Jason sits on the arm of the couch like we’re fucking hanging out, watching fucking football. “She was looking for you. Shelly told Cruise she didn’t know where you were, so she told Chad.”
Cruise picks up where Jason leaves off. “They knew something was wrong, so Chad tracked the unknown number and the location and found her.”
Grabbing the gun, I take it into my closet and hide it behind a box of baseball cards I collected as a kid. I grab a clean jacket from my closet and look to Jason as I slip it on. “Why were you there?”
“I was doing the job I was paid to do. She left town, and I knew it was for good, so I followed her back. Just like you told me to.”
My shoulders stiffen, his demeanor borders on agitated. What’s his stake in this? “You always checked in with Chad before. Why not this time if she was coming back?”
“I thought she had a right to do things her way.”
“I don’t pay you to think.” He shrugs. I know I shouldn’t be so fucking angry at him, but I can’t work out this link. Him? Nastas?
“But how did Nastas know where she’d be? Who else knew where she was? That she was on her way home?” At that, he looks even angrier.
“Fuck if I know, King,” he growls. “I have the fucker’s phone. If I find anything on it that gives us answers, I’ll let you know.”
Walking to the door, he says, “You should get back to the hospital. You need to find out if she’s okay. The police will be suspicious if we all just walk in there at this point.”
My eyes narrow, and I stop beating around the bush. I want to know what this fucker’s end game is. “Why do you care? What’s in it for you?”
“She and I are friends. I’m not trying to be insensitive, King, but I care if Alice . . . Sara Jane lives.”
His asshole front slips for just a moment, messing with my head. On some weird base level, I see it. We’re the same. “You care about her.” Not a question, but a realization.
He shifts, putting his back to me and walking into the hall. “Of course I do. Like I said, we’re friends.”
I follow him with Cruise behind me. “You sure that’s all you are, Jason? Or is it Eric?”
Stopping, he stills with his back to me. I see the rise and fall in his shoulders, his anger building. When he turns back, his arms are crossed defensively over his chest. I study him and everything that will give his truth away if the words don’t when he says, “I’m sure. You accusing me of more, King?”
Cruise steps in between just as I step forward, and says, “This won’t do Sara Jane any good. We should go.”
Focusing back on him, I ask, “I haven’t received a call, so that’s good.”
Jason replies, “Yes, but you should be there just in case.”
Something different, less suspicious, maybe honesty, lies in his tone that makes me believe he could be telling the truth. “Let’s go.”
On the drive back, I catch glimpses of Jason in the side mirror since he’s sitting behind me. Why is he here? What does he want?
Jason Koster has a story, and from my experiences in life, it’s one that’s driven by something dark. I don’t know what he was escaping in that small town where we found him, but clearly he doesn’t want it to catch up to him. That much is evident. I’m not sure who I put on my payroll, but right now, I’m glad I did. If for no other reason, he was quick in hiding evidence from the attack on Sara Jane and Chad. He took care of bodies and got rid of Nastas’s car. How did he even know how to do all that? I’m not sure I want to ask for fear of what his answer might be. He may be breeding vengeance against the world, but he also took care of Firefly when I couldn’t. I look back once more. “Thank you.”
“Just let me know how she is.”
I nod when I should hesitate. Once I asked him to keep tabs on her, Sara Jane affected his life too. If anyone can understand her appeal, it’s me. She draws people into her light with one little smile. “I will.” I turn to Cruise. “Don’t wait for me. I’m staying as long as I have to.”
“You got your story straight?”
“She’d been gone for months. Shelly heard from her so we went to look for her. We saw her car, we found her on . . .” Terror strikes my chest like lightning when the memory of her lying there flashes through my mind. I exhale and shake my head, trying to free the nightmare image. “I grabbed her, and we rushed to the hospital.”
Jason adds, “We left her car there. They’ll search it for evidence. They won’t find anything beyond the vehicle, except her blood.”
Staring straight ahead. I try to overlook his matter-of-fact tone. How can he be so clinical? So detached? That’s my fucking soul bleeding from her body, but he doesn’t understand the depth of my love for her. No one does.
I thought the last three months were painful. Those were nothing compared to the chance of losing her forever. Visions of her body—limp and pale—bloody, lying on that dirt and gravel . . . I close my eyes, my fists tight. Cruise pulls up to the hospital, and I take a deep breath and breathe out slowly. Please God, let her live.
The car stops, and I get out, slamming the door behind me, and rush inside. As soon as I cross the threshold, two police officers are talking to a nurse. Looking away, I keep walking to the nurses station just beyond them. Pressing my abdomen to the counter, I ask, “Any word on Sara Jane Grayson?”
I don’t recognize the nurse. She’s not the same one from earlier. “Your name, sir?”
“Alexander Kingwood.”
She types on the keyboard in front of her, then glances back to me. “She’s not out of surgery yet. Her family has received one update.”
“Her family?”
“Yes, they’re in the waiting room.”
“What was the update?”
“You’re the one who brought her in, right?”
“Yes.”
A kind smile appears. “She’s been stabilized, but she’s not out of surgery yet.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
I turn toward the waiting room and her parents, my heart racing already.
The nurse adds, “Hold on to hope. She’ll pull through.”
She will pull through. Please, God, let her pull through.
The irony that I’m praying to the same God that took my mother isn’t lost on me. I can’t think about that. Something more powerful than this existence has to be pulling the strings of fate. I’ll pray on bended knee to whoever that may be as long as Firefly’s safe.
What I won’t do is be cut out of her life. If I have to take on her parents, so be it. I start walking. Her dad stands when he sees me. We’ve not gotten along in the past, but I’m staying in this hospital as long as Sara Jane is here.