The Summer Children (The Collector #3)(58)

She gives me a tired smile. “The warrant went through. Mr. Lee should be getting me the list of file access by end of business Monday. Burnside got approved for access to their system to examine digital footprints.”

“Word to the wise, Gloria Hess is helping Lee put the list together.”

“Fuck.” She glances at Vic and turns bright red, but doesn’t apologize.

His lips twitch in a reluctant smile.

“Brayden isn’t talking to Tate,” Cass continues after a moment. “He isn’t talking to anyone. But he doesn’t seem to mind Tate staying with him.”

“Tate seems like very good people.”

“I got that impression too.” She straightens out a wrinkle in her shirt, then frowns down at it. “I can’t tell if this is inside out or backward.”

“Backward,” Sterling answers. “I can see the lines of the tag.”

“Huh. Anyway, Brayden probably isn’t going to communicate for a while. Tate said, and Holmes agrees, you should probably head on home and get some rest. You know, if you want.”

I eye the last splashes of my coffee and wonder if I can fall asleep before the caffeine kicks in.

“Thank you, Cass,” Vic says for all of us. “You’ll keep us updated?”

“Yes, sir.”

Eddison and I both snort, followed by Cass’s blush deepening. Sterling just gives her a commiserating look.

“Cass? Killer left bruises on Zoe’s left wrist; I don’t know if you’ll be able to get fingerprints, but it can probably tell you her general size. Talk to Holmes and her medical examiner.”

We end up following Vic home and sacking out in his living room rather than separating. Sterling curls up in the armchair, face buried in her knees. Eddison and I each take a couch, and it says a lot that despite the adrenaline, the caffeine, the light pouring in through the sheer drapes, we’re out cold pretty damn fast.

Several hours later, the ringing of my personal phone snaps me awake in nothing flat, my heart thumping painfully against my ribs. Sterling wakes just as abruptly, flailing off the chair and landing on the floor with a squeak that has Eddison attempting to prop himself up on an elbow, and sort-of managing it three attempts later.

The screen says Esperanza. “It’s not another kid,” I announce, and Eddison drops back into the couch and blanket.

“You’re not answering it,” mumbles Sterling, hauling herself up the chair.

“I’m not sure if it’s my cousin or my aunt.”

“Are either of them bad options?”

“One of them is.”

“Oh.”

Eddison cracks open one eye. “Why is it still ringing?”

“Because I don’t want to pick up if it’s Soledad.” I wait for it to go to voice mail, and listen to the message. It’s Esperanza, afortunadamente, but her message doesn’t really tell me much. There’s something big, call me back so I can be the one to tell you, rather than my mother.

Big or little, I really don’t want to know. Don’t need to know.

Before I can decide whether or not to call her back, the phone starts vibrating and ringing again, her name lighting up the screen. Damn it. With a bone-deep sigh, I accept the call. “Hello?”

Sterling winces at how rough my voice is.

“Mercedes? It’s afternoon where you are; why do you sound like you just woke up?” My cousin’s voice is frazzled, which is uncommon for Esperanza. The biggest reason I allowed the reconnection was her calm and common sense.

“We were up all night for a case. What’s wrong?”

“Family meeting this morning.”

“Oh, God, I do not need to know this.”

“Yes, you do. Tío is sick.”

“Which tío?”

There’s a heavy silence, and after far too long, it clicks. “Oh.”

My father.

“Pancreatic cancer,” she continues once it’s clear I won’t.

“Painful.”

“The family wants to get him out of prison for treatment.”

“Probably not happening, but not any of my business regardless.”

Eddison is almost sitting up now, slumped against the arm of the couch and desperately blinking to keep his eyes from staying closed.

“Mercedes . . .” Esperanza huffs into the microphone, and it distorts like a hurricane through my speaker. “You really think the rest of the family isn’t going to bother you about this?”

“That’s exactly what I think, because I’ll be turning off my personal phone until I can switch the number.”

“Most of the grandkids have never even met him.”

“Lucky them.”

“Mercedes.”

“No.”

“Pancreatic cancer isn’t all that treatable. You know he’s probably dying.”

“Mucha carne pal gato.”

“Mercedes!”

“Is that her?” I hear her mother in the background. “Let me speak to her, that ungrateful, malicious—”

I end the call and turn the phone off, which is how it will stay for a while. The kids in the hospital have my work number, as do Priya, Inara, and Victoria-Bliss. Anyone else can email me. Have to admit, I’m disappointed in Esperanza. She was supposed to be the one person in the extended Ramirez familia who understood that that wasn’t my life anymore.