by Leonie Gant
Chapter Seventeen
Pulling up to the apartment complex, I noted that Sean was still in the garden working with Miss Betsy. I groaned. The poor kid. I had not meant for him to be working all day. After saying goodbye to Monique and Reggie, and making sure Crystal got dropped off with Edwin, I went back to the garden.
“Hey, Miss Betsy,” I said as I came to her side. “Is it time to let him go for the day?”
“He’s a good boy, worked hard,” she said. “You did the right thing bringing him here. We’ll take care of him.”
Obviously Miss Betsy had managed to get Sean’s story out of him. I wondered if he realized that he may never be able to leave now.
“Want something to eat, Sean?” I asked.
He looked at me gratefully. “I’ll just finish this and be right in,” he said.
“See,” Miss Betsy said quietly, “a good boy.”
Back in my apartment, I started getting things ready for my house guest. Despite the number of times I seemed to eat takeaway, I can cook and I decided that tonight Sean needed something homemade. I had the sauce for a pasta dish bubbling away on the stove when he walked in. I caught a whiff of pungent, sweaty teenage boy and wrinkled my nose.
“Do you have any clean clothes?” I asked.
“Not really,” he said, lifting up his arm to sniff.
I went into my room and grabbed some sweats and a t-shirt of mine that looked like it would kind of fit.
“Take a shower and throw your clothes out. Give me everything you have and I’ll get them washed.”
While Sean was in the shower I ran downstairs into the laundry room and threw his clothes in the machine. Back upstairs I had to laugh at how discomfited Sean looked in my clothes. They didn’t look obviously feminine but you could tell that they offended his sense of masculinity.
“Don’t be such a guy,” I said as I dished up some dinner for him.
After settling Sean on the couch, I went to bed. Despite the dramas of the day I was grateful when I fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
I woke up in the morning a bit disoriented. Noises coming from outside my bedroom filled me with alarm until I remembered my house guest. Stumbling out of my bedroom I was a bit concerned when I found Sean at the kitchen bench on my laptop.
“I hope you don’t mind me using your computer,” he said.
Crossing my arms, I fixed him with a cold stare.
“Actually I do,” I said. “I’ve got a bit of a thing for privacy.”
“Probably shouldn’t tell you about going through your medicine cabinet should I?” he said with a cheeky grin on his face.
“You’ve got the self-preservation instincts of a lemming,” I said sarcastically, as I went to grab my laptop.
“Yeah, I know,” he said. “Where are the rest of the photos?”
“What do you mean the rest of the photos?”
“After I met with Ryan he paid me a few bucks to keep an eye on his brother. I got a few other photos but they weren’t with the chick. They were with some guy. I gave those to Ryan as well.”
“We only found one flash drive with the photos of Adam and Emily. Do you still have copies of the other images?” I asked.
“Sure,” said Sean. “I already downloaded them to your laptop.”
I opened up the laptop and started to go through the photos. My heart sank. There, in irrefutable color, was Adam Hendricks buying drugs, doing drugs and partying with guys that scared me just looking at their photos. This was not good and all of a sudden I started to see that this situation had got worse, and this sixteen year old kid was now in the middle of it.
“Sean, does anyone else know you took these photos?” I asked, as the ramifications of this situation swirled through my head.
“I didn’t tell anyone, but Ryan might have said something to someone,” Sean said, seemingly oblivious to the sudden tension emanating from me.
“Sean, I need you to listen to me. This is a bad situation.” I pointed to Adam. “Yesterday I saw this guy being kidnapped by this guy here.” I pointed to one of the men in the photo. “He and another guy shot at Crystal and me. They then ran us off the road.”
Sean looked horrified.
“We need to take this to the police,” I said.
Sean started to argue.
“No, Sean,” I said in as firm a voice as I could. “These are bad people and if they find out that you took these photos it is going to put you in a lot of danger.”
“I could just leave,” Sean said, grabbing his backpack. “You’ll be safe then.”
I grabbed one of the straps on his backpack.
“This isn’t about me, you idiot,” I said. “I don’t want you hurt. We need to come up with a way to keep you safe.”
Sean looked stunned. “You’re trying to take care of me,” he said softly.
“Somebody has to,” I said, pointing a finger at his chest. “Self-preservation instincts of a lemming remember. I have a friend, kind of, who’s a cop. He’ll be able to help us. I can call him now and we can get him to have a look at these. He’ll know the next step to take.”
Sean nodded and sat down heavily. Dialing Griffin’s number, I hoped I had made the right decision.
“Griffin,” he answered, and I had to admit that just hearing his voice was enough to make me feel better.
“Griffin, it’s Trudie.”
“Hey, Trudie.” His voice softened and I tried really hard not to read anything into that.
“I have a problem,” I said hurriedly. “I want to tell you about this problem but I need to know that you are going to think carefully before bulldozing forward with the whole cop thing.”
“What’s going on, Trudie?” Griffin growled.
“Some information has fallen into my lap which may, and I do stress only may, be pertinent to the Ryan Hendricks situation. I think it’s the reason Adam got kidnapped yesterday.”
“Where are you?” growled Griffin.
“I’m at home.”
“I’m coming over now.” Griffin hung up on me.
Turning around I turned off my phone. “He’ll be here soon.” Looking down at myself in my old worn pajamas I said ruefully, “I probably should shower and get dressed shouldn’t I?”
Sean nodded a little too enthusiastically. I didn’t think I looked that bad.