Free Web NovelChapter 27: Fuck Choice
Ezra
Fuck what Corrian says.
It was her choice. Her choice. Her choice. As if her choice fucking matters.
Repeating it enough times will not transform the reckless decision into something reasonable.
Five days since she disappeared, and the house has become a study in controlled collapse. Jax barely sleeps. Leo has broken three doors, two tables, and one unfortunate member of a rival pack who happened to be in his way. River has gone so quiet it circles back around to being unsettling.
Corrian walks around carrying the weight of all of us on his shoulders, pretending he isn’t exhausted. Pretending he isn’t terrified. Pretending this was always a possibility he could live with.
The lie annoys me more than I can adequately articulate. freewebnoveℓ.com
My office has become the only tolerable room in the building. Thick stone walls and six monitors illuminating the darkness in pale blue light. Order. Logic. Facts. All things that obey rules.
Unlike Frankie.
I lean back in my chair and stare at the map glowing on the centre monitor. A sea of red dots and lines indicate the data points I’ve plotted. Timetables, bus routes, CCTV captures, transaction histories, names, locations. Hundreds of tiny pieces of information stitched together into the resemblance of a trail.
Most people think finding someone is difficult. It isn’t. Not any more.
Every person leaves fingerprints across the world. People willingly surrender their entire lives to technology, then act surprised when they can be followed. Frankie would hate that observation. She’d make some sarcastic comment about privacy and government surveillance, steal my coffee while she was doing it.
That train of thought is uninvited. It’s happening more often than I’d like.
I reach into the drawer and pull out her phone.
She left it behind. Frankie is clever enough to know it was a direct line to her. Clever enough to know I’d be the first person to check. The corner of my mouth twitches despite myself. It was a good move. Irritating. The tracker I embedded months ago had become useless the moment she abandoned the device. Not that it matters. The tracker had never been the plan. It had simply been insurance, one precaution from dozens.
I turn the phone over in my hand and stare at her cracked case. I gave her the card to replace the shattered remains of her shitty life, but she’s refused to change such a simple thing. Stubborn woman.
Every logical part of my brain understands that she left because she was frightened. Because her world shattered. Waking up to discover monsters are real tends to alter a person’s perspective. Understanding it does not improve my mood. fгee𝑤ebɳoveɭ.cøm
The truth is uglier.
I know exactly why Corrian keeps talking about choice. If we acknowledge what this feels like, then we’re forced to confront what we’ve become. Territorial.
The word is unpleasant because it is accurate.
Every decision she has made since I gave a nudge here and there, belonged to her. That’s the distinction I tell myself when sleep becomes difficult, even if it sounds increasingly thin at three in the morning.
The uncomfortable truth sitting beneath all the data and planning and strategy is that I miss her. The house feels wrong without her. Quieter despite everybody shouting more. Colder despite the summer heat. There is an absence where she should be, and every instinct I possess despises it.
I set the phone carefully on the desk and my gaze drifts back to the map and the reason I’m here now. A new transaction alert appeared at dawn. One cash withdrawal at a service station on a rural route, headed north.
"Where are you going, little brat?" I whisper to the screen.
I locked myself in here hours ago. Long enough for Corrian to stop knocking and start leaving me alone.
Lines of code scroll across three separate screens. Bank records on one, traffic cameras on another, transaction logs on a third. Frankie withdrew cash hundreds of miles from home. My jaw tightens as I replay the ATM timestamp for the hundredth time. At least she took the maximum withdrawal. That will tide her over for a while, but it’s not enough. I’ve already upped the limit for her, in case she uses it again.
Since then, nothing. Frankie has somehow managed an almost impossible escape while exhausted, traumatised and running blind.
A pop-up flashes red on one of the screens. Access denied.
I stare at it for a second, then try again. Different exploits. Access denied.
The CCTV network attached to the service station isn’t connected to any external server, they are running some ancient local storage. Completely offline with no cloud access. As primitive as it is rage inducing.
I sit back in my chair and rub a hand across my mouth, trying to wipe the anger that simmers low and steady. Every wolf with half a brain would notice an unbonded female travelling alone. Every predator would start asking questions.
If Leo’s instincts are right, we are no longer the only ones looking for her.
I grab my phone and call before I can think about the alternatives. River answers immediately.
"Yeah," His voice is calm as always. Ancient and unhurried.
It pisses me off.
"She withdrew money six hours ago, the CCTV footage is stored locally, I cannot get into it remotely." I swivel toward another monitor, pulling up the station details. "I need eyes on the ground to physically access that system."
I know what he’s going to say before he opens his mouth.
"Maybe it’s a good thing you can’t," He pauses, releasing a long sigh. "You want me to go?"
"You should already be in the fucking truck."
I can practically hear him considering possibilities, routes, outcomes. "Ezra."
"They’re already hunting her." I close my eyes.
"I know." His voice hardens.
My fingers tighten around the phone and for a moment neither of us speaks. I open my eyes and stare at Frankie’s photograph pinned across three separate screens.
Five days.
Five fucking days.
"Go," I say quietly.
River doesn’t answer.
"Use whatever means necessary."
The line disconnects.
Outside my office door something crashes and shakes the wall. Jax, probably. Or Leo. I don’t bother checking. My attention remains fixed on the glowing network of information spread across the screens.
Corrian can keep talking about choice.
I am going to find her.
And when I do, she can scream at me, threaten me, insult me, and tell me exactly where I can shove my concern.
But she will be alive when she does it.
That is the only outcome I am interested in.
