Page 50 of Riptide
The team chat buzzed on her phone. They were waiting for her. Counting on her.
"And please," Cara continued, wiping her face, "please give me the strength to stop her. To stop Blaire from doing this to anyone else. Because I can't let another Shawn die. I can't let another family be destroyed."
She took a shuddering breath. "I know I'm not—I know I've done terrible things. I know I'm still lying to everyone. But if You could just... if You could help me protect them. The next victims. The people Blaire's hunting who don't even know it yet."
"Please."
The word hung in the silence.
She looked at the clock. 7:29 PM.
Her phone buzzed again.
Reagan:We're all here. Waiting on you. Tom has news.
Cara gathered Tom's files with clumsy fingers. Wiped her face, though fresh tears kept coming. Took a breath that felt like broken glass.
Jessica wouldn't help. Was too damaged, too scared, too broken by what Blaire had done.
Cross her off the list of potential allies.
But Jessica had given them something. Maybe the most important thing.
Blaire had a system for hunting people. A way of identifying vulnerable targets systematically.
If they could find that system, understand it, they could maybe stop her from using it.
Stop her from finding the next Shawn Forsythe.
Cara rose, hoping her legs would hold her and grabbed the cold pastries she'd planned to bring.
At the door, she paused. Looked back at Shawn's photo one more time.
"I'm going to try," she promised him. Promised his daughters. Promised Jessica. "I know it might not work. But I'm going to try."
She opened the door and descended the stairs, each step feeling heavier than the last.
The calculated con artist she'd been at the start of that phone call was gone. Burned away by Jessica's grief and Shawn's story and the terrible understanding of what was really at stake.
This wasn't about her survival anymore.
It was about stopping a predator before she could destroy another family.
Even if that meant risking everything.
Even if that meant Cara ended up like Shawn.
Please, Lord,she prayed again silently.Give me the strength. Give me the wisdom. And please, please protect the people I care about from what's coming.
Cara wiped her face one more time, took a breath, and headed outside.
15
At almost 20:00 hrs.,mist rolled in thick off the ocean, turning Haven Cove's Main Street into something out of a noir film. Gabe's footsteps echoed on the wet pavement as he approached Sugar & Salt, finally off-duty after an endless day.
He needed to tell Cara about his conversation with David. About the Neptune Brotherhood—or rather, about how nobody would talk about it. About how that kind of silence meant serious reach, and serious fear.
But mostly, he just needed to see her. To make sure she was okay.
