Mile High

by Ophelia Bell

  Not to mention that as far as she knows, you died, asshole.

  I never forgot her, though. For some crazy reason Dr. Nicolo’s face found its way into my dreams on some of the darkest, loneliest nights until I made my way into Rafael’s inner circle. He was Zavala’s head of security, my first mark at the compound whose trust I needed to gain to access Zavala’s servers and find the intel I was sure he had.

  I’ve always been good at making friends, and often used that talent to my advantage. This job was no different, so when I found a way in with Rafael, I took it. It just happened to be an interest near and dear to me: my love of classic cars.

  In our meager time off, he and I started a project restoring a ’69 Mustang with his wife, Emilia, frequently looking on, and sometimes lending a hand when she wasn’t immersed in her painting. Over the months of working together for Zavala and working on the Mustang in our off-hours, Rafael and I bonded, and if it hadn’t been for my own necessary lies to him and his wife, I might have considered them true friends. Now, thanks to Amador, they’ll never have a chance to learn the truth.

  My teeth involuntarily clench at the memory of Christmas day and the barrage of bullets that rained down on what should have been a happy family gathering. The attack was meant for me. Somehow Amador’s second, Gustavo Delgado, had learned I was alive and came for me, leaving the bodies of my two closest friends in Mexico behind.

  Gustavo’s window to attack had closed too fast for him to get me, which was fortunate. Zavala owns much of Mexico City, so it couldn’t have been easy for Gustavo and his men to get as far as Rafael’s hacienda to begin with. All I know is that they got away, and I was burned thanks to what one of the other survivors heard that day. But I’m not too dumb to believe Gustavo won’t keep looking for me now that he knows I’m alive. I just don’t know how much time I have before he realizes I’m no longer in Mexico.

  I shake my head to rid it of the barrage of images, instead forcing myself to picture Dr. Nicolo’s face again. My pulse slows, and the hot, impotent rage subsides, allowing my breath to even out. The doctor calmed me that first day I set eyes on her, just by virtue of her steady, sure voice and gentle touch. I haven’t thought of her in at least a year. I don’t even know her first name, but when I saw her this morning, she felt like a sign from heaven that I was somehow on the right path, that I didn’t make a mistake taking this detour to see Mom.

  No, it wasn’t a mistake, but I need to get my ass in gear. I scratch my chin and wince when I hit a tender part of my jaw. An ice pack is in store for my face after I clean myself up. I consider shaving too, but decide I need to give the bruises a couple more days to heal before I try to hit them with a razor.

  At last I step into the shower and turn the hot water on full blast. Closing my eyes, I try to banish all thoughts, but the photograph Arturo showed me earlier refuses to leave my mind. My entire being itches to get this done, to get the deal Zavala wants, get the intel I was hired to get, and get Zoe the fuck out of Mexico.

  But despite that driving need, I’m fucking terrified. Not just for her life or her safety in the hands of that monster, but for the life she might have when I bring her home. There’s no question it’s the right thing to do, but what if I’m still looking over my shoulder for Amador’s matónes now that they know I’m not really dead?

  The simple answer isn’t an easy one, but it’s the truth: I have to eliminate that problem. That’s all there is to it. One way or the other, I have to make it so Gustavo is no longer invested in wiping me out of existence, so I’m no longer a liability to him or Amador. So that it doesn’t serve them to see me dead.

  If Arturo Flores is willing to kill a man he promised not to for the sake of his daughter, then I sure as shit need to be willing to do whatever is necessary for the sake of mine.

  8

  Callie

  A farewell party for one of our nurses keeps me late, so by the time I get back to my apartment, I’m frantic to finish my last-minute packing before my Uber comes to take me to LAX. I keep checking my phone for a response from Barnaby, increasingly miffed because he hasn’t texted back all day. We’ve had a policy of trust all along, but perhaps I’ve been too trusting? I thought getting engaged would settle our conflicts and open up more discussions about our future, but maybe I was wrong.

  We spent a few months on a break when I was two years into my residency. Then the following summer, Barnaby surprised me with a visit. At first he claimed he was just out in LA to scout a few private practice partnerships for potential positions when he finished his residency the following year. We spent one night together, which was the first sex I’d had since seeing him last.

  Then, out of the blue, he proposed.

  The sequence of events was so surprising and flattering I said yes. I’d mistakenly believed that he was earnest in his desire to move, to be closer to me and to make our relationship work. But it didn’t take long to realize his trip was only a way to leverage a better offer from a Denver practice. He would earn too much to justify moving to a more expensive, competitive city, so our relationship went back to how it had been before.

  Maybe I’m a fool for accepting his lack of effort, but I’m just too busy to waste energy on pushing him for more. I tell myself we’ll figure it out, but it’s been almost three years since I accepted his proposal and nothing has changed. Which is why the strange text gives me such a sense of dread.

  It isn’t until I’m in the back of the Uber and a friendly Black woman named Yazmin is driving me to the airport that my phone buzzes again. I swipe the screen to a message that makes no more sense than the last one, despite having words this time, and a cold prickling sensation sets in at the base of my skull.

  “Thought you were waiting in Aspen? I’m coming to you, remember?”

  I’m definitely not going to Aspen, nor waiting there for him, and I’m pretty sure he’s not coming to LA or he’d have told me. Fingers already going numb from the shock of cold understanding, I type back, “You haven’t been to LA in two years. Why now? Or did you mistake me for someone else??”

  The next few seconds of watching the dots on the screen seem to last an eternity, then Barnaby’s message finally pops up:

  “Fuck.”

  I want to scream, and it’s all I can do to resist the urge to chuck the phone out the window. I just stare at it until I jump when it starts to ring. Icy fury takes hold when I finally swipe the screen and hold the phone to my ear.

  Before he can get out any platitudes or any “let me explains,” I snap, “I’m fucking done. It’s over. Goodbye, Barnaby.”

  And I hang up.

  Then I let out a frustrated roar of anger that makes Yazmin glance warily into the rearview mirror. “Everything okay back there?”

  “No!” I bark. “I wasted five years on that asshole! What the fuck was I thinking? Five years! I could’ve been fucking surfers or had a torrid affair with a celebrity, or . . .”

  The mysterious, rough-looking man from the hospital this morning pops into my head and I sit back and groan.

  Yazmin chuckles and shakes her head. “Girl, I’ve asked myself the same damn question so many times. Do I need to turn around and take you back?”

  I shake my head, swallowing down angry tears that threaten to flow. I won’t cry. He doesn’t deserve it. “No, this trip wasn’t about him. He can go fuck himself. Or whatever snow bunny tart he has stashed in Aspen. Gah!”

  “You know the best way to get over a man?” Yazmin asks. “You get under another one.”

  I meet her gaze in the rearview and can’t help but laugh. “You sound like my best friend Nina. That’s definitely something she’d say.”

  She nods. “So you have a support system. Good. Girls gotta stick together. Most men aren’t worth the damn rubber on the bottom of their shoes. Or whatever’s stuck to it.”

  I’m not that uncharitable about men in general, but I agree with her anyway. Our conversation for the rest of the drive is mostly abou
t all of the myriad bullshit either of us have put up with from men over the years. It becomes painfully clear to me how very little time I’ve spent single, much less dating more than one man.

  I didn’t even take advantage of those few months Barnaby and I were broken up because they were some of the most grueling months of my residency. I didn’t have the energy for random hookups, much less going on actual dates. I didn’t even get asked on dates because I never bothered revealing that I was single. Now I wish I had.

  The last time a guy hit on me, he died.

  The shock of that death had served as the catalyst for my split with Barnaby to begin with. That man—J.J. Santos—had been the first man I’d connected with on such a visceral level since . . . well, ever. I still couldn’t explain that feeling any more than I could explain his death.

  Ever since, I’ve resigned myself to never knowing the truth on either count. I only heeded that lesson briefly and distanced myself from Barnaby because I knew he never once made me feel that way in all the years we were together.

  But I forgot. I missed some of what being with Barnaby had given me, even though, deep down, I knew it was never enough. Now I realize saying yes to his proposal was a mistake. I may never again have that feeling my dying patient had given me, but I have a far better chance now than I did yesterday.

  I stare down at the small diamond and garnet ring on my left hand, then slip it off and drop it into my purse. It doesn’t even leave a mark, I wear it so rarely. Pretty jewelry and brain surgery don’t exactly mix, so the ring has lived in a box on my dresser most of the time I’ve owned it. I only wear it on days off, or when I’m about to see the man who gave it to me. So it doesn’t exactly feel strange not to have anything adorning my finger anymore.

  When Yazmin pulls up to the busy curb beneath the Southwest Airlines sign at LAX, I’m fighting off a sense of despair. I’m thirty-one and single. Sure, I have what is likely to be a brilliant career ahead of me, thanks to all the work I put in, but I have no one to share it with. I have nothing but my work. That, and this one week a year I allow myself to have fun.

  Shoving my self-pity aside, I take my suitcase from Yazmin and impulsively pull the curvy driver into a tight hug. “Thanks for the talk. I hope you have a happy New Year, okay?”

  She squeaks in surprise, then laughs and hugs me back. “Oh, it was nothing. Just be sure to five-star that shit on the app, okay? And don’t you settle for anyone from now on who doesn’t worship the ground you walk on. You are a goddess, honey. We are all goddesses!”

  I grin as I wave goodbye, then haul ass inside. The baggage check line is blessedly short, but the airline attendant says they’ve already started boarding my flight, so I only have a few minutes to get to my gate before they close it. I don’t have an assigned seat, which means I’ll probably wind up with the worst seat on the plane, especially if it’s full.

  I make it through security, then sprint down the concourse and make it to the gate within minutes, breathlessly apologizing as I fish my phone out of my bag and swipe to open the airline app to find my boarding pass. Then I’m through and boarding, face just as flushed from the run as from all the stares I get from the seated passengers as I scan for an empty spot. There are none near the front, naturally, so I keep moving down the aisle until a flight attended catches my attention.

  “Here, miss,” she says, pointing to a seat in the emergency exit row, which would be a godsend if it weren’t smack in between two huge men. The one by the window is a portly older man, his girth spilling over the armrest. The other has shoulders as wide as a bus that bulge within his tight cotton “Navy” T-shirt.

  I’m fixated on the narrow gap between them and nod my thanks to the flight attendant. At least I have leg room. One direction is better than nothing, right?

  The man in the aisle seat unbuckles his seatbelt and rises, unfolding himself almost to his full height. He has to stoop a bit or else hit his head on the ceiling. I avoid eye contact, not in the mood to engage anyone as raw as I am, and I lift my carry-on, surveying the overhead compartment for space.

  A big hand covers mine. “Let me help you with that, Dr. Nicolo.”

  That deep voice sends a cascade of tingles down my spine and my gaze jerks up. I meet a familiar set of steel-gray eyes set in the bearded face of Mason Black, the mysterious disappearing man who visited Marcella Santos this morning. The dark purple bruise around one eye is just as I remember it, though a little less swollen. He smiles and my entire body warms.

  “Thank you,” I say, smiling back and relinquishing my small suitcase. I move to slide into my seat, a rush still coursing through me from the shock of coming face-to-face with him again.

  He wrestles with the other bags in the compartment to fit mine in, and I can’t help but steal a glance at his tattooed biceps as the muscles bunch and flex with the weight of my bag. His T-shirt rides up a little, revealing a cut belly adorned with more ink. His stretch puts his crotch at eye-level, his impressive package clad in well-worn, blue-gray camouflage fatigues.

  Yazmin’s wisdom repeats itself in my head. If I want to get over Barnaby, this is the kind of guy I want to do it with.

  A throat clears from my other side and I avert my gaze, glancing at the man in the window seat as my cheeks turn molten. He chuckles softly and shakes his head before returning his attention to his e-reader.

  Sitting back, I fasten my seatbelt and try to settle in, but when Mason reclaims his seat, his shoulder brushes mine and sends a fresh jolt of electricity straight to my core.

  He leans his head close and inundates me with his woody scent. The back of my neck prickles with acute awareness of his proximity. Jesus, he’s going to talk to me. I’m afraid I’ll spontaneously combust if he so much as breathes a word. What the hell is wrong with me?

  But what he says cools me down significantly.

  “Not that I’m not happy to see you, Doc, but who’s taking care of Mrs. Santos if you’re here?”

  Right. To him, I’m not a woman; I’m a doctor. The doctor who was treating his sick relative. I make a point to look him in the eyes this time and my heart melts a little at the genuine worry I see. Compassion takes over and I rest a hand on his arm, squeezing gently.

  “She’s stable and in capable hands. I’m only one of several doctors on her team. I’m also only a resident. My attending, Dr. Yao, is the head of neurosurgery. He’s still there, so you don’t have anything to worry about.”

  His pinched expression eases and he nods, sitting back in his seat. “Thanks.”

  “Your aunt is very special to you, isn’t she? Do you mind if I ask why you aren’t staying?”

  His bearded face is hard to read, but I’m sure I catch a flash of frustration in his eyes. He just shakes his head. “Work,” he says, staring at the back of the seat in front of him. Then he looks at me again and his gaze slips down my body. “What about you? I didn’t know they let residents off the leash.”

  I laugh, which earns a smile from him too. He has a nice smile that’s only enhanced by the dark bristles of his beard. An errant part of my brain imagines what he might be like to kiss, to feel that fringe against my lips.

  “They do technically allow us time off, but we don’t always get it when we want it. I made a point to work through the holidays just so I could have New Year’s. It’s a sacrifice, but worth it.”

  I leave out the part about not having much of a life to speak of, which earns me the good will from my superiors to actually request more than a few days at a time. I’m taking an entire week of consecutive days, which few residents manage to get.

  The flight attendants begin their pre-flight spiel, so we turn our attention to them. When they’re finished, the captain announces a delay due to a storm on the flight path. I sigh and pull out a tattered book I’ve been slowly working my way through, then stop and stare at the cover, realizing the book was a gift from Barnaby several Christmases ago. I completely lose interest and shove it into the seat pocket in fro
nt of me, then sit back, closing my eyes and gritting my teeth against a wave of fresh internal arguments I wish I’d had with Barnaby for real.

  There were so many things I buried just to avoid conflict. So many things he did that I let slide because they were only small slights that he managed to make up for with platitudes and presents. I’d fully expected him to blow off Mom’s party this year. I can hear his excuses clear as day in my head now. He made plans to go skiing with friends in Aspen. It’s an excuse I’ve heard before, and a sick feeling rises in my gut when it occurs to me that whoever he thought he was texting might have been present for past trips too.

  “It’s not a very good book anyway,” Mason says.

  “It was a gift,” I say in a resigned voice. “I kind of felt obligated to read it because literally everyone I know has. It’s one of those books I think people like to have read so they can sound cerebral at dinner parties with other stuffed shirts who want to discuss it.”

  His deep chuckle warms me. “Pretending to be someone you’re not takes a lot of energy. Why not just read what makes you happy? Life is too short to worry about what other people think.”

  “I like the way you think, Mason Black.” I grin at him and his eyebrows shoot up.

  “I don’t remember telling you my name, Doc. Is this some kind of black magic?” His mouth quirks to one side.

  “No. You gave your name to the nurse this morning. She told me. No tricks, I promise.”

  “I see. I never caught your first name, though. I’m guessing it isn’t just ‘Doctor.’ ”

  “It’s Callie. Callie Nicolo.” I hold out my hand as if we’ve just been introduced. He takes it and the squeeze of his fingers around mine evokes an unexpected longing deep inside. I meet his eyes for a beat, and his gaze is so intense I can’t help but feel as if he sees straight through me. I have to tear my eyes away and find myself staring at our hands, then frown and turn his over in mine.