Page 69 of Love Me Carefully
“He was in there, I know he was. I heard him through those headphones. I heard him talking to my mother. I know he’s in there.” Terrell was getting antsy, and Leah wondered what he was about to do.
When the side door to the van slid open and Jeff stepped in, she looked at him and prayed he’d have an answer that would keep Terrell from going off.
“Good news,” he said sliding into the back seat of the van. “We got our guys.”
“Where’s Donald?” Terrell questioned.
“He’s in the hotel,” Jeff replied.
“Why didn’t you bring him out?”
“Why should we?”
“I don’t understand, I thought you went in to make arrests,” Leah questioned.
In the distance they heard a siren. Leah looked out the window to see an ambulance approaching. Terrell never bothered to take his eyes off Jeff.
“He was one of them. He was with the guy that night when those men were shot in the alley. Why didn’t you arrest him?” Terrell yelled.
“Terrell, there’s a lot that you don’t understand,” Jeff began.
“Then maybe you should explain it to me.”
“It’s not my place. You can go on into the hotel. Your mother is in room 417.”
“I want to know what the hell is going on!” Terrell roared.
With a steadying hand to his shoulder, Leah looked away from the agent. “Terrell, why don’t we just go in and make sure your mother’s okay.” She tried to nudge him out of the van.
“No, I want him to tell me what’s going on. Why isn’t Donald being arrested? Why is he still in there with my mother?”
“Let’s just go in and find out for ourselves.” Leah leaned over him and pressed the button that opened the side door.
By the time they stepped out of the van two ambulances had pulled in front of the hotel, and paramedics ran through the revolving doors. People streamed out of the hotel in a state of panic as Jamaican authorities tried to hold the assembling crowd back.
Terrell’s heart skipped a beat when he saw the ambulances parked in front of the hotel, and he started across the street. Leah trailed behind him, praying Rosie was all right. Agent Blum stood at the front door and signaled to the agents and officers to let Terrell and Leah in.
“Take that service elevator to the fourth floor. Room 417,” he told them.
Terrell was quiet on the elevator. Leah moved next to him, taking his hand in hers. She didn’t say anything, and neither did he. When they exited on the fourth floor, they walked down the hall, both filled with apprehension, afraid of what they would find in room 417.
The door was open, and agents and Jamaican police were going in and out, their voices booming through the narrow hallway. The first stretcher was wheeled out of the room just as Leah and Terrell approached the door. The body was covered completely and she felt Terrell’s hand slipping from hers. She gripped it tighter.
When the stretcher was past them and they could make their way through the door, Terrell entered first, relief washing over him as he spotted his mother sitting on the edge of the bed on the far side of the room.
“Mama.” He went to her, falling to his knees on the floor beside her as she embraced him. “I was so worried,” he whispered while he held her close.
“Terrell? What are you doing here, baby?” Rosie asked before looking up to see Leah standing behind her son. “How’d you two get here?”
“We took a cruise,” Leah said, and thought how stupid she must have sounded. In the midst of all this commotion and confusion she’d made it sound as if they were on a pleasant vacation.
“I thought you were…I thought…that stretcher.” He couldn’t bring himself to say it.
“Oh no, baby. I’m fine,” Rosie said, figuring out what her son had been trying to say. “That was Cable.”
“Who’s Cable?” he asked, vaguely remembering the name. And where’s Donald?” Terrell rose from his knees to sit on the bed beside his mother.
Tears sprang to Rosie’s eyes as she pointed across the room. Just outside the patio door stood another stretcher with paramedics surrounding it.
