Mystery: The Card Counter: (Mystery, Suspense, Thriller, Suspense Thriller Mystery)

by James Kipling

  “Are you sure about that?” I asked. Just the idea of leaving him and Flo kind of felt like deserting the frontline when shit was hitting the fan, which made me feel guilty for wanting to go home.

  “I’m sure,” Captain Bancroft replied. “If something big happens, we’ll get in touch. I’ll get someone else to file through the paperwork. Like you said, the team’s being watched, and that should slow him down.”

  “I’ll take it home with me.”

  “Not a fucking chance,” the Captain corrected me. “There’s no way anyone is taking this shit home. If you forget it at the pizza place on your way home, it will be on the front page of The Times tomorrow.”

  “All right,” I said as I stood up and put my coat back on. “Thanks.” The idea of heading home to be with the girls before they went to bed sounded good. I could probably clean up a bit before Cassie brought the girls home. I promptly left and drove home, which wasn’t bad since traffic was a little lighter at night on the way to where I lived.

  When I pulled into the driveway, I saw another car parked by my place. Cassie didn’t have a car and I quickly realized whose car it was. I dreaded the moment. As I stepped out of the car, I took a deep breath and closed the door softly in an attempt to hide how angry I really was.

  She was sitting on the front porch in a chair by the front door, and rather than ignore her, I thought it best to start talking now and get things over with. “Beth.”

  “Jake,” Beth called back.

  “You do realize the sole reason I pick the girls up from school is to avoid meeting you.”

  Beth seemed unaffected by my wit. “Where are the girls?”

  “They’re not here,” I answered.

  “I gathered that much, asshole.”

  “They’re out with Cassie.”

  “Cassie’s here, too?” Beth asked.

  “I convinced her to stay here for the week while things are really bad on campus; she dropped by almost as soon as I got off the phone with you,” I answered. “Since I had to go back to work, I gave her money to take the girls out for pizza and a movie – she’d come over to spend time with them anyway,” I fibbed.

  “You know, if you don’t want to spend time with the girls˗”

  “Is that what you really think, Beth?” The conversation was starting to heat up but I didn’t care. “Do you really think I wanted a serial killer to start torturing and murdering kids at Cassie’s campus so I wouldn’t spend time with Abbey and Sandy? There are people dying out there, Beth, and the fact that Cassie was very close to it scares the shit out of me. That’s why I go in when they call me.”

  “You’re over-reacting,” Beth sniped back.

  “No, I’m not.”

  “You’ve always been full of shit, Jake.”

  “The second victim was found in her dorm.”

  There was a long pause after I made that statement. There was no way she could know that. I had only been there earlier today so there was no way the press could have released that information, if we’d even released it in the first place. I could tell the comment cut Beth pretty deep. Cassie was very close to the violence this time, and unlike previous paranoia I’ve displayed as a father, this one seemed to have legs. “I had no idea it was this bad.”

  “Beth, you have no idea how bad this is at all,” I said as I walked closer. “These are some of the most brutal killings I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen a lot of sick shit in my time. These kids are Cassie’s age. Do you think I can sit on the sidelines and let someone else do it when this is going on? There are parents out there who are living what are my worst fucking nightmares, and you have the audacity to accuse me of being selfish because I want to bring this piece of shit in as soon as possible?”

  “There are other cops in the station, Jake,” Beth countered. “The world isn’t going to end if the great Detective Walker has to pass on a single damn case!”

  “So you think I should tell my boss to fuck off whenever he calls me to come in?” I snapped back. “He doesn’t do that often, and I like my job. Sometimes it means going back when called in. I’m not going to apologize for being good at my job.”

  “You could apologize for being a bad father.”

  “A good father would want this sick piece of shit behind bars or in a morgue!” I yelled back at her. “I want kids to stop dying and if that makes me an asshole in your books, I don’t fucking care!”

  “Don’t talk to me like that,” Beth angrily replied.

  “This is my fucking house!” I yelled back as I pulled a pair of cuffs out of my pocket and waved them in her face. “Just being here is a violation of our court agreement. I suggest you leave right now.”

  “Or what?” Beth said back, daring me to do something about it.

  “Or I’ll call in and have a few uniforms haul you down to the station for trespassing and disturbing the peace.”

  Beth looked like she wanted to scream back at me, but thought better of it. “You’ll hear from my lawyer.”

  “I wouldn’t expect anything less, you fucking whore!” I called back as I watched her walk across my grass to her car. I walked into the house as she was pulling away, but my heart sank as I turned on the light. All three of my girls were sitting on my couch in the living room. They had come home early and had heard everything we’d said outside.

  Sandy was crying in Cassie’s arms, and just the sight of that broke my heart as I began to recall all the terrible things I’d said to their mother just outside the door, only minutes ago.

  After a pause that lasted at least a minute or two, Cassie finally spoke up. “We grabbed a few pizzas, wings, and a video, hoping you’d come back early.”

  I sighed and sat down on the coffee table. “That was very sweet. You shouldn’t have done this for me. I don’t deserve it.”

  “Yeah, well.”

  I wanted to say something, but there was nothing I could say. What I had done was inexcusable, and somehow a horrible day managed to get much, much worse. One by one, all three girls went upstairs to their room. I wanted to call them back down to talk, but now didn’t seem like such a good idea while they were still upset. At least they’d stayed downstairs long enough to eat with me.

  I’d been divorced for close to half a decade now, and despite how angry I was about the separation and the affair that led to it, I’d worked hard never to bad-mouth my ex when the girls were present. I did it out of respect for them more than out of respect for their mother, who I didn’t like very much. There was a time when she’d actually had the nerve to ask if we could be friends. I said no because I couldn’t be friends with someone who claimed to love me and then stabbed me in the fucking back the way she had. And, at the time, I was still fucking in love with her, so what else was I supposed to do?

  Nice people didn’t do that to their friends, and she was the last person I would ever consider my friend. I tried to be nice to her when the kids were around, but in this case, it had never occurred to me that they might be in the house, hiding away to keep me out of trouble, but when I came home alone, trouble was what she gave me. They’d hidden from their own mother so she would assume we had all gone out together, and I repaid that loyalty by bad-mouthing their mom in front of them.

  I sat down on the couch and looked down at the left-over pizza and DVDs that were on the other side of the coffee table. There were two pizzas; the first one was a deluxe with green peppers, pepperoni, and mushrooms. The other was my favourite: sausage, feta cheese, and anchovies. They’d picked up some girly movies, but with the gruesome shit I have to tolerate at work, I never had any issue with the girly movies.

  I was sincerely touched by their efforts to include me in their plans, despite the fact that I’d hardly been there all weekend. I took out another piece of pizza and ate it while thinking about what an ass I’d been when I spoke to their mother earlier. They were good kids and they deserved better. Was it possible their mother was right? Maybe I was the bad father she’d accused me of being
, a short time ago. That asshole who picked his job over his family; the one who didn’t care that he was missing out on family memories because he was too busy protecting the rest of the city as if they were all his children. Maybe she was right.

  6

  I ate a few more slices of pizza and then took the leftover food into the kitchen and put it in the fridge for breakfast the next day; the girls always overestimated how much they could eat.

  I cleaned up the kitchen before heading to bed and I was about half done when Cassie came down to the kitchen. She didn’t say anything at first; she grabbed a slice of pizza and some soda from the fridge, and sat down on a stool by the island in the middle of the kitchen. I stopped cleaning the counter and turned to face my eldest daughter. “Hey.”

  “Hey,” she replied. That was a good sign.

  “Pretty rough weekend, eh?”

  “You could say that.”

  “Look, I’m very sorry about what happened out there.”

  “I know.”

  “I had no idea you guys were in here.”

  “I know.”

  “Thanks for the pizza. I hadn’t eaten anything at work.”

  “Well, you did pay for it.”

  “I know, but still … you even got my favorite.”

  “Disgusting, but also very true.”

  I paused for a moment. “Usually I don’t get like that with your mother, even when you guys are not around. It’s just been a stressful weekend.”

  “Does that excuse what you said?” she asked.

  “No,” I answered. “I guess not. I’m sorry.”

  “Shouldn’t you say that to Mom too?”

  “Don’t worry. Her lawyer will make sure I regret it even more.”

  “Dad.”

  “I don’t expect you to understand. I hope you never will.”

  “Was it really that bad?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re the one who left, you tell me.”

  This was the moment I’d really regretted since the separation. Because I left the girls when I left their mother, they naturally blamed themselves as the final straw on my getting fed up. I really wasn’t in the mood to get into it, not after how badly I’d behaved. “It’s complicated, but that’s between your mother and me. You and your sisters had nothing to do with it.”

  “I’m not a child. You can talk to me about it.”

  “I didn’t want to bash your mother like this.”

  “You’ve already crossed that line,” Cassie corrected me. “Might as well let it all spill. Why are you so angry at her?”

  I paused for a moment. “It’s Karl.”

  “What about Karl?” Cassie asked. “After you left, did you expect mom to become a hermit and never date anyone ever again?”

  “Of course not,” I answered.

  “Then why all the hate for Karl and Mom?”

  “Because they were an item for a lot longer than you know,” I answered. “They had been dating for almost a year before I left.”

  I could tell by the look on Cassie’s face that she had no idea. She’d known her mother had cheated, but she’d never known there was a long-standing affair; we’d managed to keep that much from her, as somehow it had seemed much worse, much more shameful, to both Beth and I. Yet, inside her head it all started to make sense, the one reason why I’d finally walked out the door and didn’t look back, and scuttled the marriage without hesitation. Her mother was unfaithful, even more than she’d imagined. “I had no idea. I thought...I thought it was just a short, a one-night... I didn’t know it was like that.”

  “I said it wasn’t your fault.”

  “So you found out about it.”

  “Yes. I moved out the same day.”

  “Why?”

  “I left because I was betrayed by the one person who swore to love me her entire life. I couldn’t stay with her anymore and look her in the face. It wasn’t a mistake on her part, Cassie. At some point, she made the conscious decision she was okay with being unfaithful to our marriage vows.” I paused for a moment and thought about it. “I hated her. I didn’t want anything to do with her anymore. She made me feel bad about my job because of the long hours I worked. When I resisted her requests to make more time, she found someone else who would give her what she needed. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to give her what she wanted, but I was a very busy guy. I had responsibilities˗”

  “Dad,” Cassie interrupted. “You’re doing good work out there. I’ve never complained about you being away from the house to work. The work you do is hard and often unrewarding.”

  “That’s not true,” I corrected her. “What I do is easier when I know that it makes the city a safer place for you and your sisters. You girls are the drive that keeps me going when things get tough.”

  “Really?”

  “Well, that and the money.” We both laughed. While I wasn’t poor, I wasn’t exactly a rich man either. “I’m more dedicated now than ever because it’s your campus that’s being attacked. I need to find this person to make everyone safe, including you.”

  “The killer is attacking our students, specifically?” Cassie asked.

  “It seems that way, but there’s a specific pattern,” I replied. “He’s attacking a specific kind of student. Athletes.”

  “Should I be worried?” Cassie asked.

  “I said athletes. Your field hockey team doesn’t count.”

  “Dad,” Cassie said, soberly. It was a serious question and she expected a serious answer from her father.

  “You’ll be fine,” I replied. “I have the football team locked away at a hotel on the other side of town. They’re the targets. Right now, the student population should be safe tonight if my hunch is correct. That’s all confidential, by the way.”

  “Does that mean I can head back and meet some friends to study tonight?” Cassie asked.

  I could tell she didn’t want to hang out because of what had happened with her mother, and I couldn’t blame her. At the same time, I also knew she wasn’t going to be ‘studying’ on a Saturday night. “All right, but please stay together as a group. I don’t want any of you running off on your own. All right?”

  “All right, Dad,” Cassie said as she gave me a half hug. I didn’t mean to toss her mother under the bus by telling the truth, but at the same time, I wasn’t going to lie to my children.

  I never claimed to be perfect, but there was nothing I did that would warrant going out and looking for someone else behind my spouse’s back. I was out there working hard to support my family, keeping the city just a little bit safer at the same time, for the people and my children.

  I called her a cab, and gave her enough cash to get home. I watched her walk out to the cab and even waved as it pulled away. I’m not sure if she saw me, but I did it anyway just in case. Once Cassie was on her way back to campus, I wandered back into the kitchen and tidied up again before finally heading to bed.

  The other girls were already in bed, as things were quiet and the lights were off in their room, so I decided to do the same. There was no telling if my work would wake me up again, forcing me to leave early, so I decided to go to bed as early as possible so I could at least have a little energy if I got that call. Part of me wanted to check on the girls and even apologize if I got the chance, but good judgment got the best of me and I walked right by, and didn’t disturb them. I didn’t even bother to change, and instead just laid down in bed, and passed out in less than a few minutes.

  At first I wasn’t sure how long I was asleep, but I wasn’t woken up by my phone, which was a good sign. I’d gone to bed worrying if someone else would die and I’d have to go back in. That didn’t happen, which gave me the impression that moving the team and coaching staff to a secure location had seemed to help, for now at least. When I opened my eyes, it was a lot brighter, which, according to my astute detective skills, meant that the sun had risen and it was morning.

  When my vision focused, one of my daughters
was at the side of the bed, staring at me. “Abbey, is everything all right?”

  “You were very mean to Mommy,” she replied.

  I immediately sat up and quickly rubbed my eyes to clear my sight and to give myself a moment to figure out the correct response. “I’m very sorry about that, baby. Daddy was just angry. The next time I see your mom, I’ll apologize.”

  Abbey paused for a moment and then finally smiled. “Okay.” I smiled back and then asked her what she would like for breakfast. She paused for a moment and then quickly answered, “How about some eggs?”

  “How about your favorite omelette?” I suggested.

  “Okay,” she answered. She gave me a hug and left the bedroom to give me a little space while I got out of bed.

  I took a deep breath, hopped out of bed, and went to the bathroom to freshen up. After I brushed my teeth, tossed a little water on my face, and left the bathroom, I realized that Sandy was still in her room, reading a book. “Aren’t you coming down to help with breakfast?”

  She looked up from the book, some cheesy vampire romance novel for teens. “I thought I was grounded. What’s the point?”

  I paused for a moment and thought about it. “Are you sorry for what you did?”

  “Yes,” she answered.

  “Do you plan to keep your mother and me in the loop on your studies?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you’re done,” I answered. “Come on down and help make breakfast. You don’t burn the toast as often as I do.”

  Her answer couldn’t be more obvious as she quickly put down her crappy book and led the way down the stairs to the kitchen. I fried up some mushrooms and bacon before starting the girls’ omelettes. I then stuffed the mushrooms and bacon into the omelettes while cooking them in separate pans. I used to work in a diner when I was younger, so cooking stuff like this was second nature to me.

  I flipped a few omelettes while Sandy happily made some toast. Abbey poured some orange juice and things seemed as normal as they had been during the good times of my marriage. Usually on Sunday mornings, Beth and Cassie would sleep in and I’d wake up with my two youngest and cook breakfast with them. Things seemed that happy again as we worked well as a team, like we had many times before. When I was finished making everyone’s eggs, we sat down at the table and talked about boys, school, and other feeble things while we ate.