Chapter 1 - THE WRONG NUMBER
The first thing Harper Sloan heard after her boyfriend broke her leg was the front door slamming behind him.
The second was the quiet hum of her refrigerator.
The third was her phone vibrating with a message from a man she had never met.
Harper lay on the kitchen floor of her cramped Portland apartment with one cheek pressed against cold linoleum and her right leg bent at an angle no human leg should make. A broken bottle had spilled beer beneath the table. Her overnight bag sat open near the couch, three shirts and a pair of jeans still folded neatly inside it.
She had been ten minutes from leaving Tyler Maddox.
Ten minutes.
That was all.
Then he had come home early.
He had seen the suitcase.
He had demanded to know where she thought she was going.
And when Harper finally said the sentence she had practiced in whispers for six months—I'm leaving you—Tyler had knocked her backward, kicked her legs out from beneath her, and brought his boot down when she tried to crawl away.
Now he was gone.
For the moment.
Harper knew the pattern.
Tyler always left after things got bad. He drove to the convenience store, bought cigarettes or beer or a bag of ice, and returned twenty or thirty minutes later wearing guilt like a costume.
He would cry.
He would tell her she had scared him.
He would say they had both made mistakes.
And if she resisted the story he needed to believe, he would become dangerous again.
Harper dragged herself toward the coffee table.
Three feet felt like three miles.
Every movement sent fire through her shin until black spots crowded the edges of her vision. She reached the phone, almost dropped it, and tried to remember her sister Sadie's number.
Her hands were shaking too badly to open the contacts.
So she typed it from memory.
He broke my leg. Please help me.
She hit send.
Then she lowered her forehead to the floor and breathed through her teeth.
One minute passed.
Then two.
Her phone vibrated.
Relief almost made her cry.
She opened the message.
Unknown Number: Who is this?
Harper stared at the screen.
She checked the number.
Her stomach dropped.
She had reversed the final two digits.
Wrong number, she typed. Sorry. Please ignore.
The reply arrived immediately.
Unknown Number: You said someone broke your leg.
Harper swallowed.
Yes. But I meant to text my sister.
Unknown Number: Are you safe right now?
A laugh escaped her, thin and almost hysterical.
Safe.
She looked at the blood on her palm, the bent outline beneath her jeans, the overturned chair, the dent Tyler's fist had left in the drywall last month.
No.
The typing dots appeared.
Then disappeared.
Then returned.
Unknown Number: Give me his name and your address.
Harper's breath stopped.
Who are you?
The answer came ten seconds later.
Unknown Number: Someone who has no patience for men who hurt people weaker than themselves. Name. Address.
Harper should have stopped answering.
Every sensible instinct told her not to give a stranger her location.
Then a shadow crossed the blinds.
Tyler.
He was pacing beneath the apartment window.
He hadn't gone far.
Her phone trembled in her hand.
Harper typed.
Tyler Maddox. Apartment 3C. 214 West Alder.
The stranger responded with only two words.
Unknown Number: Stay awake.
Harper barely had time to process them before boots thundered up the stairwell.
The key scraped against the lock.
Tyler stepped inside carrying a plastic bag.
He saw Harper exactly where he had left her and sighed.
Not apologized.
Sighed.
"You're still down there?"
Harper stared at him.
"I can't get up."
"Don't start."
"My leg is broken."
Tyler's eyes moved toward it.
For one second, genuine fear crossed his face.
Then Harper watched that fear transform into anger.
The change was almost mechanical.
"No, it isn't."
"Look at it."
"You probably twisted it."
"Tyler."
"You always make everything worse than it is."
He tossed the bag of ice onto the couch.
"I brought you this. I'm trying here."
Harper felt something inside her become strangely still.
Maybe there was a point when terror became too large for the body and turned into clarity.
"My leg is broken because you broke it."
Tyler stared at her.
"Lower your voice."
"You broke my leg."
"I said lower your damn voice."
He crossed the room and grabbed her upper arm.
Harper screamed when he tried to pull her upright.
Tyler immediately released her, looking toward the door.
"Shut up! Do you want the neighbors calling somebody?"
Three measured knocks interrupted him.
Tyler froze.
Harper stopped breathing.
Another three knocks.
Slow.
Calm.
Not the nervous tapping of a concerned neighbor.
Tyler turned toward her.
"What did you do?"
"Nothing."
"Who did you call?"
"No one."
The knocking came a third time.
Tyler approached the door.
"Who is it?"
A man's voice answered from the hallway.
"Gideon Locke."
Tyler frowned.
Harper's heart gave one violent beat.
She didn't know the name.
But something in the man's voice made Tyler hesitate.
"Don't know you."
"No," Gideon replied. "You don't."
Tyler opened the door several inches.
A broad-shouldered man in a dark coat stood on the other side. Behind him waited an even larger man and a silver-haired physician carrying a medical bag.
May you like
Tyler barely managed, "What the hell—"
Before the door slammed backward into his face with bone-shattering force.
