The Children's Cop

by Sherry Lewis

  “So what do you want to talk to him about?”

  Lucy treated him to another one of those smiles. “Not anything you need to worry about—unless, of course, you were with him on Saturday the fourteenth.”

  Some piece of machinery fell silent and the laugh that their guide belted out at the same moment echoed off the warehouse’s tin walls. “Nope. Sorry. Saturday’s my night off. I don’t hang around this place unless they pay me to.”

  Jackson had remained silent long enough. “Are you saying that Fitzgerald was working that night?”

  The man shrugged casually. “He works every Saturday.”

  “What hours?”

  “We usually put in four tens, so he woulda been here from eight until six the next morning.”

  Lucy met Jackson’s gaze and he saw disappointment in her eyes. But Jackson wasn’t so sure. Somebody somewhere knew where Angel had gone, and he wanted to make certain Wayne was innocent before he walked away. “Are you sure he was here?”

  The guide scratched with a finger above one ear. “Well, not one-hundred percent. Like I said, I wasn’t here myself. But somebody could tell you fast enough.” He came to a stop a few feet from the crew and nodded toward a skinny young man with a face full of dark stubble and a scraggly goatee.

  Everyone there seemed well acquainted with hard work, but Wayne Fitzgerald looked dirtier than most—from the grease in his hair, to the dirt under his fingernails, to the stains on his bright yellow T-shirt. Bile rose in Jackson’s throat at the thought of him anywhere near Angelina. Jackson had to force himself to stand still, hands clenched into fists at his side, while Lucy introduced them.

  People like Wayne had been in Holden’s path when he was younger, holding out enticements, shooting holes in Wiley’s arguments, flattering, cajoling, pretending to care, while all the time they used him for their own personal gain. The decisions had all been Holden’s, but he’d had help from pieces of scum just like the kid standing in front of them.

  The machinery started up again, drowning out the sound of their voices. After only a few minutes, Lucy led Fitzgerald outside and away from curious ears, and Jackson trailed along once again, aching to do something constructive. He’d probably never understand why Holden couldn’t see what kind of people he got tangled up with. He just prayed Angel wasn’t following in her father’s footsteps.

  Fitzgerald scuffed along behind Lucy, hands in pockets, dragging his pants even farther down on his nonexistent hips. He appeared supremely uninterested in everyone and everything around him. Anger boiled up inside of Jackson, all the things he hadn’t been able to say to Holden came rushing back, and he found himself wanting to wrap his hands around Wayne’s scrawny neck, just to get his attention.

  When they could finally hear each other speak, the kid flicked something from a tooth with the tip of his tongue and let out a resentful sigh. “So what’s this all about, anyway?”

  “We’re told you used to live on Alder Drive across town,” Lucy said. “Is that right?”

  Wayne nodded uncertainly. “I haven’t lived there in a while, though.”

  “When was the last time you were in that neighborhood?”

  “I don’t remember.” He hitched his pants higher, but they immediately sagged back down again. “Why do you want to know?”

  Lucy ignored his question. “Were you there on Saturday the fourteenth?”

  “No.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Tugging at the tangle of hair on his chin, Wayne took a step backward. “I said no, didn’t I? Whatever you’re after, I can’t help you.”

  The stubborn set of his mouth and the mocking light in his eyes were too much for Jackson. No way was he going to let Wayne walk away. He shifted to block his escape route and decided to try reaching him on a level he might understand. “Why don’t you think again, asshole. Maybe you’re forgetting.”

  Wayne’s beady eyes flew to his and locked there. Jackson saw anger and uncertainty, but did he see guilt? He wasn’t sure.

  With a warning glance in his direction, Lucy switched gears. “Why don’t you tell us what you know about Angelina Beckett?”

  “Who?”

  Lucy pulled a copy of Angel’s picture from her pocket and handed it over. “You recognize her now?”

  The boy barely skimmed the picture before handing it back. “Never saw her before.”

  “Why don’t you look again?”

  “Why? So you can pin something on me?” Wayne shoved the photograph at her and tried to put some distance between them. “I still have friends over there, and I’ve heard that she’s gone. But if you think you’re going to make me look guilty, you’d better think again. I haven’t seen the kid in months. Don’t want to, either.”

  “You didn’t go over there last Saturday night and invite her to take a drive with you?”

  Wayne’s eyes darted from Lucy’s face to Jackson’s, and this time there was no mistaking the hatred burning in them. “What in the hell would I want to do that for? She’s a kid.”

  “A kid who’s been missing for the past ten days,” Jackson growled.

  “Yeah?” Wayne’s lips curved into a smug smile. “Well maybe she doesn’t want to be found. You ever think of that?”

  “Did you take her somewhere? To meet her dad, maybe?”

  “No way. A kid like that is nothing but trouble, and that’s one thing I don’t need more of.”

  “You didn’t take her to meet her father?”

  “I said no, but I wouldn’t worry about her too much.” The ugly smirk on his face grew stronger, and mocking laughter filled his eyes. “She knows her way around…if you know what I mean.”

  Maybe he didn’t know where to find Angel, but he was cut from the same cloth as Holden and his friends. A parasite. A boil on the butt of humanity. “You’d better watch your mouth,” Jackson warned.

  “Why? Because you can’t handle the truth? The girl’s a skank, man.”

  The rage he’d been keeping barely contained came rushing to the surface and erupted in white-hot fury that nearly blinded him. With a roar, he lunged at Wayne, grabbed him by the shoulders of his scruffy T-shirt and shoved him up against the warehouse’s outside wall.

  He was vaguely aware of Wayne’s shouts of protest and the sound of Lucy’s voice behind him, but he could think of only one thing. He jammed his forearm against Wayne’s throat and pressed hard enough to get the kid’s attention. “Where is she, you little son of a bitch?”

  Wayne bucked against the pressure, but he couldn’t do much without hurting himself. “What the hell are you doing?” His voice came out tight and choked, and his eyes bugged out in surprise and fear. He looked for help from someone behind Jackson’s shoulder, but a little more pressure got his attention back where it belonged. “Get off me, man!”

  “Not until you tell me what you’ve done with my niece.”

  “You’re crazy! I haven’t done a damn thing with your niece. If she’s not where she’s supposed to be, it’s not my fault. Dammit! You want to find her, check out her computer. She’s always talking to people in chat rooms and stuff.”

  Jackson knew Lucy was saying something to him, but he wasn’t ready to back off yet. She was shouting at him, warning him away, but Jackson didn’t want to listen. He was sick to death of dancing around people. He wanted answers.

  He leaned in close, inches from Wayne’s face, to make sure the dirtbag didn’t miss the point he was about to make. “You’re making a big mistake,” he said between teeth clenched so tightly he could feel the muscles in his own neck bulge. “If you’ve done anything to Angel, if you’ve so much as touched her, I’ll prove it, no matter how long it takes, no matter how far I have to go.”

  “I mean it, Jackson. Let him go, now!” Lucy wrenched his arm away, and before he knew what was happening, whipped him around against the warehouse wall so hard it almost knocked the wind out of him.

  “Go on,” she said with a jerk of her head at Wayne. “Get out of
here.”

  The scum hoofed it into the warehouse and disappeared, and Jackson could almost see his one hope of finding Angel disappearing with him.

  Chapter Eleven

  JACKSON DIDN’T EVEN HAVE time to catch his breath before Lucy rounded on him. “I thought I told you to let me handle the questions.”

  “He knows where she is.”

  “He was probably here the night she disappeared.” She ran a hand across her face and turned away. Her shoulders heaved as she tried to catch her breath, but when she turned back toward him, her eyes still flashed fire. “What in the hell got into you?”

  “He knows where she is,” Jackson said again. “I could see it in his eyes.”

  “Oh, really? You could see that?” She propped her fists on her hips and glowered at him. “Well, I couldn’t. In fact, I think that’s what you wanted to see. And even if he does know where Angel is, you’ve just about guaranteed that the next time we want to talk to him, there’ll be lawyers everywhere making sure he doesn’t say a word.”

  She might have been right, but Jackson was still too riled to listen. “There’s something wrong with a world where a young woman can go missing and nobody knows a damn thing, and all the rules in the books protect a son of a bitch like that.”

  “The system works,” she snapped. “Just give it a chance.”

  “The system is a joke. It put Holden back out on the streets after his first half-dozen brushes with the law so he could keep hurting people. You saw Fitzgerald’s rap sheet. He has no business being out here, walking the streets, spreading more of his poison.”

  “So what do you want to do? Lock him away for the rest of his life?”

  “That would be a damn sight better than the way things are handled now.”

  Lucy’s expression grew frosty. “Do you feel that way about your own brother?”

  “You don’t know my brother. You don’t know what he’s done, and you haven’t watched your grandfather almost lose everything because of him.”

  “You’re right. And I haven’t lost my own dreams because of him, either.” Lucy’s voice was soft but it pierced him like a knife. “But you can’t blame the system for that, Jackson. Ultimately, you made the choice to go back to the ranch.”

  He pulled away from her sharply. “I never tried to blame my situation on anyone else. But if the system had worked, Holden wouldn’t have been able to commit fraud, wipe out my grandfather’s life’s work and walk away with a slap on the wrist. And that piece of filth in there would still be in jail, not out on the streets hurting people.”

  “If he has broken the law,” Lucy said slowly, “he will pay. But you aren’t judge and jury, and you can’t make him pay for past crimes just because you don’t think he’s suffered enough. I’m warning you. Either you get a grip on yourself, or we’re going to have to make some changes in how we’re doing things. I know how much you want to find Angel, but I won’t let you run around like a wild man attacking witnesses. If you keep that up, nobody will talk to us, and I’ll be yanked off the case completely. Is that what you want?”

  It was a stupid question, and she knew it. The fact that she’d even ask it got Jackson’s blood boiling again. Never in his life had he felt so helpless, and he hated the feeling with a passion. But no matter how much he hated being dictated to, he couldn’t let the police shut down the investigation.

  “What I want,” he snapped, “is to start looking in those chat rooms. You heard what Wayne said.”

  “Then that’s the next place we’ll look.”

  Slowly, the red began to fade, and with the return of reason came the realization that he’d lost control. Self-loathing rose like bile in his throat. He was no better than his old man.

  This was the real reason he’d never married. He just hadn’t been able to admit it to himself before. If there was even a chance that he’d take after his old man, he wasn’t going to risk it. No wife of his would go through the things his mother had endured. His children would never suffer like he and Holden had.

  And maybe it was a good thing he’d discovered a few basic differences of opinion with Lucy. Because the last thing he should be doing was indulging in daydreams he’d never dare act upon.

  WHILE JACKSON WAS IN the other room ordering dinner, Lucy set up so they could get to work. Both Angel and Patrice had been missing a long time, and Lucy had finally received a warrant to their house, with Orry as backup. She’d been hoping to find Angel’s computer so they could trace her activities, but if she had a computer at all, she’d taken it with her.

  But for once, luck was on their side. A phone number in Angel’s room had led them to a girl named Paige, who’d tearfully admitted to letting Angelina use her laptop computer. Paige’s mother had been wonderfully cooperative, and she’d given them use of the computer for the next few days to aid in their search.

  Lucy had shown it to a couple of guys on the Internet Task Force. They’d recovered a list of names saved in the computer’s recent Internet activity, pointing Lucy toward a couple of teen chat programs that seemed to be Angel’s favorites.

  Armed with this information, Lucy and Jackson were prepared to continue their search—this time virtually. With the laptop set up and the phone cords connected, Lucy started the computer and waited, stretching in the comfortable dining room chair. Here in his mother’s condo she felt strangely comfortable. More comfortable than she’d ever expected to. More comfortable than she probably should.

  As much as she resented her continuing sessions with Cecily, they had made Lucy rethink some of the ideas she’d once accepted without question. Her belief that she’d never marry was a big one.

  As Cecily had pointed out, plenty of officers had successful relationships. Look at Orry. And Nick. Risa was apparently doing well with Grady. But Lucy had glossed over these examples and focused instead on the failures.

  Why did she do that?

  Tension had faded between her and Jackson since that afternoon, but things weren’t quite back to normal and Lucy missed the easy camaraderie they’d begun to enjoy before their argument. While the computer booted up, she decided to take advantage of the moment to freshen up.

  Though she’d probably never achieve her mother’s fashion flair, she had been making more of an effort. For herself? For Jackson? She wasn’t sure about that, either.

  She slipped down the hall, found the bathroom and shut herself inside. The black slacks she’d bought during a free moment fit her well, but the sleeveless pink shell was more feminine than anything she’d ever owned. She wasn’t used to her new look yet, and she wasn’t sold on its practicality. If she had to chase down a suspect, she might be sorry, but at least for tonight it was kind of fun to feel feminine and pretty. Risa and the others would fall over if they could see her.

  Remembering something her mother had once tried to teach her, she tipped her head over, ran her fingers through her hair and stood straight again. Better. At least it had a little volume.

  She swiped at her lips with the tube of clear gloss she kept in her pocket, and reached for the door again with a sigh. But as she turned the knob, an overwhelming urge to talk to Risa came over her. If anyone would understand what she was feeling, Risa would. She knew Lucy nearly as well as Lucy knew herself, and she understood Lucy’s hopes for her career better than anyone else. She’d somehow managed to balance career and her new relationship with Grady, and she would understand without being told why Lucy shouldn’t mix business with pleasure in the middle of a case. She’d also know which of the arguments Lucy had been turning over in her mind were real concerns, and which were just excuses rooted in her insecurities.

  But would Risa be willing to talk to her? That was the question that had been hanging over her for weeks.

  She pulled her cell phone from her pocket and stared at the display screen for a long moment, then squared her shoulders and dialed Risa’s number. There was only one way to find out if Risa had really forgiven her.

  But as she
listened to the phone ringing, her courage began to fade. She told herself Risa may have turned her phone off, or maybe she’d left it somewhere. There might be many reasons why she didn’t answer, but there was also the possibility that Risa had seen Lucy’s name on the caller ID and chosen not to answer.

  Her voice mail message started to play and Lucy nearly hung up. But she’d avoided this for too long already, and she was tired of feeling afraid.

  “Hey,” she said softly. “It’s Lucy. I… It’s been a while,” she said before her courage deserted her, “and I was hoping maybe we could talk.”

  She hated being so uncomfortable with the woman who’d been her best friend. Hated the distance between them. Most of all, she hated knowing she was responsible. “There are a million things I need to say to you, Risa. Call me, please.”

  Feeling a little sick, she slipped the phone back into her pocket and hurried down the hall. She found Jackson standing in front of the computer, reading something on the screen. He looked up as she entered and his lips curved into a slow, sexy smile that wiped Risa right out of her mind.

  His eyes darkened with appreciation and he observed her. “Have I mentioned that you look beautiful?”

  She swallowed thickly and hoped she’d sound normal when she answered him. “Thank you.”

  He took a couple of steps toward her. “You should wear your hair this way more often.”

  What was she supposed to say to that? She laughed nervously, cut herself off before she sounded hysterical, and indulged in a long, luscious shiver of anticipation as he moved closer still. “Did you call for dinner?”

  Still without breaking eye contact, he nodded. He was closer now, close enough for her to see the need in his eyes. She told herself that his need was spawned by frustration over the search for Angel, but she knew that wasn’t entirely true. And she wanted, just for a minute, to believe that all was right with the world. She needed, even for one night, to feel the warmth of belonging to someone, real or imagined.