Page 107 of Sticks and Stones (Shadow Valley U)

Set it down.

Fuck.

“What?” Evan snatches it up.

“Don’t—”

He unlocks it and stares at the screen.

At the app that tracks Wren’s phone.

It currently shows her in class, for the record.

“What the fuck, Stone?”

I grind my teeth together.

Evan sighs. “I know you’re doing this to protect her, but—”

“There’s no but,” I snap. “There’s no second chance here, man. If her father gets his hands on her, I think that’s it. No coming back from it. I just have this feeling he’s going to do something terrible to her.”

That’s my fear realized.

Out loud.

And suddenly I want to take it back. Snatch the words out of the air and stuff them back down my throat, erasing the shocked expression from Evan’s face and dulling the spike of adrenaline crashing through my chest.

I don’t want to be afraid. It’s a stupid, useless emotion.

What I need to do is channel it into something productive—like figuring out where Wren’s dad is and what his plans are.

The only problem is, we haven’t fucking seen anyone.

“They have to be watching, don’t you think?” I glower at my phone in Evan’s hand. “They were in her room.”

“Well…” He shifts.

“What?”

Guilt crosses his face. “You know me. I’m the first to believe Wren. But she can be a little paranoid, and…”

I narrow my eyes.

“And she accused me of going through her stuff once. When we were, like, thirteen.” He looks away. “I didn’t. No one did as far as my parents could tell. But she had a meltdown anyway, insisting that someone had. That they left her an obscure little note in one of her books.”

Well…fuck.

“What happened?”

“She showed us the page, and it was nothing. A drawing of a freaking pumpkin in pencil. And not a very good one. If she hadn’t said that’s what it was, I would’ve guessed an apple.” He sighs. “I just… I’m not sure if she’s so wound up, she’s more likely to cry wolf.”

Interesting.

“Well, there’s one way to find out, right?” I shove back from the table and head upstairs.

Evan trails me to my room, and we both stop and stare at the disaster.

“Okay, it’s messy,” I mumble.