My phone rang from its position beside my computer.Too close to the horrific picture on the screen for me to take a single steptowardit.
Rhett didn’t hesitate.He reached out and snatcheditup.
Esme.On thesecuredline.
“I don’t know if I can do this,” I choked out.“How do I tell her?I’m not strongenough.”
“We’ll do ittogether.”
I answered the phone, and all we heard were sobs until she startedwailing.
“He’s dead!Someone ...someone sent me a text message.With a picture.And one ofJantoo.”
My knees buckled, Rhett’s hold the only force keeping me upright.“Esme, whereareyou?”
“In an Uber.Goinghome.”
“Don’t go home,” I croaked, the words sounding broken.“Don’tgohome.”
“Oh God, they sent it to you too?”Her voice rose to a screeching level.“How is this happening?This can’t behappening!”
“I’m so sorry.It’s all myfault.”
“No, it’s those motherfuckers, and we’re going to take them all down.”Esme’s hysterical tone took a turn for thedangerous.
Rhett grabbed the phone from my hand.“What you’re going to do is go directly to the airport and get on a flight to Vail.You’re going to lay low until thisisover.”
I jerked my head around to look at Rhett.“Vail?Why not here?She should be here.Withme.”
He gave me a hard look and repeated himself.“You understand me, Esme?Don’t take a damn thing with you.Tell the driver right now to change direction.We’ll get you a ticket and message you the details through thesecureapp.”
“Okay.Okay.”Esme’s voice shook as she repeated herself.“Colorado.Pot’s legal there.I’ll get so stoned, I won’t remember what happened.I’ll forget.I’ll ...Erik...”She broke into sobs again, and I pulled myself together enough to take the phone from Rhett and form words withoutcrying.
“Listen to me.We will take them out.We’ll get revenge.No one is getting away with doing this.No one.We won’t just hurt them, we willdestroythem.” I didn’t care if I sounded like a bad movievillain.
“Okay.Pot and destruction.I can do this.”Esme’s voice quavered, but she sounded steadier as we heard her tell the driver to go to the airport instead and she’d pay him cash.He agreed, probably not about to argue with the hysterical woman in his backseat.“Send me the ticket.I’ve got Erik’s computer.I’m going to find out exactly what he was doing, and then I’m going to track down thesemotherfuckers—”
“And give us the information so we can take care of it,” Rhett finishedforher.
“Only if youpromise—”
“I swear to God, we will get them, E.I will not stop until we do.”I’d never made a more serious vow.“Call me when you get to the airport and arecheckedin.”
“Iwill.”
We hung up, and I turned in Rhett’s arms and soaked the front of his shirt with mytears.
“How can this be happening?What didIdo?”
He smoothed my hair back from my face and held me close.“This isn’t your fault.You didn’tdothis.”
“But Erik wouldn’t have been a target if not for me.Jan either.”I looked toward my laptop and the other message mocking me for not clicking on it.I couldn’t.Not right now.I didn’t know if I could handleseeingmore.
“And you wouldn’t have been a target if not for someone else.There’s a hell of a lot more going on here than we thought.Now we pull our shit together, find the answers, kill the people who need killing, and get Erik and Janjustice.”
I looked up at him, blinking away my tears.“I need to call mybrother.”
Rhett nodded in agreement.“Weneed to call yourbrother.”