Total pages in book: 218
Estimated words: 215412 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1077(@200wpm)___ 862(@250wpm)___ 718(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 215412 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1077(@200wpm)___ 862(@250wpm)___ 718(@300wpm)
Underage girls.
Children.
No consent there.
“He sells them.” I swallow hard, the room tilting with the sick memories of my own childhood. “He traffics them.”
“Yes. But he keeps his hands clean, hiding behind lawyers, donations, and compromised officials. His public image is armor, protecting what he really is. A trafficker. A collector of victims.”
I see it then, all of it clicking into place so fast I feel nauseous.
Dove being dragged into white rooms and soft voices and hands that pretend they’re helping. Dove being told she chose this. Dove being erased carefully, methodically, until no one knows where to look.
“That’s why Jag surrendered.” I push off the wall and pace. “He knew. He fucking knew what Crowe would do to her.”
Monty’s hand comes up, gripping my arm, hard and grounding and necessary.
I can barely breathe.
“This isn’t ransom.” Acid rises in my throat. “It’s inventory. He intends to traffic her.”
“No. It is more complicated.” Mikhail doesn’t look up. “I found a file on Crowe. Jag Rath has been stalking him for… Twenty years.”
“What?” I shift closer and squint at the screen over Mikhail’s shoulder, my pulse climbing.
Folders nest inside folders. Time-stamped photos. Crowe stepping out of private jets. Crowe laughing at galas. Crowe shaking hands with men who dominate headlines. Shipping manifests. Flight numbers. Guest lists.
Jag collected twenty years of this shit? That’s not curiosity. It’s obsession.
What’s his infatuation with Adrian Crowe?
Mikhail scrolls sideways, pages down, and opens a directory. Jag’s personal notes.
My chest constricts as I scan years’ worth of records, bank accounts, surveillance, and history. Jag meticulously documented patterns, faces, and aliases, tracking Crowe like prey.
“Why?” I rub my neck. “Does he want the billionaire’s money?”
“This is not about money.” Mikhail flips through digital memos, scanning, searching.
“Then what?”
He leans closer to the screen and opens a file named First Meeting with Adrian Crowe - California Tavern. It’s an audio file dated seventeen years ago.
Mikhail hits play.
Static. Old static. Sounds like a cheap recorder or a phone hidden in a pocket. Noise muffles in the background, glasses clinking and someone coughing off-mic. The recording is messy, handheld, and outdated.
A young, raspy male voice comes through. “Why are you following me, Crowe?”
“That’s Jag.” My pulse surges as I find Monty’s eyes. “I’m certain it’s him.”
Seventeen years ago… That would make Jag twenty-three and Dove fifteen. I wonder if this meeting happened before or after the night she ran from him at the drug dealer’s house?
A chair scrapes through the recording.
“I have a business proposal,” Adrian Crowe says, his tone cold and incisive.
“Rot in hell.” Jag makes a disgusted sound. “I know what you did to Celeste Rath.”
Celeste.
Dove’s mother.
My stomach drops.
Is Adrian Crowe connected to her murder?
The tavern noise swells, muddying Adrian’s response. “Celeste isn’t her real name, but you already know that.”
“Yeah,” Jag snaps. “I also know you found her through your talent agency, groomed her, flew her out, locked her on your island with your sick perversions and your cameras, and got her pregnant.” A pause. “Then you sold her to one of your rich, child-raping friends.”
Ice clinks. A slow exhale.
“Why would I sell a pregnant woman?” Adrian asks dryly.
“You didn’t know she was pregnant. And she wasn’t a woman.” Rage seethes through Jag’s voice. “She was fifteen. A goddamn child.”
“Watch your mouth.”
“You should’ve watched your paperwork. She ran, changed names, married my father at a legal, consensual age, and raised your kid without you finding her.”
A chair creaks, and Adrian laughs. “Except I did find her, didn’t I? I found all of you. Tell me, how’s life on the streets?”
Something slams hard, and glass shatters. Jag’s breathing turns rough and loud, all restraint gone, a deep animal sound grinding through clenched teeth. Then a violent scrape, table legs dragged, a body shoved forward, and the mic crackles.
“You’re smarter than this,” Adrian says, his voice closer now. “If you hurt me, my guards will kill you. Who will protect Dove then, hmm?”
Crowd noise spikes. Voices overlap, and Jag’s fury cuts through it all. Ragged breaths, a strangled snarl, the sound of a man holding himself one second away from murder.
Then fabric rustles, and a final, brutal exhale.
“Accept my offer and work for me.” Adrian’s tone shifts, moving farther away. “She’ll no longer need protection, and you’ll have everything my friends have. Planes. Retreats. Women who don’t say no. A real seat at the table.”
My blood boils, and a vein throbs in my temple.
“I’ll die first,” Jag growls.
“That can be arranged.” A smile floats through Adrian’s voice.
“Stay away from her.”
“I’m not interested in the girl. But if you walk away from my offer? I’ll make her my only interest.”
“If you touch her—”
Static spikes, and the audio ends.
“Holy fuck.” I can’t feel my legs. “Adrian Crowe is Dove’s father.”
“Yeah.” Monty scowls. “He raped Dove’s fifteen-year-old mother.”
“When Dove was eight, he found them. That’s when he killed David and Celeste. And Jag knew. All this time, he fucking knew who killed them and never told Dove.”