He was twenty-six, but he felt older. Miles, too many miles and they were hard. After he got back from Iraq, he tried a round robin of vices to kill his pain: Drinking, smoking, and he couldn’t remember the last vegetable he ate. Too little sleep and too much work…it wasn’t a shock that he looked rough. Gina dug that type of guy. She said it made him look dangerous.
Jack frowned. Well, she might come back…no bags.
She’d stormed out several times before over the last few months, but each time she’d returned. When she had, she was wild. His smile broadened into a full grin as he thought about how they’d trashed the bedroom the last time.
He opened the fridge and his smile disappeared, along with any hope for food. The only things on the top two shelves were dried spots where something long ago had spilled and an empty bottle of spiced rum. He figured there would be leftovers or something, but there were only a couple of open cans and some condiments. Gina wasn’t much for keeping a well-stocked kitchen, and he wasn’t much for keeping the rum bottle full.
Now he was hungry, tired, and it was the middle of the night. He debated going out to pick something up when he saw the front door was open. It wasn’t the first time it had rebounded from Gina slamming it. “Stupid lock.” No way was Jack going to ask the landlady to get it fixed again. She was mad enough the last time it got broken.
Jack trudged over to the door. It may have been due to the frequent slamming, but now you had to jiggle the handle for the front door to latch. He fiddled with the knob and pushed at the latch until it popped back out. He yawned, shut the door, turned around, and then—shrieked.
“You squeal like a baby.” She laughed.
Jack’s mouth fell open. He’d seen a lot in his life and thought he was beyond instant shock, but all of his training went out the window as he gawked at the pretty, woman who stood in his living room wearing nothing but a towel.
She moved closer. “You got nothing to eat and—”
“What the hell?” Jack grabbed the unknown woman by the arm, pushed her out the front door into the hallway and slammed the door behind her.
BANG! BANG! The walls shook. BANG!
Dammit! She must be slamming her whole body against the door.
Jack panicked when he thought about what would happen if someone found a young half-naked woman outside his apartment. When he yanked the door open, she charged headlong into the living room. She tripped and sprawled out across the floor.
Crap!
He heard loud stomping feet come down the hallway.
Oh no…just what I need.
He peeked out the door and saw his extraordinarily large landlady storm down the corridor. Dressed in her flannel nightgown, her face flushed bright red. He ducked back inside and locked the door. A few seconds later, the thuds came to an audible stop just outside.
KNOCK! KNOCK! KNOCK!
The young woman scrambled to her feet and wrapped the towel around herself. “You suck,” she growled as she shoved both hands into his chest.
Caught off guard, Jack staggered back from the blow and crashed into the wall.
“Mr. Stratton, what is going on in there?” Mrs. Stevens continued to beat on the door. “Was that a girl in the hallway?”
“What’s your problem?” the young woman demanded.
Jack was at a loss for words.
She shot an angry glare at him while his landlady huffed and puffed just outside the door.
“That’s it, Mr. Stratton. That is it! You’ll be evicted this time.” Mrs. Stevens stomped back down the hallway.
Jack tried to keep his eyes on her face as he held his hand sideways in an attempt to block his view of everything else. Her shoulder-length dark brown hair was dripping wet, but it was her piercing eyes that grabbed his full attention: emerald green with flecks of gold.
Jack blinked and focused. “Who are you and why are you in my apartment?”
She adjusted the towel. “You don’t remember me? I’m Chandler’s sister.” She stood defiant before him.
Jack laughed. “Michelle is his sister.”
“So am I.” Her hands tightened into fists.
Jack opened and then closed his mouth. There was a girl at the foster home…after Jack had been adopted, he did remember a girl who’d worn her hair in a ponytail on top of her head and was always following Chandler and him around whenever he came back for a visit. He’d moved out a few years before Aunt Haddie took the girl in. She must have been ten or eleven. That would make her at least nineteen now.
“Replacement?” He said her nickname out loud as he tried to reconcile his memories of her then with the young woman who stood before him now.
She looked at him with an expression that said, “Yes, stupid.”
He could hear his best friend Chandler say: “Leave it to my Aunt Haddie. We’re the only poor black family that goes and adopts a white kid.”
His pleasant recollection of his friend faded when his memories changed. Chandler’s dead. Died in Iraq.
Jack turned away.
Replacement stood there and glared at him.
Jack sighed. “Sorry. I forgot your name.”
“Sure. Jerk,” she spat.
Her tone forced him to turn around. A pair of blazing eyes ripped into him.
Jack shook his head. “Wait a minute. Why are you here—”
“Hold on.” She turned and went into the bedroom. “I need to get dressed.” She slammed the door.
Jack’s eyes narrowed. Now he had a headache.
Chandler had been his best friend since elementary school, but he could barely remember Replacement. Chandler and he were about to graduate from high school when Aunt Haddie brought her home from church one day. Jack couldn’t recollect the whole story of why Chandler suggested the name or why Replacement preferred to be called that. It had something to do with her wanting to forget her abused past but Jack couldn’t recall why. All he remembered was she loved it so much, the nickname stuck.
Jack was seventeen and in high school, but whenever he visited Aunt Haddie’s, the girl followed him around like a lovesick puppy. He had lived with them for several years, so he always viewed Chandler and Michelle like a real brother and sister, but with Replacement it was different. To Jack, she was just one of the many other foster kids who came and went through the house after him.
He wondered why she was here or whether there was something wrong with Aunt Haddie. Haddie Williams had been Jack’s foster mother for four years before he was adopted. He could never forget the big black woman’s bright smile and sparkling eyes. She wasn’t his or anybody’s real aunt, but everybody called her that. She’d taken Jack in and loved him when he needed it most.
Jack walked to the bedroom door. Right before he was about to knock, it opened.
Replacement put her hands on her hips. She wore a green and white dress that looked familiar. It was too long for her petite, five-foot-four frame. She still looked peeved but at least she was decent.
Jack tried not to make a face. “Why are you here?”
“Aunt Haddie sent me. She needs your help.”
Guilt washed over him.
Jack knew he should have gone to see her. He’d been back in the area for over six months now, but he hesitated. His memories of Chandler were still too raw.
“Aunt Haddie was your foster mother. She took care of you,” Replacement continued, “and she said that you’d help.” She stuck her chin out.
Jack held his hands up. “I’ll try. What’s she need help with, kid?”
Her knee bounced and her eyes searched the room behind him as if she was trying to figure out how to deliver the news. “Michelle is gone. She’s missing.”
The words were like a kick in the gut. Michelle was Jack’s foster sister and friend. Chandler and Michelle, who were biological brother and sister, were at Aunt Haddie’s when he had arrived. The three of them had quickly become inseparable, like the Three Musketeers. They treated him like a brother. Even after Jack ha
d been adopted and he moved to his new parents’ house, they’d stayed close.
He’d always felt guilty that he’d been adopted, but they never had been. Part of that was because they were brother and sister, and they refused to let anyone separate them. It was hard enough to place one older kid, but to place two kids into one home was nearly impossible.
He also knew that part of it was because they were black, and he was white. Jack hated that fact, but he could see it in the eyes of many of the couples who came by to adopt. Some beat around the bush, but you could tell they really wanted a little white kid.
Jack’s back stiffened. “Gone? What do you mean, gone?”
He took a step closer to her. The hair on the back of his neck rose and his chest tightened.
“We haven’t heard from her in over two weeks. She got accepted at White Rocks Eastern College, and then—I tried going up there, but when we went to the police—”
She was like an engine that revved too high and then sputtered out. Her eyes welled up with tears.
Jack’s heart pounded. He forced himself to breathe. “Wait a second.” He held up a hand as if he were directing traffic. “Michelle has to be…what, twenty-four? Why was she going to White Rocks Eastern College?”
“She always wanted to go to college, but she couldn’t afford it. She got a work scholarship. It was her first year. She didn’t come home and—”
“Calm down. What day was she supposed to come home?” Jack coaxed.
“Four days before Christmas.”
“Okay. When you went to the police, what did they tell you?”
“They investigated it and said she transferred to Western Tech out in California and just left. She wouldn’t do that. She wouldn’t just—go.” She threw her hands up. “She just started and had a full scholarship. Why would she leave?”
“Did she ever talk to you about transferring?”
Replacement stamped her foot. “She didn’t. After Chandler died, do you think she’d just take off to the other side of the country without telling anyone? Do you think she could do that to Aunt Haddie? Do you honestly think Michelle would just leave and not tell her?” Her voice trembled.
Michelle was just like Chandler and to them, family was everything. There had to be another reason. “Why do you think I can help?” Jack walked toward the kitchen.
“Who says I do?” She raised her head; her eyes blazed once more. “Aunt Haddie does. She says you’re a cop. She still thinks of you as family. You were Chandler’s best friend, for whatever that’s worth.”
He let that slight go; he knew he deserved it. “Who’s handling the case?”
Jack was a third-year deputy. He’d transferred to Darrington a little over six months ago. Cops with a few years under their belt didn’t get missing person cases; they were the gophers for the detectives who did.
“Aunt Haddie filed a missing persons report in the Fairfield County’s sheriff’s office. They said they asked someone over here to look into her last known address. They said his name’s Gaven…Daven…”
“Davenport,” Jack said.
Joe Davenport was an older detective in Darrington. He had a few years to go until he retired. Jack thought he was coasting to the finish line. Joe wasn’t a bad guy, but he was far more interested in fishing than police work.
Still, it was a missing person case involving the college. He must have given it a solid going-over.
“If Joe—”
“I knew it. I knew it. You don’t care!” She pushed him again. “You don’t give a flying—”
“Shut up. Just shut up for a minute.” Now it was Jack’s turn to be irate. He towered over her when he stood upright. He put his face right down in hers. “Now, you listen.”
“Listen to what?”
He leaned in. Normally women didn’t tick Jack off, even when they were screeching at him, but this one did.
“Well, what?”
Jack couldn’t believe it when she stuck her head forward closer to his. Her lips quivered, not out of fear, but with fury. They stared at each other, nose to nose, like two prizefighters waiting for the bell.
He closed his eyes for a second, but he could still feel her glaring at him. “I need to think. It’s two in the morning, the college is closed, and I just got home. I’m taking a shower.” He turned and walked to the bedroom. “We’ll talk when I’m out.”
Although Jack wanted to, he forced himself not to slam the door.
CHAPTER THREE
Drama Queen
Jack stood under the shower, lost in the water. The giant hot water tank was the best thing about the apartment, and it was included in the rent. After it started to run ice-cold, he shut the water off and got out. Steam filled the small bathroom and created a mini sauna. He loved to take long, hot showers and then linger in the mist.
“You suck.” Gina and Replacement’s words rang in his ears. Twice in short order, two girls had told him that. Problem was—they were right. Jack didn’t know what he was doing.
He vainly stared into the fogged mirror, but nothing stared back. Maybe that was his reflection. Misty. Shifting. Empty.
He ran his fingers through his hair and grabbed a pair of shorts and a shirt from the hamper. He hated putting on dirty clothes, but he’d only worn them around the house yesterday, and it beat going around in a towel with a girl in the living room.
He worried about Michelle. Jack knew she wasn’t the type to run off. She’d never leave Aunt Haddie. She loved her foster mother dearly. He hoped she just went out to California to check it out. She could have a boyfriend and took some time between classes. She’d be twenty-four now.
What if something had happened?
Jack hated pain and misery. He’d already had a lifetime of it, way more than his fair share. Thinking that someone else, especially Michelle, might be in danger right now tore him up inside.
Think about something else…anything else.
Mrs. Stevens was furious. She threatened to have him evicted, again. Not good. Jack would have to get an “I’m sorry” card, a box of chocolates, and a chocolate cake this time. It had been a couple of months since his last appeasement present. Jack found food worked best. The time Gina threw the phone through the window, it cost him a hundred bucks for the window, thirty for the phone, and two all-you-can-eat buffet gift cards.
For a naked chick in the hallway, I’d better get her a gigantic cake.
He shook his head.
What about Gina? She’ll show up tomorrow and get all her stuff. After that…gone. Too many fights. Their relationship sucked anyway. They had nothing in common. And it wasn’t as if Jack hadn’t tried, but it was a little hard to make a relationship work if the other person was in love with herself. Jack wondered why he didn’t kick her out and send her packing.
I never can—not with her, not with any of them. They all leave—but I never do.
He lingered at the bedroom door, not wanting to go back into the living room. He didn’t want to fight anymore.
Jack exhaled and then opened the bedroom door. Replacement rushed toward him. She must have been pacing outside the door.
The second he stepped out, she was right back in his face. “What the heck were you doing in there?” The forty minutes he spent chilling out in the shower didn’t seem to have calmed her down at all. If anything, it had the opposite effect. Her whole body vibrated. “I have to let Aunt Haddie know. Are you going to help or not?”
Jack hesitated.
“I knew it! I told her you didn’t care. If you had cared about us, you’d have come back already.” She moved forward until he could feel her breath on his face. “I saw the letters with those worthless excuses—after Iraq, you had to go straight on to college. You couldn’t come for a visit? Not one holiday or summer? Yeah, right.” She stood with her hands balled into fists. “You’ve probably never even paid your respects at Chandler’s grave. And then to find out you moved an hour away months ago, and you still haven’t visited or
even called. That’s low. Really low.”
Jack would never hit a woman, but he found himself struggling to avoid making an exception. He controlled his right hand as it twitched at his side, but he couldn’t control the snarl. “Kid, I’m going to help you look for Michelle, but if you say another word about Aunt Haddie or Chandler—”
Jack was cut off when the front door swung wide open. Gina sashayed in, carrying a bag and a drink from the local convenience store. She looked at Replacement and her eyes went wide. She dropped the bag and cup. Soda flew everywhere.
Her glare moved from face to face. “She’s still here?”
Jack cocked an eyebrow.
Gina’s disdain turned to outrage. “You…you,” she stammered at Replacement. Gina took three long strides toward her.
Jack sighed. This was gonna be good.
“You little slut. That’s my dress!” Gina’s bright red fingernail shook with anger as she jabbed Replacement in the midriff.
Jack took another look at the outfit Replacement wore. He leaned back and realized why the green and white dress had looked familiar. Gina raised her hand back, poised to slap, but Replacement swung fast and hard. Jack scooped Replacement aside and into his arms just in time. The punch swished by Gina’s face. Even though the blow didn’t connect, Gina squealed and grabbed her cheek as if it had. She shrieked and staggered backward. Jack knew just the thought of something happening to Gina’s face was enough to terrify her. “How dare you!”
Jack shook his head. Gina was a drama queen. He almost called 911 one day before he realized she’d only broken a nail. If something actually had happened to her face, she’d have needed CPR. Jack chuckled.
Gina turned her anger toward Jack. “That’s it. Over,” Gina declared. “I mean it. I knew it when I gave you a ride home from that crappy bar.” Her red lips twisted into a sneer. “You’re pathetic. Oh, poor baby. You’re so sad. Poor Jack. He has mommy issues…”
Jack had enough. She was trying to hit below the belt. She’d called him every name in the book before, but he still couldn’t stand when love or lust turned to hate and disgust. Gina had just turned that corner. She now looked at him with loathing. He could see she wanted to slice him to ribbons with her words, but he wasn’t the type to just sit there and take it.
GIRL JACKED (Crime and Punishment Mystery Thriller Series) Page 2