It’s one more question to join all the others I have no answers to. I reach for my phone, mostly by muscle memory at this point, and pull up his number. Still doesn’t ring. I open his social media pages and hope that maybe this time there will be something. A picture of him, literally anywhere, just enjoying himself, but it’s radio silent there too.

I’ve gnawed on my lip so many times over the last few days that it’s raw and shredded. My lack of sleep is normally great for when I’m working through the night, but with my naps constantly interrupted, I’m getting low on patience.

If something’s happened to Colin, I … okay, I don’t know what. Still not a criminal mastermind, but with my frustrations bubbling around a hundred, I’m interested to find out.

Fighting for sleep is useless at this point, so I head out to the kitchen and turn the coffee machine on. The view here isn’t as great as the one at work since we funneled all our money into the business, and I didn’t save a cent for this place. Lars and I took out the rent together so we could afford something slightly larger than a shoe box and not shared with who knows what kind of vermin.

The current takings at Saint Clare’s are looking promising, but we’re stuck here for a while.

The creak of a door behind me makes me jump out of my skin.

Lars’s chuckle fills the still apartment as he joins me in the kitchen. “What the hell are you doing?”

I wait for my suddenly racing heart to stop being so damn dramatic before I answer him. “Couldn’t sleep.”

“Colin?”

“Yep.”

Lars’s mouth flattens. “The whole thing is weird.”

“You’re telling me,” I mutter, grabbing the sugar. “I can’t shake the feeling something bad has happened.”

“I’m a big believer in listening to our instincts.”

“You also cleanse the apartment every other month and have a concerning addiction to horoscopes. My instincts tell me those things are bullshit. Who do we believe?”

Lars throws me an unimpressed look before taking over making the coffee. He’s only in his briefs, and it really highlights why he’s the muscle and I’m the … ideas guy.

When I’d hired him, it had been more about having a barrier between me and any drug-crazed partygoers or wannabe gangsters lurking outside. I’d never imagined for a second that I would need actual protection, but since Colin disappeared without a trace, who the fuck knows what’s going on?