30. Jace Holloway

Chapter 30

Jace Holloway

This was wrong.

I’d been wrong.

Letting Theo go was wrong.

I sat in the property manager’s office, feeling as if the floor was seconds away from splitting open and I’d plunge down to the core of the Earth. She spoke, but I couldn’t quite understand what she was saying. As if she had shifted to another language that was completely foreign to me. My thoughts couldn’t focus. The entire room spun.

How could this have happened? And what would happen next?

I just let a serial killer run.

I had fallen for a serial killer.

Fuck.

“Thank you,” I said, cutting her off mid-speech. Her head twitched backward. She was confused as to why I was suddenly getting up. She was saying something else, but I had to step outside and get some fresh air.

Theo wasn’t in the lobby, as I expected. He wasn’t outside, either. I placed both hands behind my head, shut my eyes, and tried to control my breaths. The same strategy that worked to control Theo’s panic attack in the elevator wasn’t working for me.

I had him. I could have brought him to the police. Could have ended his reign of terror.

But… what if there was truth in what he said? Did that make his actions justified? If the people he targeted were truly as monstrous as he said, and if they had been involved with his sister’s death—even indirectly—then maybe Theo wasn’t the one who needed to be punished? Maybe the trauma and pain he’d suffered at the hands of his father was punishment enough? And if he really did promise to stop this streak of terror, then what good would turning him in do?

I stumbled backward and leaned against the wall. I felt close to passing out.

What the fuck had I just done?

I needed to get to the Stonewall offices. Maybe I could discuss this with Benji. Not by telling him the full story, because that likely would have made his head explode, but maybe I could talk to him in a way that kept things vague but still gave me decent insight.

I wish I could talk to you, Dad.

Although I knew he was likely looking down on me and yelling at me to wake the fuck up in his thick Jersey accent. He’d never have let this happen. He was always about doing the right thing, keeping his moral compass intact. I looked up to him because of it. Letting a serial killer go because I was falling in love with him would have likely made my dad cry angry tears. He’d be disappointed, shocked, upset.

I pulled out my phone and opened up Uber. I couldn’t imagine getting on a cramped subway train right now. The claustrophobia would have hit me hard. I ordered my car. They were two minutes away. Good. I slipped my phone back into my pocket and stepped up to the side of the street, looking up and down for my ride. I chewed on my nails. It was almost shocking how normal this morning felt. How the world continued to spin per usual. How traffic rolled past me, how New Yorkers walked around me, on their way to their jobs or homes.

It felt wrong. Like they should all be experiencing the invisible hurricane that swirled around me.

A car came to a slow stop in front of me. I didn’t even check to see if it was mine, that’s how scrambled my head was.

I jumped in the back seat. “For Jace?”

“Yup,” the driver said. He adjusted his rearview mirror and smiled at me. Somehow, I managed a smile back.

“How’s your morning going so far?” he asked.

“Fine.” I clicked on my seat belt and rested my head against the window.

“Long night?”

“Long week.”

“I feel ya on that one.”

He inched forward in the morning rush. I continued to bite my nails. How could I bring this up to Benji without telling him everything that happened between Theo and me? I also didn’t want to give Theo’s name up, not yet, at least. I needed at least another day to think about how best to handle this. All roads appeared to be leading toward giving Theo up, but there was a tiny sliver of me that resisted that idea.

“Anything you want to talk about?” my driver asked. “I’ve watched that Taxi Cab Confessions show. These rides can be pretty therapeutic.”

“It’s complicated,” I said, one of the biggest understatements of the century.

“Does it have anything to do with your job?”

“It does, actually. Job and relationship.”

“Those are the worst kinds of problems.”

“They are,” I said. The driver made a left and turned onto Times Square. Even at this time on a Wednesday, the place was busy as fuck. I looked up at the electronic billboards advertising the newest album by a well-known pop star, right next to another billboard about a Broadway show that would have been great to take Theo to.

Theo—Nevermore.

Fuck.

“Well,” my driver said, slowing down in the traffic. I realized there wasn’t a phone on his dashboard showing the ride we were on. He also appeared to be going in the opposite direction than Stonewall. “I think you’ve got a lot more to worry about than what’s going on at work.”

“Huh?”

“I think you have to worry about what’s in front of you, right now.” The driver locked eyes with me through the rearview mirror and smiled. He raised his hand. In it was a slick black pistol. My entire body flushed with panic. My jaw dropped, my hand flying to the door handle. But it was locked. The door wouldn’t open. I couldn’t roll out to safety.

“Don’t move. Don’t try anything stupid.”

I wasn’t carrying my gun, either. I hadn’t grabbed it in this morning’s rush. I was defenseless. I’d gotten into this man’s car without even checking it, and now he was going to rob me blind. “Take whatever you want,” I said. “Have my wallet, my phone. Whatever.”

The man gave a dark chuckle. “You really are an idiot. I’m surprised Theo sees anything in you.”

“Theo…”

“Yes, Theo. Nevermore. The man you’ve been fucking. The man who’s now responsible for your abduction.” He came to a red light and leaned around his seat, aiming the gun directly at my chest. “My son never seemed to be able to find someone good for him. But I’m glad he found you when he did. You’ll be a perfect way to get him to suffer.”

My son…

“Let me out. Now.”

“No, I don’t think so. Now, let’s see how long it takes for Theo to realize you’re missing.”

My situation had gone from fucked to catastrophically fucked.