14

GARETH I’ve been patient. Extremely so. Even when the impulse to inflict pain mounted and multiplied, reaching heights I hadn’t experienced since that time six years ago, I repressed it all. Leaving no room for mistakes. This needed to be perfected. To a fault. There’s no way I’d be caught off guard like that night I was literally brought to my knees. So I watched him—my criminal professor who’s teaching criminal law. I learned his habits to a tee and gathered some basic info about him through a private investigator. I had to hire someone who came recommended through dark web research myself, opting not to use the mafia’s resources. If I went that route, the news would get back to Jeremy or, worse, my parents. The private investigator Nadine, a serious-looking American woman who’s ex-military, is reliable and already came through with some info. Kayden Lockwood is boringly typical. He comes from a middle-class upbringing in Boston to a lawyer dad and a college professor mom. He practic