Page 46 of Reacher
“Exactly. Right there with you, brother. The same stuff that bastard used when he raped her, and they use it like a fucking sex aid now.”
He started pacing, his hands dragging through his hair.
“That’s a level of fucked up that I didn’t see coming, especially from Ry. So she took it for them?”
I nodded again. “And then she sat with me, and fucking lied about it. Well… pretended she knew nothing about what was going on. Sucked my dick with nothing but lies in her mouth.”
He blinked, his lips twitching at me.
“You know, if you’re going to start doing the poetic thing, you might want to wait until you can think straight, because that…yeah,moving on, because that just got weird… did you ask her about it after?”
I turned and grabbed the door handle, striding from the room. I nodded at the prospect waiting outside, so that he knew to get on with clean-up, and then I kept walking.
“Don’t just fucking run from me, brother. We need to talk this through. You know we have to find her, right?”
I stopped, turning to glare at him.
“She’ll have gone to that flat of Tori’s. It’s not like we can’t just go grab her any time we want. There’s no rush.” I reached into the front pocket on my cut, and held up the key to prove my statement.
“We can even just let ourselves in. This is the key right here.”
He opened his mouth, just as my mistake hit my bleary consciousness.
“Fuck.”
“Yeah… unless she had a spare, you made sure she couldn’t even go and hide there.”
“Jesus fuck.” I shoved it back in my pocket.
Stitch grabbed my shoulder.
“Go freshen up. Get more coffee. I’ll get a couple of the guys to start looking. We’ll start at Tori’s, just in case she broke in. I’ll also speak to Tori, in case there’s anywhere else she knows of that she might have gone.”
I went back to my room, which was too fucking empty without her, the loneliness punching me in the face as I entered. I closed the door and leaned back against it. Just twelve hours or so ago, I was banging my old lady against this very door, and now I’m alone again. And maybe that was what I deserved. I just killed a man with my bare hands. I mean, we all took a piece of him, but the finishing? That was mine, and it hadn’t soothed my soul like I’d hoped it would.
I went and showered again, watching the water run red, then pink, until the blood was cleansed from my hands, face, and hair. Jesus. I slumped against the tiled wall, missing her like I missed my youth. She was supposed to be my future.
By the time I was finished in the shower, and went back into my bedroom, with just a towel around my waist, I noticed I wasn’t alone.
Stitch was sitting at my dining table, coffee in hand.
“Yours is getting cold, man.”
I nodded, grabbing some clothes, and dressing quickly. I joined him at the table, sitting down heavily.
“So?”
He leaned back, resting both hands on the table surface.
“Good news or bad news first?”
Jesus. “There’s good news?”
His face dropped and he shook his head.
“No. There really fucking isn’t. First up, Tori has no idea where Alicia went. She’s heard from her, and she’s sent her money, which means she’s no longer too broke to leave town.”
“Shit. Got someone watching the bus station?”
