“Okay, if you’re sure you want her in on this. I’ve already started compiling a list of all the kids that her kills dealt with in the system. As you can imagine, there’s a lot of missing information, so it’s a pain in the ass. It’ll be great if she recognizes any of the names; some of this shit goes back twenty years.”
“Twenty years? How’d you get all of that information so fast?” His smirk was all the answer I needed, and not for the first time I wondered at the incongruity of decent law-abiding men having to circumvent the law to get shit done.
I put Track on hold when I heard the shower go off and moved to the drawer where I’d stashed my clothes to grab her something comfortable to wear. Ash’s clothes were all fancy shit more suited for going out than sitting for hours at the computer. I knocked on the bathroom door and passed the tee and sweats off to her when she cracked it open.
I was way too pleased by the sight of her in my clothes when she walked out. She must’ve rolled the top of my sweats six times, and the tee hung down to her thighs, but at least she looked comfortable. “Come sit here with me, let me introduce you to someone.”
She looked at the monitor before grabbing the offered seat. “Track, this is Roxana, Roxana, Track, he helped rescue you. He wasn’t there physically, but his cyber skills helped.” I hurried to add at her look of confusion. “Yeoboseyo Roxana!” She seemed pleased with his greeting, which I’m guessing was Korean, and then the two of them had some kind of conversation that made her relax even more.
I’m not sure how I felt about someone else talking to my girl in her language when I didn’t know even the damn alphabet. It did help to put her at ease by the time I put her on her own monitor and wired her in. Track sent her the list he’d compiled, and the three of us got down to business combing through them looking for any that she might’ve known.
ROXANA
What a strange day. From my sparring match with the kid to working with Jason and Track, who was full of surprises, and now sitting here at the big family-style dinner with everyone who seems to have accepted me in their midst without question. Most surprising for me was the way they let their kids, especially their daughters, just hang around me.
One minute I wanted to yell at them for being so careless, and the next, I wanted to break into tears at their acceptance. I’ve kept myself away from polite society because one of the things I’d come to accept about myself is that no one with any real value would want to be associated with someone with my past.
But here were these people who seemed even wealthier and of more importance than my tormentors, just including me in their conversations. The women seemed genuinely friendly, especially the one Jason had introduced as his sister. And though I was sure they all knew where I came from, there were no sly remarks or innuendoes tossed my way.
By the time dinner was over, I needed a quiet corner alone to get my thoughts together, but Jason, who always seem to be watching, caught me at the door leading downstairs. “It’s a nice clear night out; let’s go for a walk on the beach.” He didn’t give me a chance to answer, just took my hand and led me in the opposite direction.
I started to protest but decided against it since he’d already proven that he doesn’t listen to my objections anyway and let myself be led outside into the warm evening breeze. The scent of the ocean was strong this time of night, as well as whatever flowers they had growing in the garden. Another scent reached us as we walked further down on the beach, and we both looked at each other in surprise.
We were even more surprised when we saw where the scent of weed was coming from. It was the group of older adults that had been in the background since I got here. There were seven of them sitting around an unlit fire pit in Adirondacks of varying colors. They looked up when they saw us, and one of them, Lyon’s dad, if I remember correctly, called out to us to join them before having a coughing fit.
“No, thank…”
“I’d love to join you.” I cut Jason’s refusal off and dropped his hand as I made my way towards the others. I heard him mumble something beneath his breath as he followed behind me but didn’t look back. There were more than en0ugh of the beach chairs laying around, so I dragged one into the circle or started to before he took it from my hand and finished the job and before I could agree or decline found myself seated on his lap.