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I huff, shutting down my computer that I haven’t even bothered looking at the entire day. “There’s a war between a gang and the cops literally on the brink after six cartel members were found floating down the river. It’s all hands on deck.”

She nods, biting into her bottom lip. “Yeah. At least we found them quickly and were able to get them examined relatively shortly after TOD.”

My nerves prickle. “Have we heard back?”

Other than profiling the cause of death and matching them to the killer we already had, my uncle is keeping me as far away from the investigation as possible. No one beside me, him and Fikes, know that three of them were who attacked me, but he doesn’t want to take any chances. The cartel is already pissed off and giving them any fuel will only expose the deal he’d made, making matters much, much worse.

Still, even though I threatened Elena, and I’m hurt far more than I want to admit out loud, I would never connect her to the murders.

I can’t. Not even when my heart closes in with every pulse. Not even when I wake and tears are the first thing to spring to my eyes, and stain my pillow when I go to sleep. Or when I can’t function enough to feed my sourdough or walk by my back door where that damn plant—Pamela—hangs in her new macrame.

Not even now, after learning I was simply a task on her fucking to-do list, do I want to see her behind bars.

“Yeah, but they didn’t find anything. Whoever did it was a professional. But we knew that already.”

I sigh, but don’t respond. Being able to see it all in hindsight, I can say without a shadow of a doubt that Elena is professional. Methodical. A perfect killer.

It’s too bad my infatuation blinded me to the obvious.

Guess I’m just as much to blame for my attachment as she is.

“Come on. Peanut. One more time.”I wrap Jessica’s hand around the silks, and readjust her so she can try the move again.

We’ve been out here practicing for well over an hour, and I know she’s getting tired. Know her strength is dwindling. But I also know how badly she wants to get this move. How hard she’s worked to get it just right.

Jessica groans but nods, allowing me to help her regain her center before jumping, twirling around and flipping over to wrap herself in the fabric. The sun beats down at her back, the warm glow illuminating her like an angel, but she doesn’t complain, not even now that sweat drips into her eyes.

I’m careful when I move forward, whipping it away quickly so she can try to rotate into position.

And she does…almost. Her hand slips, her muscles giving way to the fatigue, and falls.

I’m beneath her before she touches the ground, grunting when she lands smack dab on top of me.

I prepare for her to be upset at herself, yell an obscenity into the sky like she’s done every other time she’s fallen. But she surprises me when her whole body vibrates with her laughter. She rolls over, half her body on the grass, the other half still on my chest and laughs harder, tears springing to her eyes as she releases the fabric.

A confused smile spreads over my lips, but I let her have her moment, just happy she isn’t upset. When the fit of giggles finally subsides, she looks at me, her eyes matching the sky above her, and sighs.

“Why did you let me convince you to try silks at a park?”

I laugh, scanning the empty park behind her. It’s a school day, so no one is here, plus, the bar is high and wide enough. At least, that was her reasoning when we showed up. In retrospect, I can see how I was blinded behind my rose-tinted glasses. “Because you can convince a bee to buy honey.”

She smiles, staring over my features for a moment before leaning in to kiss me.

We lay there for what feels like eternity while also feeling like a second. It isn’t until her stomach rolls from her hunger that we finally decide to get up.

If were up to me though, I would have laid there for the rest of time.

When I open my eyes, the bright blue sky fades into an inky gray, the clouds forming rooted cracks. The soft grass beneath my back is hard concrete, while the warm summer breeze shifts to colder-than-comfortable air conditioning.

I peel my eyes open to the cell I’ve spent who knows how long looking at. With no windows, and the only door staying shut, I have no way to gauge how much time has passed. Only that my body sleeps and wakes in cycles I can only hope represents days. If so, it’s been about five since I was taken.

One hundred and twenty hours since I last saw her face.

I hope she is alright. I hope that the pain I caused her is short-lived, and she forgets about me so she can find what she so rightfully deserves.

Happiness.

Hope.