“What's this?”
“A gun. For you,” he said, pressing it into my hands. “Don't plan on you having any trouble, but you need to be prepared. This is the safety,” he said, slipping it off. “You hear something, see something, you take off the safety and you point. Put your finger on the trigger and pull. Don't think about it. Don't hesitate. No one belongs here. Anyone here but me? They mean trouble. You take them out then you call me,” he said, reaching into his pocket for one of the burners he kept with his weapons. He flipped it open and punched in something. “My number is in there. Got it?”
“Got it,” I agreed, taking the phone and tucking it into my pocket then reaching for the gun, trying not to think about it too hard. He was right. I needed to be prepared. So I needed to get over whatever hangups I had at the idea of using a gun.
“I won't be long. Two, three hours. Mostly because of the commute. Stay inside. Lock the door behind me. And keep the phone and gun within reach at all times.”
I felt my lips curving up. “I said I got it.”
“Just making sure,” he said, reaching for the back of my neck and hauling me toward him to kiss me. Hard. With lots of tongue. Then he pulled away, grabbed his keys, and walked out the door. “Don't hear the lock, woman!” he called through the closed door and I laughed as I ran to the door and pushed the locks into place.
I stood there listening to his truck pulling away for a while, feeling a strange surge of disappointment.
Which was ridiculous so I moved back toward the kitchen, nabbed my mug, and made my way over to the living room, grabbing my laptop and waking it up.
Then my heart flew into my chest.
Because there was a response.
On the post about Lex.
There was a response.
I clicked the post, scrolling down over all the information I had uploaded to find a comment by someone with the screen name “Jstorm”.
I can help. We need to chat.
I slammed my mug down on the table, not even noticing that the coffee splashed all over the surface as my hands flew across the keypad.
Where? When?
It was only a couple minutes before another comment was made. Like whoever Jstorm was, was sitting and waiting for me to get back to them.
Now? Secure webcam?
Of course.
SN: Jstorm.
I didn't respond to that, just brought up my camera and chat software, quickly brushing my hands through my crazy morning hair, before entering the screen name and hitting the call button.
My heart was hammering in my chest, my breathing feeling shallow and labored.
I had given up.
Days ago, I had decided it was no use. I checked anyway because I was always praying someone more powerful than me would step up.
That there was someone who wanted to help.
Someone who could end this for me.
And for Breaker.
And Shoot.
Shoot who Breaker hadn't heard from since the last meeting. Shoot who Breaker was getting more and more worried about by the day. He didn't say anything about it, but it was there. In the heavy way his shoulders sat. In the tightness in his jaw. In the faraway look in his eyes.
He was worried.
And that was my fault.
I needed to fix it.
The call got answered and it took a moment for Jstorm's camera to connect. When it did, it might as well not have been hooked up. Because the image gave me nothing. Someone in a hood that hung over their face. The hoodie was big and black, dwarfing whatever body was underneath it. The room Jstorm was in was dark. I couldn't even tell you from looking if Jstorm was a man or woman.
“Alex?” the inhuman voice asked.
Inhuman because whoever Jstorm was, they were using voice modification software.
They meant business.
That was good for me.
“Yes,” I said, nodding slightly, feeling almost nervous.
“I'm sorry to hear about Glenn,” Jstorm said.
“Thank you,” I said, meaning it. No one else had offered me sympathy. And I didn't deserve it, but Glenn's memory did.
“Lex has been allowed off his leash for way too long.”
That was true. “Yeah,” I agreed.
“Are you still with Bryan Breaker?”
That was not information I shared. Jstorm had been doing his or her own research. Again, that was good.
“At his house. But he ran out for a few minutes.”
The hooded head nodded. “You need to untangle yourself from him.”
The words felt like a kick to the gut.
Even though they were ones I had been forcing myself to try believe for days.
“I know.”
“Shooter is still alive. But if you don't show proof of the hacker when Lex returns, he won't be alive for long.” There was a pause. “You could create false leads, make false information to hold yourself over. But that will only last for so long and Lex would use his usual methods of... persuasion against you.”
Persuasion.
Rape and torture.
Yeah.
Jstorm was right.
“But not before he uses your weaknesses against you.”
“My weaknesses,” I repeated hollowly.
“Shooter and Breaker.”
Right.
That was true.
Shit.
It was one thing to know it. It was another to have someone else tell you the same thing you were worried about.
“You need to leave.”
“How will leaving help? Breaker will get in trouble for losing me.”
“Not as much as he will be in for helping you.”
That was also true.
“I have no money. No where to go.”
“You leave and turn left at the end of the gravel road. You find a stop sign bent in half and laying on the grass, turn into the woods, under the first downed tree is a bag. Enough money to get you out of town for a few weeks. An ID. A burner.”
Holy shit.
Jstorm really meant business.
“And then what?”
“Then I take it from there. I use what you have and what I have gathered and I take down Lex Keith. Finally.”
“But...”
“You're out of this, Alex Miller. You've lost enough already. Take the bag. Leave town. Don't look back. Don't gather any more information. You can take your laptop and keep tabs, but don't stick your finger back into this mess. You're free. Go build a new life.”
And with that, Jstorm ended the call.
If my heart was pounding before, it was threatening an attack then.
I had just been taken out of the equation.
I had just had my life's work taken from me.
And, at once, it filled me with overwhelming terror and soul-crushing relief.
All I needed to do was leave.
The problem was, there was no 'all' about it.