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Mr. Thorne nodded in the footage. “We’ll take her to Glen Falls. It’s been too long since the last one, hasn’t it? She didn’t last long. Too weak. This one should hold up longer. If we don’t get rid of her before then, she’s got quite the mouth on her.” He laughed, and the sound was like a million centipedes crawling up my spine. “She’s a bit older than I’d like, but…” He shrugged.

“I’ll get everything ready.” The excitement in Tom’s voice was harrowing. “I’ll go out there tomorrow and set up the⁠—”

Court pressed a button and the video stopped. He slid the laptop back to Brooks.

My vision blurred. I felt like throwing up. It was true. It was all true. I knew they were horrible fucking people, but I had no idea—none—that they were planning on doing something like that. And all of a sudden, my entire life felt like the worst waste of existence that had ever been spent on this earth.

She’s nothing.

“When was this?” My words were barely a whisper, but Court heard me.

Had Tom been following me? Were those the eyes I’d been feeling on me?

“Last week,” he said. He spoke softly, gently, like he knew how stunned I was, how skittish I was feeling.

He had no fucking clue what this felt like. He was six and a half feet of muscle, but I couldn’t be mad at him for that. And I wasn’t mad—I was terrified. Because if Court had never come to the store when he had, who knew what would have happened to me?

Well, that footage didn’t leave much to the imagination. They laid it all out there, not knowing they were being watched. And if these guys sitting around me hadn’t decided to hack those cameras, I might very well be on my way to becoming just another missing woman that nobody gave a damn about.

I didn’t know what to say, so I just sat there.

“You can help us. You can get back at them.” Court’s voice was still soft, though more resolute now.

I looked at him. “By stealing from him?” I let my eyes wander over all of them. “Why are you guys going to all this trouble, anyway? Why would you even care what happens to me? I’m nobody to you. I’m nothing.”

There was a whole lot of looking at each other, looking away, silent communication among the four of them. Then Cade leaned forward on his elbows, met my eyes, and spoke. “Because Thorne would have killed you. And we were able to do something about it, so we did.”

I swallowed, letting his words fall into place. I didn’t even know why I was sad, exactly. Maybe because nobody would have known. Not a single person would have cared, if these guys hadn’t stepped in and…rescued me. Yeah, they saved me.

I glanced at Court. He had saved me.

“You’re safe with us. You know that, right?” The weight of Court’s hand as he moved it up my spine was equal parts terrifying and reassuring. He settled his warm palm against the back of my neck, fingers lightly grasping me. I didn’t have the energy to shove him off me, and truth be told, it felt good. That warmth. His strength. Bleeding into me and grounding me.

“No, I don’t know that. I just met you all,” I said. My voice was still annoyingly shaky. “But you haven’t really given me a reason not to trust you. Yet. I just… Fuck, this is a lot, okay?” I scrubbed my hands over my face and shook my head, exhaustion making my arms weigh a thousand pounds. “I think I just need some time to process everything.”

I didn’t think I’d ever process this completely. It was more in my nature to ignore and forget. But fuck pretending to comply with Court until I could escape him—after learning all of that, I wanted him to take me as far from Marion as possible. From there, I could figure out my next move, but for now? I really did feel like I was safest with him.

Court nodded, then turned to Vincent. “Bags are in the car?”

Vincent sat quietly through this entire conversation, and when I looked at him, his eyes were already on mine. Dissecting me. “Yep. We’re ready to go.”

“Good. Everyone pack up whatever you’ve got left. We’ll head out in twenty.”

What? Where were we going?

The guys all stood and walked off. Court still had his big hand on the back of my neck, his body still turned toward mine. His presence beside me was like a steel trap, a black hole, and I couldn’t ignore it or escape it. Right now, I didn’t even want to. If I was alone, if he wasn’t holding me like he was, I thought maybe I’d break into tiny shards and float off into nothing.

“You good?” he asked quietly.

I wasn’t able to do more than nod once as I stared down at my hands. I was not good. I didn’t think I’d ever been good in my life, but this wasn’t a therapy session and I didn’t feel like talking anymore.

“I’ve got your shoes,” he said, finally pulling his hand away and standing.

I immediately wanted to call him back and make him keep holding me, but instead I watched him walk over to the far wall, where he bent down and picked up my ratty sneakers. He set them gently down beside my feet and patted my back once. Then he was gone. He moved over to Cade and held a quiet conversation I couldn’t hear.

I looked down at my shoes, wondering why he’d taken them off in the first place. With hands that were slightly shaking, I slipped them on and double tied the too-long laces. They’d been white once. Maybe. Now they were so dirty and stained that they were gray and brown, torn in a few places, but they still got the job done.

I was really doing this. It wasn’t as if I had anywhere else to go, any other pressing matters to attend to. It was hard to believe that these men had saved my life, had protected me from a fate I didn’t want to think about. Seeing that footage had scared me like nothing else.