Page 18 of Waiting For A Girl Like You
The second woman, armed with a machete, had more fight in her. But, in the end, the manchineel fruit robbed the woman of strength. Izzy said the girl cried as she died, begging for help. Not knowing what else to do, and with the police handling the two that had broken in, Izzy sat on the ground and held her, whispering comforting words as the young woman took her final breaths.
“Thank you, Izzy,” Samuel replied. “If you don’t mind.”
“I’ll go with you.” Abe rolled up, looking just as tired as everyone else. “I don’t need to see or hear Toby. It’ll just piss me off.”
Abe wasn’t one to hold on to anger, but after the attack, something had shifted in him. He prowled around Haven night and day, watching through the windows like the women might come again.
Izzy and Abe left, re-engaging the media room’s security door behind them. Holden entered just as the lights dimmed, and the security feeds showing all the rooms in the house flicked off the movie screen and out onto various flat screens mounted on the walls. The media room was now a full-blown command center, with Rowan as its captain.
“You good?” Holden asked Samuel as they took their seats at one of the folding tables arranged in a U-shape. “We could hear Toby screaming through the walls.”
The replay of Toby’s interview fired up on the movie screen, opening with him shackled and shuffling his way to the interview table in chains.
“Yeah, I’m good. He looks like shit,” Samuel answered, watching intently as Toby settled into his seat on the playback. “At least I know he’s living in pain.”
Jamison sat with them, watching the screen with Samuel as the others found their places. To her, Toby looked fine, even making jokes with the guards. “He doesn’t look in pain to me.”
Samuel smirked. “Watch his eyes when they tell him who’s on the call.”
Sure enough, when one of the guards informed Toby who was on the other side of the camera, his arrogance waned. The smile on his lips vanished, and what looked like tears gathered in his eyes.
“I didn’t notice that before,” Jamison murmured.
“Adrenaline makes you miss things,” Liam said, coming over to kneel beside her. “You did great in there.”
She didn’t feel like she had done great. She’d felt sick the entire time, and when Liam slipped the ring on her finger, she’d nearly blacked out. It was hers. Theirs. The one he proposed with on a rainy day in Paris. It had been his first time in the city, and Liam, being Liam, had wanted to wander around on foot to get his bearings. During their little walking adventure, they passed an antique shop not far from the Champs-Élysées, and he’d swept her inside when something in the display window caught his eye.
That something had been a ring.
As they looked around the shop, Liam snuck off to purchase the ring while she was distracted by a pair of vintage Chanel boots. His plan had been to ask her on their last day in Paris, but he was so excited he couldn’twait and dropped to one knee later that afternoon while they toured the Luxembourg Gardens.
Even when she ended things, Jamison always kept the ring with her. She wore it around her apartment when no one was watching, and at work, she kept it tucked away in her purse or on a necklace.
Of course, she had packed it when it was time to come home. Liam must have gone rummaging through her bags, knowing her as he did, and found it. Now that it was on her finger again, it wasn’t coming off. Ever. If she had to do the proposing this time, she would, and she would make it great. A moment that would knock his socks off and show him how much he meant to her.
But right now, she couldn’t focus on life or the future. That would come later when the world wasn’t against them.
“It’s time to get started,” Liam said, a spark of excitement in his eyes. “This lead could be it. We might finally get some progress.”
Progress was something they sorely needed. “Well, get up there and explain,” Jamison said. “I didn’t catch half of what happened in there.”
Liam gave her thigh a squeeze before moving to the center of the room, where Will was standing off to the side, flipping through a file.
“You want to take the lead, or me?” Liam asked his father as a hush fell over everyone.
“Go ahead,” Will mumbled, shuffling through the batch of papers. “I’m working on something.”
Stepping forward, Liam nodded at Klausen and the unfamiliar agent who had joined in on the call. There hadn’t been enough time for formal introductions before Toby’s feed went live, but Jamison thought she heard Will call the new arrival Agent Anderson. “That was productive. Thanks to the Bureau for making that call happen. I know it wasn’t easy.”
Klausen inclined his head. “It’s always interesting joining a Fairweather family reunion.”
Normally, Jamison would want to bite his head off for that remark, but Klausen was growing on her. He and his team were working their asses off to help, and she was learning not to snarl at every sarcastic remark that came out of his mouth.
“But the thanks should go to my colleague,” Klausen continued. “Without Agent Anderson, that call wouldn’t have been possible.”
“You owe me one, Will.” Anderson fixed Liam’s father with a stare. “Actually, you owe me two if we count that crap that went down ten years ago.”
Will continued reading. “The crap that went down ten years ago was a draw, but this,” he looked up, waving the paperwork, “thisI owe you for.”
