Page 19 of Vicious Savage

19

ATTILA

The Jekyll and I wait outside Nadia’s room waiting for some news. It may be selfish but all I can think about is that the more time that passes, the further away Luna gets. I didn’t even contemplate that we might lose her. That just wasn’t in the cards. But now that it’s happened, a deep, dark anxiety rears its head, threatening to bulldoze everything in its path.

“I know what you’re thinking,” he says, looking up at me from his chair as I continue to pace up and down the hospital corridor. I stop, turn to face him, and wait for him to continue.

“You’re thinking that we’ve lost her.”

How the fuck could he possibly know that?

“Well, she’s gone, isn’t she?”

I’m angry and I’m spiteful. Things haven’t exactly gone the way I planned, and shit’s probably going to hit the fan once Caleph finds out everything that’s happened. I know I dropped the ball on this one, but I can’t get stuck in what’s happened. I need to figure out how to get past this and find our footing again.

The Jekyll stands and faces me. He tucks his hands in his pockets and lifts his shoulders in a shrug, which he holds then exhales as he fixes me with curious eyes.

“You know, you never really told me what happened between you two.”

I don’t say anything. I won’t insult him by lying, yet my silence pretty much answers his question. He stares at me quietly for the longest time before I turn away, unable to hold his gaze.

“At any rate,” he starts. “I know exactly where Luna is.”

* * *

The Jekyll tellsme that he knew something like this might happen and had accounted for every eventuality, especially knowing the sort of man that Coyin Castillo is. There are things about the man that I apparently am not aware of. Yet some things still that neither of us could possibly know — Luna lived with the man, so she’d be the best judge of the sort of man he is, but she didn’t seem to be a fan. Even if he is her father.

“When you left us to settle the motel bill,” The Jekyll starts, bringing me back to the conversation. “I spoke with Luna. She wouldn’t let you see it, but she was terrified of going back to her father. I gave her a tracker and showed her how to use it.”

“Why would you do that?”

“Because I promised we’d come looking for her if it came to that.”

“She’s not our responsibility,” I remind him, a false sense of bravado in my voice. Even I can admit to myself the shallowness of my words. She may not be our responsibility, but even criminals live by a code of morals.

“She became our responsibility the minute she got into that car after the bar. We picked her up from there to protect her. And when she was taken at Nadia’s house, we failed to protect her.”

He’s not trying to sell me anything. He’s saying it like it is, and I know that every word he says is right, because they reach into the deepest recesses of my brain and tell me so. It’s morally wrong to throw her to the wolves then wash our hands of her. That’s on a normal day. But the fact that I already feel the loss of her tells me I’m not willing to let this go as easily as getting on a plane and going back to France. Or heading back to Seattle. Or any one of the many other places where I often lay my head. I’ve been a nomad all my life, hopping from one country to another, from one problem to the next, cleansing the earth of the scum invading it. But for the first time, I have the overwhelming urge to stand still. To stop running and just be. Just stay. Without having to think about where my next landing will be.

“The tracker on now?”

“It’s on. The receiver is in the car.”

“What if they find it?” I ask.

This is the next complication that we have to think about. We have to consider that they may find the tracker and switch it off. We could lose Luna, with no-way of ever finding her. It has taken years between us to even get a whiff of Castillo — there’s no way we can find him if he disappeared on us now.

“They won’t,” he assures me. “I sewed it into her clothes. She knows not to wash that shirt and to keep it with her at all times.”

I nod, somewhat reassured. For some reason, the thought of not knowing where she is at any given time doesn’t sit well with me. I step away and place my hands at the back of my head like a cushion, wondering how we came to be standing here in this hospital. How we even came to be in this predicament.

“I have to call Caleph,” I tell him. He gives me a short nod and watches as I walk away to speak with my best friend.

“I really didn’t want to bother you with this,” I say, after I’ve laid out all the details for him. How we came to be at the same bar with Luna and her friend. How she was accosted outside the bar and her harasser shot. Her getting in the car with us to get away from her father’s men. And then the phone call that ended it all and everything that came afterward.

“So you have no idea where Castillo has gone?” he asks. When what he really wants to know is how we could’ve been so close yet let him get away.

“We don’t know where he is, but wecanknow.”

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