From A to Z - Angel Reyes

Chapter 19

Angel raced off toward the hospital rather than joining Miguel for the ride and ended up beating the Galindo cars by almost five minutes. He hurried in through the ER double doors where he was approached by a man in a suit, with neck tattoos. Angel knew he was one of Galindo's men, the tattoos and expensive clothing combination giving him away.

"Where is she?" Angel asked before the stranger could explain anything.

The man pointed down the long row of ER exam rooms. "Third from the end on the left."

Unable to see into the room, the curtain closed to obscure the patient from view of the large glass doors. Angel knocked "Z?"

"Angel?" She whimpered and instantly he was through the door into the room.

Zara was sitting up, her bloody legs dangling off the side of the bed, in a flimsy pale green hospital gown.

"I gotta stop finding you here," he said, vaguely scolding himself. "Are you okay?" He asked, sitting beside her on the bed and pulling her into his arms.

"They took him," she said, still dazed.

Angel's face scrunched up. "Who?"

"The baby," she stammered, "They took Cristobal."

"Fuck," he hissed, holding her closer. "They'll get him back, it's fucking Galindo." Letting her go, Angel shifted his body to see her better. "Lemme look at you. What happened?"

Zara swallowed hard and nodded. "Uh, we uh, got run off the road. They killed his men, they forced us out of the car and," she whimpered, "They made us kneel and I thought they were going to kill us, Angel." As she said it, she broke down, "But they took Cristobal and left us. He's just a baby. Who could do this?"

Shaking his head, Angel just held her unsure of what else he could do for her. Finding those responsible would not be Angel's job, although he'd love to get in on the hunt, that meant all his attention could be spent on Zara.

"What's the doctor say?"

"They did blood work, a got a few stitches," she pointed to the side of her face near her temple. "But barring any nasty blood or MRI results I'll be released soon, I think."

"Your parents?"

She huffed. "No. They told me not even to mention Cristobal is any staff or cops asked. I'd have to edit too much, it's less stressful just to keep it to myself."

"I'm sorry," he whispered, pressing his lips to the side of her head. "I'm supposed to be protecting you, Z, but you keep getting hurt."

"None of this is even your fault, please don't feel guilty," she said softly. "If anything, I'd be worse off and much more alone without you."

"I'm not going anywhere," he said quietly just as Nestor barged in.

"How's Emily?" Zara asked him.

"Shaken up but okay," he said. "I need to know everything," he said darkly.

Zara nodded, intimidated by Nestor but feeling more comfortable with Angel by her side. "Uh yeah. I don't have any license plate numbers, my eyes were blurry from the blood and uh, tears, but they were driving identical old vans, those Astrostar or Aerostar ones, something like that. Ugly as fuck and really popular back in the 80s. They all wore masks, like freaky animal papier-mâché ones, the little girl was a rabbit, and the other two I saw were wolves or dogs or something."

As she spoke, Angel felt his heart rate quicken and his chest grow tighter. It was the rebels. It was Adelita. He couldn't help wondering if this was a message for him as well as Galindo. Campbell was causing more problems now and he was dragging Zara into Los Olvidados' crosshairs.