Beautiful Broken Promises(12)

Jace: Did it go that bad?

Me: I should be at work on Monday. Plenty of time before Nolan’s arrival.

It was shitty of me to leave him hanging like that, especially after everything he’s done for me. But there was no way in hell I was talking about this until I was ready, and I damn sure wasn’t going to discuss it over a text message. At any rate, I would have plenty of questions to answer when I walked into work, what with the sling and stab wound and all.

Mateo pulled the zipper closed on my bag and patted it, indicating it was packed and ready. I didn’t have a flight scheduled home yet. I figured I’d buy one when I arrived at the airport, and if I had to sit around and wait—well, who the f*ck cared anyway. Mateo gestured that he was taking the bag down and I nodded in understanding.

The shrill ring of my phone broke up the quiet of the room and I looked down to see Charlie’s name pop up on the bright screen. I might as well get this over with. Plus, he had helped me the most out of anyone, going above and beyond the call of duty.

Charlie and I had been partners when I used to be a cop in New York. We saw each other more than we saw our own families. I would have taken a bullet for him and he would have done the same for me. He kept his ear to the ground for me and always let me know if he got a lead on Flores, even though it wasn’t his case. All while I quit the force, moved down to San Diego, and tried to find him myself.

“Yeah,” I mumbled into the phone.

“Shit, Lane,” Charlie’s gruff voice whispered into the line. “I thought you were f*cking dead.”

“I thought I was too.”

“What the hell happened? Scratch that, you can tell me in a bit—”

I interrupted his speech and said, “I need you to get Flores extradited to the US. He needs to burn. He’ll just pay his way out down there.”

“You know I don’t have any power to do something like that—”

“Talk to Chief,” I interrupted again.

“I tried, man. But seriously, enough with Flores...” he whispered again.

“ENOUGH WITH HIM?” I boomed into the phone “He f*cking killed her, Char. He killed her and he had the goddamn balls to laugh in my face about it. If you guys can’t do anything, I’ll go down and end him myself.”

“Chill out for one damn second, you’ve got bigger fish to fry!” he whisper-shouted into the phone.

“Why the hell are you whispering to me?” I hollered back.

“I have her, Lane. I’ve been trying to get a hold of you to tell you. I have her.”

He may as well have been speaking a different language. I had to replay the words in my head ten times before I could wrap my mind around what he could possibly be saying.

“You...”

“Have her,” he repeated quietly.

I could hear Flores’ words in my brain. Check the bottom of the Sea of Cortez. All of a sudden, I was picturing boats and underwater search diving teams. But there was no way they could have found a body that fast. It had only been a few hours since he told me she was there. I couldn’t figure out what Charlie was saying, and all I could feel right then were the damn tears dripping down my face again.

“Lane? Are you still there?” He must have heard me sniff past the overwhelming grief lodged in my throat because he hurriedly said, “I have Kate… alive.”

My heart froze in my chest for so long, I began to wonder if I would even continue breathing. “Wha- how? I mean… is that possible?!” I exclaimed.

“She’s sitting right next to me. Yeah, it’s f*cking possible, man. We finally did it!”

“Dude, just stop cussing.” I inhaled deeply and plopped down on the bed, dropping my head in my hands. Forgetting that one of my arms was in a sling, I let out a string of profanities when I moved it the wrong way. The irony that I had just told Charlie to knock off the sailor mouth was not lost on me. My body shot back up and I began pacing in my hotel room.

“How is it possible? Are you sure? Did you check her—”

“Her wrist?” he interrupted the onslaught of questions I was firing his way. “Tiny heart birth mark on the inside of her left wrist. It’s there, man. I know that missing persons report backward and forward. It’s Kate.”

All the air I had unintentionally been holding in flew out of my chest and my head became light. I quickly looked around for a place to sit, but I couldn’t make it so I slid down the side of the wall until my ass hit the ground.