Page 73 of The Layover

She looked between us, brow furrowed. “I swear to Christ I don’t know where she is. I don’t fucking want her. I’m only here for Raul’s family. Their connections. I need investors for my next film.”

“What?” Joystick’s shout matched my own disbelief.

The answer made me sick, but it was the most real thing I’d heard come out of her mouth since she showed up in our lives again. “You’re fucking disgusting.” I spat. “If you come near any of us ever again…” I left the threat to hang in the air and turned away. Waste of fucking time.

“How could you say that about your own child?” Joystick’s furious question faded behind me as I walked down the hotel room hallway.

I needed to get back to the restaurant. My phone was in my hand to call Raul when Joystick caught up to me.

“I had no idea,” he said.

“I don’t care.” There were more important things to worry about.

“Let me help look for her.”

I couldn’t turn that down. The more people searching the better. “Suit yourself.”

I called Raul to tell him I hadn’t had any luck, and that I was on my way back. My heart sank to hear him say they hadn’t found anything either.

Joystick caught a ride with me, and was blissfully silent the entire time. Regardless of his real reasons for doing this, I was grateful for the help, and at the same time might snap if he said anything wrong.

When we reached the church, I had to argue with the police for a few minutes, and wait for them to go get Raul, before they let me in. Carly’s friends had come back while I was gone. Daria was sitting with Harmony, and Raul told me everyone else was out searching.

Raul was updating me, and his stress and frustration radiated and amplified my own.

“Mommy.” Harmony’s yell startled us. She was pulling on Daria’s sleeve.

Daria turned to her. “What, hon?” Even her tension was audible.

All these people we didn’t know, here in our time of crisis. I’d be grateful for them when it was over.

“He’s like the man Eloise went with.” Harmony pointed at Joystick.

He held up his hands. “I didn’t take her. I swear.”

“His tattoos, right?” Raul asked.

Harmony shook her head rapidly. “No. It wasn’t him. It was someone like him. Like his shirt, with all the pictures on it. But all the way down his arms.”

Realization spread through me, and Carly’s mutters of, “No. No, no, no,” reinforced the revelation.

I looked at her. “Would he?”

“Kidnap a little girl? I wish I could say no, but…”

I grabbed her arm. “Let’s go.”

“Shouldn’t you tell the police?” Joystick’s question hit my back.

Raul said something to him, but Carly and I were too far away to hear it. I wasn’t waiting for anyone. I had to know now. And if we did find Eloise with Curtis, odds were high that he wasn’t walking out of there.

26

Carly

If Curtis had touched a single hair on Eloise’s head, I’d hold him down while Diego beat him, I didn’t care how much bigger than me Curtis was.

“His office or his hotel?” Diego asked as we climbed into his car.

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