Inflict: A Novel

Chapter Fifteen

Connor didn't bother to properly park his Harley when he arrived back at the brownstone. He barely noticed the dark sky above him, and he couldn't entirely remember the drive from Jersey to Brooklyn with all that much clarity, either.

He had never been so numb before.

Never so ... dead.

Killian leaned against the front stoop, waiting as he had been told to do. Connor only vaguely remembered calling the Lieutenant, and he wasn't even sure if he explained what was happening, only that he demanded the guy get to the house and stay there.

Connor stalked down the walkway and up the front stairs, hearing Killian question him, yet never quite making out exactly what he was saying enough to respond. Or maybe, Connor just couldn't make the words he needed to say form properly in his mouth.

This was what going crazy felt like.

He'd fecked up.

Badly.

He'd left Evelyn exposed.

Like a fool.

This was his fault.

All his.

"Connor!"

He pushed open the brownstone's front door, unsurprised to find it unlocked. There was no damage to the door, so he suspected that had simply been Sean's point of exit, not entry. Killian followed close behind him, still asking too many goddamn questions, as Connor headed for the back of the house.

There he found the broken doorjamb and busted lock.

There, he found the entry.

For a long while, Connor stared at the door, his frustration climbing and his rage boiling.

"Shite," Killian mumbled behind him. "She's not going to be here if we look, is she?"

Connor didn't feel like answering that, so he didn't. Turning fast on his heel, he headed back down the hallway, and then up the stairs. Evelyn had said she would be in the studio, working on something, though she hadn't said what. Nothing looked out of place in the hallways, or the stairwell. Not a single piece of art had been knocked over, his bookcases and shelving units were fine, and even the decorative tables were untouched.

His studio, though?

Connor stood in the midst of a feckin' hurricane.

Outside the room, it looked calm and fine.

Inside the room, someone had fought for every goddamn inch.

Easels had been upset, paints and charcoals were spilled and broken on the floors, and the canvases had been overturned, or ripped through. Smudged handprints in sky blue paint streaked across the floorboards, too wee to be a man's, and likely a perfect match to Evelyn's. Footprints showcased the dance between two people, one moving one way, another mimicking the steps only a few feet away.

"I don't know where he went," Connor said more to himself than his friend behind him. "I don't where he might take her."

Connor figured, at this point, he didn't need to explain who he was talking about, because Killian probably already knew. He hated to admit his weakness—and his feck up—but he didn't have to, really. A single look at the state of his studio was enough to tell the story of his mistake.

"I don't know where he would take her," Connor repeated.

That was what scared him the most.