Total pages in book: 86
Estimated words: 80314 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 402(@200wpm)___ 321(@250wpm)___ 268(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80314 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 402(@200wpm)___ 321(@250wpm)___ 268(@300wpm)
“I’ll let her know, and thanks for giving me a heads-up.”
“Yes, well, you are welcome. Now, I must go. I’ve got a baller who refuses to stop acting like a sod while he’s out in public.”
“Good luck with that,” I say, listening to her say goodbye before she hangs up.
Grabbing the armchair from the corner of the room, I drag it under the smoke alarm, then climb up on the cushion and twist it off its base. Jumping down, I take it with me to the kitchen and drop it on the counter, then head out of the house to grab my tool bag from my truck.
When I get back inside, I begin to dismantle the alarm and find an SD card inside, which would only be needed if it was storing something, so it has to be the camera. Looking across the ceiling in the kitchen, I find the smoke detector there and jump up on the island. As I’m pulling it down, I hear May come home and Cooper go to greet her at the door.
“Aiden,” she calls, sounding happy, and it fucking kills me that I’m about to change that. “What are you doing?” She drops her bags to the top of the island as I jump down with the device in hand. Without answering her, I open the smoke detector up, and my muscles loosen when I don’t find an SD card like there was in the other one. “Aiden.” My name leaves her mouth just above a whisper, and I turn to look at her.
“Someone put a camera in your bedroom,” I tell her quietly, and her face goes pale. “They sent a video of us to a news outlet in London this afternoon. My ex-publicist called to tell me about it.”
“What kind of video?”
I drop my eyes from hers, and my fists clench.
“What kind of video was it?” she repeats, her voice rising.
“You know.” I lift my eyes and watch tears fill hers. As one falls down her cheek, it feels like someone’s shoved a dagger right through my heart.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers, and my head jerks back. “I wish I never got on that app.”
“This is not your fault,” I growl, walking around the edge of the counter to her so I can pull her into my arms. “You are not to blame for this.”
“I am.” Her hands grip my sides as she buries her face against my chest and sobs. “I… I th-thought it was over! No… nothing has happened in t-two weeks. I thought it… was over.”
“Breathe, baby.” I kiss her head, then pick her up and carry her to the couch so I can hold her. It takes some time for her to catch her breath, and once she no longer sounds like she might hyperventilate, I place my fingers under her chin and tip her head back so I can look at her. “I need to call the cops, and while we wait for them to show up, I want you to pack a bag. We’re not staying here until we can find out if there are more cameras in the house. The smoke detector in the kitchen didn’t have one, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t others around.”
“I’ll call my dad’s cousin, Kenton.” She quickly scoots off my lap and heads for the kitchen, and I get up to follow her. “He might be able to tell us if there are more cameras, and if he can’t, Justin will be able to.” She looks over at me as she digs through her bag and shakes her head. “I don’t know why I haven’t thought about it before now, but Justin might even be able to find out who Mike is.”
“How’s that?”
“He’s a computer genius.” She drops her eyes to her phone, then puts it to her ear as she walks to the fridge and opens the freezer. “Hey, Uncle Kenton,” she greets while pulling out a pint of ice cream. “I could be better.” I watch her grab a spoon out of the drawer under the coffee pot, then walk back to the island, taking the top off it. “I hate that I’m calling because I need help, but my boyfriend found a camera in my house, hidden in a smoke detector, and I want to make sure there aren’t more.”
She digs into the ice cream. “Thank you,” she says quietly, then asks, “Should we call the police?” Her head bobs as she bites her bottom lip. “All right, see you soon.” When she hangs up, she heads to the pantry, saying, “He and Justin will be here in less than an hour, and he said not to call the cops until they’ve had time to go through the house but that we should bag the smoke detector in case the cops are able to get prints off it.”