Chapter Sixty-Six

Jackson

I keep my hand on the back of her chair the whole walk out of the interview room. I don’t touch her. Not yet. She’s holding herself together with this thin little thread and if I pull the wrong way she’s gonna fall apart right there in front of everyone. I don’t want that for her. I don’t want anyone watching her break. She deserves privacy for that. Safety. A damn hug. Something warm. Something soft. Something that tells her she’s not standing in this alone.
The hall is too bright. The floor is too cold. She keeps staring at the lines in the tile like she’s trying to keep her balance and every instinct in me screams to pick her up and carry her out of here.
But she’s Brooklyn. She’s stubborn. She fights to stay upright even when her knees shake.
Morris tells us we can have the small conference room, the one with the couch shoved against the wall. He says it quiet like he knows she’s about to crash. Nash holds the door and doesn’t say a damn word. They’re both watching her like she’s glass.
She steps inside and I swear she gets smaller. Just a little. Just enough for me to see it.
I shut the door and move toward her slowly. I’m waiting for some sign that she wants me close. She stands there, arms wrapped around herself, breathing shallow, eyes too wide. The second her shoulders tremble, I pull her in and she melts right into me. No hesitation. No fight.
She presses her face to my chest and breathes like she’s drowning.
“Baby. I got you.” I rub my hand up and down her back. Slow. Gentle. Just enough pressure to ground her. “You’re alright. I’m right here.”
She nods against me but her whole body’s tight. Like she’s bracing for something to hit her.
I ease her down onto the couch and sit beside her, thigh to thigh. She curls in without being asked. Head on my shoulder. Fingers fisting the front of my shirt like she’s scared that if she lets go I’ll vanish. I run my hand through her hair and she lets out this quiet sound that guts me.
“I’m so tired,” she whispers.
“I know.”
“I feel sick.”
“I know.”
“I hate this.”
I pull her tighter. “I know.”
She’s shaking. Not bad. Not a full panic yet. But close. The kind that comes right before the fall.
“Brooklyn,” I say softly. “Look at me.”
She does. Her eyes shine like she’s holding tears back with her teeth.
“You did good in there,” I tell her. “You told them everything they needed. You don’t owe anyone anything else today.”
She nods but she’s breathing fast and I don’t like the way she keeps glancing at the door. Like something’s waiting on the other side.
There’s a knock. Sharp. Too loud in the small room.
She jumps so hard her nails dig into my arm.
“It’s just Morris,” I tell her. “He’s not coming in unless you say he can.”
She swallows hard and tries to sit up straighter, tries to wipe her face, tries to look like she’s fine.
She’s not fine.
“Hey.” I catch her hands. “You don’t gotta pretend with me.”
Another knock. Softer this time.
“Jackson,” Morris calls. “When you’re ready.”
Brooklyn goes still. Her breathing changes. Quick. Shallow. Dangerous.
I lean close enough for my forehead to touch hers. “Baby, breathe with me. In. Slow.”
She tries but her chest stutters.
“Look at me,” I say again.
She lifts her eyes and whatever she’s holding inside starts to crack.
There’s fear. Real fear. The kind she hides from everyone but me.
“Do you trust me?” I ask.
She nods.
“Then breathe with me.”
I inhale slow and deep and she follows. Barely. But she follows. I do it again. And again. Her breathing evens out enough that her fingers stop trembling.
“Good girl,” I whisper and she shudders like the words hit a nerve she didn’t expect.
Another soft knock. “We need five minutes,” I call.
“Take ten,” Morris answers.
I hear him walk away.
Brooklyn slumps back against the couch. “I don’t want to talk to them again.”
“You don’t have to, not until you’re ready.”
“They’re gonna ask me to do something,” she whispers. “I know they are.”
A chill runs down my spine. “What do you think they’re gonna ask?”
Her eyes flick to mine. Scared. Knowing. “They’re gonna want me to get close to Teddy again.”
Fuck.
I hate how right she is.
I hate that she knows it.
I hate the fear in her voice.
“They can’t ask you that,” I say. “Not now. Not ever.”
“They will.” She curls her knees up. “You know they will.”
“Over my dead body.”
She lets out this quiet, broken laugh. “It might be.”
That does something to me. Something violent. Something I choke back because she needs calm, not rage.
“Baby, listen to me. You’re not going anywhere near Teddy.”
Her throat bobs. “And if saying no means girls keep being taken, keep dying?”
My jaw locks.
Her eyes fill.
“I don’t want to go back,” she whispers. “I can’t go back. I’m not that girl anymore. I’m not high, starving, and desperate. I’m not selling myself to breathe. I’m not his.”
“You’re mine,” I say before I can think.
Her breath catches.
I lower my head to hers. “You’re mine. And you’re safe. And no one gets to drag you back into that life. Not Teddy. Not Grant. Not Morris. No one.”
She closes her eyes. One tear slips out.
Then another.
“Jackson,” she whispers, “I’m pregnant.”
“I know.”
“I’m carrying your baby.”
“I know.”
“I can’t risk the baby.”
“You won’t.”
“I can’t risk you either.”
“You won’t.”
She looks at me then, really looks, like she’s searching for something that’ll tell her she’s not about to come apart.
“What if Teddy finds out?” she whispers. “What if he realizes I’m not actually back? What if he tries to take me upstairs again and I can’t get out this time? What if he hands me over to Grant? What if Grant sees me? What if he touches me like he used to and I freeze and I can’t do anything and I lose everything we have and I go right back to being that broken girl who would’ve done anything to stop feeling for a little while?”
She’s shaking again. Not small. Hard. Full-body. The panic attack hits like a wave.
I move fast. I drop to the floor in front of her, knees between hers, hands braced on her thighs.
“Baby. Look at me. Right here.”
She can’t. Her eyes flick everywhere. Her breath is rapid, shallow, and loud. She curls forward like she’s trying to protect her stomach.
“I can’t,” she gasps between breaths. “I can’t do this. I can’t go back. I can’t lose myself again. I can’t go through him. I can’t go through Teddy. I can’t let them touch me. I can’t. Jackson, I can’t.”
I grab her hands and press them to my chest. “Feel me. Right here. I’m real. I’m not going anywhere.”
She tries. Her fingers twitch against me but her breathing keeps spiraling.
“Baby, breathe. Look at my chest. Watch it move.”
She drags her eyes up and stares at the rise and fall.
“Match me,” I say.
I breathe slowly.
She tries, fails, and then tries again.
Catches one breath.
Then another.
Her hands clutch my shirt so tightly that it stretches.
“That’s it,” I whisper. “Come back to me.”
Her eyes refocus like she’s surfacing from underwater. She sucks in one desperate breath and then collapses forward, forehead landing on my shoulder.
I wrap my arms around her and hold her like she’s the whole damn world.
“You’re safe,” I tell her. “I swear to God, you’re safe.”
Her voice is tiny when she whispers, “But what if I have to do it?”
“You won’t.”
Her head shakes against me. “If I don’t, more girls die.”
“No,” I say. “If anyone goes under, it’s me. I can get back in with Teddy. I have the cover. I have the contacts. I can get inside that whole operation.”
“You’re not going alone.”
“I’m not taking you.”
“You might have to.”
“I won’t.”
The door opens without warning and I snap my head up.
Morris steps in slowly like he already knows what he’s walking into. His face is tight. Nash stands behind him, arms crossed, worry all over him.
Morris looks at Brooklyn first. Then at me. Then back at her.
“We need to talk,” he says quietly. “And I’m sorry, but it can’t wait.”
Brooklyn lifts her head but stays pressed against me, like she needs the contact to stay in her own body.
Morris hesitates before he speaks. “We found something. About Grant. About the new victim. About the pattern.”
My stomach drops. “What kind of something?”
Morris glances toward Brooklyn. “It’s big. And it changes everything.”
Brooklyn whispers, “Tell me.”
Morris looks at me like he wants permission.
I nod once.
He steps forward. “Grant Holloway isn’t just alive. He’s been running operations under a different alias for years. He’s tied to more than half a dozen missing girls in the last decade. And Brooklyn…” He swallows. “The girls he sells seem to be whoever he can get his hand on. But the girls that we think he’s killed, he’s been using a very specific formula. They all have the same physical similarities, hair, height, and build. And all of those girls' initials are the same as yours.”
Brooklyn goes rigid.
I feel her breath stop.
“He’s been recreating you,” Morris says. “Every murder victim is meant to be you.”
Brooklyn shakes her head slowly. “That’s not possible.”
Nash steps forward with a folder. He opens it. Photos. Notes. Patterns.
“Here,” he says, voice low. “This is the new part. The part that makes this urgent.”
He slides a photo out.
A necklace.
A silver chain.
And hanging from it, a charm.
A tiny letter B.
My heart stops.
Brooklyn whispers, “No.”
Nash’s voice is tight. “We found it in a box in the killer’s drop site. He kept it. It’s yours. From back then, isn’t it?”
Brooklyn’s entire body goes cold against me but I watch as her hand shakily reaches up to her neck, as if searching for the necklace that hasn’t been there in years.
Morris continues. “We need someone who can get close to Teddy. Someone who can get into that circle. Someone who Grant doesn’t know is onto him.”
Brooklyn’s breathing turns shaky again.
My grip tightens around her. “She’s not doing it.”
Morris looks at me. “I know what you want. But this isn’t about want. It’s about stopping a man who’s escalating.”
“She’s pregnant,” I snap. “You already knew that.”
“I did,” Morris says. “And I still need to ask the question.”
Brooklyn’s voice is barely audible. “What question?”
Morris takes a long breath.
“Brooklyn,” he says, “will you go undercover?”
My heart slams against my ribs.
Brooklyn’s fingers dig into my arm.
And the world stops.
Right there.
Right on that question.
Before anyone breathes again.
Before she answers.
Before everything breaks.