Divorced, Desperate and Dead

by Christie Craig

  “Yeah, yeah,” he muttered, but forced himself to smile at her.

  Beth walked out, and right then, a small, older lady wearing a candy-stripe top and Aggie baseball hat worn low over her face walked in with a wheelchair.

  “I really can walk,” he said, finding it difficult to let someone’s grandmother wheel him around.

  “Rules are rules,” she said. “In the chair, Buster.”

  He couldn’t help but wonder why he even tried to argue with any female. He never won.

  He stood up and sat in the chair. She came around, dropped another bag of his items in his lap and started out. Amazingly, for an elderly woman who didn’t look like she weighed ninety pounds soaking wet, she pushed him with gusto.

  They rode the elevator down to the lobby in silence. When the doors opened, she hurried him out of the elevator and started whistling. In mere minutes, moving at a fast trot, she pushed him out the hospital door. Kelly’s car wasn’t there yet.

  “Is this where they were told to pick me up?” he asked the woman.

  “Sure is, coward.”

  He froze. Had she just said . . . ? Then bam, the voice rang a familiar chord inside him.

  He looked back over his shoulder at the woman. She had the damn hat so low he could only see part of her face. He couldn’t swear it was Beatrice Bacon, but he couldn’t swear it wasn’t.

  “What did you say?”

  “I said you look like my husband Howard.”

  That hadn’t been what he heard. He started to question her again, but heard a car pull up. Facing forward again, he saw his sister’s car stopping right in front of him.

  “Coward,” the little old lady said again. “You had better take this time off to contemplate life.”

  He turned to look at her, but she was gone. Shit. He stood up, dropping the bag in his lap to his feet. His dirty underwear spilled out, but he didn’t care. He looked around. Left to right. Right to left. She wasn’t there.

  “What’s wrong?” Kelly asked, getting out of her car.

  He looked at his sister as she moved around to open the back door for him as if he was helpless. Beth crawled out of the front seat and snatched up his underwear.

  “You okay?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” he said. Bad enough his sisters thought he was a weakling; he didn’t want them to think he’d lost his mind, too.

  • • •

  J.D. woke up almost happy to be in his old room. It didn’t even matter that his body ached from sleeping on the floor for the last few days. Not wanting to face Jax, afraid of what the gang leader would do, he’d come back here—to his grandmother’s house. He parked in the back, so anyone passing by wouldn’t know he was there. But at the end of a dead-end street with only one other house about halfway up the block, not a lot of people drove by.

  He found the key his grandmother had kept under a rock in the back of the house, and he let himself in. No one was living here yet. What would it hurt if he hung out for a while? Her furniture and things weren’t there no more than she was, but it still felt like home.

  Dead silence filled the room—no buzz of electricity—and the Texas morning heat already had a drip of sweat rolling down his brow. He’d used his lighter to get around at night. Not enough light for anyone to notice he was here.

  Right now, still half asleep, he would swear he could smell that minty scented medicine his grandmother rubbed on her knees to keep them from hurting. And then there was that warm, welcome scent of bacon that always seemed to flow from the kitchen.

  His grandmother had always fixed him bacon and eggs for breakfast. Then she’d make him eat an apple, because she believed the saying ‘an apple a day keeps the doctor away.’ It must not have worked for her.

  But damn, he missed her. And not just because he was hungry, but because . . . he hadn’t realized what it would feel like to not have anyone. Not one person who cared. Especially not the foster family the state had sent him to.

  When he’d run away from there, he’d joined the Black Bloods. They were supposed to be his family.

  Family like his drugged-out mom and stepdad, he supposed.

  He almost got up, but his gaze went to the water stains on the ceiling. There, in the corner, in the brown mark the roof leak had made, was the image of the angel. He still remembered climbing up on the roof to fix the leak after a storm had knocked a branch down. His grandmother had stood below yelling at him to be careful.

  When you gonna paint that ceiling? His grandmother had asked numerous times after that.

  Someday, he’d told her. Yet he’d never done it and he’d never told her about the angel. Truth was, it might just look like a water spot to most people. He hadn’t wanted her to think he was crazy, so he’d kept the angel image to himself.

  Squinting his eyes now, he made out the image. He wondered if his grandmother was with the angels. She’d believed in stuff like that, even more than him.

  But face it, even if they were real, he’d never see one now. Because of him, a man had died and a cop was in the hospital.

  Closing his eyes, he could hear Tommy begging for his life. He could see the look in his eyes when he’d looked at J.D. A desperate look, pleading for him to stop it.

  J.D. pressed his palm over his face. Why hadn’t he spoken up? Why hadn’t he tried to stop Jax? Why had he let Jax kill him?

  Hell, now he even wished he’d let that cop arrest him. But he’d been high and hadn’t been thinking right, and the thought of prison, of being locked up for the rest of his life, had scared him so much, he’d shot his gun and raced past.

  He looked back up at the angel. “I screwed up, didn’t I?”

  His phone rang. He rolled over and picked up the cell and checked the number. Jax had actually called him twice, but he hadn’t answered.

  It wasn’t Jax this time.

  Carlos.

  He hesitated for one second, knowing Carlos was with the Black Bloods, but he was also J.D.’s friend. The only person he halfway trusted right now.

  He picked up the phone.

  Chapter Twelve

  “You gotta be kidding!” Fourteen-karat frustration laced Cary’s voice, as the buzz of the pool filter filled his sister’s backyard. “You’re seriously telling me we have zilch? Not even a partial print?”

  Danny and Turner had stopped by a few hours after he’d arrived at Kelly’s. It took everything Cary had not to ask them to break him out of his sister’s house and take him home.

  “Not one,” Turner answered, continuing to update him on the case. “They went over the whole car. J.D. must have wiped it down after he offed Tommy Fincher. Of course, they are still doing some tests to make sure all the blood was Fincher’s. Not that it looked like there was a struggle.”

  “So, no J.D. And no proof. How could this happen?” Cary growled and leaned back in the patio chair.

  “I wouldn’t say ‘no proof’,” Turner said. “We got the ID from the hit and run victim.”

  Danny suddenly sat up. “Thanks for the reminder,” he said.

  “About what?” Cary asked.

  “I’m getting laid this weekend.” Danny grinned.

  Cary shook his head. “What the hell does getting laid have to do with this case.”

  Danny leaned forward. “Does getting shot always put you in pissed off mood?”

  “Can you stop thinking with your dick and help me catch this asshole?”

  Danny cut Cary a hard look. “Hey, we want the guy caught, too.”

  Guilt shot through Cary. He might not be thinking with his dick, but he sure as hell was acting like one. “Sorry. I just want to be out there working this case.”

  “Have they said when you can come back?” Turner asked.

  “Sergeant says I have to bring a note from the doctor. And my appointment’s not until next week. I got off the phone with them right before you got here. They won’t move my appointment up.”

  “Why don’t you call that stewardess?” Danny said. �
�Bet she could help you pass some time.”

  Cary frowned. He’d gotten a text from Paula wanting to get together this weekend. He’d messaged her back and said he couldn’t. He didn’t know why, but he didn’t want to see the sexy brunette. The fact that he’d done nothing but think about a different brunette with blue eyes had nothing to do with it.

  Not a damn thing.

  “Can we get back to the case?” he asked, not wanting to talk about his sex life.

  Turner nodded. He took a minute to collect his thoughts. “We did get some tire impressions at the side of the warehouse you said the Chevy came from. And we got tire tracks at the scene of the hit and run. Let’s just hope they match.”

  “Yeah.” Cary shook his head. “But that’s not enough.”

  “It’s a start,” Danny said.

  “We’ll get him.” Turner repositioned himself in the chair. “Not sure we can get him on the Marc Jones murder, but I think we can get him on killing Tommy.”

  An image of Ms. Jones standing in his hospital room filled his head. “That’s not good enough. It’s the Jones murder I want him to go down for.”

  “Yeah, but we’ll take what we can get,” Turner said.

  He wouldn’t, Cary thought. He was bringing Ms. Jones some closure or he’d die trying.

  Danny reached for the glass of water his sister had served them when they first got there. “Besides, it wasn’t just you or the Jones kid that J.D.’s hurt. You should see the pretty thing Tommy hit with that damn truck. Thank God she came out of it unscathed.”

  Cary glanced at his partner. “You met her?”

  “Yeah, we went with her when she gave the description of J.D. She’s kind of hot,” Danny said. “In a girl-next-door kind of way. And—”

  “You’re thinking with your dick again.” Cary said, not wanting to hear Danny thoughts on Chloe Sanders. Then he had to bite his tongue not to correct his partner. She wasn’t girl-next-door hot. He’d never lived next to anything that pretty or that . . . alluring.

  “Do you guys need something else to drink?” Kelly called from the backdoor as her foster dog came running out, growling like a pit bull, even though it could fit in a super-sized fast food drink.

  “No, we’re fine.” Cary ran his hand over his face and ignored the dog that scratched at his ankle wanting to be held. When he didn’t pull the dog up into his lap, it started playing tug-o-war with his sock. “Wait,” Cary called back at Kelly. “Can you get your dog back in?”

  “He wants to be with you.”

  “Just get the thing in please.” He needed to chill, but he still hadn’t gotten over seeing the antique candy striper. Had that been Beatrice Bacon? Or was his mind just playing tricks on him?

  His sister called the dog, but the little mutt wouldn’t leave and continued to tug at his pants leg. “Never mind,” Cary called out. “Just leave him.” He tried ignoring the annoying little piss-ant.

  “We’re not going to stop looking for this guy,” Turner said.

  Cary nodded. “Have you checked with any of Tommy’s friends? Surely one of them know what Tommy was up to and can enlighten us on who else he told about this. If we can find out how J.D. knew Tommy was turning him in, or find out who told Tommy about the Jones murder, we’d at least have hearsay to hand to the DA.”

  “We went to the Long Shot bar where Tommy used to hang out,” Danny explained. “Talked to a few people and got shit for our trouble. We’re still trying to reach the bartender that might have worked there the nights Tommy hung out.”

  “And J.D.’s gang. You can’t get one of them to turn on J.D.?”

  “We’ve interviewed at least six fellow members of the Black Bloods,” Turner said. “None of them would talk. Even after Danny threatened their balls.”

  Cary’s mind went back to the woman who’d threatened his balls earlier.

  His frown deepened and he tried to blame his frustration on the case and its lack of momentum. He knew his friends were good cops and were doing everything in their power, but he couldn’t let this one go. “Didn’t J.D. have a grandmother who lived in South Houston?”

  Pooch let out a shrill little bark. Cary relented and reached down to pull the thing onto his lap.

  “She died eight months ago,” Danny said. “And his mom is doing ten to twenty in the pen for drugs. Hence the reason his ass landed in foster care.”

  “Shit!” Cary said. Pooch raised up on his hind legs and put his paws on the table.

  Danny stared at the animal. “What is that?”

  Cary frowned. “I don’t have a clue. I think it’s a guinea pig that thinks it’s a dog.” Then he looked back at his two friends. “Damn it, I want to work this case.”

  Turner shook his head. “I think we’d have to kill your sister to get you out of here.”

  Danny chuckled. “She told us when we came in that you were probably going to try to talk us into breaking you out of here. Then she warned us that she had a bigger gun than us.”

  Cary frowned. “She knows me well.”

  Turner leaned forward and petted the dog’s snout. The animal growled at him.

  “Damn, she’s a pissy little mutt.”

  “She’s a he,” Cary said.

  “Well,” Turner continued. “You’re sister’s right. You need to rest. Enjoy the time off. You were shot. Take this time to contemplate life.”

  He studied Turner, almost scared he would morph into an elderly old lady in a candy stripe uniform.

  “There’s nothing to contemplate. I like my life the way it is.” He knew he was lying.

  But the million dollar question was if he planned to do anything about it.

  Coward, he heard the old woman’s voice in his head. Dying is easy, it’s living that’s hard.

  • • •

  Thursday afternoon, Chloe sat in her office staring at the computer screen. Amber worked the front and Chloe had actually come in here thinking maybe, just maybe, if she came in here and stared at the computer screen, she might find it in herself to actually start a new book.

  But she’d been sitting for more than an hour and the only thing on the screen were two words. Chapter One.

  Wow, that was creative.

  Her cell phone rang and she snagged it up. Anything to take her mind off the fact that she had the creative level of a migraine-stricken slug on Xanax.

  “Hello?” she answered without checking the number.

  “Chloe?” The deep voice saying her name sent a row of tiny goose bumps down her spine. She envisioned Cary Stevens resting next to her in bed, remembered how it had felt just talking with him . . . and kissing him. Her breath caught.

  “Yes,” she said, not realizing how badly she had wanted him to contact her until now.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Is this a bad time?” he asked when she didn’t say anything else.

  “No, it’s good,” Chloe said, but suddenly something didn’t sound right. And it didn’t feel so good anymore either. “Who is this?”

  “Dan Henderson. I told you I’d call you about dinner.”

  Yeah, but I was really hoping you were your partner. “Yes, I’m sorry I . . . didn’t recognize your voice.” That sweet tingling down her spine faded to disappointment.

  “You have that many men calling you?” he teased.

  “Right,” she teased back, but her heart pounded with the decision she was about to make. Did she agree to dinner with a guy who didn’t make her skin tingle? A man who her best friend had a crush on?

  Or did she run home, pull out Bob—her only expected company—set him on her dinner table, and pretend she wasn’t alone? She could throw a frozen dinner into the microwave and pretend she didn’t want more out of life.

  “So . . . how about tomorrow night? I know a great little Italian place,” Dan said.

  “Italian, huh?” she managed to say.

  “Yeah. Their Chicken Marsala and Tiramisu are to die for.”

  She’d already died once this we
ek and wasn’t really up to doing that again. Then, glancing up, she stared at the blinking cursor on her computer screen and the only two words she’d written in almost a year.

  Chapter one.

  Wasn’t it time for a new chapter in her life?

  “What do you say?” he asked. “Can I pick you up tomorrow around seven?”

  • • •

  Early Friday afternoon, Cary found himself alone—if you didn’t count a tiny dog and poodle who occasionally snipped at each other—and bored silly. Kelly had taken Bella out shopping, leaving him to dog sit. Before she left she’d brought her laptop out and suggested he check out Chloe Sanders on Wikipedia.

  Ignoring her, Cary made himself comfortable on his sister’s leather sofa, surfing channels, trying to find anything besides Judge Judy to watch. Pooch, pink bows in his hair, had spent several minutes trying to jump onto the sofa before Cary relented and brought the animal up. After trying out a couple of different spots, both on the sofa and on Cary, the creature decided Cary’s chest was the best resting place.

  “Hey . . .” he said to Pooch, whose snout rested right at his chin. The dog opened one eye and looked up at him. “You realize I don’t like you, right?”

  The dog lifted his snout and commenced to bathe Cary’s face with his tongue.

  “Stop, I don’t French kiss on the first date.” After a second, he glanced back at the animal. “Okay, I do, but not with dogs.”

  The dog growled.

  “Are you as tired of Judge Judy’s bitching as I am?”

  The dog made a groaning sound.

  “Not that Judy’s all bad,” he said, staring at the dog as he dropped his head back down. The judge with all her sass had entertained them for a good portion of the morning already, but he’d had enough.

  “Time to get up,” he told Pooch.

  The dog growled and he sat the animal on the floor. “I let you sleep on me and now you’re gonna growl? And I’m talking to a damn dog!”