Not a tame lion
Grey morning light tickled me awake. I reached for the body denting the mattress behind me. Why is he so far away? Normally, I roll right into him. I tossed the duvet back, revealing Deandra. My sniffles woke her up.
I showered and got dressed. My knee was a lovely mosaic of black and purple, but since I could bend the joint and put weight on it, Dee wasn’t worried. Even if I had to hop on one leg, I’d be at the doors the second the police station opened.
Cold damp seeped into my bones; fog greyed the morning light.
I grabbed one of Rafael’s sweaters to combat the frigid humidity.
The sleeves were comically long on me, and it hung almost to my knees; like a black cashmere dress.
It also smelled faintly of his hair oil. I decided he was never getting it back.
As Mark Twain supposedly said, “No winter colder than a summer in San Francisco.”
It was only spring, but Rafael’s absence made it a permafrost wasteland.
I led Dee down to Telve. “Don’t you have work today?”
She wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “I shuffled my schedule around. They aren’t expecting me back until Sunday. Don’t you start crying again, Laney.”
I scrubbed at my treacherous eyes. “I don’t deserve you.”
“Girl, shut the fuck up. Remember in college when that one bitch kicked me out of her car in Oakland? On fucking International Boulevard at 2am? All you asked was, ‘Where are you?’ and you drove two fucking hours from Santa Cruz in the middle of the night before finals to come get me. That’s when I knew you were a real one. ”
We grabbed coffees to go. I decided not to tell the baristas what was happening until I knew something concrete. I drove, and Deandra followed in her burgundy Corolla.
She hugged my arm as we waited in the morning gloom. “Never thought I’d see the day you’d be behind the wheel of a damn Caddy.”
“Me neither.”
A few figures milled around the police station in the chilly fogbank. Any moment now, the Silent Hill sirens would start up. I latched onto the image of Rafael as Pyramid Head to distract myself. Hot as fuck, and he might be the only person tall enough to actually pull that cosplay off.
The station didn’t open until 9am, but we’d gotten there at 8 just to be safe. To my shock, Benson Ives was there. And they were approaching me.
Still sleeveless, still effortlessly cool, Benson looked me over. I braced myself.
“Hey. Shit’s fucked.” Their voice was low and silken—a voice meditation apps would pay big money for, assuming AI didn’t take those jobs too—and they scrubbed a hand through their bright green hair.
“I’m Benson. Rafael and I do not get along by any stretch of the imagination, but nobody deserves this. I want to help.”
At their conciliatory tone, I nodded and started breathing again. Dee subtly shook my arm.
“Thank you. I’m Elaine Parham.”
Benson smiled like the sun coming out from behind a cloud. Deandra made a strangled noise behind me.
“I know. Kathy told me to watch out for you. Said you’re one of the good ones.
” They snorted. “She says that about Rafael too, but nobody’s right all the time.
” Benson’s grey eyes dropped, and they chewed on a lip piercing.
“When we find him, will you tell him I’m sorry?
I did some fucked up shit and I regret it.
He might not want to hear it from me directly.
” Realization broke across their face. “I’m not trying to get back with him or anything, I promise. ”
“Oh, no, it’s ok. I’m sure he’d be glad to hear that.” Or not, but it was a nice gesture. Dee poked me in the ribs, and I jumped. “Uh, this is my friend Deandra Lee. Deandra, this is Benson Ives.”
Dee slid out from behind me with a smile bright enough to melt the fog and struck up a conversation with Benson about protests they’d been to. Love on a picket line. How very San Francisco.
I only had eyes for the door. “Y’all don’t need to come in with me. I’m just getting info. I’ll be right back.”
9 o’clock rolled around with no movement.
9:05.
9:10.
‘To be a musician is to be a timekeeper,’ Rafael had said.
At 9:12am, someone finally unlocked the glass doors. I ripped them open and charged inside.
“I have a case number for a missing person: Rafael Nazim. Have y’all got any updates?” I did my best to keep my voice from quavering. “Detective Amber Corey was on the case?”
The clerk just blinked and waved me through the metal detectors. Detective Corey was a remarkably fit woman, probably in her fifties. She had copious grey in her mousy brown hair and a tanned, hard cop face.
“Seems Mr. Nazim had an AirTag on him. It was found in the woods west of the Lively property.” Corey showed me on the map, and I took a picture. “We’re prioritizing the search in that area.”
Her eyes gave nothing away when I showed her the video I’d already sent.
I wished I’d had some kind of contact, a ransom demand, anything, but both of our phones had remained dark.
Rafael had voluntarily given me his passcode even though I hadn’t asked for it.
Given what Mandeep had said about Molly, it was understandable, but I’d never used it until now. It felt weird and invasive.
He’d gotten some worried texts and voicemails, but everything else was just business as usual.
As it turned out, he was much more curt over text with other people than he was with me.
He also had minimal apps, no games, and most of his recent photos were candid shots of me that made me blush.
Nothing salacious, but I’d never been with a man who wanted to take pictures of me like that.
Detective Corey was not reassuring. “Ma’am, I don’t mean to alarm you, but the first 24 hours are critical with missing persons. If you receive any information at all, keep me updated.”
I left, dragging my spirit behind me.
“We’re going to convene at Alice’s in Woodside,” Benson said. “You know how to get there?”
“I take it most of these folks have never been in the woods before,” Deandra muttered to me.
She wasn’t wrong. Some had worn hiking clothes. A few people had shown up in workout attire. There was an awful lot of impractical footwear, though. Mandeep waved us over; he wore a colorful Cotopaxi ensemble with new hiking boots.
Surprisngly, Benson was the one coordinating the search. I showed them the map, and they marked the coordinates on paper maps for everyone, since cell phones couldn’t be trusted. Benson also had a big bloodhound named Matilda with such a droopy face it looked like she was slowly melting.
“Benny, why do you have a bloodhound?” Mandeep asked.
They shrugged. “What? I watch a lot of true crime.”
Matilda did not seem impressed by life in general, but she obligingly whuffled all over Rafael’s sweater that I’d worn.
We drove in a caravan to the hiking trail closest to where the AirTag had been found and fanned out from there.
Benson and Matilda stayed with me, Deandra, and Mandeep.
It had been a few years since I’d done a proper hike in those steep hills, and it wasn’t long before my legs and ass were burning.
Luckily, Mandeep had experience and a better sense of direction than the rest of us, and kept us from wandering in circles.
Hours crawled by. We’d stopped for a break when Matilda perked up.
“What is it, girl?” Benson kneeled beside her. “Did Timmy fall down the well?”
She shoved her nose into a patch of moss, tail wagging. With a loud bray, she lunged forward, nearly yanking the lead out of Benson’s hand. Hope bloomed in my chest as we jogged after her.
Matilda led us down a winding canyon, with the occasional detour for unpassable areas.
Finally, we came upon a decent-sized shed; almost a warehouse.
Benson gave the dog a signal, and she quieted.
Four men in familiar black tactical gear stood guard outside.
They all looked worse for wear: scrapes, fat lips, black eyes, bloody noses.
Fucking good. They also did not look armed. Even better.
Apparently, I thought I was invincible because I started down toward them. Deandra grabbed my arm.
Benson waved a bulky satellite phone. “Stay put. I’ll tell the cops and everyone else. We don’t know if these guys are armed.”
I wanted to climb out of my skin. “Fuck that.” I pulled the 9mm out of my backpack. “I’m not waiting.”
Mandeep’s eyes popped wide. “Whoa, you know how to use that thing?”
I slapped the magazine in and clicked off the safety. “You can take the girl out of the country…me and Ms. Beretta here are old friends1.”
He laughed faintly. “No wonder Rafael likes you.”
No one needed to know that I’d never shot anything more intimidating than a circular paper target. I didn’t even like shooting at the people-shaped targets. Hopefully, they didn’t see how my hands shook.
“I can back you up,” Benson said, flashing a .22 on their belt. “I grew up in Buttfuck Nowhere, Indiana.”
“Shit, does everyone have a gun?” Mandeep turned to Deandra, who shook her head. “I must have missed that group text.”
No time for cowardice. I crept down the hill; mostly to keep from sliding and shooting my own stupid ass. The guards perked up when they saw me.
I drew down on the closest one. “Open the door.”
He raised his hands. “Now, miss, let’s stay calm—”
Fuck it. I didn’t need to be able to hear out of both ears.
I racked the slide, covered one ear, raised the gun to the sky, and fired it.
Everyone cringed, and birds took off from the trees in a squawking cloud.
Cries came from behind me, and the sound of rushing feet. My unguarded ear rang like mad.
I re-aimed the gun. “Open the fucking door.”
Benson and Deandra joined me, keeping the men off my back.
The door opened to a buzzing noise. There Rafael was, seated with his hands restrained behind his back.
Dried blood streaked from his nose all the way down his chest. His right eye was swollen shut, and his shirt was torn at the collar. Men surrounded him.
Those fuckers!