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“This is insane! I didn’t do anything!” Derrick cries out.
“I’m calling my lawyer!” Ramada is instantly activated, but I swipe the phone out of her hand while one of the officers puts a pair of cuffs on her, too, steadily and calmly reciting her Miranda rights. “I have the right to an attorney!”
“You most certainly do, once they get your scrawny ass downtown,” I say.
“Anything you say can and will be used against you…” the officer continues over Ramada’s dramatic wailing while Arroyo firmly drags Derrick out of the executive lounge.
“You’ll pay for this!” Derrick shouts.
“Up yours,” Elias shoots back with a cold, dark smirk. “The jig is up,” he adds, reminding him of what he said to Amaya when he presented us with his lies. “Just be careful in the showers, buddy. With a face as pretty as yours, you’re gonna be somebody’s bitch in no time.”
“I need my lawyer!” Ramada whimpers.
We watch as the vermin are removed from our presence, quietly waiting for the silence of the aftermath to settle. My stomach hurts. My head hurts. We’ve been struggling in this elaborate lie for so long, getting ourselves played and pulled away from the woman of our dreams by those two.
For heaven’s sake, I feel like the biggest idiot in the world. We bought the lies just long enough for Amaya to realize that she had no way of getting through to us.
It has to be the reason why she chose to leave that day.
“What, now?” I ask.
“We go talk to Amaya,” Kace says. “It’s long overdue.”
“I wholeheartedly agree,” Elias says and gets up, straightening his black jacket. “She’ll be at the yoga studio,” he adds, checking his watch.
Minutes later, we’re walking past the reception desk. I can see the police cars outside, lights flashing red and blue as Ramada and Derrick are shoved into their respective backseats in a most unceremonious manner.
I allow myself a smile before Tanya pops up from behind the reception desk with the palest face I’ve ever seen.
“You’re going to the hospital, right?” she asks.
“What hospital?” Kace replies.
“I thought… Mira didn’t call you?” Tanya sounds confused.
My blood runs cold. “No. What’s happened, Tanya?”
“It’s Amaya. She got really sick yesterday. She’s in the hospital. They’re keeping her under observation to make sure the baby’s okay...”
“What baby?” Kace gasps, speaking for all of us.
“I just got off the phone with Mira. I was gonna ask you guys to let me take the rest of the day off, since Melissa is coming in earlier for her shift,” Tanya says. I doubt she is aware of what she let slip mere seconds ago.
“Which hospital?” Elias asks.
28
Amaya
My dreams are jumbled and nonsensical, but at least I’m registering them as dreams. Part of my consciousness is starting to pull me up from deep under as I breathe a sigh of relief, realizing that I’m still alive. Whatever happened, I’m still alive.
“Damn,” I hear myself say as my eyes peel open to meet a white light mounted on an equally white ceiling. The smell of disinfectant quickly invades my nostrils, and I whimper from its sting. “Ugh.”
I’m in the hospital. There’s a machine beeping constantly by my bedside. There’s a dull ache in the back of my hand. I glance down and see the IV line leading into a bag of what I assume is saline with a mixture of vitamins. Right, I must’ve fainted.
Fear quickly takes over as I instinctively touch my belly.
“Hey, hey, take it easy,” Mira’s voice comes into focus along with the rest of the room.
