by Sherry Lewis
“So you figured I was out chasing men or tying one on.” She dropped onto the couch and crossed her legs. “I always knew you hated me, but that’s a little low, even for you.”
Jackson held up both hands to ward off her attack, but he hated knowing he might deserve it. “I’m sorry,” he said as he sat on the arm of a chair. “I didn’t know. But why didn’t you know that Angel was gone? Didn’t you try to call her?”
“Wouldn’t that be lovely? Haven’t you been listening? We don’t have that kind of money. I’m two months behind on the rent. The utilities are all thirty days past due. I’ve had creditors breathing down my neck for months, and we lost the phone two weeks ago. I can’t afford long-distance phone calls just because.” She paced for a minute and then seemed to regain control. “I’m hoping she’s just in a snit. That she’ll get over it and come back.”
“I’d love to agree with you,” Lucy said, “but we’ve talked to so many of her friends, I’m having trouble with that theory.”
Patrice smiled almost gently. “That doesn’t mean anything. Her friends are very loyal. They’d cover for her if she asked them to.”
That was hardly news. Jackson leaned up eagerly. “Why do you think she’s in a snit?”
“Angel?” Patrice laughed and brushed the hair back from her face with one hand. “When isn’t she in a snit these days? Everything’s fine one minute, and the next nothing’s good enough for her. I’m not good enough. This house isn’t good enough. I mean, this place is a dump, but she doesn’t have to get nasty about it.”
“We were told you had an argument before you left,” Lucy said. “Can you tell us what that was about?”
“It was just more of her dramatics. She wanted to be on the pom-pom squad and I told her no. We can’t afford things like that, and I don’t take charity. I’m not going to get one of those fee-waiver things just so she can jump up and down at some silly games.”
“You don’t need to take charity,” Jackson reminded her. “Wiley and I would be happy to help.”
“And you don’t think that’s charity?”
“Angel’s family.”
Patrice tossed her fake blond head defiantly. “We do okay on our own. We don’t live fancy, but we do okay. I don’t get welfare. I don’t use food stamps. And I don’t beg for anything.”
Once again, they were straying from the point. Jackson tried to steer her back. “Even if she is in a snit and ran away, she’s just fourteen years old. She’s not equipped to be out there on her own.”
“Well maybe after she’s been out there for a while, she’ll figure that out and stop taking me and everything I do for granted.”
“One of her friends said she might be trying to locate her father,” Lucy said. “Do you know anything about that?”
That certainly got Patrice’s attention. “Holden? Are you kidding me?”
“That’s what we’ve heard, but we don’t have any proof to back it up.”
Patrice stood and walked toward the window. She fumbled in her pocket, pulled out a cigarette and lit up with trembling fingers. “She’s asked about him in the past, but I thought she’d gotten over wanting to know.”
“Apparently she hasn’t. We’re starting to think maybe that’s where she’s gone.”
Patrice’s eyes filled with tears and she looked so frightened, Jackson almost softened toward her. “But she can’t do that. You know what he’s like.”
“Yeah, I do.” He paced back and forth in front of the couch for a few minutes. “The key still has to be with her friends. We’ve talked to everyone we can find, but maybe you know someone else. Like this LaNiqua. She probably knows exactly where Angel is.”
“If we can find her.”
“Surely you must know something. Doesn’t Angel talk about her friends or mention things that have happened at school?”
“You don’t know a whole lot about teenagers, do you? They like their privacy.”
“If a kid can run away without a trace, maybe she has a little too much privacy.”
“And maybe I’m doing my best.”
Lucy signaled Jackson to be quiet and took over the questions. “Just think for a minute, Ms. Beckett. Do you know where LaNiqua lives?”
“No. I should, I guess, but Angel worked things out with her and her mother. I talked to her mom on the phone, but they were going to pick Angel up and bring her back, and I never went over there.”
Jackson had never expected much from her, so he didn’t know why he was surprised by their arrangements. Patrice had turned out just like the aunt who’d raised her. The apple didn’t fall far from the tree. But that’s what scared him most about himself.
“We’ve learned that Angel spent quite a bit of time online,” Lucy said. “Do you know who she talked to?”
Patrice shook her head slowly. “I don’t know. When Angel’s home, I’m at work. I hate it, but that’s how it is right now. I don’t know what else to do. Even when I ask her to stay with friends, she ignores me—obviously.”
Jackson was torn between old anger and the reality in front of him. Patrice might not win any parenting awards, but she wasn’t exactly the person he’d been expecting, either. Even he had to admit she cared about Angelina. “We’ll work all of that out later,” he assured her. “Right now, let’s focus on finding Angel and bringing her home, okay?”
Patrice nodded wordlessly and dashed a couple of tears from the corner of her eye. “I don’t like you, Jackson. You know that. But maybe you’re right. Maybe I do need your help.”
The sudden change of heart made him almost weak with relief. “Thank you. So let’s start at the top. Tell us about her friends. Her school. About your neighbors. I don’t want to leave any stone unturned—agreed?”
She gave another nod and crushed out her cigarette. We don’t know many people in the neighborhood, but I’ll tell you what I do know.”
He felt the yawning chasm of hopelessness grow a little smaller. Maybe he’d been wrong about her. Maybe they could actually come together, if only for Angelina’s sake. And maybe Patrice would finally let them play a part in Angel’s life. At least there was hope.
Chapter Thirteen
LATE THE NEXT NIGHT Lucy popped a piece of caramel candy into her mouth and closed her eyes in appreciation as the creamy taste spread across her tongue. The detectives assigned to the Avila homicide case had left a message requesting clarification on one of her earlier reports, and she’d been poring over witness statements for hours, trying to refresh her memory. The small of her back felt cramped and tight, her head hurt, and the smell of someone’s dinner from a nearby trash can turned her stomach.
If only there were something that would help clear her mind. To release some of her tension, she pulled the elastic from her hair to relieve the pressure on her scalp.
On the other side of the room, Orry rolled away from his computer and nodded toward the case file that sat open on her desk. “How’s it going?”
Lucy shifted her shoulders to get rid of the knotted muscles between them. “I think there’s something wrong with me. A few weeks ago, I would have moved heaven and earth to assist with this investigation. Tonight, all I can think about is Angel Beckett. If she’s hurt because I can’t find her, I don’t know what I’ll do.”
Orry crossed the distance between them and perched on one corner of her desk. “Come on, Luce. You know what this job is like. Sometimes you find ’em. Sometimes you don’t. You do everything you can, but you don’t blame yourself if the outcome isn’t what you want it to be.”
She knew he meant well, but his words were hardly reassuring. “She’s a fourteen-year-old girl, Orry. A kid with a mother who cares but doesn’t know the first thing about being a parent. She’s had a rotten life, and the thing is, there’s no need for it. She has a great-grandfather and an uncle who’d give her the moon, but she’s never even had the chance to know them.”
“And you want to fix it all for her?”
“I want her to
have a chance to know her family. What’s wrong with that?”
“Not a thing—as long as that’s all it is.”
“What else could it be?”
Orry gave a nonchalant shrug. “Anytime you’re working with kids it’s hard to keep yourself from getting personally involved. But you can’t get wrapped up in their lives or the worry and aggravation will kill you. And if you lose your objectivity, you can’t do the job.”
She knew he was right. God only knew she’d heard the same advice more times than she could count. Sighing heavily, she rubbed her temples with her fingertips and nodded reluctantly. “I know. I know.”
“So what have you got?”
“We’ve got a kid who’s missing. A mother who didn’t even know her kid was missing. A guy named Wayne who’s been in and out of trouble since he was young. A dozen people who say this guy routinely bothered her and one who claims she was going to ask him to help her get to her father—who, by the way, makes Wayne look like a choirboy. I’ve talked with Wayne’s supervisor and good ol’ Wayne can prove that he was at work the night she disappeared, so all those stories mean nothing.”
“Maybe.”
“Maybe.” Lucy rolled her head from side to side. “And if she actually found her father, I want to know how she did it, because even with all this technology we have here at HPD, I can’t find anything on him.” She slumped down in her chair and kicked her feet onto her desk. “I’m lost.”
“You want to talk about it?”
A slow smile curved her lips and Orry jumped up a notch on her list of favorite people. “Do you have time?”
“Sure. I’m in the middle of a report, so let me just finish up with that and then we can go over what you’ve got.”
Dropping her feet to the floor again, she dug change from her desk drawer. “You’re on. I’ll head down and get Cokes and chips. Any special requests?”
“You know what I like.” Orry headed back to his desk, and since it was late and the building nearly deserted, Lucy left her shoes under her desk and padded down the hall to the break room in her bare feet.
Stifling a yawn, she fed one machine enough coins for two Cokes and hit another for chips. Halfway out the door, she turned back and bought a candy bar. Sugar and caffeine. Together, they ought to keep her awake for a while.
Clutching the goodies, she headed back toward her office. Her shadow stretched in front of her in the dimly lit corridor, and a shiver skittered up her spine as she walked. She was used to working late, but tonight the eighteenth floor felt unusually deserted.
Laughing at herself, she rounded the corner by the bank of elevators. Just then, the elevator let out a high-pitched ding that sounded unnaturally loud in the silence. Acting solely on instinct, she whirled around on the balls of her feet and watched the doors swish open.
It took only a heartbeat to recognize Mei Ling, one of her friends from academy days, but it took a moment longer to decide what to do. She hadn’t spoken to Mei since shortly after the shooting that had put Risa on the chopping block, and their last conversation had been so strained Lucy wasn’t eager to repeat it.
Seeing Mei tonight brought back memories of when things had been good between them, and a tight knot of longing welled up inside her. If they’d still been friends, she could have told Mei about the case, talked with her about her fears of disappointing her parents and even confessed her confusion over Jackson. Though she’d been trying to tell herself for months that she was doing all right on her own, she knew it wasn’t true. Oh, sure, she’d move on. She’d make new friends and life would change. But she didn’t want to lose those old friendships completely.
The old elevators frequently stopped on floors for no apparent reason, and that must have been what happened tonight. Mei was staring at the lights above the door in consternation and, with an agitated flick of her wrist, swept back a lock of midnight hair as she reached out to punch the number for the floor she wanted. When she saw Lucy standing in the middle of the hall, she froze.
Still clutching the two cans of Coke, Lucy lifted her hand in something resembling a wave. A gesture, but nothing so overt that Mei couldn’t ignore it if she wanted.
Lucy held her breath, waiting, hoping, wishing, while Mei stood like a statue in front of her. The elevator dinged again and Lucy’s heart sank. Then slowly, almost imperceptibly, just before the elevator doors swished closed, Mei lifted one hand and curled her fingers slowly into her palm—a wave of acknowledgment.
The elevator door closed. Juggling all the goodies in her hands, she tried to ignore the stinging in her eyes. Lucy wasn’t comfortable with strong emotion. Never had been. But the possibility that the doors to her friendship with Mei weren’t completely locked gave her more of a boost than caffeine and sugar ever could.
“EITHER ANGEL’S ONLINE friends aren’t chatting,” Lucy said the next evening, “or they somehow know I’m not her.”
Jackson glanced up from the counter where he was working on dinner. They’d ordered in every night this week, but tonight he wanted to do something different. Special. Something to show Lucy how much he appreciated all the hours she’d devoted to finding Angel.
“Maybe we’re just hitting the Internet at the wrong time,” he suggested.
“Maybe. But it’s hard to believe that with all the hours I’ve spent online, none of her friends have logged on even once. And if Holden’s out there, he’s not saying anything. I keep wondering if we’re chasing the wrong lead again, but she must have found a lead on Holden this way. Why else would she have run off?”
“Maybe we should log on right after school, or maybe we should stay on later. Maybe the good stuff happens after parents go to bed.”
Lucy shrugged and rolled her shoulders. “Maybe, but most kids going to school would be in bed, wouldn’t they?” She thought about taking the computer home with her, but she didn’t have the heart to keep Jackson out of the loop. Or maybe she just wanted an excuse to be here. “I have an appointment in the morning, but I’ll try to get here shortly after lunch. I should be able to make it by one-thirty or two. Maybe someone she knows will be online then.”
“If she’s made contact with Holden, there’s no telling what time of day will be best.” He poured two glasses of merlot and carried one to her. She’d taken off her jacket hours earlier, and the soft swell of her breasts had him spellbound—like a kid who’d never seen a woman before. “Last time Holden was at the ranch, he spent a lot of time surfing the Net. All he needs is access to a computer, and that’s easy enough with libraries and Internet cafés around. But how did she find him if we can’t?”
“If she’s with him, he knows we’re not the real thing and he’s not going to let us see him.” Lucy took the glass and slid down in her seat, arching her feet and stretching like a cat luxuriating in the sun. “So what’s this secret you’re fixing for dinner?”
Jackson followed the shift in the conversation without batting an eye. Sometimes thinking about something else, even for a few minutes, made it easier to concentrate when they went back to work. “Oh, it’s some secret. Steak. Baked potatoes. Corn on the cob. Real exotic fare.”
Lucy laughed and reached for a handful of the candy corn he’d picked up on a whim earlier. “There’s nothing wrong with a good old-fashioned steak. I’m a Texas girl, too, you know. But when did you learn how to cook?”
“When my dad was drunk out of his head and Mom was too busy looking after him to think about us, my cooking was the only thing that stood between us kids and an empty belly.” He grinned and helped himself to the candy, as well. “I took a hit-and-miss approach when I was little, and some of the combinations I came up with were…well, let’s just say they were imaginative. When I got older, I decided to read a few books and learn some real techniques.” He indulged himself and bent down to give her a brief kiss. A reminder that life had changed for the better. “Next time it’s your turn. Just don’t show me up too badly.”
To his surprise, a faint pink t
inge crept into Lucy’s cheeks. “Oh, I—” She pulled her bottom lip between her teeth and sent him a sheepish grin. “I don’t think you really want that. I’m not much of a cook. My mother tried to teach me, but the lessons never took.”
“So you have other talents,” he said with a shrug.
“None of them in the home-and-garden department.”
Abandoning the computer, she carried her glass into the kitchen, and Jackson watched her, appreciating the sway of her hips, the beauty of her movements, and wondering if she was as fluid and graceful all the time. “There are other things that are important,” he said, letting his eyes linger on a few of his favorite places. “Dusting and vacuuming aren’t everything.”
“Yeah? You only say that because I’m not in charge of cleaning your house. My cousin Tony once told me that I’d make some man a great husband.”
Under other circumstances, Jackson might have laughed. But there was something beneath the laughter in Lucy’s eyes that stopped him. “Some cousin. I hope you set him straight.”
Lowering her glass to the counter, she sat on one of the breakfast stools and picked up the bottle of Cajun seasoning he’d left sitting there. “I’m never going to be wife material, Jackson. I work too much, hate being stuck in the house, and I’m never going to love the smell of Mr. Clean.”
“That’s your definition of a wife? Kind of narrow, isn’t it?”
She opened the bottle and took an experimental sniff. “Are you saying that’s not what you want in a wife?”
He shrugged as if they were talking about the weather, but he knew the topic was anything but casual to her. “The whole time I was growing up, my mother stayed home with Holden and me. She took care of my daddy whenever he needed it—and believe me, he was one man who needed taking care of. When I was little, I remember Mom being fun. She loved to play games with us kids, loved to go camping and riding, and she could pitch baseball with the best of ’em. But every year, it seemed like she shrank a little bit and lost a bit more of herself.