In For the Kill (McClouds & Friends #11)(129)

“He always gets to,” Connie yelled. “When’s my turn? What insane lengths do I have to go to? A sex scandal, a psychotic break?”

“That is enough!” Dad thundered.

Connie’s mouth quivered. “Yes, it is.” She grabbed the wheeled suitcases that leaned against the wall and turned toward the door.

“Hey!” Sam called. “The suitcase you brought for me. You’re not taking it with you, are you?”

She frowned. “Of course I am. It’s much safer at our hotel. What use do you have for it now? I’ll bring it when they release you.” Her eyes swept the small, grotty room. “Or when we have you transferred.”

“I want it. It has toiletries, right? Shaving cream, toothpaste, dental floss, fresh underwear? Leave it.”

“But you can’t even get out of bed!” she protested.

“I still want it,” he repeated stubbornly.

“Oh, whatever.” She gave it a shove, back against the wall, and turned to her dad. “Shall I tell the car to wait?”

His father looked grimly reluctant.

“A night’s sleep will help all of us,” Sam urged. “I’m just going to sleep. There’s no point sitting in that hard chair watching me do it.”

His father grunted and got to his feet. “Trying to get rid of me, as usual,” he muttered. “Fine. Tomorrow, then.”

Ten teeth-grinding minutes of lecturing and scolding before they were out the door. When it shut behind them, he almost wept in relief.

He’d been lying, when he said he felt better. Pain was a meat-mallet, hammering with each heartbeat. Face, head, ribs, thigh, balls. Add being dumped by your girlfriend to that, plus a day-long session of scolding familial disapproval, and you had the recipe for exquisitely calibrated pain on every level of the self. A symphony of discomfort. He’d never been so angry, or so hurt, or so scared. Other than the other day, when Sveti had been clamped under the goon’s arm, in imminent danger of dismemberment. A caustic stress cocktail zinged through him every time that image flashed through his mind, making him twitch and writhe on his bed. This could drive a guy right over the edge.

But hey. He’d left the edge behind a long while back. Ever since he saw that girl years ago, and promptly lost his mind. Inappropriately young, problematic, complicated, hostile, unattainable. And yet, he’d started courting her. Bugging her.

Stalking her. Call it what it was.

His eyes rested on her phone, which he had found in his tangled sheets in the night. A gift from a mischievous trickster god, intent on messing him up. A perfect opportunity for an obsessed, irrational ex-boyfriend. Hack into her phone, snoop into her life. Torture himself by listening in on her future love affairs. Feed the beast of his sickness, until it grew and grew, became more feral, more twisted. Less human.

Until they locked him up. That was the trajectory of a man’s life, once he picked up the cell phone of a woman who had dumped him and started f*cking with it. So why was he still holding on to the thing?

The locked screen wanted a six-digit code. He tried all the obvious ones: her birth date, Rachel’s birth date, Irina’s. He tried all the kids’ names, one after the other, the ones who hung all over her and called her Auntie Sveti. None worked. He tried her parents’ names, too.

He moved on to all the adults in the McCloud Crowd, starting with Tam and Val, Nick and Becca. He tried the ass-bite’s name, too, just to torture himself, and was relieved when none of the “joshua” or “jcattre” or “cattrell” combos worked, either.

He hesitated for a long time, but since he was on the self-torture kick, why not? He tried PETRIE. Nothing, of course. Then he punched in SAMUEL. The device accepted the code and opened itself to him.

He started to shake. His vision blurred.

He sat there for a long time, unmoving. Pathetically grateful to be alone in the room.

It passed through him. He sponged off his face with a wad of sheet and flung himself into the contents of her phone, ass over head.

Her calendar had no surprises for him. Her contacts were all known to him, and the ones he did not personally know, he’d already investigated. She hadn’t posted to her Facebook page, Twitter account, or v-log since before Nina and Aaro’s wedding. Busy, busy.

He dug in to the photos. McCloud Crowd kids, all over the place. Rachel, Irina, and Sofia were featured most, but all the McCloud brood were represented extensively. Adults, too. Nick and Becca. Tam and Val, kissing on their veranda with the sunset behind them, Seth and Raine laughing on their yacht. Connor and Erin carving a ham. Davy and Margot, Sean and Liv, Kev and a pregnant, very happy-looking Edie. Lily and Bruno, Aaro and Nina, Miles and Lara. Zia Rosa. Hundreds of photos, from weddings and christenings, birthdays and barbecues.

She had a good eye. People looked good in her photos.

He found a batch that were all from the housewarming party of Lara and Miles. Their beautiful house in the mountains. Cedar paneled, thirty-five-foot vaulted solarium windows, panoramic views. Shots of the newly landscaped patio out back embraced by massive pines and firs, a big barbecue grill loaded with steaks, a big tub of ice full of beers. There was the beautiful waterfall, with a bunch of the kids swimming in the pool under Sean’s and Davy’s watchful eyes.

There were two more folders, one marked “Mama,” one marked “Misc.” He clicked on the latter.