Prologue

PROLOGUE

AIDEN SINN

6 Days Earlier

K icking in the door of the tiny trailer did little to quench the anger inside of me. The smell hit me before anything else. Stepping inside, I found the conditions of the mobile home deplorable. I wouldn’t have let my dog live in such filth.

“What the fuck?” Micah, one of my best friends, said as he looked around the house in disgust.

“Laylah, baby?” I yelled as I kicked some trash aside.

“Baby?” I called again. Still we were met with silence.

“You’re sure this was the right address?”

“Yeah. 162 Second Street. She has to be here. I’ll go to the right and you take the left,” I ordered.

“There’s nothing outside. I couldn’t even find her car,” Justin, my other best friend, said as he stepped into the house. “Shit.”

“This is bad,” Micah voiced.

I rubbed my forehead. “If we don’t find her here, we’ll go to the police again.” Not that the police had been helpful. They’d brushed us off since our first call six days ago when Laylah had gone radio silent. Justin placed his big hand on my back. “We’re going to find her, Aiden. It’s going to be okay.”

His words were the balm my weary soul needed. I was so thankful for him and Micah. Laylah too. The four of us had been inseparable since we’d all landed in the same foster home as kids and the last week without Laylah had shown us we were only operating at seventy-five percent without her.

“I’m going to go down the hall and toward the back, you guys check that way,” I said, walking away. Swallowing the emotion in my throat, I looked through the piles of trash, hoping to see any sign of her, and beating myself up as I searched.

We should have tried harder to stop her from coming to this hellhole. We should have come with her.

It took me far longer than it should have to navigate down the cluttered hall. Each step brought more and more anger. How could anyone live in such filth? How could anyone expose their daughter to such filth? I scoffed to myself. Probably with the same audacity her father used when he called her and begged her to come back home and help him. He’d sworn he was doing better and in a twelve-step program.

He’d fucking lied. Laylah had arrived a week earlier and immediately told us she was cutting her trip short. She didn’t tell us why, just that her Dad wasn’t doing any better. She’d begged us not to come get her, and promised us she’d be home in forty-eight hours. She just wanted to leave some flowers on her mother’s grave. We’d agreed against our better judgment.

Seven days after that phone call, we still couldn’t find her. We’d gone to the address he’d originally written her from. Apparently he’d never lived there. After talking to over a hundred people in the small town and checking several other locations, we’d finally gotten a break.

“Laylah?” I flipped over a desk chair.

“Laylah?” I heard Micah yell.

“Baby?” I pulled back a computer desk. It broke in my hands as roaches scattered everywhere.

Thud.

I froze.

Thud.

“Laylah?”

Thud. Thud.

“Baby, do it again for me! I’m coming!”

Thud.

“That’s right, baby. You’re such a smart girl. Keep making noise. We are all here. We’re going to find you,” I promised.

Micah and Justin ran from the other end of the house and started helping me move things. There wasn’t much room left to look, but furniture and garbage bags filled all the space.

Thud.

“That’s it, Laylah. Keep being strong for us, little love,” Justin begged as he tossed things behind him in the hall. “This stuff was placed here recently. That’s why all this trash is on top of it.”

“No wonder her father was never granted visitation,” Micah said in disgust as more roaches crawled up the walls.

Child services had placed Laylah in the same foster home as us when she was seven. Her mother had been killed in a robbery gone wrong and her father wasn’t fit to take her. She struggled the most. Micah, Justin, and I had been in the system as long as I could remember. We’d never had a good parent, so we couldn’t imagine how badly she hurt. We kinda just took her under our wings, and years later, she was still one of the most important people in our lives.

“I found a door!” Justin yelled as he pushed on it.

“We’re here, baby, we’re coming. Hang on, okay?” I promised her.

Micah and I continued digging out around it until finally the green door was visible enough we would all dig our shoulders into it.

“One, two, three,” Jason counted as we all pushed. The door splintered under our weight and Justin kicked it the rest of the way in.

“We’re here, baby! We’re here!” I shouted as I ran to her. She was laying on the filthy floor with her arms and legs tied behind her. Hitting my knees beside her, I reached for the ropes, trying to untie her.

“I got it,” Justin said, pushing me aside and using his pocket knife.

“We’re here, little love. We’ve got you,” I soothed, stroking her face.

“Cut the gag out of her mouth, I can’t get it untied,” Micah demanded.

She screamed into the cloth when her arms and legs were free. I imagined from the pain she felt as feeling came back to them.

“I’m so sorry, baby.” I pulled the fabric away from her mouth once Justin cut it. “We’re here. We’re here.”

“Help me with her legs, Aiden,” Justin said, struggling to get the rope untangled from them.

“What the fuck?” Micah mumbled from where he was kneeling beside Laylah’s head.

Looking up, I saw her spitting change out onto the floor. Nickels and dimes fell from her mouth and rolled all over the stained carpet.

Micah patted her back. “Get them all out. That’s it. Good girl.”

I slowly brought her legs in front of her. They were bare and covered in bruises and urine. There was no telling how many days she’d been in here like this.

“I-I knew you’d c-come,” she sobbed into Justin’s arms. “I t-told him you’d come.”

My heart clenched painfully in my chest at her words. I’d figured her father had done something, but to hear it, broke my heart. How could he do this to his own child?

“Can we move her?” Micah asked, looking at me.

I nodded. The way she’d grabbed Justin made me believe she didn’t have any spinal injuries and we were in far more trouble here than anywhere else.

“Let’s get you the hell out of here, baby.” Justin scooped her up and we followed behind him, stepping over the coins as we left.

“Why the fuck did he put change in your mouth, Laylah?” Micah asked. Probably before he thought better of it. Now wasn’t the time to question her.

“When he asked for money, I gave him some change I had. It made him s-s0 angry. He w-went into a rage. He shoved the change in my mouth before…” She hesitated and gave a shiver, before finishing. “Before he tied me up and beat me with that stick,” she said, nodding her head toward a bloody broom handle.

“Let’s get you to the truck, babydoll,” I said, taking her hand over Justin’s shoulder. “You’re safe now and that’s all that matters,” I added.

“I knew you’d come,” she said again. “I knew you’d find me.”

I pressed a kiss to her bloodied knuckles. “You’re our whole world, baby. We will always be here for you.”