Her father’s focus shifted to Jax.

“Not him,” Sarah said. “Dad, dammit, look at me! Tell me! I know there’s another victim out there. One that links to the man after me. I need that victim’s name. Give me the name, and then I can find this guy. I can unmask him, and I can stop him!” If her father would just give her a name.

“I never forget a face,” her father said.

“Dad . . .” He was still staring at Jax.

“I’ve seen your face, son.”

Jax stiffened. “We’ve never met. I don’t think I would forget you.” Anger hummed there, slicing in his words. Then Jax reached for Sarah’s hand. His fingers squeezed hers.

Sarah had often doubted her father’s emotions but when she saw rage burn in his eyes right then—she knew that emotion was real.

“I want you to get away from him, Sarah,” her father said in a voice that was low and intense. Then he shouted, “Guards! Guards! Escort my daughter out of here, now.”

They immediately stepped forward. When the Monster said jump, even the guards moved.

But Sarah didn’t.

“You can’t trust him,” her father said with a slow shake of his head. “Get away. Now. Go back to your LOST friends . . . go back to them, Sarah.”

Sarah didn’t move. “Jax is with me. I’m—”

“You look a whole lot like him.” His cuffed hands pointed to Jax.

Jax was frowning at her father. “Like who?”

“He screamed, in the end. Wanted to die.”

Sarah didn’t know who he was talking about then, but she wanted to push her father more so she said, “The man after me . . . he told me that he’d make Molly beg for death. He wanted her to beg before she died. When she didn’t beg, he didn’t kill her.” Her fingers were shaking so she balled them up in her lap. “Remind you of anyone?”

And, just like that, the rage vanished from her father’s eyes. All of the emotion just winked away. “If they ask to die, then where’s the crime? It’s just like putting an animal out of its misery.” His head turned, almost snakelike, as he gazed at Jax once more. “Isn’t that right, Jax Fontaine?”

Sarah stood up. “You’re not going to help me. You’re just going to let him keep attacking me. Keep coming until, what? He kills me?” Her hands were fisted at her sides. “Come on, Jax. We’re leaving. We’re—”

Sarah stopped. She stared down at her father. Jax was rising beside her. Standing so close. Normally, he made her feel warm, but, right then, she was ice cold. “I never told you Jax’s last name.”

A faint smile curled her father’s lips. “I never forget a face . . . or a name.”

“You haven’t met Jax before.” But he’d said . . . I never forget a face. She tried to rush through the options in her mind. “You’ve been keeping tabs on me, haven’t you? You sent someone to watch me!”

“From here?” He laughed. “Hardly. My reach isn’t that strong, Sarah. But I am flattered you think so.”

“How did you know his last name?” Had a guard told him? They’d signed in before and—

“I knew the man who took him, of course. Thought about killing him myself. But then, well, other prey came to my attention.” He shrugged, as if none of what they were discussing really mattered.

Shock was rolling through Sarah. Her father was a master manipulator. Was he lying to them? Or was there a grain of truth in his words?

Murphy’s eyes turned to slits as her father studied Jax. “Is that why you’ve taken up with daughter? Because you found out what I did?”

“Wh-What?” Sarah could feel her careful control fracturing.

“My victims deserved to die. They all did. Including your father.”

Sarah stumbled against Jax. No, she didn’t stumble. He’d just grabbed her and pulled her close. “He’s lying,” Jax snarled.

She wanted him to be lying.

His father’s stare was assessing as it swept over Jax’s features. “He had your eyes and your jaw. Your face, but his hair was darker.” Her father seemed to consider things. “I think you have your mother’s hair.”

“You don’t know my parents.” Jax’s voice was ice cold.

“Of course I know them.” He shrugged one shoulder. “Knew them, rather.”

Sarah tried to pull Jax toward the door. Only he wasn’t moving.

“After all, I killed them, so I had to know them.”

SARAH AND JAX had vanished.

He’d been waiting for Jax to return home, but the guy hadn’t. Why? Had he decided to slip away with the doctor?

Sarah . . . Sarah Jacobs. Just like her father.

His little surprise for Jax could wait only so long.

With every moment that passed, he grew more and more impatient.

Hurry back, Sarah. Hurry the fuck back. And bring Jax!

If she didn’t show herself soon, he’d just start killing her friends. Maybe he’d start with the redhead. She hadn’t entered the game yet. What was her name . . . ?

Viki . . . Victoria.

She’d been the one in the news, the one who’d been taken on the last big case that LOST handled. Poor Victoria probably thought the danger was over. That she was safe now.

No one was ever really safe. Certainly not Victoria.

And not Sarah.

And sure as fuck not Jax Fontaine. That bastard was going to pay. Before this was over, he’d be the one to suffer the most.

I KILLED THEM.

Murphy’s words rang in Jax’s ears. He shook his head, denying them, because that sick bastard had to be lying. Just playing another one of his head games. Sarah had warned him about that. She’d told him that her father would try to get in his mind . . .

“Your father had a meth lab. He’d sell that shit to anyone he saw. Your mother . . . hell, he whored her out half the time.”

No, this wasn’t true.

“It’s time to leave, Jax,” Sarah said as she pulled on his arm. “Let’s go. Now.”

But he couldn’t move. He couldn’t take his eyes off Murphy Jacobs. “You don’t know them. You’re spouting bullshit.”

“It wasn’t until I took him that I realized . . . your father was a whole lot more than just a drug dealer.” He laughed. “He was running weapons, taking hits, doing anything, if the money was right. A real high opportunity player. He was wanted in four states.”

“Jax, Jax, look at me,” Sarah said. Her voice was shaking.

“Your mother had been with him since she was fourteen. I don’t think she loved him. I think she was too scared to leave him. I tried to get her to leave. She wasn’t the one I was after, but she wouldn’t go. She screamed and she fought. He’d hooked her on so many drugs, I don’t know if she even realized what was happening.”

A dull ringing was filling Jax’s ears. “Stop it.”

“You remember them, right? They had that little house on the edge of town near the South Carolina coast . . .”

“I live in New Orleans.” But he hadn’t, not always. He’d been in Atlanta when he was with Charlene. Charlene and . . .

“They put you in a closet when they did business. A damn closet. You were quiet as a mouse in there.”

It’s dark. Let me out! Daddy!

But his dad hadn’t come. No, no! Jax violently shook his head. Mitch Fontaine had been the one to put him in a closet. Not his real father.

Right?

“You didn’t make a sound, so I didn’t know you were in there. Not when I came to take them.”

“Please, Jax,” Sarah whispered. Her hold on him was fierce. “Just come with me.”

He couldn’t move.

“I killed him first. He was the fighter, but he didn’t last long. Once the pain started, they never do.” Murphy leaned forward even more. “Do you have one of those snake tats like he had? It used to wrap all the way around his forearm . . .”

Jax had a flash then. Of a man reaching out to him. A man with a green snake circling his arm. Stay quiet until I’m done. Then we’ll go out . . . we’ll go fishing . . .

He’d . . . liked to fish. But his father had never really taken him.

They never did anything.

“No,” Jax rasped as the ghosts of his past started to slip through his mind.