Page 49 of The Fix
“Thanks, Ginger. By the way, your store wasn’t listed online.”
“We just opened last month. My dad’s a one-man show, and he hasn’t gotten around to online stuff. We’re almost exclusively a local business, so I guess he hasn’t made it a priority.” She shrugged. “He only got the sign up a week ago.”
“Well, thanks again,” Cami said, and they both turned.
When they’d stepped back out onto the street, Cami sighed. “I hate that we have to wait until tomorrow morning. And there are several places to purchase comics within half an hour or so.” They got in the car, and Rex checked the time. Businesses would be closing soon.
“This’ll be our first stop in the morning,” he said. She sat there, bouncing her knee and frowning, obviously as frustrated as him. He reached over and laid his hand on top of hers where it rested on the console, and she turned toward him. “The owner will be in at seven thirty. If he confirms that his shop sold those comics, then we’ll know for sure we’re close, and we’ll send the location to Joaquin. Every bit of information he has to work with, the better.” A drone would help, and he wondered if there was a chance of getting one of those somewhere around here. Then again, there were thousands of cabins in the area, and they might not be able to see bars from the air anyway.
Plus, there was red tape regarding drones, and rules on wildlife preserves too. They just didn’t have time for all of that.
She turned her hand over and laced her fingers with his. “Okay.” She met his eyes, appearing to take comfort from his steady gaze. And her trust increased his resolve as well.
He glanced at Cyrus and dropped her hand. “Shit, the laptop’s dead.”Fuck.He blew out a breath. Cyrus had just lain down before they’d entered the bookstore, and so he trusted he was fine. “Let’s go grab something to eat and bring it back to the house and power yourlaptop. We’ll take turns staying with him tonight. We can purchase a car charger in the morning, so we don’t have to worry about staying out as long as we need to.”
Rex didn’t think the man guarding Cyrus would be back before tomorrow morning with the pancakes, and hopefully the others weren’t arriving until late afternoon because every minute counted if they were going to rescue Cyrus.
Chapter Thirty
Cami lifted her feet onto the railing as she tucked her sweater around her. The day had been sunny and warm, but, true to Northern California, the night temperature had quickly dropped. Rex had lit a fire in the gas firepit on the deck next to where she was sitting, and the warmth from that and the sweater ensured she was nice and cozy, even in the chilly air.
She glanced at the laptop on the small table next to her and saw that Cyrus was still sleeping. Her heart squeezed, and she could barely consider the possibility that by morning, she might be staring at an empty room, no earthly clue where he’d been taken.
She wanted to speed through the hours until morning, when they could again continue their search for businesses that might tell them where to begin hunting for the cabin with bars on the window.
Without a definitive starting point, they’d most likely be spinning their wheels and wasting time. Time that Cyrus didn’t have.
They’ll be here sooner than we thought. Tomorrow afternoon.
The little boy turned over in his sleep, tucking his hands between his knees and curling into a ball. Moonlight through the window streamed over his face, and a lump formed in her throat at how beautiful he was. How innocent looking and small. And she massaged the pain that had been just under the skin of her chest ever since she’d first looked upon him over the screen of her laptop, the pain that felt like a fishhook had impaled her heart, some powerful force reeling her toward an unknown end.
Watching him brought up her own trauma, her memories of being bound and voiceless. Cami reached out and ran a finger over his sleeping cheek.I’m with you,she told him silently.I’m here.
She gazed up at the moon, knowing it was the same one he’d see if he woke and looked out his own window. And it caused that hook to pull tight.
Rex came out a few minutes later and handed her a hot cup of tea. “I’d love to offer you a glass of wine,” he said. “But we should stay sharp.”
She smiled as she accepted the warm mug. “This is perfect. Thank you.” They’d stopped and picked up sandwiches earlier and eaten them at the island while they made a list of stores and restaurants to visit after the bookstore first thing in the morning. She prayed they’d hit gold with the owner, but if they didn’t, they needed to be prepared. They couldn’t waste a moment.
Rex sat down in the chair on the other side of the small firepit and kicked his legs up on the rail too. For several moments they simply stared out at the slip of ocean they could see through a break in the trees, the moonlight causing the water to glimmer as it swelled and crashed below. And though she couldn’t exactly enjoy the beauty of her surroundings, she did recognize the majesty. She felt Rex’s gaze on her before she turned her head. “Cami,” he started, “if we ... if we’re not able to find Cyrus in time, I want you to be prepared for that.”
Her heart dipped. She didn’t want to imagine that scenario. “But your friend, he’s working on it. And we have a good lead for tomorrow morning. And then hopefully most of the day.”
“Yes,” Rex agreed. “But we need a plan B too. We’ll find that cabin, I know we will. But if it’s ... after the fact, then we’ll still find him. We’ll track down the people who are doing this, and we will find your son.”
She took a sip of the hot tea to melt away whatever was halting her breath. Her gratitude was so all-encompassing that she hardly knew what to say. How was this man, whom she’d once wronged, unselfishly offering her everything he had to give? And he’d barely hesitated to doso. Rex Lowe was good, and he was kind, and she’d felt it that day at Hollis’s pool party so long ago, when they’d practically been kids and only spoken for a few minutes, and she’d beenright.
It’d been the first real thing she’d felt in a long time of pretending—of playing a part to be accepted by others—and she’d recognized it for what it was. An honest connection. An indescribable pull. And what if ... what if ...
Because that pull, it was still there, even if this wasn’t the time to do anything about it. And even if a pull like that terrified her because of what she’d experienced. She hadn’t been with anyone sexually since ... Hollis. She’d dated here and there in the last eleven years, but whenever things got remotely physical, she’d begin to drift, like she’d done withhim. In the back of her mind, she knew she wouldn’t feel completely healed until she managed to be present in her skin. And she still wasn’t sure what that would take.
She reached her hand out behind the glowing embers, and he reached back, taking her hand in his. “How do I thank you?” she asked.
Even in the dim light, she saw his eyes flare, and she saw the way he immediately shut whatever thought down that had caused his bodily reaction, and she knew he felt a pull toward her as well. He looked away, back out to the sparkling waves, so distant they could barely hear the roar. “Do you remember that day at Hollis’s pool party when we first spoke?” He looked back at her, his lips tipping, his expression slightly shy and reminding her of the boy he’d once been.
“Of course I do.” She didn’t mention that she’d just been thinking about that and wondering if things had gone differently ... how maybe ... but, well, what was the use of maybes when that time was so long gone?
He smiled again, and this one was sort of secretive, and it made her smile back. He let go of her hand and brushed his hair back. “I used to often wonder what was going through your mind,” he said, and it sounded like a confession. “But the time I want to ask about is that day at Hollis’s pool. Right before you saw me, you were staring off at thetrees, and you had this look on your face ... Is there any chance you remember what you were thinking? Because I wondered about that, my whole walk home, and I never got the answer.”
