“We’ll find her, Kash, I swear,” Mason choked out, and my head snapped back up to find him looking at me. “I swear to God we’ll find her before they can do anything else to her.”
“She’s alive?” I whispered, and hope surged through me before his words sank in. “What happened?”
“You’re not supposed to know anything, you’re supposed to stay completely separated from the case.”
“I don’t give a—”
“But if the roles were reversed, I would hate you for not telling me.” With one hand he wiped the wetness away from his eyes as the other reached over to his desk to grab something, before standing and walking slowly to me. Dropping to his knees, he handed over a folder and I hesitantly grabbed for it.
Flipping the top open, I pulled out the blown-up photograph and swallowed back bile before the tears started to fall down my face. An anguished cry burst from my lips and my hands gripped my hair after I dropped the folder and paper to the ground.
Mason put a hand on my shoulder, and spoke softly. “They called, they didn’t even ask if there was progress . . . they already knew there wasn’t any. They have to be in contact with Juarez or one of the guys, so the department is checking every call and visitor they’ve had. You could—” He paused, and the hand that was gripping my shoulder began shaking. “You could hear her screaming in the background, Kash, and they said they’d call back in another two days. This picture was sent an hour later. They had our techs working on it, trying to track it through the server, but these guys know what they’re doing. It just kept coming to a dead end.”
Another tortured cry left me, and I brought my knees to my chest as my head shook back and forth. “God, Rachel, I’m so sorry—I’m so damn sorry. We have to find her, Mase.”
The picture was burned into my mind, so much that even after I closed my eyes, it was still all I could see. Three of Rachel’s severed fingers. One still had the engagement ring that I’d put on it a few months before. The bright purple color she always wore on her nails a dead giveaway that they were, indeed, her fingers.
“We will, I swear we will. Byson is questioning Juarez again—”
I didn’t wait for him to say anything else. I pushed him back and scrambled to my feet, already running toward the interview rooms.
Mason barked out my name, but I kept going. I passed the first two open rooms, and just as I was approaching the third door, it opened and Byson stepped out, looking down at his notepad.
Hearing my approach, his head snapped up, and his eyes widened. “Ryan! What the hell—”
Shoving past him, I kicked the closing door back open before slamming it shut and locking it, and came face-to-face with Juarez for the first time in almost a year.
“What a pleasant surprise,” he sneered as I approached him.
“Where is she?” Slamming my hands down on the table, I leaned over it as I yelled, “Tell me!”
“You expect me to know what you’re talking about?”
I would have thrown the table if it weren’t bolted down to the floor. Rounding it, I went over to where Juarez was sitting and kicked his chair back into the wall.
“Don’t fuck with me, Juarez!” Stalking over to him, I gripped the arms of the chair he was cuffed to and leaned in so my face was directly in front of his. “Tell me where my goddamn fiancée is!”
His only answer was a sardonic smile.
“Tell me or I swear to God I will make your death slow and painful,” I growled.
“You mean like Rachel’s?” Juarez whispered.
I punched him, and grabbed the collar of his gray prison shirt to bring him closer to me. “I will end you, you son of a bitch! Where the fuck is she?” I was so far gone—my mind only on finding Rachel and making every one of the sick bastards involved in her kidnapping pay for what they’d done to her—that I didn’t even register what the yelling outside the room was about until I was being dragged away from Juarez.
“Kash, calm down,” Mason grunted as I struggled to get away from him and Byson as they pulled me back.
“Tell me where she is!”
Another mocking smile crossed Juarez’s face, and my frustrated roar filled the room.
“I will make you pay for everything that has happened to her!”
“Enough!” Mason yelled as they threw me out of the room.
I turned to go back in, but Mason slammed me against the wall and restrained me by pinning my arms behind my back.
“Kash, don’t make me put cuffs on you,” he said low. “You have got to calm down. I know you’re upset, man, I know. But you’re ruining your career, and making it worse for Rachel by doing this.”
“He knows where she is,” I gritted out, the adrenaline quickly leaving my body. “He fucking knows, Mase. He said her name!”
“Ryan! Gates!”
I turned, and my body sagged against the wall when I saw Chief standing there.
“My office. Now.”
Mason swore under his breath as he pulled me from the wall and kept my arms behind my back as he walked us toward Chief’s office. Byson was already waiting for us in there, and when Chief sat down at his desk, I knew I was about to lose my job.
WALKING SLOWLY, like I was expecting a bomb to go off if I made any noise, I stepped into the bedroom that just ten days ago had been destroyed. That just ten days ago had had a message about why they’d taken Rachel on one of the walls. That just ten days ago was considered a crime scene and had been full of officers. That just ten days ago Rachel had been taken from.
I hadn’t been in here since that day, but since then Maddie, and Mason, and my mom had come in to clean the disaster that had been left over, and paint the wall. The TV was gone—I hadn’t seen a need to replace it, since I hadn’t wanted to come back here—and so were the mirror and lamps; but other than that, there weren’t any signs that anything had ever happened.
Except one.
Rachel was still fucking gone.
The department hadn’t gotten any closer to finding her, and even though Chief had been considerate enough to give me only unpaid time off for the rest of the week . . . I was still doing things every day that were sure to get me fired at the very least. I just made sure that everything was away from the department, and that no one other than Mason knew what I was up to.
Although he had strict orders not to, Mason had kept me updated on everything about the case, and I would always be thankful to him for that. But I wasn’t sure how much more I could take.
It’d been ten days and already I felt like I was dying from what I had seen and heard. I didn’t know how Rachel was still pushing through the torture we’d seen her go through. I didn’t know how she was even still alive. And when I got her back—because I was getting her back—I didn’t know what would be left of her fiery spirit I’d fallen in love with.
Putting Trip down on the floor, I watched him take off for the bathroom and followed him into the master closet. He went right to the fake wall and began crying, and for some stupid reason, something dangerously close to hope actually sprang up in me. I tentatively reached out toward the wall, a harsh huff escaping my chest when my fingers were just inches away, and I paused.
I’m fucking crazy. She’s not going to be in there.
Shaking my head, I reached out to grab it, and yanked it back. Trip ran in, and my hand fisted around the thin material as the worst type of disappointment washed away any form of hope I may have had.