He grabbed the glass, half filled with the gin and tonic he’d made from the minibar. Tilting the tumbler back, he downed what was left, then slammed the glass onto the dresser.
How could this have happened?
It was the million-dollar question that he’d asked a million times. But he already knew the answer—he never should have brought Jasmine back to his hotel. Even the lobby restaurant was more private than public, and by definition, with their history, that was trouble.
But Jasmine had been so distraught, he’d had to get her away from the center. And this lunch was supposed to be just a meeting between friends; after all, they’d been spending a lot of time together, with only the most innocent of contact between them . . .
Brian shook his head. He’d been a fool. Acting like a man walking in the dark. Because really, he should’ve seen this thing coming.
So what did that mean? That this was something he’d wanted to happen?
He sighed out loud as he remembered the kiss. First, in slow motion. Then, in fast-forward time. Over and over. A loud groan of regret pushed through his lips.
There had always been this sick connection between the two of them—some kind of crazy lust that wouldn’t go away. She was a major part of his addiction.
But the truth? Brian knew that he could blame it on his illness all he wanted, but that kiss didn’t have a thing to do with his addiction. And it wasn’t just lust either, because when he held Jasmine in his arms, he’d wanted her there.
It was love.
But it wasn’t the kind of love that consumed every bit of his heart—it wasn’t the kind of love that he had for Alexis. No, this was more like the love he had for Regina, the mother of his sons. A concern. A deep caring. A love for a woman who’d given birth to his child.
But however he tried to shape it, it was love. And that was dangerous. A dangerous love at a dangerous time.
Brian, I want you.
Those were Jasmine’s words.
Brian, I want you.
That was what he couldn’t get out of his head.
Brian, I want you.
How did that happen? He lay back on the bed, closed his eyes, and remembered. After he paid for their lunch, she’d hugged him and thanked him. It was the tears in her eyes that made him hold her again . . . just for an extra second, just to let her know that he heard her and that he cared.
He’d told her to stay strong. She’d said okay. And the next thing . . .
The kiss. She’d kissed him first, there was no doubt about that; but the lethal mistake was that he’d kissed her back.
And that was why he had to leave New York.
But how could he do that? Quit right in the middle? Give up before Jacqueline came home?
He’d made promises to himself and Jasmine that he was going to find Jacqueline. He didn’t know why, but he still believed that she was alive, and because of that hope, he just couldn’t leave—not before the job was done.
Then he thought about Dr. Taylor Perkins, with her white-blond bouffant hair and her stern, disapproving glare.
Be aware of the triggers! he could hear his therapist saying. Never forget the stress.
Brian took a deep breath and then nodded as if Dr. Perkins was there in the room. Right now, he was in the most perilous of places. With Jacqueline’s abduction, with Jasmine’s heartache, he was under more stress than at any other time in his life.
He had to go.
Brian pushed himself up, strolled across the carpet, and took in the music of the metropolis from his sixth-floor window. The Big Apple pulsed with residents and tourists bundled up and bustling through the streets. Car brakes screamed and drivers honked horns, creating a melody that belonged only to this city. Though he could hear little through the solid glass panes, the energy was thick; New York’s power was contagious.
Brian inhaled, sucked in a portion of the city’s vivacity . . . and thought about Los Angeles. His home. Where he belonged. Especially now.
He could do it; he could still help—work and strategize—all from L.A. His major contribution was working on securing media. He’d already spoken to the people at America’s Most Wanted and Crime Stoppers. And this morning, he’d been late getting to the center because he’d been on the phone with Steve Harvey’s and Tom Joyner’s people. He was close to getting what he needed; he could finish it from the left side of the country.
His mental debate continued: with cell phones and e-mail and five-hour flights, he was easily reachable and could be back in almost an instant if he was needed.
But it wasn’t until his thoughts turned to Alexis that the decision was final. He’d worked hard to preserve himself for her. His fidelity—through his illness—was a battle that he’d won and was a gift for Alexis.
Brian snatched his cell from the nightstand and paced while he spoke. It only took seven minutes; he had his return flight to L.A.
He would be leaving on the first thing smokin’ in the morning.
Fifty-one
JASMINE’S HEART WAS STILL POUNDING, even after she’d walked into her apartment. Even after she’d greeted Mrs. Sloss and Zaya had run into her arms. Even after her son screeched, “Love Mama!” in a pitch so high and so loud, she worried that he wouldn’t be able to talk for days.
“I love you, too.” She squeezed him tight. But though she held her son, and then rocked him as she read from his favorite picture book, Brian stayed right on her mind. As she thought, and read, and played, she figured it out.
Brian had apologized—that meant he thought she didn’t want to be with him. But she did, and she needed to let him know that. All they had to do was talk.
She wasn’t sure if the conversation should be face-to-face or over the phone. Either way, by the time they finished, Jasmine had no doubt that they would be together again.
The sound of the front door closing interrupted Jasmine’s thoughts and a moment later Hosea walked into Zaya’s bedroom.
“Dada!” their son exclaimed as he jumped from Jasmine’s lap and into his father’s arms.
“Hey, son! What’s good?”
“Me!” Zaya giggled as Hosea lifted him.
“You’ve been good?”
“Yeessss!” Zaya sang.
“Well, I’ve been good, too.” Hosea turned to Jasmine, but he wasn’t wearing a smile. Not that he looked angry—his eyes were filled with a sadness that she totally understood. “Let’s ask Mama, Zaya. Let’s ask Mama if she’s been good.”
Jasmine almost choked on the air that she inhaled. She coughed. And coughed. Looked up at Hosea. Now he was smiling.
“So, Mama,” he asked as he held their son. “Have you been good?”
“Good, Mama?” Zaya added his own inquiry.
She nodded, because she couldn’t get any words out. Did Hosea know something?
“Great!” Hosea exclaimed, as he turned Zaya upside down.
Her son’s squeals gave Jasmine a moment—to sit up straight, wipe the tense smile from her face, act as if all was normal.
When Hosea turned back, she was breathing again. “So how was your day?”
It was a question he asked just about every night, but today it rang with new meaning.
“Fine.”
He paused, looked at her some more. Tilted his head. “Are you sure?”
He knows! That I kissed Brian.
Jasmine crossed, then uncrossed, her legs. Crossed, then uncrossed, her arms. She didn’t have time to figure out how he knew. All she could do was come up with some story, a tremendous lie. Or she could deny, deny, deny. Then twist it around somehow, put this whole thing on him.
“Keith told me about the phone call.”
She blinked. And blinked. Then remembered. The call—had that happened today? With all that had gone down afterward, that phone call seemed so long ago.
He said, “I tried to call you.” Moving closer, he asked, “Are you all right?”
“Yes.” Her voice trembled, but he would attribute
that to what she’d been through, she was sure. “I’m fine now.” Her time with Brian had made her forget, but now because of Hosea, the memory was back.
The voice. Those words.
The recollection tackled her so fast, so rough, that she had to close her eyes. “You should have heard that man,” she whispered, her voice filled with tears.
He called for Mrs. Sloss to take Zaya from the room, then he turned back to Jasmine. As he hugged her, he said, “Don’t think about it.”
“How can I not?” She pushed herself up from the chair and away from his arms. Pacing the length of the room, she said, “This whole thing—Jacquie, that man, everything—is driving me crazy. I don’t know whether to live or just try to die. I don’t know if I should stay home with Zaya or start pounding the streets myself. I don’t know if I love . . .” She completed the thought in her head: you . . . or Brian.
“Go ahead.” Hosea stood up straight. “Finish what you were saying.”
She folded her arms, but she couldn’t look at him. So with her head down, she said, “I’m just saying that it’s all too much, and I don’t know how much longer I can take this.”
“You’re stronger than you think,” he said. “I promise, you’re going to be all right.”
But his assurances weren’t anything like Brian’s. Hosea’s assurances were never about Jacqueline, and that brought new tears to her eyes.
She rewound the past hours and remembered how she had laughed with Brian. Now, here at home with Hosea, all she wanted to do was cry.
“Jasmine, I’m going to make sure that our family is okay.”
Didn’t he know that wasn’t what she wanted to hear? To her, there was never a way that their family could be okay without Jacqueline.
Gently, he kissed her forehead. “I’m going to check on Zaya,” he said, as if his son was his only concern. He had walked away without a single clue of how he could help her, what she needed.
They used to know each other’s thoughts, could finish each other’s sentences. They used to move as if they were one. But their connection was lost—the abductor had taken more than Jacqueline from them.
Jasmine shook her head as she returned to the rocking chair. She wondered what was going to happen to her marriage.
And then she turned all thoughts to Brian.
Fifty-two
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA
DECEMBER 2009
THERE WAS A CERTAIN EXCITEMENT that Brian always felt whenever he landed at LAX. Even though it was still an hour before noon, the airport was bustling with Los Angelenos, strolling past Christmas decorations, dressed in shorts and T-shirts and flip-flops.
There was no place like home.
Except this time, Brian didn’t wear the smile that always came to him when he headed out to the curb to wait for the car service. This time, his mind was still in New York.
Every minute of the five-hour-and-thirty-minute flight, Brian wondered if he’d made the right decision. Now that he finally had a chance to make a difference, was he deserting his daughter? But like all the other times he’d asked that question, he told himself that it didn’t matter where he was—he would still do what he had to do.
Brian waved at a slowly approaching town car the moment he saw his name on the placard tucked in the window. Two minutes after that, he was inside, speeding down Century Boulevard. The moment the car turned left onto LaCienega, Brian pressed the Power button on his cell phone and pushed the first icon for his messages.
“You have thirteen new messages. First message . . .” Brian hit End before the voice could begin.
Thirteen messages. He didn’t even have to check. He knew who the calls were from, and he needed to handle this now.
Scrolling through his contact list, he clicked on Hosea’s name and was relieved when he answered right away.
“What’s up, Brian?”
“Nothing. Listen, I just wanted to let you know that I’m back in L.A.”
He could sense Hosea’s frown in the silence that followed. Finally, Hosea said, “I didn’t know you were leaving. I mean . . . I got the impression that you were going to stay longer.” Then, when he asked, “What happened?” the gentle manner of the man was gone.
Brian replied, “Nothing, I just figured that I could do as much from here as I was doing in New York.” More silence, so he added a lie, “See . . . ah . . . there was a surgery . . . that I’d forgotten. I had to . . . really, you know . . . get back for that.” If his addiction had been gambling, he would’ve bet and probably won lots of money that Hosea didn’t believe a word he’d said. But Brian kept on anyway. “It’s tomorrow . . . yeah . . . and I wanted to get a head start, to get rested . . . you know . . .”
“Yeah, I know,” Hosea said, in the tone of a suspicious husband.
Brian said, “Listen, I’m not giving up, man!”
“No, I know that.” The loving father, the caring pastor, was back. “And neither are we.”
“I’m going to keep working on those contacts. We’re gonna score some major media somehow, someway.”
“That would be great, since there hasn’t been much in the last two weeks.”
“Yeah, and I really want to stay in touch.”
“Do that. Call me anytime, and check in with Keith, too.”
Brian released a long breath of air. “Done deal.”
“And, I’ll call you if . . . when there’s news.”
“Thanks.”
Then another pause before, “Does Jasmine know that you—”
Brian answered before Hosea finished, “No. This came up suddenly. Last night . . . I didn’t have a chance . . . you know . . . to tell anyone. But . . . would you mind . . . you know, saying something to her for me.” A moment of silence. “Please.” He closed his eyes and wondered why guilt always made him sound like an idiot.
“Yeah, I’ll tell her.”
“Thanks, and Hosea, I’m gonna keep praying. I’ll be in touch.”
After his good-bye, Brian clicked off the phone. With the way he sounded, Hosea had to know that something was up.
But what was real was that there was nothing for Hosea to figure. Nothing was up. Nothing had happened. Nothing was going to happen.
Well, at least that part was done.
He leaned forward and said to the driver, “Change of plans. I need to make a detour. Can you take me to Ninety-five hundred Wilshire, please?”
Brian wasn’t sure that he liked the look on Alexis’s face. Shock, yes. But what he’d been hoping for was more of a look of wonderment. A look that said she loved him, that she was glad he was home.
But her eyebrows were furrowed so close together they almost looked like one. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to see you.”
“I mean, what are you doing here in L.A.? On Tuesday, you said you were gonna stay until . . .” Her eyes widened.
“No,” he shook his head, “Jacquie’s not back . . . not yet.”
“Then?”
His strut was back as he moved around her desk, pulled her up, and wrapped his arms around her. He noticed that it took a moment for her to hug him back, but he refused to be denied. “I missed you,” he whispered in her ear.
She pulled away from him. “So you came home because you missed me?”
In that second, the image of Jasmine and their kiss flashed through his mind. He blinked it away, stepped back, and said, “Yeah . . . I came because . . . you know, I couldn’t wait to see you . . . and because . . . well, there wasn’t anything left for me . . .” He stopped, knowing that if he kept on talking he’d give himself away.
Alexis tilted her head and stared at him as if she knew he had a secret. “So, no news?” she asked.
Leaning against the edge of her desk, he folded his arms and shook his head. “Still getting lots of those weird calls, though.” His words made him think of Jasmine and the call she’d taken that had led to the kiss. He couldn’t believe it had all happened only yesterday.
>
Alexis’s sigh dragged Brian out of New York, back to L.A. “I know about those calls, took too many while I was there.” Shaking her head, she asked, “Why do people call up like that?”
Brian shrugged. “I’ve never been able to figure out crazy.”
Alexis shook her head. “I don’t know how Hosea and Jasmine are doing it. How are . . . they?”
Another shrug, and this time he worked to keep the guilt away. “They’re just like when you left, still hanging.”
“Being in New York with them was tough.” She shuddered and crossed her arms, as if suddenly chilled. “I just pray for them. Hosea’s such a good man, you know?”
He wanted to tell her that Jasmine was good, too. She was a good mother who loved her daughter and was suffering tremendously, too. But he wasn’t about to defend Jasmine. Not to Alexis. Not right now.
“Well, I’m just glad to be home.”
She said, “You should have stayed in New York.”
His head reared back a bit at her words, her tone.
“I mean,” she began, trying to warm it up, “Jacqueline needs you. And,” a deep breath, “Jasmine does, too.”
He frowned. Why would she say that?
“Jasmine doesn’t need me; she has her husband.” He leaned forward. “And anyway, the only woman I want to need me . . . is you.”
She shook her head. “Your attention needs to be on Jacqueline right now.”
“And it is.”
“You need to be focused, without distractions.”
“You’re not a distraction. You’re the woman I love.”
She leaned back to put some space between them, then waved her hand like his words didn’t matter. “There can’t be any ‘us’ right now.”
“Give me one good reason why, Alexis.” Frustration was all in his tone.
“Because you don’t know what’s going to happen. You don’t know if Jacqueline will ever be found . . .”
“She will be,” he said, as if he was sure of it. “But what does that have to do with us? No matter what happens, there’s still you and me.”
“I’m just saying, let’s keep everything the way it is and . . .” Her voice trailed off.
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