Page 149 of Flash Point

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Lynette went as still as a heron searching the water’s edge for its next meal. “We haven’t taken our eyes off the kids.”

“Which is why they’re still here and safe,” Liv said. “Thank you.”

“Considering our less than stealthy entrance,” Zeke said, “he’s long gone.”

“I’ll call the kids out,” Lynette said.

Liv shook her head. “Please, let them play for a while longer. This is probably the safest place for them right now.”

The older woman didn’t look convinced, but she didn’t try to persuade her either.

“What now?” Belinda asked, though Liv suspected her aunt had already gone through a battery of scenarios.

Liv stared at her son playing with his new friend as if the world hadn’t almost crumbled down around him. She was glad. Glad this one piece of his youth had been preserved.

A loss for a loss.

Why didn’t Jackson at least try to take Brodie? Why go through so much trouble and not even make the attempt?

“It doesn’t make sense,” Liv said. “He was here, yet all he did was take a picture.”

“Maybe after observing his target’s bodyguards, he realized his plan wouldn’t work,” Zeke said. “If he somehow nabbed him under that kind of pressure, he’d still have to carry a kicking and screaming kid through a building full of parents without getting tackled. Bad odds, even for a sociopath, psychopath—whatever he is.”

In today’s world, murderers blew through schools, malls, churches as if they were invincible. If he’d wanted Brodie, he would have waited for that one moment of inattention that happens with even the most attentive parents, and made his move.

With shocking clarity, Liv said, “He never intended to take Brodie.”

Sadie, finally noticing the new arrivals, gave them an exuberant wave.

“His texts would suggest otherwise,” Zeke said, lifting a hand to the little girl.

The exchange was so normal, despite the fact that somewhere out there, an unstable man was playing Wheel of Fortune with her life.

“A loss for a loss. That was his promise,” Liv said. “After he trashed Brodie’s room, I assumed he intended to make me pay by hurting my son. He knew my mind would go there, encouraged it by sending me that picture.”

Liv’s phone chimed, and dread darkened the edges of her vision until she saw only her phone. She tapped through to her text messages. An image filled her screen. The concrete beneath her chair crumbled away, and she fell, fell, fell.

Zeke leaned close, and he growled low and hard. “Sonofamotherfuckingbitch.”

On her screen, she stared into the terrified eyes of her sister.

A loss for a loss.

Callie.


Tags: Tracey Devlyn Paranormal