Hard Beat
The only response I give him is a low “Mmm-hmm.”
“So you hoof it back to your assignment, and have been there for what, a week? And you’re still desk jockeying the shit out of recycled material instead of following up on the story. Can you tell me what’s wrong with this picture?”
The buzz is gone, I almost say but catch myself. I got back here and I had no desire to get back in the game. Zilch. Zero. I had no desire to contact Omid or to get on an embed mission with Sarge despite his calling me about exactly that to assuage his own unfounded guilt over the blast. Nothing. That live by the sword, die by the sword buzz I’ve used for over ten years to propel me to become the top foreign war correspondent is nowhere in sight.
“There’s most definitely not a picture, Rafe. None whatsoever, considering I don’t have a photographer to take one until she comes back,” I state evenly to try to hide from the fact that he’s absolutely fucking right.
“Is that what this is? Are you waiting for her to come back, Tanner?” He sounds so much like my father giving my teenage self a lecture that it’s comical. “Screw her stuff that was stolen. It’s insured, and I’ll have the hotel staff pack up what’s left. She isn’t coming back.”
The breath I didn’t even realize I was holding whooshes out in a deceptively even draw as the wind is knocked out of me. There goes that stupid little thread of hope that I had held on to for some reason that she’d come back, see me, and we’d be good again. It shatters me.
“She’s not?” I ask, making sure my voice is calm although my insides are screaming.
“No. Her condition is improving. She just needs some more monitoring and to take it easy, so she was moved stateside.”
Silence fills the line as a part of me breathes a sigh of relief. “When?”
“Yesterday.”
“Where?”
“I’m sorry, I can’t give you that information.”
“What do you mean, you can’t give me that information?” My voice escalates on the question.
“Not your business.”
“What the fuck, Rafe? What’s your problem? I just want to make sure she’s okay.”
“She’s okay. Hear me tell you that. And now hear this: You’re too close right now, so what’s going to happen next is you’re going to pack your shit up and come home. I have —”
“No.” I spit out the refusal, but there’s not a single ounce of conviction behind it. First Stella, now Beaux… I couldn’t save either of them, and the one that’s still here doesn’t want me. How’s that for a blow to the male ego? Even scarier, though, is the will to fight for her was left behind at the hospital. It’s no use fighting for someone who doesn’t need your fight.
“I have transport coming to get you in one hour,” he says evenly, ignoring my outburst. “You’re either on that flight home, Tanner, or you can look for another job.”
“This is bullshit!” For the first time I feel fire blazing within me, and maybe it’s because I don’t want to leave the only thing that’s connecting me to her now.
“No. We can talk about bullshit all day, Tanner, but it’d start with you. I’m worried about you. You took a big knock, physically, emotionally, and I know you hate me right now, but I’m just looking out for your own good. You’ll see that someday.”
I blow out a breath and start to pace the room. My foot hits something under the unmade bed we abandoned when Pauly interrupted us. The sight of the empty bottle of bubbles that bounces against the dresser when I kick it is like a knife wound to an already ailing heart, reinforcing the truth I just can’t face right now: This was all a lie. One more final fuck you from Beaux.
The bubble has burst.
“I’ll be on the flight.”
There’s nothing more I can say.
Chapter 25
R
afe’s words still ring in my ears as I sit at home in the dark. Even though my name’s on the title, the place feels so much more foreign than a hotel. The shades are drawn, I’ve got a beer in my hand, and my thoughts are still back on a woman I should let go but just can’t.
I’ve made a career living on gut instinct, and my instinct is telling me that something is off here. But isn’t that the same feeling I’ve had since day one when it comes to Beaux?
I ignore the knock on the front door. The only people who know I’ve touched down on U.S. soil besides those at work are Rylee and my parents. And I bit the bullet and saw my parents yesterday, faked my way through why I came home, blamed it on needing some recovery time – because let’s face it, you don’t really tell your parents who have been together since they were in their early teens that you fell in love with a married woman. It’s not exactly a crowning moment of their parenthood regardless of whether I knew she was married or not.
So the persistent knock on the door has to be Rylee. And of course if it is her, she will have driven the two hours south from Los Angeles to San Diego, so that means she won’t go away easily.
Besides, she has a key.
I sink back farther into the couch and close my eyes only to immediately open them because damn it to hell, Beaux’s there too. She’s fucking everywhere. And nowhere.
The rattle of a key in the lock tells me I was correct in my assumption about the visitor’s identity. “Tan?”
“In here,” I say, not eager for company.
“You becoming a vampire or something?” she asks at the same time as blinds start opening in my kitchen and the telltale sounds of the ocean crashing on the cliffs below filter in once she’s opened the windows.