“Then we’ll probably die. Same as if we stay here and are being tracked.”

My head is too full of worries to know what the right answer is. Colin and Perry take up a huge amount of them, but I have enough to spare for me and Lars as well. It’s very much a fucked if I do, fucked if I don’t situation, and I can’t lie and say that I’m not curious about what we could find at Colin’s. The first time I went there looking for him, I noticed his laptop on his office desk. It’s been weeks now, and the police obviously don’t give a shit.

“And if Perry comes back and finds us missing?”

Lars doesn’t have an answer for that. In an ideal world, Perry will get us our answers, find out who’s after me, and then we can turn them over to the police. In order for any of that to happen, he needs to be able to find us once he’s done. Because I refuse to believe he could die over this.

Perry is the kind of guy who feels too big for this world. There’s this permanent brightness to everything he does, and it draws me in. The idea that the brightness and life he has could suddenly be gone ruins me.

“We’ve been okay here so far,” I say. “Would another day make much difference?”

“Imagine if you asked that question this time yesterday.”

He has a good point. Yesterday made a lot of difference, and so did the day before that. I’m almost scared of what else could be coming for us.

I swallow and nod at his phone, grasping at straws to find a sign that will point us in the right direction. “What does your horoscope say?”

Even though I know he would have started the day by checking it, he pulls his phone out and opens the app. Then he reads out loud. “Sudden work pressures are set to test you today, Taurus, but rest assured you’re up to the challenge. You have the strength and energy to meet this head-on and will overcome setbacks quickly, but use caution. Decisions have a ripple effect that will last long beyond today.”

Well, fuck. Up until that last line, it had sounded positive. “I’m so glad horoscopes are clear and decisive.”

“You asked.”

“I’m regretting it now.”

“Look, it says to be cautious. And being cautious means not sitting around here waiting for someone to come knocking.”

“Or maybe being cautious means not making random choices to up and leave.”

Lars turns his phone over in his hands. “Okay, we’ll stay. For now. Any sign of a car, we leave. And if Perry’s not back tomorrow morning …”