He’d tried not to care that she’d simply walked away with that stranger. He hadn’t cared about her secrets. The mysteries of her past. Only prayed she would come back to him.
He loved her too much.
He wanted to stay in this place—her in his arms forever. He wanted to keep her here where she belonged. But suddenly . . . now that she was back—he cared about all of it.
A chill crawled over him. Anger kindled in a place he hadn’t known existed until this moment.
Zoey must have sensed the change in him—even before he recognized and accepted it himself. She slowly dropped her arms and stepped back. “I’m so sorry.”
Alan remained silent. He wasn’t sure what to say, what his first words should be. But that wasn’t true. “Zoey, I . . . I feared the worst but wouldn’t allow myself to think you were dead. I’ve been so worried about you. I was dying inside. Callie needs you. Where have you been?”
“I can explain later. We need to get out of here. You’re in danger. There’s no time.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you until you give me at least some reasonable explanation. Who was the man you met with? Where have you been? I want answers.” You could have called or texted if you were free enough to find your way here!
Zoey’s eyes widened.
She appeared surprised that Alan would demand answers. He never had before.
Zoey frowned and nodded. She crept to the door and shut it. “I don’t want to wake Callie. Is she . . . is she all right?” Her eyes shimmered with tears in the moonlit room.
“She misses you.” He loved her so much. But unless she had a good explanation, she was going to break his heart. “I’m waiting.”
Zoey sat on the edge of the bed and shoved her hair out of her face. She took a slow, shaky breath.
“This all started years ago when I was abducted. Before I moved to Denver and went to college, I had a stalker. His name was Simon Astor. I couldn’t shake him no matter what. So I left and changed my name. Started a new life and left behind the old one. But Simon found me again and that time, he abducted me.”
Alan’s chest ached as he listened to her story, the past he hadn’t asked her to share before and wished she didn’t have to now. He heard the deep pain that remained. He pulled a chair from the corner to sit closer so she could keep her voice low.
“He found me by accident, actually. He’d come to Denver for business.” She glanced up at him. “Illegal business. With all his partying and gambling and drugs, he was sucked in deep and was the middleman for a trafficking ring that continued to grow exponentially.”
“You mean drugs.”
“Yes. And human. It was all part of a diversified ring that’s still going. I guess being part of that business made him bold enough to take me off the street.”
Zoey sniffled, and Alan could tell she fought to hold back her sobs. “But I got him, Alan. I got him good.”
“You killed him.”
“What? No! No. I could never kill someone. If I could escape without committing murder, even in self-defense, then I would.”
“Then what do you mean that you got him good?”
“He beat me. Abused me in every way. Had his fun.”
His chest tightened as he held her gaze. “Is this . . . is this man . . .”
She squeezed her eyes shut. Lips quivering, she nodded, then opened her eyes. “I can’t think of him as her father or having to do with any part of her. Never bring that up again. You’re her father, Alan.”
Alan felt her pain to his bones. He shouldn’t have mentioned it. “You’re right. I’m sorry . . . Please, tell me what happened next.”
She cleared the thick emotion from her throat. “I let him think I was unconscious, and then when he was passed out drunk, I got on his laptop. He was stupid enough to open it and use it while I was there. Even before I graduated, I knew what I was doing. I hacked all his files. I learned about his business and his partners. Found what I needed about his interactions on the dark web—the names of real people behind dark web identities. Simon . . . I think he was going to use the information for his own leverage to free himself from the man he