Hey, you at school?
She didn’t answer. They called her again the following period, and the one after that. When lunch finally rolled around, I called her phone. She didn’t answer. A sick feeling hit the pit of my stomach, and I called her again. Still nothing. Images of her dead in a ditch somewhere flashed through my head and I dipped out, skipping the last two classes. I wouldn’t have been able to focus anyway.
I’d worked myself up into a rage filled panic by the time I made it to her place, and the cop car parked outside her house didn’t help at all. Some old suspicions rose for a split second; what if she was spilling all the beans? I hadn’t exactly been a law-abiding angel in front of her, and God help Eddie if she starts talking about him.
The smart thing to do would have been to turn around and go to Eddie’s, help him stash his shit before the cops raided, but I couldn’t do that. If I’d been right the first time and she really was hurt or in trouble, she might need me. Even if she was telling the cops everything, I needed to know if she was okay. So, knowing that I was risking my life, liberty, and happiness, I stepped out of the car.
Her dad opened the door when I knocked. I recognized him immediately, even without his expensive suit and shit eating grin. A flash of anger thumped through me. I pushed it away.
“My name’s Blayze,” I said. “Is Arlena home?”
He looked me up and down, giving me a hard, calculating gaze. “What are you to her?” he asked.
What the hell kind of question was that? I opened my mouth to respond, but was interrupted by the woman herself.
“Blayze?” She sounded as though she’d been crying. Every other concern flew out of my head. “Daddy, let him in, please.”
Surprisingly enough, her dad stepped back to let me through, but kept an intimidating posture as I passed. I didn’t care. I didn’t care much about the two cops and detective sitting around in the living room, either. The only person I saw clearly was Arlena, who sat in a big chair alone, her eyes red and puffy and her face streaked with tears. I pulled her into my arms and stroked her hair. She buried her face in my chest and clung to me, trembling.
I kneeled down in front of her. “What’s going on?” I asked.
“They know everything,” she said. “The letters, the cat, the car, the pictures—when the pictures went out, I guess the school called the cops. My dad and the insurance people couldn’t find my car, so he filed a police report to report it stolen. This detective put the two together and recognized that something bigger was going on, so Mom kept me home today to go through it all with them.”
“This is pretty serious criminal harassment,” the detective said. “If you know anything, son, I suggest you tell us.”
“If I knew anything, the harassment would have stopped a long time ago,” I said coldly.
“There it is,” Arlena’s dad said. “That attitude right there is why this town is so difficult to clean up. Guys like you don’t want help, you just want to break things and kill people. You’re overdressed Neanderthals with guns and drugs.”
“Daddy!” Arlena sounded shocked, which showed me just how detached she’d been from her dad’s career. Anybody who looked at his court history could have assumed he felt that way. I rose to my feet and spun slowly around to face him.
“That attitude, right there—that one that you share with the cops and the judge and the mayor—is why we live the way we do. You don’t want to help people. You just want to put us away so you don’t have to look at us.”
Mr. Drake stiffened his spine and literally looked down his nose at me. “I beg your pardon, but my work has saved hundreds of thousands of children from being preyed upon by drug dealers.”
I scoffed. “Has it? Has it, really? You think locking up some dude with a dime bag is going to save kids from poverty? From parents who work too hard to pay attention? From a neglectful society and vigilante cops?”
“That’s an oxymoron,” Drake said smugly.
“The hell it is. Beat cops will use any excuse, any, to fuck someone’s life up. You all really think you’re helping people? Let me tell you a story about a kid who was pressed into hauling drugs because the cops were stop-searching every grown man. That kid couldn’t ask a cop for help, are you kidding? They’d have taken the drugs and thrown him in juvie. He’d be marked a rat and killed in cold blood the second he got out.”
“Which is exactly why we get the dealers off the street!”
“Is it? Really? Tell me, sir, if you send a man to prison on a felony charge, what are his chances of getting a decent job when he gets out?”
Drake smirked. “That’s not really my concern, is it?”
“It should be,” I said. “If your concern is ‘cleaning up this town’ like you claim it is, then you’ve got to stop being so damn short-sighted. Men hit the streets with a felony on their record, they’ll be lucky to get a minimum-wage job. They still gotta eat, right? Still got rent to pay, don’t they? Well shit, they’ve only got the skills they went in with. It’s hard to get a job. Any job. You know what’s easy though? Getting back in touch with old contacts and getting back in business again. So yeah, that’s exactly the road they end up going to down…again. Rinse and repeat.”
Drake narrowed his eyes at me. “If they were good people, they wouldn’t consider that an option.”
“Good or bad doesn’t have a damn thing to do with it,” I said coldly. “Good people have to eat just as much as bad people do. Good people get brought up in this life just like bad people do. A good person around here won’t sell drugs to kids, but they’re still gonna sell them if that’s what it takes to pay the bills.”
“If they want to pay the bills, they should get better jobs,” Drake said as though he hadn’t listened to a damn word I said. “And they would stay away from drugs. How hard is that?”
“You tell me,” I said. “How many people have you guys locked up this month on drug charges?”
“One hundred and eight,” Drake said. The pride in his eyes sickened me right down to my core. “One hundred and eight criminals off the street.”
“Cool. Now tell me how many job openings there are around here right now paying fifteen dollars an hour or more. That’s bare-bottom minimum what it takes to pay for a room. Not an apartment, a goddamn room.”
Drake shook his head. “I don’t know the answer to that.” Of course, he didn’t,
“Hm, okay, let me see.” I pulled up a job search on my phone, put in the specifics, and handed it to him. “Twelve,” I said. “Twelve openings. How many of those jobs do you think want a bachelor’s degree? How many of them need ten years of experience? How many of them do you think are willing to take a man who’s just got out of prison?”
Drake frowned at the phone and handed it back to me. “What’s your point?”
“My point is, you’re part of the problem. All of you. You’re attacking the symptoms and ignoring the disease. You’re going to walk away from here in a year, maybe two, with another success under your belt. You’ll catch all the bad guys and lock them all up and walk away. And kids will still be starving. And rent will still be impossible. And in three, four years all those guys you locked up will be back on the streets again, except this time they won’t be able to get honest work even if they want it.”
Drake shook his head. “What do you want from me? You want me to just let these guys walk so they can keep preying on kids just because the economy’s bad? No. That’s an excuse, and a terrible one. The economy’s always bad somewhere. You don’t seem to understand that innocent children are being hurt—”
“Innocent children are relying on that money too,” I interrupted. “Let me tell you how it goes. A small-time dealer sells some shit on the weekends to make ends meet so he can support his kids or his little brothers and sisters. He gets picked up with a misdemeanor’s worth of drugs on him. First offense. Okay, that’s fine. It sucks, but he’s probably gonna get probation. He can still work, still provide, maybe squeeze in
another job somewhere to make up the difference. Then he gets to the courtroom—and sees you.”
Drake’s gaze hardens, but he doesn’t say anything. I smirk. “You see where this is going. Now he’s up against the super prosecutor who somehow takes that little bit, that first offense, and spins a whole story about how this twenty-something kid is the next kingpin in training. You slam him with a felony drug offense.”
I gesture widely. “Maybe he’s got kids. Siblings. People who rely on him. What are they going to do now? Well, they’re going to turn to their friends. Or his friends. People who have the means to take care of them for a while—extra money. It’s scarce around here. Only a few kinds of people have it. Now you’ve sent that man’s dependents right into the thick of it. Impressionable young kids, being provided for by a big-time dealer.”
“Where’s the mother in this hyperbole of yours?” Drake demanded.
I grin. “Locked up for drugs, man. Or maybe living with some sugar daddy who doesn’t like kids.”
“That’s what the foster system is for.”
“Okay, let’s ignore the fact that foster care grinds kids up and spits out addicts every damn day. Let’s say that this guy’s dependent is an eighteen-year-old high school student who actually has a chance of going to school and breaking the cycle—if he can finish school. Foster system won’t take him, mother won’t take him, and now his brother has a felony on his record and is going to jail for five years. That kid has two options.”
I put up one hand like a scale. “He can drop out of school and start working.” I held up the other hand. “Or he can sell some drugs, stay in school, and gamble his present against his future.”
“Doesn’t this kid have any other family?” Drake says, exasperated. “Friends?”
I shook my head. “Hell no, man. Once you’re eighteen—hell, once you’re sixteen—you better be making your own money or nobody’s going to take you in. And just think—if that kid had gone to school, he could have gotten one of those well-paying jobs you keep talking about. He could have given his big brother a hand up, helped him break the cycle too. All of that potential wasted—because you wanted to make an example out of this guy instead of giving him the probation he deserved.”
Drake looked thoughtful for a minute, then smiled. “Hypotheticals are fun to play with, aren’t they?”
I shook my head, giving him a flat stare. “Nothing hypothetical about this, Mr. Drake. Let me introduce myself properly. Blayze Arrow. You might remember my brother Damon.” I held out my hand. Drake stared at it for a few seconds too long, then shook it slowly.
“I see,” he said quietly. “I see.”
Nobody spoke for a few minutes, then the detective stood up. “As exciting as that was,” he said, “I think we’re all forgetting why we’re here. Blayze, Ms. Drake says you’ve been helping her navigate this whole stalker situation. Would you mind answering a few questions?”
I smirked. “I’ll answer whatever I can answer without implicating myself. I’m standing in a room with a magician who can turn a sip of communion wine into a raging kegger with a word, you know.”
Drake and the detective shared a glance. The detective hid a smile and nodded. “Fair enough. First things first, do you know where Ms. Drake’s car is?”
“Sure,” I said easily. “It’s sitting between two dumpsters behind Joe’s Marketplace in the alley between third and first.”
The detective nodded at one of the cops, who then took off in a hurry. “Thank you,” the detective said. “Now, if you’ll have a seat, I would appreciate you telling me everything you know about Arlena’s stalker.”
28
I tried to stay for moral support, if nothing else, while Blayze was talking to the detective, but even listening to all of that all over again was exhausting. After an hour or so I excused myself to the kitchen for some water and just stayed in there for a few minutes, watching the water run down the sink. Everything was coming to an end now. I could feel pressure from all sides, and I was collapsing under it.
“Interesting friend you have there,” Dad said as he walked in. “I’m not sure how I feel about his sense of morality, but he’s an interesting character.”
I scoffed. “His sense of morality? Dad, he’s the only person who’s been protecting me all year, even after you locked his brother up. He’s been couch-surfing for months and skipping school to take care of me and he’s still going to graduate near the top of the class.”
“Low bar,” Dad sniffed.
I blinked at him. “You’re a snob,” I said, my voice soft with the realization. “You weren’t even listening to what he was saying, were you? You deal with these people as if they have a gap year to consider their options and think about life and then they just go yeah, you know, I feel like being a criminal.”
Dad cocked his head at me. “You agree with him?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. I agree with both of you, and I think you’ve both got these huge blind spots you can’t see around. You, with your rigid idea of morality, him with his passive acceptance of crime as a way of life. It’s like you’re both seeing half the picture and you keep arguing about your own half instead of trying to put the pieces together.”
I wet my hands in the cool water and rubbed my face, then filled a glass and turned the faucet off.
“I will admit that he got me thinking,” Dad said. “I’ve never questioned my methods before now.”
I smiled at that. “He’s pretty smart, you know.”
“I see that. But what is he going to do with those smarts?”
“I don’t know. I know he was planning on going to college before Damon was arrested, but now—he can’t keep living where he’s living, he’s going to have to move out sooner rather than later, maybe even before school’s out. Money is going to be his priority. It’s going to have to be, he doesn’t have any real choice.”
Dad nodded thoughtfully. “That’s a shame,” he said.
I looked up at him sharply. “Why?”
Dad’s lips twisted into a little smile. “Because if Blayze had been his brother’s public defender, Damon would have walked away with probation.”
He gave me a meaningful look and walked away, back out into the living room. I watched him go, frowning. I really wished people would stop trying to get their point across to me sideways. I drank my drink and went back out to the living room, where Blayze was just finishing up with the detective.
“And you really won’t tell me where this party took place,” the detective said.
Blayze shook his head. “Nope. That’s top secret. If someone sees my car and your car outside this house, and then the party house gets raided right away, who’s skin do you think is going to pay for that?”
The detective nodded. “Fair enough. Don’t worry, we’ll find it.”
Blayze clenched his jaw. I sat down beside him and held his hand. I knew how hard it must have been for him to lead the cops any closer to Eddie, and not just because Eddie was his best friend.
“Okay,” the detective said. “I think that’s everything. But if you think of anything that will help, don’t hesitate to call. I might have some more questions for you in the future. If I do, I’ll call you.”
“Just don’t stop me on the street acting like you know me,” Blayze said. “Last thing I need is people thinking I’m working with you guys.”
The detective nodded his understanding, then he and the other cop left. I let out a long breath and sagged against the back of the couch, utterly beat. Blayze did the same.
“Blayze?” I asked. “Are you really in danger?”
“After today? Yes. It’s really going to depend on what they find and who they decide to pin this on, though. If it’s the wrong person—” he trailed off and shrugged, then looked at me with love shining in his eyes. “But it’s okay, you know why?”
“Why?”
“Because you’re worth it.” He kissed my nose, then bumped my forehead with his. �
��Completely worth it.”
I could feel my dad’s eyes on me. I glanced at him and found him gazing thoughtfully at Blayze. I could almost feel his cross-examination posture kick on.
“Do you want to go for a drive?” I asked Blayze.
“Absolutely.”
29
“My dad says you could be a public defender,” Arlena blurted out after we’d driven in silence for a few minutes.
I slid a look at her then turned my eyes back on the road. “Anybody could, apparently. I’ve watched them work. A monkey with a decent grasp of sign language could do that job.”
She shook her head. “That’s not what he meant. He said if you had been defending your brother that day, he would have walked with a misdemeanor charge.”
It felt like a slap in the face and fury swept through me. “Really.”
She nodded, oblivious to the shift in my mood. “Oh, yeah. He thinks you make very compelling arguments. He asked me what you’re going to do after school—I think he sees lawyer potential in you.”
I snorted. “Did you tell him potential costs money?”
“Sort of,” she said with a shrug. “I told him how hard it would be for you to go to school, especially now that your brother’s locked up.”
That didn’t make me feel any less angry. Even though I’d already told him that myself, I didn’t like knowing that people were talking about the more vulnerable parts of my life—especially people like Tristan Drake.
“Your dad strikes me as the kind of person who would use that against me,” I said.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, if I can’t afford to access my potential, then obviously I’m a bad match for you. I feel like that’s where this conversation of yours would have headed if we hadn’t gotten out of there when we did.”
She frowned, but since I was driving, I couldn’t tell if she was thinking or hurt. “He’s protective,” she said defensively. “But he wouldn’t use that against you, I don’t think. Lots of people can’t afford to go to school, he knows that.”
Manic: A Dark Bully Romance Page 19