I didn’t think it was only that.
Something was coming. Something was about to happen.
I guess that left us in the same situation.
Move fast.
* * *
I returned to the chamber an hour after I did the drop off with Frankie.
It was two in the morning. The search while I was away was on the whole right section and the guys hadn’t found anything.
A search on the next section of a hundred vaults came up with nothing too. That took me and the guys four hours.
I couldn’t express how pissed off I was when we spent all that time to come up with nothing. Worse when I had to leave because I had to be at the casino for work in an hour.
Wes continued though with the other guys.
I planned to return again tonight if they weren’t successful.
The day was the longest ever and yesterday’s event with Balthazar had gotten under my skin in the worst way. I just kept thinking about Jia.
It worried me that Balthazar had just come into the casino. A place she worked. He’d come in as the essence of danger itself.
Only last week I worried sick that she could get taken by the Ra. Now I knew it was Balthazar all along the worry over her was amplified a hundred fold.
Of course I’d be worried sick. After all he killed the last woman I cared about.
Over the last few days I hadn’t spoken to Jia, but the little glimpses of her helped. Today though, she wasn’t there and I didn’t know why.
Diverting my focus from where it should have been I decided to make my way to her place just to see her. It was nine, and yes I was making another reckless mistake by even thinking about her but I couldn’t focus properly on anything with her on my mind.
At least before I rushed off to be reckless I spoke to Wes first, just to let him know where I was going. I’d thought it was right to tell him.
Frankie was parked up outside Jia’s house as usual. I went to him first and the minute he saw me he frowned.
He frowned and rolled his eyes at me as he rolled his window down.
“You have some death wish don’t you kid?” he asked. “What part of stay away from the boss’s daughter don’t you get?”
“I just want to see her,” I told him. “She wasn’t at work today.”
“Yeah, because that asshole Armand upset her that’s why.”
“What did he do?”
He shook his head. “She wouldn’t tell me. But do we really need to ask? That guy actually makes me sick. He gets all the opportunities ever, more than any of us because he’s someone’s son, who’s a friend of a friend’s family and he screws around taking all the liberties in the world.”
“I get it,” I agreed.
“If you do you won’t go adding to the problem. Xander, she leaves in a few days. This isn’t healthy. It’s not good for her to keep seeing you. There’s going to have to be a cutoff point somewhere.”
I knew that. I absolutely knew that. I just didn’t want to make the cut.
Not yet.
“Does it have to be tonight?” I asked.
