Page 109 of Reaper
Adriana
Outside Murphy’s bar, I press a button on my phone and raise to my ear. It rings once — always just once — before a sharp, professional voice answers the phone.
“Ruiz. Why are you calling me at two in the morning?”
I grit my teeth to attain some semblance of control over the tidal wave of feelings that seem to surge through me with shocking regularity ever since I saw that news report on the TV — despair, anger, love, heartache, a fervent need to see Reaper even just once more to talk to him, even if that talk ends in nothing more than another ‘Fuck you, and I hope you die.’
Even if things end between us for good, if I can save his life from this hell he’s thrown himself into for the sake of an old woman he hardly knows, I can walk away feeling like maybe, years from now, I’ll have closure.
“I need a favor.”
“Are you drunk?”
“What makes you say that?”
“It’s two in the morning, and you said ‘I need a favor’ all as one word.”
“Fuck.” I pause, embarrassment at drunk-dialing a former mentor and a now-Assistant Special Agent in Charge turning my tongue to stone.
“What’s this about, Ruiz?”
I imagine a cup of coffee in my hand, take a sobering mental sip, and then imagine an ice-cold shower cascading over my body. “I. Need. A. Favor.”
“Now that you’re talking like a sober person with a speech impediment, what favor do you need?”
“Information.”
“What kind of information?”
“Ruslan Volkov,” I say. My voice is steadier. Maybe clearer. Vengeance, anger, love, hate, pain all burn the alcohol coursing through my blood, giving me a clarity of rageful purpose.
“What the fuck are you involved in?”
“You don’t need to know. But I need to know where his hideouts are and where he would take a high-value prisoner to be tortured.”
“Jesus fucking Christ.”
“Reynolds, I need this information.”
“And I don’t need this aggravation.”
“Just like I don’t need to keep that secret you asked me to keep, about what you and Agent Frank Harrison did together in Dallas when your wife thought you were just away at a convention.”
Silence follows. I hold my tongue between my teeth to keep it still and to keep my teeth from chattering in drunken, furious fear. The Marine, who has been watching me silent this whole time, widens his eyes to the size of dinner plates and forms his lips into the shape of an ‘o.’
“Is this really the road you want to go down, Ruiz?”
“Do you think I’d be calling you drunk and really fucking desperate at this early in the morning if I were on a road I wanted to be going down? No. Fuck no. But I can’t turn around, and I can’t walk away. I have to keep going forward until I…”
Until I what? Save the man I might still love? Die? Get close enough to see his corpse and realize that maybe I’m better offwith him dead? I have no fucking clue where this road leads or what I even really want, except that I know I have to follow it and I’ll figure the rest out when I get there.
There’s the sound of shuffling, then a grunt as Reynolds slides out of bed. “The Bureau has someone inside Volkov’s operation. Give me a second to get to the files.” The sound of a keyboard clacking and muttered cursing fills my ears. I hear a few muted, impolite things about me that would’ve bothered me if I still had a career in law enforcement, but now, I simply shrug off as the cost of saving someone’s life. “Got it. You have a pen?”
“Do I sound like someone who’s in the frame of mind where they have a pen? No, I have a gun, backup, and that’s fucking it. Text me the address.” I pause, then add, “Please.”
He sighs. “Incoming. Do I need to remind you to follow protocol after this conversation?”
“You mean destroy all evidence that we talked? I might be drunk and ready to die, Reynolds, but I’m not a fucking idiot.”
