Salvar and Silas stayed frozen in their seats for a long, suspended moment. The burner phone lay on the couch cushion between them, its screen still glowing with the message that had shattered whatever fragile calm had existed in the room.
Before twelve, Patrick should be dead incompletion of task will lead to the death of the members.
The words sat in Salvar's mind like a stone dropped into still water, the ripples spreading outward in directions he couldn't yet map.
Then Salvar moved. He pushed himself up from the couch with a sudden, urgent motion, and Silas followed a heartbeat later, both of them on their feet as if the room itself had caught fire.
"Should we tell the police?" Silas asked. His voice was controlled, but there was a tightness beneath it that Salvar recognized. The same tightness that had been in his own chest since he first saw the message.
