Page 17 of Control

“Alana!”

At the sound of the familiar voice calling my name, I spun around and saw Rita moving in my direction.

A wave of regret washed over me. It had been more than a week since I’d spoken to her. Yelled at her. And while I was still angry, maybe more now than I had been in the hospital, she hadn’t deserved me treating her the way I had.

“Hi, Rita,” I said softly as she came to a stop in front of me.

Pointing over her shoulder, she said, “They said you stopped in. Did you see Dale?”

“I did.”

“Any luck?”

I shook my head. “No.”

Her shoulders fell. “I’m sorry, Alana.”

Offering a nod of appreciation in return, I said, “Yeah. I’m sorry about the way I spoke to you while I was in the hospital.”

She waved her hand in the air dismissively. “Don’t worry about it. I understand. Trust me, I wasn’t looking forward to giving you that news, because I knew you weren’t going to take it well.”

“I can’t say I’m much happier about it now. This is awful, Rita. And I wish there was something I could do to get Dale to see reason.”

“I wish there was something I could do to help,” she murmured.

I shrugged. “There’s nothing. He’s made his decision, and we just have to accept it. Anyway, I’m going to get out of here. This day isn’t going anything like I planned.”

Rita nodded. “Okay. Keep in touch, Alana, and let me know when you’re coming back. If anything changes here, if there’s a way I can convince Dale to reconsider, I promise to try.”

“Thanks.”

With that, I turned and walked out, my frustration building with each step I took.

I made it to the car, got in, and dropped my head back against the headrest. Closing my eyes, I tried to breathe through the overwhelming disappointment I felt moving through me.

I never thought Dale would stick to his guns. I truly believed he would have reconsidered the moment he saw me and heard the determination in my voice to continue reporting on the story.

But now I was here, already feeling lousy about my physical situation and even worse about the work predicament.

The mere thought of having to look away, to pretend there wasn’t a bigger story to uncover, left me feeling such an overwhelming sense of heaviness.

I wanted answers.

I wanted the truth.

Annie’s family deserved as much. Yasmine’s, too.

Unexpectedly, a wave of defiance washed over me. My eyes shot open, my stare focused on the building in front of me, as my mind raced with thoughts.

A part of me understood where Dale’s logic came from—nobody wanted to be the one responsible for someone else’s misfortune. He didn’t want to be the one who put me in such a precarious position. My mom would love him for that.

Did that mean I couldn’t use my skills when I wasn’t working to dig into this story? Obviously, I couldn’t tell Dale or Rita about my plans. And I certainly wasn’t going to make my parents aware, considering they didn’t even know about what truly led to my car accident.

But perhaps there was somebody I could trust with this information, somebody who might be willing to help. I pulled out my phone, searched for the location I needed to go, and took off.

Eighteen minutes later, I pulled into the parking lot at Harper Security Ops. Though I disagreed with Dale’s decision, I couldn’t say he didn’t have a valid reason to be concerned. I wasn’t a fool; I knew there was a risk. Maybe it was time to mitigate that risk.

When I walked inside, I was met by a gorgeous woman almost immediately inside the front door.

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