Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 78142 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 260(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78142 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 260(@300wpm)
They forsook me, so I forsook them.
But I have to know.
I have to know if this phone message was real or if it was just a horrible trick.
I walk to Diana’s room and knock.
She opens the door just as she’s ending a call. “Dragon?”
I swallow. “I don’t want to bother you, but I need your help.”
“With what?”
“Do you know how to trace a call?”
She shakes her head. “No, but my family has resources. What’s going on?”
I pull up the number on my phone. “I just got a call from this number. I need to find out who it belongs to. Where it came from.”
She takes a look at it. “It’s a Denver area code, so it couldn’t have come from far. Unless of course it’s someone with a cell phone with a Colorado number who is now living somewhere else.”
“Fuck.” I rub my forehead. “You’re right. It could’ve come from anywhere.”
“I can call my dad. He has investigators he uses. Maybe they could figure it out.”
I shake my head. “I’m sure I can’t afford that.”
She holds up a hand. “My dad has them on retainer. They probably wouldn’t mind doing it as a favor.”
“I’m not in any situation to ask anyone in your family for another favor,” I say. “I’m already living here.”
She frowns. “Dragon, what is this about? What did that person say to you?”
I close my eyes for a moment. When I look at Diana—at her beautiful caring eyes—I almost want to tell her everything. I could so easily vomit out the entire story. More than I’ve even told my therapist. More than I even told Jesse.
But can I trust Diana Steel?
Better yet—do I want to trust Diana Steel?
Because I don’t trust anyone. Besides Jesse. I’m not even sure I trust my therapist, though he hasn’t done me wrong yet.
“I just need to know where the call came from. If it’s legit or not.”
“Dragon, you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.” She places a hand on my shoulder. “But if I call my father and have him get in touch with our investigators, you will have to tell them.”
I ignore the jolt of electricity coursing through my body at her touch. “Why would they need to know what was said? Can’t they just figure out where the call came from?”
“It’s not that simple. They need all the information to do a thorough investigation. Whatever they said to you might be some clue as to where they are, what they want, why this even happened.”
“They didn’t say they wanted anything.”
“Fine.” She looks me dead in the eyes. “But if I call them, if I get our investigators to help you, you have to tell them everything. You get it?”
I heave in a deep breath. “Fine. I wouldn’t even ask except…”
“Except what?”
“Except…nothing.”
“This is important to you,” she says.
“You think?”
She frowns.
I run my hands through my hair, sighing. “I’m not trying to be rude, Diana. This… This…” No more words come.
She removes her hand from my shoulder and cups my cheek. Her touch is soothing. More soothing than it should be.
“Something is inside you,” she says. “I don’t think you’re as dark and sinister as you claim to be.”
I shake my head. “You don’t know me.”
“You’re right. I don’t. I know next to nothing about you.” She looks into my eyes, narrowing her own. “But I can see that this is important to you. I see it in those eyes of yours. I see emotion in their depths. Emotion I wasn’t sure you had until…”
“Until what? Tonight?”
She bites her lip. “Until this morning.”
This morning? Is she serious? What happened between us had no emotion whatsoever. I open my mouth to say so, but no words come out.
She drops her hand from my face and then reaches into her pocket to grab her cell phone. “I’ll call my father. He’ll know what to do.”
All I can do is nod and leave Diana’s room so she can make the call in private. I saunter over to her living room and plant myself on her couch.
A few moments later she comes back out.
“An investigator is coming over,” she says. “He’s going to need to look at your phone. I’ll leave the room if you want me to, but you’re going to need to tell him everything.”
I nod. “Thank you.”
A smile spreads over her face.
“What?” I demand.
She slaps her hand over her mouth. “The smile isn’t because I’m happy you’re going through something difficult. I’m not, Dragon. I can see that you’re hurting, and I don’t like that one bit. But you said thank you.”
With a slow exhale, tension draining from my shoulders, I meet her gaze. “Yeah, I have a hard time with that.”
She crosses the living room and lowers herself onto the love seat. “I know you do. Why?”
I take a deep breath. “I’m not used to people being nice to me. I’m not used to people doing something for me out of the goodness of their hearts. It’s usually because they want something in return.”