Chapter 164

Theo and I dashed down the street and around the edges of the buildings. He kept making strange turns, even doubling back, before ducking inside one last alley and behind a dumpster. Thank goodness the cold autumn air kept the place from stinking. However, the tang of old metal stung my nose.

“What was all that about?” I asked.

“I was looking for spots between surveillance cameras on the outside of businesses. Well, we won’t be able to avoid the fact that they’ll be able to go back and look at the footage and see us leaving the club. But at least they won’t track us down until we’ve had a chance to find out what the damages are and come up with a plan of how to combat it.”

“If we were really drugged, shouldn’t we just go to the hospital and have a test before it’s out of our system?”

Theo nodded. “That’s exactly what we’ll do once we have decent clothing and an idea of what the attack was. If it’s blackmail, things will look pretty quiet until we receive some sort of demand. If we’re all over the media, then we’ll have to think carefully about who we talk to. Because I’m sure the hospitals closest to our apartment will be compromised.”

“How so?”

“If the situation is really what we think it is and Anthony Bellweather was paid off to ruin you, then whoever’s out to get you has plenty of money to pay off doctors, too. What good are the drug tests if they’re altered to simply play into their narrative?”

I reached over, gripping Theo’s arm. “Thank you for all of this,” I said sincerely. “I’d be lost without you on this one.”

He gave me a grim smile. “Sorry that this is the way I’m having to put my training to good use. But I want you to know that I really meant it when I said that I have your back and you’re in good hands. I will take good care of you.”

I nodded. “How do we get out from behind the dumpster?”

This time, the grin he gave me was quite wicked. “I chose this dumpster on purpose.”

“Why?”

“Because we’re outside a clothing shop.” He lifted the lid of the dumpster and looked inside. “Oh, good. Exactly what I was hoping.”

“We’re going to wear clothes from the trash?”

He scoffed. “You’d rather go home in the couch cushions?”

I cocked my head. “Good point. Trash clothes it is.”

Theo held out some packages.” Besides, look here. Someone spilled ink all over these. The clothing inside is new, just ruined.” Theo tossed me a couple. “Do you think those will fit?” he asked.

I nodded, pulling out a T-shirt with ink blotched on it. The next package I opened had athletic pants. It’s not really my style. But as he pointed out, it was certainly better than wearing couch cushions from some club. Which, now that I thought about it, might have even been more questionable than I thought to begin with. If Theo and I had the privacy to be naked on those cushions, who else had done that before us? In a juicier manner. I shuddered.

“Don’t look,” I said.

I ripped off the questionable couch cushion dress and dressed myself in the newly unpackaged garments. Honestly, you couldn’t even tell there was ink on the pants. The ink on the shirt was dark blue, but the pants were black and didn’t show any stains aside from a slight shimmer in strange patches.

“All in all, not as bad as I would have thought,” I said.

“I’m dressed,” he said. “You can turn around.”

I did, and he was dressed in the same outfit. His shirt was a different color, and his pants were navy blue, so I couldn’t see the blue ink on them at all.

“We’re going to have to get back to the apartment in order to see what the damage is,” he said.

I nodded. “It’s going to be a long walk without our phone or a car,” I said, trying not to whine.

Theo shrugged. “You may not be from Packhaven, but I am. We’re not going to have to walk all the way back.”

“Really?” I asked, hopefully.

He grinned at me. “Come on.”

We did have to walk about ten blocks before we ended up inside a post office, the sort with lockers and mailboxes that you can access with the key and no attendant. Theo went to one of the PO boxes and pressed his thumb on a screen, which unlocked the door. Then he reached in and pulled out a bag.

“It’s just like a spy movie,” I said.

He held up the bag with a smile. “Inside, I’ve got cash and a spare phone, ID, and some other things that we need. This way, we’ll be able to take a cab back to the apartment, and I can call David and give him a heads-up.”

He shut the locker and relocked it with his thumbprint, and then let me outside before opening the phone and dialing David’s number. I couldn’t hear the conversation because he’d stepped a bit away from me, but he gave David a quick rundown of everything that had happened. The longer he talked to David, the more serious his expression grew.

When he hung up, he looked at me. “It’s exactly what we thought: not blackmail but a smear campaign. We’re all over the news. They’re calling you a hypocrite and unfaithful to your man. Charles’ stock is in the tank. It’s a mess,” he said.

“We’re going to have to get back and do some damage control. Any ideas how?”

Theo shrugged. “I got us out of the situation.” He held up the bag. “And found us a way home. You’re going to have to think of how to take down whoever is targeting you. The best I can offer is someone who…” Theo shrugged his shoulders again. “I guess the only way to describe them is a hacker. They’ll be able to do any computer work you need to trace the articles back to the IP addresses that they originated from. They’ll be able to get you names. But the rest of the investigation is on you.”

I nodded. “I can handle that. Names and origins are more than I need to get started. Thank you.”

In short order, we were back at the apartment. Theo and David had gone back to their apartment to begin tracing the main articles to find out where they originated from. And I was left standing awkwardly in the kitchen with Charles.

After the longest moment of silence I think I’d ever felt, he crossed the kitchen and scooped me up, squeezing me so hard I could barely breathe.

“I was so unbelievably scared last night for you,” he murmured. “When you didn’t come home, I feared the worst.”

“You know I didn’t do anything with Theo, right?” I asked.

He nodded, his nose to my hair, drinking in deep breaths of my scent, and then set me down. Looking seriously at me, he said, “It was Anthony Bellweather. It had to be. His name is on several of the first articles that aired. That man is everything I warned you about and more. Clearly.” The anger on his face made my hair stand on end.