Divorced, Desperate and Dead

by Christie Craig

  J.D. felt a raw pain burn in his chest. “What’s Moses’ cell number?”

  She didn’t answer. She’d hung up.

  “No!’ J.D. seethed. Then he remembered Carlos had called him a few weeks back on his brother’s cell. He started going through his call list until he found it.

  • • •

  Chloe sipped from the warm cup. “If you’ll just drop me off at my apartment . . .”

  “No,” he said, almost choking on the coffee he’d just swallowed.

  “I don’t mean to stay. I mean just to grab a few things,” Chloe said.

  “No,” Cary said even more adamantly than before.

  Chloe set her third cup of decaf down. They had spent the last hour talking about their college years, their favorite restaurants, and laughing. All the while, pretending the elephant wasn’t sitting in the booth with them.

  And it was a big elephant. In her mind it was even pink polka dot.

  Once or twice the question sat on the tip of her tongue. What did you really think of Room Six? But then she’d chicken out, and just start enjoying the conversation again. And she did enjoy it. She ate up every bit of information she got on him. He had a way of telling stories that kept her entranced.

  He had a certain charm, and she wondered how he curtailed that charm to do his job as a cop.

  Needless to say, cop or not, she couldn’t remember laughing so much with one person. Especially in the last year. Right then, she knew more than ever that she had to move ahead. She needed joy and laughter in her life.

  And maybe she even needed a man. But she still didn’t like him outright telling her what she could and couldn’t do.

  “What do you mean, no?” she asked, staring at him over her cup. “I have to get my car anyway. It’ll only take me a few minutes to gather a few things.”

  “You don’t need your car. I’ll take you to your mother’s house. And I’ll pick up anything you need from your place tomorrow, plus your car, and deliver it myself.”

  “But . . . I don’t have clothes or anything.” Not that clothes were her biggest issue. There was a certain feline waiting on treats. “No, I have to go back. I need to—”

  “I’ll bet you fifty bucks that anything you really need, you can find at the twenty-four hour Wal-Mart right down the street.”

  She shook her head. “You’d lose that bet.”

  “Okay, it might not be the same brand name, but . . .”

  “Nope. I can’t get it period,” she said.

  “What do you need that we can’t buy at Wal-Mart?”

  “My cat.”

  “Hmm . . .” His brown eyes met hers. “Okay.” He ran a hand over his face. “I owe you fifty bucks. But let’s look at this logically. Your cat’s not going to—”

  “She expects treats before she goes to bed.”

  “Back to being logical,” he said.

  She saw it then. The part of him that would make a good cop. A bit pushy, but with just the right amount of charm that one was tempted to just give in.

  “I don’t always follow logic,” she argued.

  He leaned forward again and pressed his hand on the table. “Look, if you don’t go, she goes without her treats. You go, you might end up shot. Does one of those not seem like a better option to you?”

  “Not if you asked Cupcake.”

  “I’m not asking Cupcake, I’m appealing to your better sense.”

  She frowned. “You’re assuming I’ve got better sense.”

  He smiled. “I know you do. I’ve read your books.”

  There it was again. Charm. She dropped back into the booth. She shook her head. “It all seems so unreal. I mean, it was an accident.”

  “He shot me. That wasn’t an accident. And I think he killed two other people. Let’s not forget he was at your place today. I saw him.”

  She nipped at her bottom lip. “I’m not saying he’s not bad, I’m just saying I don’t think he wanted to hurt me. And it seems nuts that now he wants to kill me.”

  “You’re a key witness that could put him away for murder.”

  “I didn’t see the murder.”

  “You saw him driving the same truck. And as we speak, the cops are trying to match the tire tracks.” He paused. “Look, I don’t know what he really did or didn’t do, but I don’t want to risk your life on it.”

  She closed her eyes a second. “Fine. But I get my car and my cat first thing in the morning.” She paused. “Oh, and this whole thing has to be cleared up before next Thursday, because that’s when my mom comes back and I refuse to stay at her house when she’s there.” Guilt filled her chest. “Not that she’s not a lovely person. She just drives me crazy.”

  “Deal,” he said, and held up his coffee like a toast.

  She held up her own mug. “You’re used to winning, aren’t you?”

  He grinned. “Not always. But with that thought in mind, are you sure you wouldn’t like to just come back to my place?”

  She rolled her eyes. “No.”

  He sipped his coffee. “I think I’m a bit offended. I would never try to push myself on a woman. You don’t trust me?”

  She stared at him, and before she could stop it, the truth snuck out. “It’s not you I don’t trust.” She didn’t say it was her that she didn’t trust. But she didn’t have to.

  A slow, sexy smile spread across his lips and lit up his brown eyes.

  She’d give anything to take those words back, but it was too late.

  “That’s nice to know,” he said in that deep voice.

  • • •

  As they walked out of the restaurant, Cary’s phone rang. He clicked open the door and reached for his phone to see who was calling. When he spotted Chase Kelly’s name, he glanced at Chloe. “Sorry, I need to get this.”

  She nodded and they both climbed into his Camaro.

  “Hey,” he said, answering the phone and getting in behind the wheel. “What’s up?”

  “I got a call from Bradley at the precinct. There was some trouble at an apartment complex over off Harris Street. They’re pretty sure it’s gang related. A couple of bystanders were driving by and broke up an incident. About six guys were beating the shit out of a kid. We’re pretty sure he was one of their own, too.”

  “Don’t tell me, it was J.D. Andrews?” Cary saw Chloe glance at him. He remembered her saying the kid hadn’t meant to hit her, then he recalled the way the kid had just looked at him back at Chloe’s apartment.

  “No, we’re not that lucky. It’s a Hispanic kid, but the two men who stumbled upon it said the guys drove off in an old Honda Civic. That’s what you said the guys were driving who shot at you, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Have you interviewed the kid? Maybe he’s upset enough to talk?”

  “Not yet. He’s in surgery. Pretty bad shape, too. Doctors say they’re not sure he’s gonna pull though. He’s only sixteen, too.”

  “Shit,” Cary said. And he hated it for the kid, but he couldn’t help but think of Marc Jones—the sixteen-year-old non-gang member that they’d taken out because he wouldn’t join them.

  “Anyway, Joey got hung up on the case he’s working for Luke, so he’s not going to be at Chloe’s place for a few more hours. I didn’t want you letting her go there.”

  “She’s not. She’s staying at her mother’s.”

  “Good,” Chase said. “So, is this thing serious between you two? Y’all’s little No Ball & Chain gang is getting smaller and smaller, isn’t it?”

  “Thanks for letting me know,” he said, and glanced at Chloe under his lashes.

  “Ah, so she’s still with you, huh?”

  “See ya.” He hung up. Why the hell did these guys think they had the right to poke their noses into his business?

  Chloe looked at him. ‘Something bad happen?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Another sixteen-year-old kid, a gang member, is probably going to bite the dust.”

  “Was it the J.D
. kid?” Concern laced her voice.

  “No,” he said. “But witnesses say the perps who hurt the kid drove away in a dark colored Honda Civic. So, it’s probably the same people who shot at us.”

  He started the car. “I swear, the average life expectancy for a gang member is seventeen. I don’t get it. Do these kids just want to die?”

  • • •

  J.D. sat in his truck, and every few minutes he would call Moses again. Each time, his phone would go to voicemail.

  “Why aren’t you answering?” J.D. muttered. “This is J.D., call me and let me know how Carlos is doing. Please?”

  He slumped back into his seat. Hating himself. Blaming himself. He should have never called Carlos.

  “Damn it!” he yelled, looking up at the dark sky. “Why? Why does all this bad shit happen?”

  Rage, dark, pure and painful swelled up inside his chest.

  His phone rang.

  He grabbed it and looked at the number. It was Moses.

  “Hey,” he said. “How’s Carlos?”

  “He’s in surgery,” Moses said, his tone tight and angry. “Who did this to him? Was it the Black Bloods?”

  “Yeah,” J.D. said.

  “Did you help them?” Moses asked, accusation in his tone.

  “No.”

  Moses said some curse words in Spanish. “Why? What did he do to them?”

  “It’s my fault,” J.D. admitted. “They wanted me to kill someone and I wouldn’t. So Jax wants me dead. Carlos had warned me. I think they found out. I’m sorry. So sorry.”

  “Look, I’ll tell you just like I told Carlos. Get out. Stay out!”

  J.D. shut his eyes tight. “Will you call me? Call me when he’s out of surgery?”

  “Yeah,” he said and the line clicked.

  J.D. wanted to hit something. No. He wanted to hit Jax. He wanted to hit him hard. As hard as he’d hit Carlos. He wanted to hit him so hard he never breathed again.

  He balled his right hand into a fist. And just like that, J.D. knew how he could hurt Jax. A plan started to form.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chloe stared out the window as Cary’s Camaro pulled into the drive. Her mother’s house, a modest one-story brick home in a semi-modest neighborhood out in Hoke’s Bluff, seemed extra dark. Actually, the whole neighborhood seemed dark. She shouldn’t be surprised, considering it was almost midnight, and probably sixty percent of her mom’s neighbors were senior citizens who rolled up the red carpet and called lights out at around eight at night.

  Cary cut off the engine and looked at the house as if checking it out and looking for potential danger. Chloe tried not to let Cary’s caution affect her.

  “You got the key?” he asked.

  “Yeah . . . well no, but she leaves it under the mat.”

  He frowned. “Why do women think that’s safe? That’s the first place a burglar looks.”

  Perhaps it was due to being shot at tonight, but for the first time, she felt a tingle of unease about being alone. Completely alone.

  She wouldn’t even have Cupcake. Not that Cupcake offered any source of protection. But she was good company.

  “Well, you’re going to go with me and make sure there’s not a burglar inside and then I’ll remove the key. Problem solved.”

  He got out of his car, and she did the same. She stooped down and collected the key and unlocked it. The house smelled like home—like books. She ran her hand over the wall and hit the light switch.

  She saw Cary look around, probably noting all the bookshelves. Her mom, having owned and run a bookstore most of her life, loved books. So much so that even after she sold the bookstore, she’d brought a fourth of her stock with her.

  “Wow, your mom loves to read?”

  “Everybody has a cause,” Chloe said. “Some people are tree huggers, some are all about saving dolphins or feral cats. My mom’s cause is books. Her motto is simple, ‘every book deserves a home.’”

  Chloe walked a little farther into the living room and hit another light switch. “My parents ran a bookstore.”

  “I know,” he said and moved closer to the shelves on each side of the fireplace.

  “How do you know?” she asked.

  “I looked at your website.” He glanced back over his shoulder at her. “Is this you?” he asked, pointing to a whole shelf of her baby pictures.

  “Yup,” she said and then moved in, hoping her mom had taken down the naked ones.

  Nope. They were still there, including one of her standing up in a bubble bath, completely naked. One of her naked, face down on a blanket reading a book, her round bottom exposed. Another of her naked, hugging her first kitten.

  “You were cute,” he said, glancing at her. “And you didn’t like clothes.”

  “I guess we’re even,” she said.

  “Even?”

  “I saw you naked, now you’ve seen me.”

  “I wouldn’t call that even,” he said, grinning.

  She laughed, but the sizzle of his smile sent tingles down her spine. And that quick glimpse she’d gotten of him naked flashed in her mind.

  He moved over to the other shelf and checked out the other pictures, but right then the phone rang.

  “That will be my mom’s neighbors. Elsie and Evelyn. Twins. I think they’re a hundred years old now.”

  She picked up the phone. “Hello.”

  “Frances?” the elderly voice said.

  “No, this is Chloe. Mom’s on a cruise.”

  “Then who’s in her house.”

  “I am. It’s okay.”

  “Okay,” Elsie hung up.

  Cary looked back at her. She smiled at him. “The two sisters . . . they work neighborhood crime patrol. Actually, they are the neighborhood crime patrol.”

  He nodded then glanced back at the pictures. “You look like your dad.”

  “Yeah.” She moved in and looked at the pictures of her and her dad. One with her wearing a cap and gown the day she graduated high school, several of family vacations.

  Then there was the other one. The one that still brought a tear to her eye. The one of her and him on their last trip, deep-sea fishing.

  “You like to fish?” Cary asked.

  “He liked to fish,” she said. “I liked being with him. So I went fishing.”

  “A daddy’s girl, huh?”

  “One hundred percent.” She ran her finger down the side of the frame.

  “He died four months after that picture was taken.”

  “What happened?” he asked.

  “He’d been having headaches. Went to the doctor and was diagnosed with brain cancer. It was inoperable. And fast. And so damn unfair.” She swallowed the tightness.

  For the first time, she wondered if that was part of the reason she was so damn angry at Jerry. People out there were fighting to live. People who would do anything for just a little hope, a little more time. And then there were those who just gave up. Took their life as if it meant nothing—and for reasons no one even understood.

  “Until you’ve been there . . . loved someone and were told there were no options, no hope . . . it’s hard to understand.”

  “Oh, I understand,” he said. “I lost my mom to cancer. They found it too late. They said the only thing they could do was make her comfortable. And the doctors sucked at doing that, too. She suffered.”

  She looked at him, feeling his pain. “How long ago?”

  “Almost fifteen years,” he said. “I was fourteen. We’d lost my dad in a car accident three years earlier. So it was pretty tough.”

  “Fourteen? Who raised you?”

  “My sister.” He got a sad smile on his face. “The bossy one, with the daughter who loves your books,” he said. “She was twenty-one and suddenly became the parent of two teenagers.”

  “Wow, that couldn’t have been easy.”

  “It wasn’t,” he said. “Not once have I ever heard her complain.”

  Chloe smiled, remembering meeting his
sisters. “She didn’t seem bossy.”

  “She is, and she drives me crazy at times, yet whenever I get frustrated, my other sister, Beth, reminds me that Kelly put her life on hold to raise us. If she’s mothering us, it’s because she sort of was our mother.”

  “Sounds as if they both care a lot about you. That’s nice to have.”

  “Did you miss the part about her driving me crazy?”

  She chuckled.

  “You don’t have any siblings?” he asked.

  “Nope, I’m an only child. Hence my selfish nature.” She grinned.

  He reached up and brushed a strand of hair from her cheek. “Maybe I just haven’t seen that side of you, but I don’t see you as selfish. But the only child syndrome explains your books a little more. Did you have imaginary friends when you were young?”

  “If I say yes, will you think I’m crazy?”

  He smiled. “Maybe. But I think I could like your kind of crazy.” He leaned down and pressed his lips to hers.

  The kiss was soft, less heat than the one at the bakery—as if he didn’t want to pressure her. Yet for some unknown reason, it almost seemed more intimate. As if this time together had brought them closer.

  She wanted that so badly. The connection. Ahh, but she also wanted the heat.

  She opened her mouth and deepened the kiss—asking for more.

  She asked. She received.

  His hand slipped around her back and bought her closer. His tongue moved against hers, tasting sweet like syrup. Her breasts came against his chest. And she felt her body respond to the closeness. Felt her nipples tighten.

  His hand shifted down to her bottom, and ever-so-slightly, brought her pelvis closer to his tightness. A thought ran amuck in her head: She wanted that, too. Wanted to make love to him.