Page 543 of Cold Case, Warm Hearts

That’s all I need to unleash everything inside me. The queasy, irritating deja vu that has me stuck in the past. The horror of the desecration of so many lives and frankly, even the sweat pouring down my back and the burn in my fist.

I’m here because of him.

He’s tackled me, but I trap his legs, pull his head down into my shoulder and slam my fist into his ear. He struggles, so I hit him again, and when he pushes away from me, I flip on him, my knee in his gut and crunch my fist into his face.

It’s all blurring now—the shouting, the heat rolling off me, the cursing of the man fighting back.

He lands a couple blows in my ribs, but I’m impervious. Then Burke pulls me off, shoves me away “Step back, Rem!”

He grabs Neon in an arm bar, flipping him onto his stomach. “You—stop moving. Stay down!”

Neon stops struggling and I sink to the grass, breathing hard.

Burke shoots me a look. “What’s wrong with you?”

Me? I stare at him. “What—he was in the crowd!”

“Maybe,” Burke says, his hand still on Neon’s back. Now, he leans in close to the man. “Talk. Why’d you run?”

Neon swallows, glares at me, shakes his head. There’s a confusion on his face that doesn’t make sense, and there’s nothing clicking in, no memory that might clear this up.

“Let him go!”

The voice travels across the green, sharp and resonant, authority in the tone. Booker?

What is Booker doing here? He strides up, a little out of breath. And behind him—Mariana? She’s parked her car on the street and is running across the grass in her bare feet.

“Let him go!” She echoes Booker’s words and I get a sick feeling.

Burke has risen, backing off Neon who rolls over, spit in his eyes. And by the way Booker glares at me, I know I’m going to have some explaining to do. I’m still sitting on the grass, however, catching my breath.

“This is Ramses Vega—Mariana’s son,” Booker says and extends a hand to the man. “You okay?”

Ramses looks at me as if he’d like to have another go at me, and barring Booker, (and maybe Burke) he would.

Let’s go, buddy, I say with my eyes as I climb to my feet. My shirt is torn, grass stains my suit pants. I don’t even try to brush them off. This is why I stopped wearing dress clothes to work.

“I have my reasons, boss,” I say to Booker and he considers me for a moment even as Mariana runs up and throws her arms around Ramses. He embraces her, dark eyes glued on me.

“What is your problem?” Mariana shrieks, and there go my chances of getting that garage addition.

“He was at yesterday’s bombing,” I say quietly.

Ramses presses his thumb to the corner of his mouth, and he’s sporting a doozy of a goose-egg under his eye. I’m sure I have my own war wounds, but you don’t see me whining.

“And today’s.”

Only now do I realize that Mariana has turned to him and is translating for him.

No wonder he looked so confused.

He responds in Portuguese, a deduction I make when it pings in my brain that Mariana is Brazilian.

“Hewasthere yesterday,” she says, her voice a little shaky. “He was going to class. He attends English class at the Calvary Baptist Building, at the immigrant school there. The coffee shop is a block away from the school.”

My memory can’t confirm that, but it doesn’t matter because Booker is apologizing to Mariana, taking her hand, wearing apology on his face.

Listen, don’t go that easy on her, I want to say, but Booker is a nicer guy than me.

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