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“LET'S GO, GIRL,” I said, opening the door and making my way out onto the porch. It was a bright, beautiful day with that faded-blue look the sky gets when it's particularly warm, and I smiled up into the sunshine, letting it soak away the worries that had kept me from sleeping. I still wasn't over the idea that if I did the police report—and got a restraining order—Tony would find out about it and come after me. It meant that particular avenue of action was probably closed to me, which was frustrating, to say the least.
Though that didn't change my larger goal. I needed to find more girls who had experience with Tony and go to the police as a group. I still thought that if there were enough of us speaking out against Tony, the cops would have to take us seriously. If I had other girls backing me up, then I might take advantage of Frank's offer and do the police report. I might try to get it in front of a judge.
Make sure Tony was taken down by the girls he'd worked so hard to silence.
That was what was keeping me going right now, the thought of finally bringing to an end the reign of terror he’d had over me and so many other women over the years. He had been walking around, acting like he had nothing to worry about, but he hadn’t counted on me coming back into his life. He thought he had scared me off with the fire, but he didn’t know just how many people there were out there who would do anything it took to see him crash and burn.
I was pretty sure it would still be dangerous, but I was also hoping we could move quickly enough that he'd be in jail within hours of us having gone to the cops. Yes, Richard had told us that there was financial fraud as well, but from what I knew, that wouldn't get him thrown into jail immediately.
If he'd assaulted people, though, that should do the trick. And if he was in jail, he wouldn't be able to come after us.
If he didn’t have too many allies in the police department. That was something we’d have to consider, and it could be a major roadblock in gathering enough evidence to take this to trial. There would be so many cops who were willing to look the other way based on the handouts the McCarthy family had given them, and they might dismiss anything we put in front of them to protect Tony.
The thought made my stomach twist with anger. I had blamed myself for so long, but what chance did I stand against the power that Tony had here? He pretty much had free run of this town. I could have come out with everything back when it had first happened, but I doubted they would have paid any attention. At least I had managed to get some money out of him to start a new life—if I’d chosen to go straight to the cops, I might have been chased out of town without a penny to my name, and I had no idea what I would have done.
But with more people to stand against him, they couldn’t just deny us. They would have to make a report, if nothing else, and it might be enough to spark some action from the members of the police force who weren’t in Tony’s pocket.
Of course, this meant I had to actually find all those other girls and get them to agree to testify against him, and that was what had kept me up most of the night. I knew of Madison and the girl that had filed for the restraining order, and I wasn't positive I could use either one of them. Frank had said his niece had history with Tony, so that might be one extra, but I couldn't be sure she'd actually file a report, either.
I was going to need to find the girls and then talk them into being brave, and I had no idea how I was going to do either of those things. Some of them might have been hurt more recently than me, and I knew how long it had taken me to finally pluck up the courage to come back. I doubted I would have even done it had it not been for my mother’s accident. Some of them would still be nursing the scars, refusing to entertain the idea of even thinking about him again in case it ripped them open once more.
And I knew I wasn’t just talking about their emotional scars, either. Not a chance.
I opened my eyes and looked down at Silver, who was wearing the dog equivalent of a grin as she looked up at me. We weren't spending as much time together as I'd like, and I'd promised her—and myself—that from here on out, I'd take her on daily walks to the small, wooded area near my house. It would get her some exercise and give us some time alone together, neither of which was a bad thing. We'd spent years living out of my tiny van, just the two of us, and I missed that sense of us against the world.
Or us on an adventure together, which was just as good.
We started forward and were barely down the driveway when my phone rang. I groaned, thinking that my day with Silver had already been interrupted, but when I looked down I saw that it was my mother calling.
She'd had her surgery late in the afternoon yesterday, and though I’d talked to her right after, she'd still been groggy and incoherent.
“Mom,” I breathed, beyond happy to hear from her. “How are you feeling?”
“Better than the last time you talked to me,” she said with a laugh. “What did I say yesterday? I can barely remember. Do I need to be embarrassed?”
I laughed, already feeling better. “Only if you want to be embarrassed about telling me you couldn't feel your body and didn't think you should be talking right now. How are you? Able to feel all your limbs normally?”
“Yes, thank goodness. The nurse told me I made it through the surgery with a gold star, though I'm not sure that I had anything to do with it. I mean, I was asleep the whole time.”
This made me laugh even harder, and Silver and I stepped onto the shoulder of the road and started toward the woods. I was planning to get her there and let her off the leash so she could really stretch her legs, and if my mom was feeling good enough to be on the phone, that would give us some time to really talk.
“But more importantly, how are things there? How are you holding up?”
The buoyant feeling inside of me punctured and deflated. “Good,” I lied. “Calm. You know. Uninteresting. Maybe everything's taken a turn for the better.”
It was a flat-out lie. Not even close to the truth. But my mom had also just come out of surgery, and the last thing I wanted was to tell her that a member of the police force had approached me with a story about his own niece and an offer to help take Tony down. I also wasn't going to tell her what that led to, in my mind: more confrontations with Tony and danger for us. She didn't need to know about any of that, and she definitely didn't need the stress it would bring on her body.
We got to the forest, and I let Silver off her leash, turning the subject to something more harmless while Silver raced off. I was just laughing at something my mother had said when I saw Silver come to a sliding stop, her head low and her hackles rising up. I thought at first that maybe she'd seen a squirrel or raccoon, but moments later, she was growling and putting her tail between her legs.
Silver didn't growl at squirrels.
“Mom, I have to run. Can I call you back in a bit?” I asked, forcing my voice to stay normal.
“Of course. I don't exactly have any place to be.”
I tried to smile at that. Really, I did. But I already knew that Silver had found trouble, and all of my attention was on the trees in front of her. I hung up without telling my mother goodbye and called out for Silver to come back.
Instead, she took three threatening steps toward the forest, her lips lifting in a snarl over her teeth as her growl turned even more threatening.
What the hell was going on here?
I glanced at the trees, wondering, and had just turned in that direction when Tony himself stepped out from behind the largest trees, his hands up and a wicked snarl of his own on his face.
“Best keep that mutt under control, Lila, or I'll have to put it down for you.”
I stared at him, my words failing and my breathing ragged. What the fuck was he doing all the way out here, and so close to my house? What was he doing hanging out in the forest? Had he been waiting for me?
He wouldn't actually hurt Silver, would he?
“Silver,” I said sharply. “Here.”
She turned and ran to me without glancing back at the man she'd been about to attack, coming to a stop at my side. She turned and dropped into a sit, her eyes still on him, and I could feel the tension radiating out of her compact, muscular body.
She was ready to attack, and she'd never even met this guy. Maybe she didn't have to meet him to know he was trouble.
I put a hand on her head and watched, heart racing, as Tony started toward us. Damn, I was stupid. I was out here by myself without any sort of weapon and far enough away that no one back at the house would hear me if I screamed. What had I been thinking to come out here on my own? Why had I thought this was safe?
Because I hadn't thought he'd dare show his face around here when he'd already gotten in so much trouble, I realized. I'd thought he'd at least be careful.
But that was because I hadn't been thinking about this as his town. Now I remembered what I'd realized just last night: that he could do whatever he wanted in this place and he'd get away with it because the cops were all on his side.
Even if it meant attacking a girl a mile from her own home.
Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.
I slid my phone out of my pocket and put it behind my back, thumbing it open and hitting what I hoped was the first number on the call list. If I'd guessed right, that would be Warren's number. I could hear the faint sound of it ringing... and then the even fainter sound of him picking up.
Please let him be able to hear me. Please let him remember where I'd said I was going.
Please let him realize that I was in trouble and needed help.
“Fancy seeing you here, in fact,” Tony said, taking a step closer.
I tensed, trying to figure out whether I had time to run from him—and whether I'd be able to get away. I didn't think running would be a good idea if he was faster than me. He'd be less likely to be generous if he had to run to catch up with me.
I was smaller than him and definitely lighter on my feet. But I didn't want to count on being able to outrun him.
“Not really,” I said. “I live right down the road. Which you know. This isn't your neighborhood, though. What the hell are you doing here?”
Silver growled at this, like she was backing me up, and I felt a quick grin flash across my face. Tony saw the grin and seemed to take it as an invitation, because he puffed his chest out like I'd just given him a compliment or something.
“I was in the area, what can I say? Must be drawn to you or something.”
Silver's growling increased in volume at that—could she actually understand him?—and he lifted his hands again and backed up a step.
“Okay, okay. Touchy, isn't she?”
“She doesn't like people she doesn't know. And she doesn't trust easily,” I muttered.
Where was Warren? I couldn't hear him on the phone anymore, and I was worried he'd thought it was a mistaken dial and hung up or something.
“Trusts that veteran you're hanging out with, though, doesn't she?” Tony asked, and his voice had changed now to something harder. Something more dangerous. “How long you going to waste your time with him, anyhow? Does he even have a job or does he just sit around the house complaining about how hard things are? What could a blue-collar guy like that ever give you, anyhow? What does he have to offer?”
More than Tony did.
More by a mile.
Though I didn't think now was the right time to point that out.
“He makes me happy,” I said softly. “And he keeps me safe.”
Tony got several steps closer, his face taking on a truly terrifying expression. “He could never keep you safe, Lily. Not like I can. Come back to me, and I'll protect you. I'll even forgive all the things you did wrong.”
I almost laughed at that.
“All the things I did wrong?” I snorted. “You're the one stalking me, Tony. The one hurting me. Scaring me. Leaving dead squirrels on the doorstep and damaging my car. Burning down houses.”
He scoffed at that like I'd just made it all up. “I didn't do any of that, Lily.”
“You did, and we both know it.”
“Doesn't matter,” he said with a shrug. “Not like you can prove any of it. And even if you could, no one would believe you.”
He meant the cops wouldn't believe me. And he was probably right about that. He had them all in his pocket, and even if I went to them with proof, they'd never do anything about it.
Except that someone had, at some point.
“And yet someone had enough proof to get a restraining order against you.”
The air around us went suddenly, dangerously still, and his eyes narrowed.
“That's none of your business,” he growled.
“You don't think so? You don't think someone else experiencing what I experienced and actually doing something about it is something that concerns me? Really, Tony?”
“Stop digging around, Lily,” he snapped.
“Or what?” I snapped back.
Silver stood up next to me and barked, bringing me even more bravery, and I tipped my chin up and stared at Tony, daring him to say anything else.
Before he could, I heard voices from behind us. Two guys, from the sounds of things, were approaching. I turned enough to glimpse them and saw that they were young men from the neighborhood, their dog striding along behind them. They were talking, but their eyes were on Tony and Silver, and I could tell they were suspicious.
When I turned around to look at Tony again, wondering how he thought he was going to explain this one away, he had his hands in his pockets and was strolling away, whistling like he hadn't just been threatening me if I didn't mind my own business.
I watched him go, fury burning through my blood at the way he was acting.
I was going to get him. I was going to stop this.
Even if it was the last thing I did.
