Chapter 23
Jordy
Police cars created a dazzling show of red and blue lights surrounding the front of the airport. I stared at them through the large front windows, watching the colors play together as I debated what to do.
Surely, so many lights were a good thing.
We’d wanted to get people’s attention. Keep Grace Calderon from escaping to another country until we could drag her to court to answer for her crimes.
That was why I’d brought the boy I’d saved to the airport security to tell his story.
I’d also given them my statement, but they’d been more interested in what the boy had to say, and I’d been shuffled to the side.
Now, an hour later, I felt like dust that had been swept into the corner and forgotten.
What had happened to Kitt?
The last I’d seen of him, Kitt had run interference with the boy’s handlers to give us a chance to escape. It had worked. We managed to slip through the construction area unnoticed and reached security without running into any problems, but since then, I’d heard nothing about Kitt.
I had plenty of experience with handlers like that in the past. They looked ordinary, but they were stubborn, and not to be messed with.
These were the people that the bell ringers trusted to keep their “product” in line.
They were dangerous, and I didn’t imagine that rogue handlers who chose to leave the bell ringers to follow Grace Calderon would be any better.
If anything, they were probably even more dangerous.
Worry bubbled in my gut with each second that passed without answers.
Kitt couldn’t be hurt or... worse, right?
No, that wasn’t possible. The man was smart, and he was strong. He may not be a member of law enforcement, but he’d traveled the world and studied at several different dojos, specifically so that he wouldn’t be helpless in this kind of situation.
He had to be okay.
I wasn’t waiting any longer. If something happened to Kitt, then I needed to know. Someone must know something, so I would keep demanding answers until I finally found someone who could help me.
Just as I started to approach a group of nearby cops, someone suddenly called out my name.
“Jordy!”
Spinning toward the sound of the familiar voice, I found Clay running toward me.
“Clay? What?” In a rare display, I grabbed onto him in a tight hug as soon as he was within arm’s length without even hesitating over the physical touch. “What are you doing here? How did you even get here?”
Clay hugged me back just as tightly.
“It took us forever to shake the bell ringers off our tail. Once we did, one of Gabe’s contacts, Miss Kim, gave us the information about Grace Calderon. She said you were already here, so we came after you as quickly as we could. I’m glad we got here in time.”
With one arm around my shoulder, he led me away from the cops and toward a side door I would have overlooked on my own. A sign above the door, so small I couldn’t read it until I was right under the frame, read Medical Wing.
I snorted when Clay opened the door. Calling the area a “wing” was optimistically generous. Despite the size of the airport, the medical area only consisted of a few rooms that shared space with a storage closet.
“You got here in time?” I asked as I followed Clay through the medical area. “Does that mean Kitt is okay?”
I got my answer almost immediately. Before Clay could say a word, he was interrupted by the sound of someone else crying out in pain. I’d never heard Kitt shout like that, but I still recognized his voice and instinctively ran toward him, leaving Clay behind.
“Fucking hell,” Kitt spat out between clenched teeth, gripping his shoulder while a medic stood over him holding onto his arm. “It didn’t hurt that much when it was dislocated. Popping the joint back in should be easier, shouldn’t it?”
“A dislocated shoulder is no joke,” the medic scolded him. “You need to take it easy while the joint heals. And yes, it’s going to hurt.”
As I watched the medic wrapping his clearly injured arm into a sling, I couldn’t help blurting out, “What did you do?”
Kitt looked up, and the furrow of his brow instantly smoothed out at the sight of me.
“Oh, you know. Just took a rebar pipe to the shoulder. Honestly, I’m lucky we’re in an airport. If we’d been anywhere else, it would’ve been a bullet.”
“Is that supposed to make me feel better?” I said, shaking my head in dismay, but I was already moving to his side and letting him wrap his good arm around my waist. “You shouldn’t be injured at all.”
He pinched the sliver of exposed skin between the bottom hem of my shirt and the top of my pants, making me jump and effectively silencing me.
“We both knew we weren’t going to get out of this unscathed. I’m just glad you weren’t hurt, and from the sounds of it, you were able to get the kid to the proper authorities. If a dislocated shoulder is the worst I have to pay, then I’ll gladly accept it.”
I still continued to pout. “Just because it’s better than a bullet doesn’t make it a good thing.”
Heaving a sigh and shaking his head, Kitt leaned in and kissed the pout right off my face.
“Don’t worry about it,” he said after he pulled away. “I’m alive, and I’ll heal. We have more important things to focus on now.”
I just nodded with a dazed, “Uh huh.”
What kind of superpower did this man have?
It had only been a brief kiss. Such a short touch of his lips should not turn my thoughts into mush and leave my whole body tingling from my scalp all the way to my toes. It wasn’t fair.
How was I ever supposed to win an argument with him if he could turn my brain off with a simple kiss?
The sound of a gasp shocked me back into full awareness and I looked over to find Clay staring at me wide-eyed. He gestured between Kitt and I, his mouth gaping like a drowning fish. “You two?”
It felt like he was trying to demand space between us, but just the thought of that sent anxiety singing through my nerves and I instinctively pressed closer to Kitt instead.
Kitt’s hand tightened on my waist, a silent plea to stay calm and let him handle the argument.
“I understand your concern, considering I’m your lawyer, but I assure you this won’t affect the case or my professionalism.”
“Besides,” I couldn’t help but add. “You’re dating Logan, who’s the lead investigator for the case. If you can manage that, then I’m sure we’ll be fine.”
With a shake of his head, Clay eventually managed to close his mouth and wipe the surprise off his face, though he still looked a little bewildered as he came closer.
“No, it’s not that. It’s just... Jordy, I thought you were interested in Sebastian.”
Now it was my turn to be flabbergasted.
“But... isn’t Sebastian dating Newt. Why would I...”
Suddenly, Clay’s warning about Kitt already dating someone made sense. I thought Clay had just been confused, but it turned out we’d been miscommunicating from the very beginning.
Did he really think I was the kind of person who’d lust after a taken man?
I was almost insulted.
Luckily, Kitt wasn’t upset by this information.
He even joked that he’d have a hard time competing with Sebastian if I actually was interested in the other man.
After all, Sebastian had managed to survive his one man show down with the bell ringers’ agents in the underground bunker, and walked away with only minor injuries, while Kitt couldn’t even take on two handlers without getting his shoulder dislocated for his troubles.
His tone made it clear that he was teasing me, but I still shut him up with a kiss.
Two could play at that game, after all.
“So, what now?” I asked a little while later, after the medic had finished checking over Kitt for any other injuries and given him the all clear.
In that time, Logan had joined us as well, so now, the four of us sat around a table in a forgotten corner of the airport as security continued to stream around us.
“Now, we get ready for our day in court,” Kitt said. His good arm was slung over my shoulder, almost perfectly mirroring the way Clay and Logan sat together on the opposite side of the table.
“Do you think Calderon will give us any information?” Logan asked. As he spoke, he idly toyed with a lock of Clay’s longer hair. It was such a casual gesture, like he didn’t even realize he was doing it.
Watching their interaction, I wondered if I should grow out my hair as well.
It had been so long since I let my hair grow more than a few inches, I didn’t even remember what it felt like when it was that length.
Although, I did have a vague memory that my hair might have more curl to it than it did when it was short, though I couldn’t be certain.
My perfect memory was great for external things, but not so great when it came to remembering details about myself.
Kitt didn’t seem to mind my shorter hair, though. Instead, he was perfectly content to stroke his fingers along the exposed skin on the back of my neck, making me shiver with each brush of skin.
“I think she will. We caught her red-handed. She knows she’s going away.
The real question is where she’ll be serving her time.
There’s a reason they say that pedophiles don’t do well in prison.
The rest of her life could be easy, or very, very hard depending on which prison she’s sent to. We can work with that.”
I almost felt bad for her. When Kitt wanted to be vindictive, he showed no mercy. With his sights set on Grace Calderon, she had no choice but to eventually give him the information that he wanted.
Then, I remembered the part she had to play in everything I had suffered, and all my sympathy vanished.
Let her rot in prison for the rest of her life. That was the least she deserved.
In the meantime, we had a trial to prepare for.