Page 78 of Untamed

“Lesley this. Lesley that. I’m sick of hearing about her! She’s nothing!”

“She’s everything to me!”

Lesley smacked her hand over her mouth to cover her gasp.

“What did you just say?” Victoria was icy.

“I mean it. She is who I choose to have in my life. You’re not.” There was some shuffling, and the sound of footsteps moving away. “Go away, Victoria. Just, go away. We’re done. There’s nothing left, hasn’t been for a long time. You’re in violation of the no contact order.” The steps continued, pausing at the door.

“Fuck you!” Victoria shrieked. She also turned and moved.

As Lesley turned the corner, she saw Victoria being detained by two of the local police officers. She ducked back until they’d left out the opposite door and snuck around to Oliver’s car and jumped in.

As he drove away, he saw the squad cars in the rearview mirror. “Huh. Must be lunchtime for the local force, too.”

Lesley stared out the window. “Yeah. Must be,” she muttered.

As soon as he was in his car, Antony pulled out his phone. He’d had to fight the urge to look when he heard Lesley’s ringtone.

I’m sorry. I miss you.

His heart lifted, save for a small bit of hurt he tamped down. He was overjoyed to hear from her, but damnit, her timing sucked. He put the phone down and drove. The response was going to wait. He had to get his own shit together before he could do this.

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

On his way back onto post, Antony stopped off at a small storage unit he kept. One of his old Corcoran boot boxes sat just inside the door of the four-foot by six-foot room. He grabbed it, scanned the few other boxes in the area, then left.

After work, he sat down at his desk with a sandwich, and opened the box. Inside were all the papers that Vicky had left behind. He’d scooped all the crap from her old desk into the box and sealed it without a second glance. It was mostly garbage—bills she’d run up, utilities, receipts. Why he’d kept all this crap, he didn’t remember. He figured he’d never see her again—hadn’t planned on ever seeing her again after he left Texas, but as he had learned from investigating, keeping the seemingly meaningless shit sometimes paid off.

He flipped through a couple of papers and stopped when he got to a red envelope. Her name was on the front. In someone else’s writing.

As he slid the card out, a couple of items fell onto the desk. One was a string of photos from a booth at Sea World. Vicky and some guy, all over each other in each of the shots. The man’s hair was short, not Army short, but close. He flipped the picture over. The date was printed on the back.

One week before she walked out on him. He was still in the hospital.

The second picture was spicy. He squinted at the background. His apartment. He raised his eyebrows at that and turned it over. Same date.

She’d been cheating for his entire deployment, and probably any other time he was out of town, which was a lot. None of this was a shock. It still sucked to see that she’d cared so little while he was lying in a hospital bed a couple of hours down the road while she was off screwing and having a good time. Some of the old anger threatened to bubble up, and he breathed it out. She was nothing but someone he once knew and going through this bullshit would help put her back in that space.

Antony shoved everything back into the envelope and tossed it aside. The next piece of paper in the pile caught his attention.

Military orders.

He flipped them open and within a few seconds, he had all the information he needed. Vicky’s lover was an Airman, stationed in Phoenix. Well, that explained how she ended up in Arizona, but not how she found him.

A quick phone call later, and he had a duty number. It was right around quitting time for most people, but he gave it a chance and dialed. It rang twice and someone answered with an unintelligible string of acronyms.

“Is Jonathan Abbott available?” he asked.

“Who’s asking?”

“Antony Ramos.”

Silence, then finally, a heavy sigh. “This is Jonathan.” A pause. “Did Vicky tell you how to find me?”

“No. You did when you gave her a copy of your orders in Texas. She left them in my old apartment.”

“Look, man, I’m sorry for all—”

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