last semester, pouring dirty water on my artwork and manipulating me like a pawn in his games. "What did you get? Is it enough, you think, to get a warrant?"
Blake answers by throwing the SD card down on the table. It slides towards Lukas, spinning as it goes, and he quickly reaches out to stop its movement before it can plummet off the edge of the table. He holds it up and immediately frowns when he sees the state it's in.
In a bored voice, Blake says, "We damaged the SD card. Hope you can fix it."
Glancing over at him, I wonder a little why he said we, but don't have much time to examine it. Lukas is pulling out his laptop and an SD card reader, along with a microfiber cloth from his bag. While he gets to work fiddling with the card reader and trying to get something off of it, I grab the seat next to Tanner, and Blake sits next to me—even going so far as to scoot his chair over so it's as close as it can plausibly get.
Cole watches this all with observant blue eyes, taking it in far more closely than I'm comfortable with. After a long moment of silence, he finally asks, "What happened?"
"Well," I stumble over the right explanation to justify the SD card's state, "there was a bit of trouble with the lens and I had to go into the airport hanger..."
"I dropped the camera." Blake's lie shocks me so much that I fall silent, staring at him wide-eyed. "Brenna saw everything that happened, though. Maybe she could give a statement to the police."
Frowning, Cole shakes his head. "That can't happen," he says, while Lukas just firmly tells Blake, "No."
Grumbling, Blake mutters back, "You guys act like they're the boogeyman."
"You don't have the experience with them that we do." It's Tanner who speaks up now, to my surprise, sounding uncharacteristically serious. "People have tried these take downs before. This one will only work if it's public and anonymous. Otherwise..."
I look around at each of th
em, wondering yet again who they are, and what will happen if this all goes wrong. "Otherwise what?"
"They'll make you disappear," Cole says simply, as if it's nothing to mention secret societies willing to kill people at the drop of a hat. "You can't testify against them. Not alone, as the only witness to some big, elaborate crime. It'll never work."
Lukas adds, "So we just have to hope that I can somehow get some data off this impossibly damaged SD card, because without it we have nothing."
I fall silent at this, folding my hands on the table and staring down at the grain in the wood. All of this is my fault—if I'd just paid a little more attention to the task at hand, been less of a clumsy idiot, everything would be okay. We'd finally be able to take down Hass, maybe even part of this mysterious operation the guys won't explain to me, and Silas could rest in peace.
Hot tears gather in my eyes and tighten my throat. It takes all my effort and concentration not to let them fall. To have come so far, risked so much, and turn up nothing—it's the worst outcome I can imagine.
I'm so busy trying not to cry that I barely notice the minutes pass. At one point I feel a heavy hand on my knee, and slide my eyes over to look at Blake, frowning at him. He has a dark look in his eyes, and he briefly squeezes my knee then slides his hand back, somewhere between comforting and confusing. The one-eighty from him seems to have come out of nowhere, but I start to understand it when I see Cole cut his eyes at Blake, and Blake's smirk in response.
This is just another game to them.
It's always a game, the way they toy with me.
Yanking my eyes away from them, I watch Lukas steadily work on the SD card, and tell myself I don't care why Blake kissed me or what's going on between him and Cole. What really matters is taking down Hass—and getting the hell out of here as soon as the work is done, so I can return to Wayborne and have a normal life again. If there's anything the winter break showed me, it's that I still have friends and family in Virginia, even if none of it is perfect and it'll never feel the same again now that my brother is gone.
After several long minutes, Lukas looks up at me with something like regret on his face, and I know. It's not going to be fixed. Everything I touch will always be broken. This, most of all, because of how important it is.
"I'm sorry," he says aloud, and we all go still at the obvious news that follows. "I can't get any information recovered off the card. It's just... gone."
Swallowing, I nod, because if I open my mouth to speak embarrassing tears will come out. I can't stand the thought of them seeing me cry, especially because this is all my fault. I ruined everything.
Maybe I deserved to be bullied.
For a long moment, no one says anything. Cole breaks the silence with a single, inelegant, "Fuck me in the nuts."
Tanner scrunches up his nose. "No thanks?"
"What's with the question mark, Connally?" Blake shoots Tanner a look. "Were you considering it?"
"Maybe I was a little—"
"Shut up, all of you." Lukas quells the childish taunting with a single sentence and his narrowed blue eyes. Then he looks to me. "Brenna, what do you want to do next? We could try something else, like surveilling his house to see if we get anything. I know that property, and the fence is high, but we might be able to catch enough to get a warrant, if nothing else."
Clearing my throat, I do my best to swallow my grief and shame, telling myself that I'll get through this just like I got through Silas dying and even being kidnapped. "I think... maybe we should try to find those guys who took me last semester. The police haven't given me any updates in a while, and I think they're treating it like it's unsolvable. But if we get them, maybe they'll be able to explain why and how Hass 'found' me."
Cole arches a brow. "And how do we do that?"
"I don't know," I confess, frustrated. "They were like ghosts in the night. The only thing I know is that one of them mentioned a guy named Sal. And they wanted Silas's laptop." Daring to hope, I ask Lukas, "Any updates on that?"
He shakes his head, and my heart plummets into my stomach. "Sorry, Brenna. Your brother was very, very good at encryption and security. I haven't been able to crack it."
"Damnit." Rubbing my eyes, I admit, "I don't know what to do next. Maybe if we had more time... but the trail gets colder the longer we wait. And I have no idea what Silas even has on that partition. Or what password he used to secure it. I didn't know my brother at all, it turns out."
A moment of silence passes. Quietly, Blake points out, "She could still testify. Maybe the police will let her do it anonymously. If we talk to one of our guys—"
"Absolutely not." Cole's tone allows no argument, and his eyes are fiercely angry and oddly protective as he looks my way. "It's not worth the risk to her safety."
I quietly point out, "But what if it's the only way? Then it's worth it."
Lukas says, "You don't understand what you're up against, Brenna."
"Then tell me." Once again, frustration wells up inside me. "Tell me what I'm up against so I can understand. Otherwise we're all wasting our time."
Before we can discuss things further—or devolve into an argument, one that Tanner will apparently watch with half-lidded, disinterested eyes—footsteps catch my attention, and a familiar voice calls out behind us.
"I'll testify if she will."
Chapter 18
I stare at Georgia's perfectly lined eyes, her sculpted face, the bright orange-red fire of her hair. She's dressed to the nines, apparently back from her date with Hass, but there's no sign of him anywhere nearby.
There's also no sign of the hand-shaped bruise on her cheek, which I know must be turning a mottled purple color by now. Whatever foundation she uses, it's covered up Hass's sins quite perfectly.
Except that you can still see the pain in her eyes, and the way she holds her mouth gingerly on one side, talking around the things that he did to her in the bright light of day.
"I know you saw what Hass did to me." Her words are for me alone, her eyes intense as she stares me down, sounding like she's challenging me more than anything. "You were there getting evidence against him, right? But something went wrong when you fell."
I swallow, unsure how much I should trust Georgia, but on the other hand: she already saw me there and didn't do anything to turn me in, to Hass or otherwise, so there's not much I can say to make things worse. Reluctantly, I tell her, "We had proof he was... breaking the law. But the SD card got scratched, and now we can't retrieve the data."
"Figures." She scoffs at me. "You would think that Hass could be taken down over some drug deal. Clearly you have no idea how much money or influence his family has, or you wouldn't even think it was possible. I can tell you right now, Ferdinand Von Hassell could buy a whole truck full of heroine and they would do nothing to him. Nothing."
I keep my mouth shut tight, but Cole doesn't. "He wasn't buying heroine, you absolute idiot. He was buying a girl—one who will probably be more obedient than you, since she'd be his slave."
Georgia's eyes widen, and she shakes her head, visibly shocked. "No way. There weren't..." Stopping, she realizes, "But the plane. I thought it was weird he wanted to meet his dealer there. I didn't even think there might be something up. He kept it all from me. Then he went home early from our date because he said he had a phone call with his father and their business manager, but it must have been..."
As she trails off, I stay silent, feeling a strange mixture of pity and resentment towards her. When I caught Hass being a shitheel to Georgia, she acted like I was the one doing something wrong by stepping up and threatening him if he didn't stop groping her even as she told him to stop. They broke up briefly, but she got back together with him, and made it clear with her stunt at the Blind Ball—and the thing with the wolves, which I suspect was her doing—that she viewed me as the enemy, not him.
So to have her standing in front of me, silent in the face of her own boyfriend's cruelty, offering to give me the one thing I need, fi
lls me with a mixture of satisfaction and wariness. For all I know this is another trap—although a strange one, given that she could've ruined everything for me several times by now.
Cole starts to say something, but I turn and shake my head at him, and he falls silent. This is for me and Georgia to handle. It's a thing between two girls, full of loathing, coming to the same table to share bread.
"Why?" I ask her simply. "You didn't want to get him in trouble before. Testifying against him for abuse is a big deal."
She winces at the word abuse, and I wonder if she hates being seen as a victim as much as anything. Georgia is one of the most feminine girls I've ever seen, from her high heels to her thick long hair, never without makeup to highlight her big eyes, plump lips, and girlish cheekbones. But she's never been a damsel in distress, and she never will be.
"I want him to pay for what he's done."
"That's it?" I wait, watching her, studying every expression that passes across her face. "You know that if you do this, you'll be helping me. And possibly putting yourself in danger."
"I'm a Johnson," she says, like it isn't one of the most common surnames in America. But I know what she really means: her father is a blue blood, and her grandfather too. No one is going to come for her. Not like they'll come for me. And, as she adds, "Boys like Hass may have everything, but they need to learn that they can't shove around girls like me. We're equals. I'm not some slave he can buy."
My stomach turns, and the moment sours. Of course Georgia would see herself as above any other woman Hass is attracted to. That includes the girl who deserves so much better than to be sold to him and dismissed by Georgia as just another rival for his affection. Just when I thought she might get it, that maybe there's something in the middle of her other than pettiness, jealousy, and spite, she proves me wrong.
I need to stop looking for something beneath the surface of these blue bloods. Underneath they're all the same—when it comes down to it, they stick to their own, like wolves in a pack working together to slaughter sheep.
