Page 61 of Captive

“While you three are in position, a second team will be down the street. I don’t know the details, but I believe they’re going to cut the power to the whole street. It’ll be late, so the response time shouldn’t be too fast—but that said, you’ll need to get in and out quickly. With no power, the gate will be easily pushed open, and you three will drive up to the house.”

“Then we find him and kill him,” I say. “Has D.D.K. ever gone after someone with this kind of money before?” Out of all the victims of D.D.K. the police have found across the country, I don’t think I’ve ever heard of someone like Connor being among them.

Hawthorne shakes his head. “No, but it’s no matter. He’ll fall just like everyone else, and if something should go wrong, you’ll have the full arsenal of the Benefactor at your back. The last thing they want is for you to get caught.” He picks up a bundle of stapled papers on his desk and offers it to Royal, the one who stands closest to him. “Here, the layout of his house. Each page is a different floor. Memorize it before you go.”

As Royal studies it, I ask something I’ve been wondering on and off ever since I got here: “Why does the Benefactor care so much about this? Not Connor specifically, but killing bad men.”

“If I have to guess, I’d say they lost someone, too. Who, exactly, they lost, I have no idea,” Hawthorne tells me. “And, before you ask, no, I don’t know if the Benefactor is a man or a woman. When I’m in contact with them, it’s through a burner phone you can’t trace, and they use a voice modulator. The number is different every time, and they’ve never given me any clues as to who they are.”

“Whoever they are, they have to come from money. Like, insane multi-generational wealth kind of money, the kind of money most one-percenters can only dream of,” I say. I pretty much grew up around rich people. I was always a little different than them since my parents were self-made, but I know the ins and outs of that kind of life.

The Benefactor? They’re on a level of their own, whoever they are. It would be interesting to meet them someday, to talk to them, to find out just what drove them to fund activities such as this, but in a more realistic sense, that’ll never happen. It’s just one of those things I’ll have to wonder about the rest of my life.

I’m sure if I searched up a list of the wealthiest people in America, the Benefactor would be somewhere on that list—which is a little ironic, since rich people are usually the biggest sociopathic assholes around.

Seriously, you have to be some kind of psycho to have that kind of money and not feel guilty everyone else is pinching pennies together and children all over are going hungry because their families can’t afford three warm meals a day.

“Regardless,” Hawthorne says, “study the specs of the property, and get yourselves ready. It’ll be a long drive to get there. You’ll have to leave Thursday morning at six.”

I’d stay up for days if that’s what it took. Hell, I’d use pins to keep my eyelids open if I had to. Anything this particular kill demanded of me, I would give in a heartbeat… even if it demanded one of us get caught. I’d go down for it. I would. The guys wouldn’t like it; they’d probably fight me on it, but I would gladly step forward and take the fall after Connor is dead.

For my sister. For the old me, the girl I used to be before this world hardened me into what I am today.

But that’s not going to happen. We’re not going to get caught. The team behind D.D.K. has a system, and I’m now a part of that system.

Ezra and Royal leave, and I am starting to follow them, but Hawthorne calls me back to his desk, so I stay. “Abby, there is one more thing,” he says. He reaches into one of the drawers on his desk, pulling something out after typing a code into a tiny lockbox hidden in that drawer. “The Benefactor does not like to take risks. They were… immensely cautious when I first told them about you, as you already know.”

He pulls out something small from that lockbox, and I recognize it immediately. The key to the tracking device on my wrist.

“You have proven yourself to us,” he continues, reaching for me, and I give him the wrist with the bracelet on it. “And I’ve spoken my praises of you to the Benefactor time and time again. They’ve agreed that you fit with our mission, you share our same goals, and you are a perfect fit to officially join our team here.”

Hawthorne gives me a tiny smile as he unlocks the bracelet and takes it off me. “Congratulations. This is a big step, especially for someone like the Benefactor. I’ll be the first to admit I never thought they’d allow you to stay with us long-term, but… I am for once happy to have been proven wrong.”

I rub the area where the bracelet was, touching the skin for the first time in what feels like forever. “Did you happen to tell the Benefactor that we get freaky in this house together?” My blunt way of putting it makes him blush, which is exactly why I said it like that to begin with.

It’s too easy to make him blush. I still find it adorable.

“Um, as a matter of fact, no, I did not tell them that. I figure I’ll inform them sooner or later of it. More later than soon, though.” He carefully sets the bracelet down. “I’m still a little worried the Benefactor won’t agree with it.”

“Well, it’d be pretty shitty if they say we can’t do it. I get the whole not letting anyone leave the operation—there’s a whole lot of shit we could tell the world—but the whole no fraternizing amongst yourselves thing never sat right with me. We’re all adults here. We’re all consenting. That’s the most important thing, isn’t it?”

“That, and making sure the job is done right,” he says. “Not getting, as you’d say, freaky when there’s a body a few feet away is probably not the way to do that. I am positive the cleaners at the last job did not appreciate the extra DNA they had to clean up.”

I grin. “To be fair, I didn’t plan on that happening.”

“Still, please try not to let it happen again? Let’s not give the Benefactor any reason to regret this. If we can show that we can still be on our top game, then maybe they won’t have any arguments when I break the news to them.”

Frankly, I don’t really know why he has to ever break the news. Why can’t it just remain between the four of us for the rest of our days? Assuming we’re together the rest of our days, I mean.

I… I don’t want to think about a future without them. Is that crazy?

“I will do my best to keep it in my pants,” I say as I turn and head toward the door, and I don’t miss the groan Hawthorne gives after I say that. My smirk breaks way into a wide grin, and I trail after the guys, finding them in Royal’s room further down the hall. They sit on his bed together, staring at the layout of Connor’s house.

I didn’t get a good look at it before, but I bet it’s more like a mansion than a house.

When I see them, I don’t go to the bed right away. I stand there, half in the room and half out, and stare at them. How they’re huddled together, their brows furrowed in concentration. How Royal points what must a path through the house while mumbling something to Era, who nods and rubs his chin in thought.

My body leans against the doorframe. Crazy or not, I really can’t imagine leaving this house, leaving them, and never seeing them again. It’d be like pulling my soul in two—or in three. Ezra, Royal, and Hawthorne would each have a piece of me, and I’d be nothing but an empty shell, wishing I was back here with them.