Page 19 of Rear View
The nurse poked her head in. She smiled broadly as her gaze danced between us, ultimately landing on mine.“You’re with me.” Xavier steered me out to meet her and she moved in, taking me from him. “No unnecessary people past this point, I’m afraid. You’ll have to return to the waiting room.”
The incline of his head was stiff.
My gaze met his again, a heavy blush heating my cheeks when I breathed, “Thank you, Xavier.”
He offered me an easy wink. “See ya soon, Ryah.”
A yearning anticipation fluttered in my chest. Guiding me away, the nurse led me down the hall, and the last thing I saw before I disappeared around the corner was Xavier watching me go.
Chapter Four
Xavier
I fuckin’ hated hospitals.Spent too much time in them growing up. Before I was big enough to do anything about my father.
Between the fluorescent lights, the weird cross-scent of panic and chemical cleaners and the dull-ass walls, the place was depressing as hell. They could at least try and cheer the space up a bit. Add some color. Trick the brain into feeling anything else—if that was even a thing.
I’d been there a couple hours before Zoya arrived. She stood across the waiting area, just inside the entrance, watching the lot like she was looking for someone, side-eyeing me every few minutes as she made call after call.
I sat forward, elbows on my knees, attention on the nurses’ station, listening for any word on Ryah.
My phone buzzed and I considered ignoring it but took the thing out anyway. My brows pulled together.Castillo?
The name used to burn me. No surprise there, seeing as Juan Castillo was the Crown attorney that’d sent my ass to juvie for almost two years, till I turned eighteen.
I could still picture the cold-ass interrogation room after I’d been hauled in by the cops and charged. Still seehis fancy pin-striped suit, puffed-out chest and greasy coal-black hair from that night, ’cause he’d looked every bit the slick prick I’d thought he was.
He hadn’t bought that I framed my old man alone. Was pissed as a bull when I’d turned down his offer of “time served” if I’d just rat out my accomplices. But nothing could’ve made me roll over on Alec or Sean. Without them, I’d have been stuck in Dad’s house, under his fist, and so would Ma. The way I saw it, my situation had been a lateral move. But hers? She’d been free—and not the dead kind like Fallon.
Eventually, though, stuff had gone sideways.
Castillo twisted his pen between his thick fingers. “Are you being threatened to stay quiet, Xavier? If so, the system can protect you—”
“Protect me?” I scoffed. “System’s not built to protect me. It’s built to protect criminals like my father.”
“Criminals?” Castillo cocked his head. “So, people like you?”
“Nah.” I shook my head. “I was just tryin’ my hand at your job, serving up some justice, yeah.”
His eyes narrowed. “You took the law into your own hands.”
My laugh was dark as hell as I rolled my shoulders. “The law don’t give a shit about me or my ma, Castillo. If you were really tryin’ to help, you’d have thrown my dad’s ass in jail instead of leaving it to his fuckin’ kid to handle.” I speared him with my stare as his own fell to his case files. “So, don’t get this twisted. We ain’t here ’cause of what I did. We’re here ’cause of what youdidn’t.”
My phone rang again, jerking me back to the present. Shit between Castillo and me had changed since then. A lot.
“Hey,” I answered, shoulders bunching as I braced myself for whatever he needed to say.
“Xavier,” Castillo said. “Can you talk?”
“Yeah.” I stretched my neck and eyed the nurses’ station again. “What’s up?”
“Your father’s parole hearing is next month.”
I turned to stone. Stopped breathing. My next words were forced through my clenched jaw. “The fuck, Castillo?”
“I know. This one’s out of my hands.”
“Aren’t I supposed to be contacted by the system or somethin’?”
