Echo

chapitre 06

^^A LOOOOOONG ONE^^

"Will you tell me what's going on?" Nicole persisted through the speaker of my cell phone.

It was the middle of the week, and I'd called in sick to work this morning, but I couldn't tell her why. Because what I was about to do was stupid and reckless, and the last thing I needed was someone trying to talk me out of it.

I'd already tried to talk myself out of it plenty of times over the last three days. I'd gone over every possible scenario in my head, making myself sick with worry. I could have taken the envelope to the police, but the chances of me getting any help there was nonexistent. I still remembered how helpful they were when Brayden turned himself in. They'd tasered him on our front lawn when they claimed he was resisting arrest. It was an image that was burnt into my memory, and one I'd never forget.

Since then, I'd done a lot of research of my own. I knew how situations like this worked. If there were no fingerprints, then there would be no way to trace this. And my blackmailer made a point to say this. If I went to the police, all the evidence disappeared. Whoever was behind this had been meticulous in their demands as well as their homework.

After sorting through the contents of the envelope in the privacy of my bedroom, I'd found a record of my entire life over the last five years. It made me sick how many times I'd been photographed without even realizing it. Whoever this was knew what they were doing, and I suspected they were watching me even now.

"I just have something I have to do, Nicole," I croaked through the phone. "I can't explain right now. But if I'm not home when you get here after work, please check the kitchen drawer beneath the microwave."

I'd left her a note, on the chance things did go south.

"Brighton, you're really giving me the heebie-jeebies, you know that?"

"I know." I glanced at the clock. "But you just have to trust me."

"Okay, well... ah crap," she muttered. "Mr. Bennett is buzzing me into his office. I have to go. Whatever you're doing today, be careful."

"I will." I lied.

I clicked off the phone and left it on the counter per my instructions. With a deep breath and nothing but a hotel key card in my hand, I closed the apartment door behind me.

***

It wasn't as simple as I'd imagined. I thought if I told myself I was doing this for Brayden, it would help to ease my nerves. But that was a damn lie because my nerves were shot. I'd hoped I would be able to stay numb, to think about something else and get it over quickly. Like ripping off a band-aid. But that was naïve and childish and completely impossible in my situation.

Two hours had passed since I'd arrived at the hotel room. I'd done my part to hold up my end of the bargain, but my blackmailer still hadn't showed. I wore nothing but a dress and a blindfold as instructed, waiting on the middle of the hotel bed for my life to be turned upside down. My body would soon be in the control of a complete stranger. Someone who held the next twenty years of my brother's life in his hands. That's what I had to keep telling myself every time my stomach churned.

It made me sick to think anyone could do this to my brother, and I hated this man already. But I could get through this for Brayden, and I would. I had to. And whenever I had second thoughts, I would conjure up the image of him the last time I saw him in prison. The gaunt face and blackened eyes that stared back at me. What the other prisoners saw as just penance for his crime. Except it wasn't his crime at all. That was what I couldn't wrap my mind around.