“You’re right,” Fiona said, feeling the sick heat of shame burn its way up the back of her neck as she thought about Gage. “It isn’t fair to you at all. It isn’t fair to either of us.”
“What are you saying?” Carl asked, his forehead wrinkled with confusion and fear.
“I’m not going to be coming back here,” Fiona said. “I’ll drop your car back off in the lot out back, but I can’t come back. You don’t know me. You don’t know me at all, and the parts that you do know, you don’t like. It’s not fair to either of us to keep up the charade just for convenience’s sake. We’re finished. Goodbye.”
She began to walk around him, grabbing his car keys off the top of the dresser and heading for the door before he stopped her with a hand on her elbow. “Hey, Fiona, wait. Stop. Just think about this. You really want to give me up, just like that? You really want to give up our life together?”
There was a part of her that wanted to say no, if she was being honest with herself. That little part was small and scared and shrunken-in on itself, hiding from the world, and Fiona understood it well, but she couldn’t afford to keep listening to it anymore. “That’s just it, Carl. It’s not our life. It’s your life. It’s not mine.”
“So, what? This is about your ex, Gage, or whatever his name is? You’re giving me up for him?”
Fiona shook her head and smiled sadly, but she felt a little spark of pride flash to life in her chest. “No, Carl. I’m giving you up for me.” She slipped the diamond ring off her finger and handed it to Carl, who reluctantly accepted it into his palm. “I’ll bring the car back before tomorrow, I promise. Have a good life, okay? You deserve it.”
And with that, she walked out back into the cold night, back into the city that had raised her, that had shaped her, and that had given her life.
She quickly ran to Carl’s car in the back lot of the hotel, sticking the key into the ignition and mentally calculating the directions to her destination. She knew where she had to go. There was a feeling in her gut that she should have listened to from the beginning. If she was right, she could have stopped the killer a long time ago. It was the only thing she had to go on, but it was enough, for now.
“Candy apples, huh?” she said out loud as she pulled out of the lot and onto the busy city street in front of the hotel, thinking about what Tori had told her about the man who’d kidnapped her. “I know who you are, fucker. I’m coming for you.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Gage struggled to control his breathing as he walked faster and faster away from Carl’s hotel. He knew that if he hesitated for a single second, he wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation to turn around and catch a final glimpse of Fiona before he lost her forever. He needed to keep going, to push himself as hard as possible until he was far away from Fiona. It was the only right thing to do, the only way to protect Fiona from the danger he’d gotten her into.
He finally made it to the subway station, getting on the first car that would take him back in the general direction of his house, clenching his fists hard the whole ride over to focus his attention on anything other than Fiona. But it didn’t work. No matter how he tried to shake them off, her eyes, angry and sad, lingered in his mind like two burning spotlights. He knew he had to let her go eventually, but as the subway rolled to a stop in front of his house, he decided to stop trying to fight it. He would hold Fiona’s image in his mind like a candle, letting it light his way until he got the killer. Afterwards, he would consider moving on.
For now, he had to get supplies. Other than the fact that the killer’s phone call originated within the Bandits’ clubhouse, he didn’t have any solid leads to go off of. So instead he decided to camp around the clubhouse to look for the killer, observing the clubhouse’s surroundings rather than tearing it up from the inside out. Once inside his apartment, Gage quickly grabbed a couple of outfits, some water bottles, and plenty of dry food to tide him over for a few days while he camped out in the woods behind the compound. Based on what Tori had told them in the hospital, the killer had to have the ability to come and go easily during the day. That meant he was keeping his captives somewhere close to the clubhouse, so he could sneak in and out during the day without arousing any suspicion. Besides, Tori’s house, which was also near the compound, was close enough to the killer’s hideout that she was able to run home after breaking out. It had to be in the woods. That was the only way the killer would be able to torture the girls without attracting unwanted attention from neighboring houses.