**(Kayden"s Perspective)** I paced my house like a caged animal, senses stretched to their limit, straining for any trace of Leah in the town"s tapestry of scents and sounds. Nothing. Despair coiled around my heart like poison ivy. Then, my phone buzzed. A text from an unknown number: «Black. One of the guys hired to take the girl. Can"t take it. God"ll judge me. She"s in the basement of the old lumberjack shack at the end of Old Blackpine Road. Go through the back window. Don"t tell anyone I said this. My family"s dead if you do. Call it penance.» Blood rushed to my head. I stared at the screen, heart hammering. A trap? Or truth? **Doesn"t matter!** I"d walk into hell itself. I charged out, leaped into my Jeep, and roared toward the Black Pine Forest outside town. Adrenaline burned throug
