Page 161 of When Darkness Calls

The buzz I heard was voices coming from the hall.

“We should take her to the fucking hospital!”

“And then what? Explain to Micheals that she was fucking tortured for hours, but oh don’t worry. No need to call the cops. One of Shadow Grove’s best took a fucking sledgehammer to one of their heads, and it burst like a goddamn watermelon.”

“Hush, I heard something.”

My door opens, Liz’s eye peering in the crack before she jerks it open, running at me full speed.

“Elizabeth!” Cade barks, the high volume making my ears ring. She stops abruptly turning to him, looking like a kid who was caught stealing candy. “No. She needs to rest.”

“Cay.” My voice cracks and I try to push myself up. “I’m okay.” I blink rapidly through the nausea washing over me as I lift my head.

“He’s right, Dani Doll. You need to rest. I’ll be back in here soon to give you some more pain meds and look over your wounds, okay?” Keegan peeks his head around my doorframe.

“Thank you.”

He looks like a nervous wreck, and I wonder how much he has been through the last few hours. My brows draw together with the thought, but the concern I feel is quickly overpowered by the pain searing over my eye.

“No, sweet girl. It’s you who we need to worry about right now.”

Grayson steps into my room, passing Cay and Liz.

“What time is it?” I ask, looking at the sun shining across my floor.

“8:02 a.m.”

“What happened?”

He reaches for my hand, holding it gently to his lips. “A fucking lot, sweet girl. But we’ll talk about that later. You just rest, okay?”

“No, tell me,” I press.

Grays looks at Cade and he nods, ushering Liz out who swears she’ll be back with all the junk food she can carry.

Grayson’s quiet, tracing the bandage taped to my wrist with his finger. He clears his throat, takes a deep breath, and begins.

“Ethan and Issac took you last night.” He waits for any recognition in my eyes. I vaguely remember it happening. The costume mask, Issac looking crazed, Ethan talking about his friends.

Grays nods. “Yeah, I don’t think you’d remember a whole lot. You were—” he sucks in a sharp breath, exhaling as he says, “in pretty bad shape, baby.”

“I’m okay. Keep going. Were we right?”

“Yeah, sweet girl. You were right. The locations in Ethan’s portfolio were all linked to places where bodies had been discovered. A lot of them went unnoticed by the newspapers because they were ruled as overdoses or accidents.”

“And the storage yard?” I ask hopefully.

“Yeah, he did use one of the containers. The problem was figuring out which one it was that was in the image he had in the portfolio. I’m sorry we didn’t get there sooner.”

I lift my hand to his face, feeling the scratchy texture of his stubble across his jaw. He nuzzles into my touch, so many emotions warring in his eyes like the sea during a hurricane.

“It’s okay. I swear.”

“You did so fucking well. I’m so proud of you. My little Sherlock,” he murmurs against my palm, placing a gentle kiss in the center.

I blush, smiling at his antics.

“Well, I gotta say, despite everything, it's still a better Halloween than last year.”