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TWENTY-FOUR
EZRA
I brooded at the airport.
I knew I was doing what I needed to do for Lance, but I couldn’t get Tillie out of my mind.
And it was entirely my fault because why the fuck did I have to go and kiss her again?
The first time I kissed her, I could excuse it as a necessity. I needed to make her go and see a therapist, and that was one way to convince her. I wasn’t above using light manipulation as long as it was for her own good.
But then I kissed her again. That time, there was no plan behind it. I’d had no control. I’d kissed her because I had to. She was in my fucking system, and I couldn’t get her out of it. No matter what I tried, she was taking over my mind, my body, and my soul.
Fuck.
As I got off the plane, all I could think of was getting back on it and getting back to her. I was unduly irritated, both at the realization that she meant a lot more to me than I wanted and the fact that there was nothing I could do about it. I didn’t even know how to start fighting the virus that was seeping into my system and taking over me.
But I tried as much as possible to put it out of my mind. I could see Kuzo from about a mile away, his morose face standing a head above the rest. I strode toward him without stopping. Once I reached, he fell in step with me.
“What happened?” I asked, not bothering with small talk since it irritated both of us.
“You’ll have to tell me. I haven’t spoken to him yet. The hospital has him on suicide watch, and he’s sedated right now. He’s currently refusing to see anyone.”
That was what I was afraid of. But regardless of his wishes, I needed to speak with him. Because something told me there was something else going on here. All this escalated the moment I left town after the damned Mayor Watson case. There must have been something about it that we hadn’t noticed that could have triggered Lance’s current state.
“Tell me again what happened with Mayor Watson,” I said.
“I’ve already told you everything there is to know.”
“Yes, but describe the final mission again.”
“Well, we traced the last call to their vicinity. And then we surrounded the area, extracted the victim, and subdued the assailants.”
“Nothing else happened? The girl wasn’t tortured or raped?”
“No. Treatment was all relatively mild for kidnapping, but I guess it’s because the kidnappers were kids. They were scholarship kids who attended the same school as the mayor’s daughter, which is where they knew the victim from.”
Mmm. Then it couldn’t be the gore or trauma that triggered it.
“I emailed you the rest of the criminal profiles,” Kuzo informed me.
“Yeah, I saw.” I’d skimmed through most of them, enough to make sure none of the boys were affiliated with any political groups or terrorist organizations. But now I figured I could look into the case deeper because something in there had triggered one of my agents to the point where he’d tried to take his own life.
Kuzo drove, and I scanned through the files once again in silence. I paid particular attention to the history, and something about one of the criminals seemed a little familiar. His eyes, I suppose. I had a hunch.
I called Hardy to make sure.
“Miss me already?” the PI quipped when he answered.
“Can you dig deeper into the history of Randy Ortega? Something about him seems familiar.”
“Sure, although a please wouldn’t hurt.” He hung up before I could respond to the joke. Thirty minutes later, he called back and delivered the final piece to the puzzle.
“Um, sir, are you sitting down?” His voice sounded trepidatious.
“Why?”
“Because you’re gonna wanna be sitting down for this one.”
