by Jenna Rae
Del rolled her eyes and scanned the screen again.
“Okay,” she said, sitting down at the laptop and opening the ads. “Do I respond to an ad that looks like ‘Joan’s’? Or do I write a new one and hope he responds?”
She and Lola spent the next two hours scanning the personal ads, looking for one that seemed similar to ‘Joan’s’. There were seven possibles, but none really pinged for Del.
“Enough!” she said, unintentionally startling Lola, who’d been engrossed in an ad comprised mostly of abbreviations and text-speak.
“I don’t know what half of this means!” Lola leaned back and stretched, arching her back and rolling her neck.
“Me, either.” Del’s eyes swept over Lola’s body appreciatively before she caught herself and turned away, turning the feint into a real stretch that made her groan. Her shoulders ached from hunching over all day. She looked out of the window and saw that the sky was dark. How had that happened so quickly?
Lola heard Del’s groan and felt guilty. “Del, you can’t work twenty-four hours a day! Come on, please eat some dinner.”
She hurried to the kitchen, pulling lasagna out of the fridge to reheat it. With the microwave churning and the table set, she held up a bottle of beer in offering to Del, who was washing her hands. She had run into Marco on the way to the grocery store, and he’d mentioned that Del liked beer.
“Sure.” Del sniffed the air. “What is that, lasagna? Did you make it from scratch?”
Lola nodded. “My first,” she crowed. Then she felt silly. Lasagna had turned out to be very easy to make, and she’d started wondering what other easy things she’d never learned to do in her stunted life.
They sat down, and Lola watched Del eat in silence for a few moments. She seemed to think it was okay. Lola wanted to eat with her and see how that might be, but she still felt strange about doing so. She fiddled with her fork and tried not to stare at Del’s mouth.
“You didn’t put something in it, did you?”
“What?”
“Well, you made two plates of food. It smells and tastes amazing, and you haven’t touched yours. So, I have to wonder, did you just poison me?”
Lola smiled and shook her head. She played with her fork.
“So?”
“What?”
“Why aren’t you eating?”
Lola wasn’t sure how to get out of answering. She was still thinking of a lie when she heard herself tell the truth. “I’m not used to eating with people.”
“How come?”
“I was married. Before, I mean.” She met Del’s eyes and saw that this was not news to her. “You already knew that?”
“When I started looking for your attacker, I had to check you out. In case there was some old boyfriend or girlfriend or whatever I should look at. Most people don’t fess up to nasty exes until it’s too late.”
“Oh.” Lola’s voice was small. “What else did you learn about me?”
Del’s gaze was level. “Okay. Foster kid, married at eighteen. No record. No family. Dead husband. Car crash. Feds all worked up about Beckett’s dirty money, which they never found. Wrote a book. Bought a house. That’s it.”
Lola nodded, her eyes unreadable.
“You mad?” Del sat back, tipping her beer into her mouth. Shouldn’t be drinking, she thought. Gotta be alert. That’s why I’m here, right?
Lola shook her head. “It makes sense, I guess, that you’d have to do that. I just never thought of it.”
“Dr. Orrin Beckett.”
“Yes.” Lola’s eyes skittered away, roamed the kitchen. Del saw her mouth tighten and was tempted to drop the subject. But curiosity drove her on. She told herself that she needed information to keep Lola safe. She knew it was a dirty lie and pressed on anyway.
“You were gonna tell me why you won’t eat in front of me.”
“Was I?” Lola’s smile didn’t touch her eyes. “Or are you interrogating me?”
Del met her gaze and said nothing.
“Well, I—Orrin—” She searched for words, licked her lips, started again. “He liked things to be a certain way. I wasn’t allowed to eat in front of him. I mean, unless he told me to. I guess it sounds, maybe, a little weird.” She hoped that Del would say, of course not. That’s not weird. It’s perfectly natural.
“Yeah. It sounds very fucking weird.” Del drained her beer, and Lola rose to offer her another one. She wished her face didn’t show her every feeling. How had Orrin come up? Why had she let it? She should have lied, said she’d already eaten, anything.
“I’ll get it.” Del waved her down, grabbed and opened her second beer, and kept her face as neutral as possible. She was pinging all over this—Dr. Beckett was a bad guy. She could tell. And Lola had been afraid of him, still was, maybe—did that mean he wasn’t really dead, or was she that messed up? Her fear was still written all over her face, her posture, the quaver in her voice.
Del fought a flush of rage and frustration. Why do so many men want to hurt women? And why do so many women let them? She flashed on her father’s face, contorted with rage, and adrenaline flooded her body. Darkness pushed into her gaze and narrowed it. She felt rather than saw Lola taking in her reaction, and she again masked her face.
Cool it, she told herself. Don’t freak her out. You already did that, remember? Put on the badge and stop acting like an out-of-control kid. She took a deep breath. She pushed up her sleeves. She sipped and gazed out the back window. It wasn’t working. She was still fired up, and she could feel Lola’s antennae twitching. She was prey, always watching for danger. I don’t want to seem like danger to her. Don’t want to be danger to her.
Another sip. Shouldn’t be drinking, she thought again. But anger was seeping through, spreading its black stain on her thinking, and the beer would help with that. I’ll finish this one and be done. She pushed ahead, knowing it was the wrong time and not able or willing to stop.
“What else?”
“What do you mean?” Wide eyes, small mouth. Sitting very, very still. Playing dumb. Badly.
“What else? You said he liked things to be a certain way. What things?” Del took a long draw from the bottle and eyed Lola over it, making her eyes crinkle like she was smiling.
“Oh.” Lola shrugged with as much nonchalance as she could muster. “I don’t know. Nothing very different from most people, I guess.”
Del just looked at her.
“I’m not that easy to live with, I think. I do a lot of irritating things. Make a lot of mistakes. I mean…” She cleared her throat. “I don’t mean to, of course. But I’m not that good at a lot of things.”
“So he didn’t like how you did things? Or what you did? I don’t get it. What kind of things?”
It was a trap. Lola knew that, but she didn’t know how to get out of it. She shook her head. “You know, things. He didn’t like change. He didn’t like inconsistency. Or mess. Or, I don’t know,” her hands waved around her head, “noise or dirt or upset, you know, stuff like that. He just wanted things to be done right.”
She wished Del would look somewhere else, but she kept staring and drinking her beer. Her stomach was starting to hurt. The last thing she wanted to do was to talk about Orrin. Ever. Especially with Del, whose eyes were dark and snapping. She was electric, all lit up like she was mad. Lola swallowed hard. She wanted to leave, to hide, to stop the conversation, but she didn’t know how.
“You married him when you were, what, eighteen? He was forty-something?”
A shrug. A vague shake of the head. Who knows? Who cares? It was clear that Lola wanted her to stop asking, but Del thought maybe she could probe a little further before Lola shut down completely. She would answer even if she didn’t want to. She was obedient.
“What if things weren’t ‘right’?”
“What do you mean?”
“If you didn’t do things right? If you didn’t, I don’t know, make his toast the way he wanted it, did he throw a fit? Did he lay on t
he ground and cry?” She pantomimed a toddler throwing a fit.
Lola forced a weak, polite laugh out of her mouth. She shook her head and started to get up, but she sat again when Del shook her head and waved her back down.
There was that obedience again. How long, she wondered as she watched Lola squirm, did it take him to break you? To get that automatic, mindless, rabbity fucking obedience drilled into you? He’s been dead for months, but you’re still obedient. If I told you to jump up on the table and dance, you would do it. You wouldn’t want to, but you’d do it. She felt acid churn in her stomach, her throat. She put down her beer.
“Did he get mad?” Her voice was too loud, even over her too-fast breathing and the ragged pounding of her heart.
Lola shrugged, desperate to run away but trapped. Stop it! Leave me alone! Stop asking questions! She wanted to run, but she sat quietly, her hands fisted under the table. She tried to keep her breathing normal, but she felt her chest tightening. She knew she was bright red, but there was nothing she could do about it. She stared at the table and silently pleaded, Please stop. Stop asking questions. Please!
Her eyes flickered to Del’s face, and something broke inside of Del. I won’t bully her. She made sure that her voice was soft this time, that her face was a mask of calm. “We don’t have to talk about it.” Finishing the bottle, she rose and started rinsing off her dish. “It’s okay to say you don’t want to talk about it.”
Lola tried to speak and found that her throat had closed. She finally stood and scraped her lasagna into the trash and put the rest of the pan in the fridge. She rinsed out Del’s beer bottles and put them in the recycling bin in the garage. She took a moment alone there, waiting for her cheeks to cool and her eyes to clear. She hated feeling like she was always on the verge of falling apart. She hated letting Del see her as weak. She hated to think that Del looked at her the way that lawyer had, like she was a type. Like she was broken.
When she returned, Del was in the living room, plugging in the Christmas tree. They stood next to each other looking at the lights and ornaments.
“It’s a little random, I know,” Lola said, feeling defensive.
Orrin snorted in her ear. “A little random?”
“Huh? I think it’s great.” Del fingered a small snowman. “I haven’t even gotten a tree, yet.”
“Why not? Too busy hanging out with your neighbor?”
Del’s smile made Lola’s heart jump. In the gentle glow of the holiday lights, Del’s face looked soft and vulnerable again, the way it had early in the morning. Lola wanted to touch Del’s golden hair, look into her beautiful eyes, kiss her gorgeous mouth. She could almost taste Del’s lips, feel her warm skin. She would smell like the sun, Lola was sure. She would smell like summertime. Knock it off, she chided herself. You’re like a horny teenager!
She snorted with laughter at her inner monologue’s word choice, startling both of them. Del was unsure what to think, but the laughter was infectious, and she was glad to see Lola relaxing.
“You have a great laugh,” she whispered, and they both sobered.
Del could see that Lola was thinking of a graceful exit, and she decided to forestall it. She sat on the couch, patting the seat next to hers. Lola sat, and they gazed for a while at the tree.
“Lola—” she began, and she was interrupted by the sound of breaking glass. The alarm started wailing, and Del jumped into action. She pushed Lola to the floor, covering her and pulling her weapon at the same time. She saw no one, heard nothing but the scream of the alarm. Peering carefully out the front window, she yanked the plug that kept the tree lit. In the sudden blackness, she grabbed Lola’s arm and dragged her to the front closet.
“Stay here,” she hissed, and pushed her in and eased the door closed. She crept silently toward the back of the house.
She was just entering the kitchen when something exploded with a BANG! It was in the laundry room, maybe ten or twelve feet from her—she should go in the other direction.
Right now, she thought, as she stumbled, caught herself, and ran toward the explosion, I should grab Lola and take her out front and call it in. But her feet moved toward the laundry room as if of their own accord. She eased forward, peered in, and cleared the laundry room. The window was smashed in. There was something dark all over the floor, the walls, the ceiling. The dryer was dented. The washer too. Debris, everywhere. She edged over to the window. The yard was dark, and she turned on the floodlights but saw nothing. She cleared the rest of the downstairs, the upper floor and the garage. Finally, she called dispatch.
She pulled a pale, shaking Lola from the closet, dragged her out into the street, and held her until she saw the red-blue flash of a light bar coming at the house. Lola pressed her face into Del’s chest. She was cold enough to chill Del’s skin through her pullover. Del wanted to hold her until the shaking stopped, but she pushed her into a sitting position on the curb, pulling her hands free.
“Just sit there for a minute, okay? I need you to stay here. I’m sorry, I can’t handhold you right now.”
She wanted to take it back right away, but she didn’t. She walked toward the patrol car instead. A rookie with wide eyes stood with his weapon drawn and shaking in his too-tight, nerve-rattled grip. Great. Gotta love rookies. Maybe his momma will let him start shaving someday soon. She tried out an easy smile on the kid.
Her thinking was all black and smoky, and she needed to be cool right now. She set her weapon on the ground and stepped back from it. She explained that she was on the job, and she let him pull out her badge himself. She was worried he would kill himself, Lola, and her, and maybe a couple of the neighbors, too. He might, if he didn’t get calmed down. Finally, he seemed to believe her, and she talked him into holstering his weapon.
By the time the guards from the security company showed, two department techs were already in the house, taking pictures and scribbling in their notebooks. Del stood back and let everybody run things for the time being. She was on fire with impotent rage. He’d been right there, yards away from them. He’d been close enough to shoot, maybe close enough to chase down and beat into a lifeless pulp, and she had been useless. She’d been distracted and unprofessional and drinking, and she had been absolutely useless.
Chapter Eighteen
Lola was alone in the darkness of the closet. Mrs. Simms used to put her in the closet. For a few seconds she wasn’t sure if she was grown-up Lola or little girl Lola, and she had to recall Del’s face to be sure. Little Lola didn’t know Del, did she? So that meant that she was grown-up Lola, and Mr. Simms wasn’t going to come and drag her out and hurt her. For the first time, she realized that Mrs. Simms knew that her husband would hurt Lola when he let her out of the closet and took her to her room. That it was all a setup. How many little girls did they do the same thing to?
“Why didn’t I stop them from hurting anyone else?” She chewed her lip. “It’s just like Tami Holden.”
She knew she should be quiet, but she couldn’t remember why. It was the same reason for being in the closet in the dark. Del! Be quiet because of Del. That was it. Her side hurt, but she didn’t pay attention. She tried to listen for Del, for any sound, but it was hard to hear over her own breathing and the high-pitched screech of the alarm. Then she wasn’t able to hear anything. She sat down, feeling a little lost for a second. She dug her fingernails into her palms, trying to make sure she didn’t go away—Del might need her.
How can I just sit here, she thought wildly, and leave Del alone out there? What if he hurts her, what if he kills her? She started to rise twice, stopping herself both times and easing back onto the cold floor. Her side hurt when she did that, but it wasn’t important. It was a level two injury and could be dealt with later.
Del had a gun. Del was smart and strong. She knew what to do, and Lola didn’t. If she made a mistake, if she did something that caused Del to get distracted or confused, Del could get hurt. She strained harder to hear and held her breath. She felt complete
ly helpless and weak. She felt like a child. Tears ran down her face and chilled her.
When the door burst open, she shrank back, but Del’s gentle hands pulled her up, Del’s strong arms held her, and Del’s warm face was in her hair. She heard Del’s heart beat and felt her breathe, and she began to feel safe. They were moving. Del wanted to go outside. Lola couldn’t understand why, but she didn’t really care. She inhaled Del’s clean scent and felt her warmth and solidity. She concentrated on feeling, smelling, hearing Del. And then the other police were coming, and Del pushed her away. Lola tried not to mind that.
Del waved at the young cop, and he guided Lola back inside and sat her on the couch. Del was on the phone, pacing around the living room, yelling at someone. Well, not yelling, but talking really loudly through clenched teeth. Lola shivered. Two men from the security company arrived, took one look at Del’s face, and slinked back out the front door. Lola smiled sympathetically at their retreating backs.
Del wouldn’t look at Lola. She hadn’t looked at her once since she’d pulled her outside and pushed her onto the curb. She probably blamed Lola for this whole mess. And it was my fault, Lola thought. I acted like an irresponsible nitwit and went online and got myself in trouble.
“Oh, Lolly,” Orrin whispered, “what have you done now? Can’t you do anything right? I tried to teach you, didn’t I? But you’re just not smart enough.” He sounded regretful, pitying. Lola swallowed hard. She would not cry. She didn’t have the right to cry. This whole thing was her own fault, and now everyone was upset because of her. Del must hate me, she thought. I can’t blame her.
The young officer gave her a glass of water, and she pretended to drink some of it, mostly because his anxious, unlined face and thick brown curls reminded her of the twins. Funny, she hadn’t thought of the boys in years, and they’d been on her mind a lot lately. They would be about this boy’s age, maybe. Imagine, Curty and Donny being old enough to be police officers, college graduates, maybe even married! Of course, they wouldn’t be Curty and Donny now, would they? Curtis and Donovan. Grown men, serious men with important work to do, and they wouldn’t remember her. How could they? She’d been their babysitter only until they were, what, two-and-a-half? And then she’d met Dr. Beckett, and the twins’s family had moved away, and then it had all been bad, bad, bad things until Dr. Beckett died. And now things were bad again.