by Mia Ford
As I cooked, Blaine walked over, putting his cell phone in his pocket and kissing me on the forehead. I watched as he made himself a drink and walked into the living room to stare out of the floor to ceiling windows facing the beach. For a moment, everything seemed absolutely perfect and almost like a dream. I could almost believe that I belonged here in this big kitchen, cooking dinner for my man, and getting to sleep in the same bed with him every night. There was something calming about it all. It had actually been the first normal moment I had experienced since everything went down. I could remember what I was thinking when I was cooking last, making a pot roast for my father and preparing to tell him things needed to change. Even then, life was stressful, but at least I had my father around and I knew he was safe. I swirled the chopped potatoes around in the water and sighed. It really did feel like I belonged in Blaine’s home with him by my side. Well, if it weren’t for thoughts of the mob floating in my head, it would feel normal.
I pushed the thoughts from my mind and put the steaks in the pan, listening to them sizzle. I watched as the outside turned dark and then flipped them, not wanting to burn them. It wasn’t often that I got to cook steaks like these, and I wasn’t totally confident about how to do it. I grabbed the thermometer from a nearby drawer and stuck it into the center, deciding to cook it just a bit more. When they were done, I pulled the plates down from the cabinet and then began mashing the potatoes and pulling the green beans onto the plates. The dinner smelled delicious, and I was pretty proud of my accomplishment. Now it was time to get the opinion of the foodie in the house, Blaine.
I sat the plates down on the table and waved at Blaine to come eat. He smiled as he stood up and walked over, a visible worry hidden under his forced smile. I grabbed a bottle of red wine from the small wine cooler and opened it, pouring us both a glass before sitting down. I placed my napkin in my lap and waited for Blaine to cut into his steak. The color looked good, so I knew I could give myself at least one pat on the back. He put it in his mouth and chewed, his face staying in the same position. Suddenly, he wrinkled his nose and looked up at me, frozen.
“Just kidding,” he said, laughing. “It’s delicious, thank you.”
“No, thank you,” I said. “Your housekeeper can come do my grocery shopping anytime.”
As soon as I said it, the smiles slipped off both of our faces. I didn’t even think about the fact that I might not ever be able to do the grocery shopping ever again. Suddenly, my phone went off, shaking us both from our thoughts. I pushed the chair out and jogged over, not recognizing the number.
“Hello?” I answered.
“Yes, this is the West Palm police department,” a man said, his voice somber. “I’m looking for Josephine Gray.”
Instantly, I could feel the color drain from my face. My hands started to shake, and my eyes filled with tears. I knew things were too good to be true right now. They were going to tell me I had to come back in. They were going to rip me out of my life again, not even twenty-four hours after I had been released. There was no way I could go back to that cold cell. My heart was racing at a speed I knew couldn’t be healthy, and I could feel it in my veins. I took a deep breath and swallowed, knowing I was going to have to face anything that they had to throw at me.
“Hello?” the man asked.
“Yes, sorry,” I said. “How can I help you?”
“Is your father Carl Gray?”
“Yes,” I said excitedly. “Yes, that is my father. Have you found him?”
“We have,” the officer said.
“Oh, good, where is he? Can I pick him up?”
“Ma’am, I think there is a bit of a misunderstanding,” he said. “Your father has been found, but he is dead. We have him at the city morgue ready to be picked up when arrangements can be made.”
“I’m sorry, what did you say?” I didn’t think I heard them correctly.
“There was an accident,” the officer said. “Your father wrapped his car around a telephone pole.”
“There must be some mistake,” I said. “My father doesn’t have a car.”
“Yes, we are aware,” he said. “It looks as if the car was stolen from the Highland Casinos a couple of nights ago. His speed was more than three times the legal limit, and his blood-alcohol level was pretty high. I am sorry that I had to give you this news over the phone. We knew you weren’t at home with everything going on.”
“All right,” I said in a daze. “Thank you for your call.”
Before the officer could say anything else, I turned the phone off, letting it slip from my hand and bounce across the floor. I stood there for a moment as if my brain was trying to catch up with what the officer had just told me. Before I could even control it, I let out a scream and dropped to my knees on the floor. My father was dead. He was really dead after everything I had been through for so many years, trying to keep him alive.
I looked up as Blaine rounded the corner and ran into the living room, bending down and wrapping his arms around me. It was like he already knew what happened, and I couldn’t even get my mouth open enough to tell him the entire story. My heart was breaking in my chest, and I felt like the only thing keeping me in one piece were his arms. That was the only thing that seemed to ever keep me in one piece anymore, and I could tell that he knew that. He squeezed tighter as I sobbed, still unable to talk. Everything was spiraling out of control, and I was powerless to do anything about it. I could feel my heart beating wildly in my chest, and everything was getting fuzzy. I was starting to have a panic attack, something I’d only had one other time in my life, and that was when my mother left me alone with my father. I had felt helpless then but never anything as bad as this. There was a dread deep down in my stomach that I just couldn’t shake. My breathing picked up, and I felt like I couldn’t take in a deep breath of air.
My life had become so off-kilter, I couldn’t even recognize it anymore. Hell, I didn’t even recognize myself anymore. I gripped onto Blaine’s shoulder, letting the tears flow, trying to get control of myself. Everything was wrong, and none of it was my fault. Well, maybe it was. Maybe if I had forced my father into a treatment program the first time, I wouldn’t be sitting here on the floor, completely losing it. My father was dead, I was on trial for a murder I didn’t commit, and I had lost my job. What else could go wrong?
I lifted my head and looked out at the waves, and as if my thoughts had summoned bad luck, I ducked, seeing a brick flying at the window. It crashed through the glass, creating a cascade of broken shards that reflected the light of the sun peeking through the clouds. I gasped, seeing the brick bounce across the floor and into the dining room. Blaine ducked his head down over mine, and we huddled there in each other’s arms for several minutes until we knew we were safe. Slowly, I looked out of the broken window, but there was no one in sight. Whoever had thrown the brick had taken off as fast as they had arrived.
Blaine stood up and shook the glass from his hair. I did the same. Carefully, I tiptoed over to the couch and looked at the shards strewn everywhere. I walked up to the kitchen where the floor was clear and watched Blaine open up a note taped to the brick. He looked angry, and I hoped that his anger wasn’t aimed at me. I waited patiently for him to show me the note, and when he did, I gasped in shock.
“Die, Snitch,” was written across the paper in black marker.
I thought about the words for several moments, and then I realized that the mob had found me. I couldn’t believe they had tracked me down in Palm Beach, off the beaten path, at a boyfriend’s house no one even knew I had. It was absolutely insane. What was I supposed to do now? I couldn’t hide anywhere from these people. I didn’t have any protection except for Blaine, and now that I had lost my father, I knew I couldn’t lose Blaine, too. He was the only person I had left. My thoughts started racing, thinking of the dream I had, thinking of Blaine, and wondering if he was next. I put my hands up to my head and dropped the letter to the floor, trying to make my mind stop racing so fast.
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I blinked my eyes, but everything around me was blurry. All I could see were fuzzy shapes of the things in front of me like a fogged-up window in a car. I reached out, trying to find something to hold onto, but there was nothing there. I knew Blaine was calling to me. I could see him, but everything was coming out in slow motion and muffled. My hands started shaking so badly that I couldn’t control it. My feet felt as if they were rising from the ground, and the floor was spinning underneath my feet. I could see Blaine step forward as I groaned. The light from the room slowly faded away and everything went dark. The last thing I could make out was my body falling, falling like my dream, but instead of waking up, I could feel Blaine’s hands grabbing on to me. And that was it.
Chapter 27
Blaine
“Josie,” I said, tapping her cheek. “Josie, wake up.”
She stirred in my arms and slowly opened her eyes. She looked up at me, blinking for several moments before coming all the way awake. She tried to sit up, but I laid her down on the floor and grabbed a wet washcloth to lay over her forehead.
“What happened?” she asked.
“You passed out,” I said. “I caught you, but you went down pretty hard. I need you to lay here for just a few minutes while I take care of some things.”
I walked over to the living room, the glass crunching under my shoes. I stood there for several moments, just glaring out over the ocean. The anger in my chest was out of control, and I couldn’t believe that the mob had found Josie. They had thrown a damn brick through my front window just to prove their point. On top of all that, Josie’s father was dead, apparently from some sort of car accident. Now, I knew he wasn’t a model citizen, but I didn’t take him for someone who would steal a car, get wasted, and drive around until he crashed into a telephone pole. I felt like there was more to the story than that, and I wasn’t going to sit around and wait for the mob to give me the answer.
I picked up my phone and dialed the security service I used for the office. I asked them to send several men over and keep them on rotation until further notice. Whether we were home or not, the place and everyone in it needed to be protected from these guys. I knew I could trust this company because their background checking policy was so thorough, I probably couldn’t even work for them. Most of the men they hired were former military or worked for the secret service in the past.
I knew that it was going to be hard on Josie, but we needed to go down to the morgue and talk to the person that worked there. There were a lot of missing pieces to this puzzle, and I wanted to know for sure that her father had died from the accident and not from mob involvement. I couldn’t leave Josie there at the house, even with security. I needed to know where she was at all times, and the risk was just too great. Before we left, I called a window company and told them to check in with the men at the front. They would make sure they got in to get their work done. I needed the house to be put back together and the mess to be cleaned up because it was the last safe place that I knew of, unless I packed Josie up and took her out of the country. Unfortunately, that scenario wasn’t possible since she wasn’t allowed to leave the state.
When we got to the morgue, Josie clung closely to me, and we walked up to the front desk. I requested to see the coroner on duty and then waited to be called back. Josie leaned her head against my shoulder as we waited for the coroner to emerge. I could feel that her hands were still shaking, but at least, the color had come back to her cheeks and lips. This poor girl had been through enough, and now, she had to bury her father. It just didn’t seem fair. When the coroner arrived, we followed him back to the main area of refrigerated coolers holding bodies.
“We are here to talk to you about Carl Gray,” I said.
“Carl Gray,” he said, thinking. “Oh, yes, the car accident. I don’t think you will want to view the body. The damage is pretty extensive.”
“We aren’t here to see the body,” I replied, feeling Josie grasp harder to my hand. “I wanted to ask you a couple of questions.”
“Okay,” he said. “I’ll do my best.”
“Are you sure this was a simple drunk driving accident?”
“I am positive,” he said, picking up a file and opening it. “Mr. Gray’s alcohol level was three times the legal limit. He died on impact since he was going about thirty miles over the speed limit. It is really a shame to see that kind of thing, especially with an older man. However, from what the police had told me, he had more going on than just having a bit of a drinking problem. Apparently, he had a gambling problem as well. I’m not judging, but that type of accident is pretty normal for people like him. I’m sorry if that is not helpful enough.”
“Was there any way that his death could have been a homicide?”
“I mean, anything is possible, but I highly doubt it,” he said, shaking his head.
He walked over to his desk and opened the file so he could read the details. I stepped in front of Josie since there were several pictures inside of her father’s body. She clung to my back like a scared little mouse, unable to move from that spot. The place was sterile, and the smell of formaldehyde wafted through the air. It made me remember when I had to go in and identify my parents’ bodies after they had been fished out of the water. Anderson had offered to do it since I was still recovering from my injuries, but I insisted, so he wheeled me in my wheelchair, and I looked down at their broken and bloated bodies. That image was still burned into my mind, so there was no way I was going to let Josie see her father like that.
“To be honest,” he said, shaking his head. “And I don’t mean any disrespect, but I’ve seen my fair share of dead drunks before. To me, this just seems like another sad case of a man that drank too much and met his ugly fate against a telephone pole.”
“Thank you,” I said, turning to Josie and nodding toward the door.
We left the morgue and walked out to the car, looking around to make sure there was no one following us. I had already made Josie an appointment at the funeral home for the next day so she could begin the arrangements for her father. I knew she was highly shaken, but I also knew that I needed to ask her some questions. I needed to really understand what shape her father was in when he met his end. I didn’t want to rule out mob involvement, but it was looking pretty straightforward.
“Look,” I said, taking her hand. “I’m sorry you have to go through this. If anyone can understand how the death of a parent feels, it’s me, but I have to ask you some questions. They may be hard to answer, but I need you to muster up that strength and give me your best shot.”
“Okay,” she said, sniffling and shaking her head.
“Was your father a drinker?”
“No,” she said. “I mean, he didn’t use to be. The only time recently that I would see him drink was when he didn’t have any money to gamble with. Even then, he wasn’t wasted. It was more like he had a few drinks and then went to bed, tired from the alcohol. Of course, I haven’t been around him when he was out, so I guess anything was possible. Everyone told me one addiction often could turn into another.”
I nodded my head and rubbed my hand down her hair. She buckled her seat belt and sat back as I put the car in drive and pulled out of the coroner’s office. This was definitely a shock and a terrible way to go, but it looked pretty simple. In reality, it looked like Josie’s dad wanted to gamble, but between the mob being after him and his bank account being low, which we checked during the investigation, he decided on a cheaper habit to indulge in. I didn’t know the story behind him stealing a car, but at this point, anything was possible. I guessed he probably felt guilty about his daughter being pinned with a murder she didn’t commit, and it sent him off the deep end. I knew he loved her, he must have, but I also knew as a man, having an addiction and depending on someone else to take care of you probably could easily turn you into a harsh and angry man. It was pretty clear to me that we could rule any mob involvement out of her father’s death. It was a shame that he died in a car accident,
but if he really had gone on impact, he might have saved himself a really painful and agonizing death at the hands of the mob. They weren’t known for having mercy for the people they were after, and for Josie’s father, there was no reason for them to be kind.
“I hate to even ask this question,” she said, looking at me. “But what in the world could happen next?”
“Hopefully, we find out what is going on, and we can completely get these charges wiped away,” I responded trying to calm her nerves. “Right now, though, we are going to get some dinner, and when the window is done being fixed, we are going to go home, clean up the dinner we never got to enjoy, and relax a bit. I have some good movies, and we can veg out and just enjoy the rest of the day. I know it sounds hard to do, but you need to relax.”
“Everything in my life has gone to shit,” she said with tears in her eyes. “My whole world is crashing down around me, and I am powerless to stop it. My father is dead, the mob is after me, I’ve been framed for murder, and I don’t have a job to go back to anymore. I don’t even know what to do with myself. I’ve lost everything.”
“Not your entire world,” I said, taking her hand and smiling.
She pulled my hand up to her cheek and rested her face on it. I could feel the tears running down her cheeks, but it was okay. She had been so strong, it was bound to come crashing down on her at some point. All I knew was, I needed to protect this woman in any way I could. She had become my world, and I loved her with all my heart.