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Over the past couple of weeks I’ve been going over the DNA test results, checking with the lab that provided these documents. They confirmed from their records that the copy we got was, in fact, obtained from their facility, though they couldn’t tell us much else on account of patient confidentiality.
I don’t know what to believe. Even now, even after I watched Amaya leave with so much pain in her beautiful, dark eyes. The anguish in her voice. She was offended by our hesitation, but dammit, can anybody really blame us after what we went through with Trinity?
Trinity did something similar, though she never dragged a kid into it. She played our heartstrings and got close enough to the point where Kace, Finn, and I were ready to give her the world.
When the truth came out, when we understood that she had been playing us the whole time, it broke us. It broke me. I could never bring myself to trust another woman, until Amaya came into our lives.
The minute I saw Mikey, the minute Kace told us about their past connection, I put two and two together. It made so much sense. Then again, these medical documents make sense too.
Derrick may be a sniveling prick and a shady entrepreneur, at best, but he doesn’t have a criminal record. I learned to look at the facts before listening to my heart and its sometimes tainted desires. What my heart keeps telling me about Amaya doesn’t match the current reality. And while I’m trying so hard to remain level-headed, I can’t not investigate every fucking aspect of this issue.
Every morning, I’m in my office, poring over CCTV footage from the past few months, trying to figure out when these photos were taken. We spent so many nights together, the four of us, it’s kind of hard to get the details solely out of the images themselves.
I don’t even know who or what I’m looking for on the cameras. But someone was out there, following us, watching us, photographing us. Someone with an evil endgame. Of course, my mind already has some ideas as to who and why, but without evidence, my suspicions are virtually useless.
“Any luck yet?” Kace asks as he comes into my office, accompanied by Finn.
They both look like shit, but I’m no charmer at this hour, either. We’ve been losing sleep, drinking too much coffee during the day and too much whiskey at night. We’ve been skipping gym sessions, and when we do hit the free weights and the machines, we go too hard and end up horribly sore the next day.
I’ve been neglecting my nutrition, too. Eating mostly junk and anything I can nibble on, just to get me through the day. I’m a fucking mess. At least I’m not the only one.
“Nope,” I say, leaning back into my chair. “I’ve been combing through every angle for July, but it’ll be a while, still. It’s a lot of footage.”
“It’s a shame we don’t have access to the Navy’s video search engines anymore,” Finn sighs as he collapses into one of the guest chairs. “That scanning tool they used for our base in Guam would come in handy since it fast-forwards through the whole video, only slowing down when there was motion detected.”
“Remember that add-on that Sanchez installed into that software?” Kace asks as he places a cup of freshly brewed coffee on my desk. “It used facial recognition features, and the playback would freeze frame if it recognized a specific person.”
“We don’t even know who we’re looking for,” I reply.
Kace cocks his head to the side, slightly doubtful. “I think we kind of do.”
“Evidence, Kace. We can’t get burned the same way twice,” I harshly remind him.
“What the fuck are we going to do?” Finn asks, running a hand through his red, wild hair. “Amaya keeps sending our gifts back. Rejecting money transfers.”
“I was expecting that,” Kace sighs deeply. “Honestly, I don’t know why we keep doing that anymore, especially after the DNA results.”
I give him a hard look. “Because deep down, the three of us know that there’s something rotten going on, but we can’t fucking prove it.”
And so, each conversation devolves precisely into this exchange of bitter energies, of regrets and doubts as we struggle to find a way forward. One of us always brings up Trinity as the lesson that we were supposed to learn so much from.
Then another one of us brings up the fact that Amaya is cut from a completely different cloth, that she repeatedly proved herself to be sweet, kind and genuine. But then we remind each other about how she broke everything off, how she left us.
Inevitably, the DNA results pop back up to the center of our focus. And the dismay we felt that day returns with a vengeance, throwing a wrench at our wheels.
And round and round we go, unable to find a path forward.
“I’ll take the day off to check some of that footage, as well,” Finn says.
“We should take turns,” Kace offers.
“About fucking time,” I grumble.
Kace gives me a frown. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means I’ve been the one solely searching through all of this CCTV footage and it’s about time you two joined in.”
After a moment I add, “You guys can’t tell me you really are okay with this situation, with the way we handled it, about the DNA, I mean.”
