Page 30 of Blood and Sand

“What do you expect me to say, DeeDee?” I ran my hand down my face. “I’m an asshole. You know it, and so do I. I disregarded your needs and your dreams for what I wanted.”

She stared at me like I’d grown another head, which made me feel even more shitty about the person I’d been back then. I was an asshole. Had taken her for granted. I hadn’t seen it until she was gone, but I recognized it now. I was lost without her.

I’m still lost without her.

“When I got those papers,” I continued, hoping to make her understand the headspace I’d been in back then, “you made it perfectly clear you wanted that job. I thought I had no right to interfere with your career. You never interfered in mine, and for the first time in our relationship, I needed to put you first.”

“I was willing to work something out, Rey. You were my husband. And that still doesn’t explain why you immediately started fucking Chanel since, according to you, you still loved me. That’s not love, Rey.”

My brows furrowed. “Yes, I started fucking Chanel, but almost a year later. I always thought we still had a chance, then as more time passed, I didn’t know anymore. You were moving on with your life with that asshole.”

“Rey, Aaron is a great guy.”

I threw up my hand. “I know I have no right to be angry, but you looked so happy without me. You looked so happy with him, and it pissed me the fuck off.”

“And Chanel let me know how happy you were without me, too.” She rolled her eyes.

“I don’t know what you heard or who you heard it from, but Chanel isn’t as important to me as you’re making her out to be. She’s not even the only woman I’ve fucked since we split!”

She rolled her eyes again. “I don’t need to hear the details of your sex life, Rey.”

A knock sounded at the door before I could respond, causing both of us to groan. Chanel was keeping us separated. She shouldn’t be, but she was. We were going to have to tackle that problem in order to take the next step.

I walked to the door and yanked it open. “Yes?”

“Detective, I’m sorry to interrupt, but we’re running out of time. I need to make sure all the communications are working,” the tech guy said.

“Okay, we’ll be out in a minute.”

He gave a curt nod and walked back down the hallway. I shut the door and faced Dana. “Are you sure about this?”

“I can’t let him hurt anyone else, Rey.”

I walked toward her and stopped inches in front of her.

“Not because of me,” she said.

I grabbed her arms, pulling her up from the bed. “If anything seems out of the ordinary, you get out of there, you hear me? We’ll find Delaney another way.”

“I love you, Rey.”

She ignored my comment, but I wouldn’t call her on it. Dana would do whatever she could to save Delaney, even if that meant sacrificing herself, but I wouldn’t let anything happen to her. I refused to lose her again.

“I love you too, sweetheart.”

I kissed her lips and fought the urge to deepen it. I forced myself to pull back. Even though it felt like a goodbye, I wouldn’t let it be. I would die to protect her. Even if it was my last day on this earth, it wouldn’t be hers.

Chapter eleven

Dr. Dana LaCroix

Immediately,achillrandown my spine. The hairs on the back of my neck and arms stood on end. He was here, hiding, waiting amongst the weekend crowd. I shook off the unnerving feeling and slid onto the only empty stool at the worn, wooden L-shaped bar ofLucky’s Dive.

The same dusty, red and white, saucer-shaped hanging lights dimly lit the smoke-filled bar. I hadn’t been here in years, and nothing had really changed. The same vintage Coca-Cola sign Rey had picked up at an estate sale in Charlotte then gave to Lucky still hung on the wood wall beside the hallway leading to the stock room, Lucky’s office, and the bathrooms. The same photo of Lucky, Rey, and blues legend, Buddy Guy that I had taken for Lucky’s seventy-fifth birthday still hung proudly behind the bar, among others.

While Lucky, the previous owner, had passed away a year before I left town, it remained the same. The only thing missing was Lucky’s voice crooning old tunes from a blues legend he’d met at one time or another in his life. I used to love listening to his stories whenever Rey and I stopped by.

Hidden among the bald cypress forests covered in Spanish moss,Lucky’s Divesat at the end of a long dirt road, right off one of Louisiana’s many bayous in the middle of nowhere. If you weren’t a local, you’d never be able to find the place, even if someone gave you directions. That was why it wasn’t a place that tourists frequented unless they came with a local. And it couldn’t be just any local, but someone born and raised here.

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