“Tanner!”
I stopped on the concrete walkway and turned back toward Cervantes, holding my hands out. “What, man? We’re wasting time here.”
He jogged up to me. “Why do you feel so strongly about this?”
“Why don’t you?” I said. “I already went by the house. She wasn’t there. Yeah, maybe she’s returned. But we both tried calling her and neither of us got an answer. We go over there, we’re wasting time. Let’s get to the house before something happens.”
He rocked from foot to foot, fingers twitching, like a linebacker over the A gap ready to blitz the moment the center snaps the ball. The hell was the guy’s problem? I could get him not trusting me since I was from a different area. The ‘Big City,’ as he’d referred to it. But my argument was sound and logical. And Cassie was in danger.
“I can’t wait all day, man,” I said. “And neither can Cassie.”
“Get your car and meet me by the rear entrance,” he said. “I’ll lead the way.”
And he did. Like a pulling guard he cleared a path through the city with his lights swirling and siren blaring. No easy feat, either. Seemed every second intersection we came to required us to slow down or stop all together and wait for a pedestrian or two to get out of the way. The squares made it tricky as well. There was no speeding at eighty miles per hour when you had to turn sharp right every hundred feet.
We finally broke free when it happened. Cervantes didn’t hear my blaring horn. And he didn’t see the oncoming truck that had failed to hear the sirens or spot the flashing lights.