by Lissa Kasey
“Kade says he’ll buy me one when we get there.”
It was all coming together now. “You can’t stay with me.”
“Stick, is more the point. Like glue, he said. You go somewhere. I go too.”
I groaned. “No. Oh, no. I’m so not taking you with me.” There was no way I was going to put Micah in danger. He was just a kid. Kade’s kid. Holy shit, my head was still wrapping around that.
“Guess we’re both staying here, then?” Micah said, folding his arms over his chest in a very Kade-like way.
“Fuck,” I swore.
His eyes widened.
I hit the lock to open the door on his side, swearing the whole time. So much for shaking someone down. I’d have to go in polite and smiling now. Dammit. Micah threw his bag in the back seat and got in. His gaze darted to the building where his mother and Kade had gone.
“You can stay,” I told him, giving him an out.
He seemed to debate that for a minute, then shook his head. “I know the town better than you. Who to avoid and all that. Police hot spots. Kade said we’ll meet back at your hotel.”
I pulled my seat belt on and tapped my fingers on the steering wheel for a minute before deciding just to go for it. I had an address, a name, a mission. One little interview couldn’t hurt even if I was dragging Kade Jr. along. I’d interviewed plenty of people in my life. It could be dangerous, but rarely so.
“Strap in, kid,” I told Micah before backing out and heading toward the guy who’d claimed Kade had tormented him.
When I pulled up in front of the house that belonged to one Tony Meoloni, Micah was clutching his seat belt. “I know teenage drag racers who drive better than you,” he said.
I glared at him.
“You do know red means stop, right? Not just slow slightly?”
“Ha ha, Kade tell you to say that?”
“Nope. Pure truth. I scored 100 percent on my driving test. Do you actually have a license?”
I got out of the car, not answering him. He followed, jogging to keep up.
“Who are we talking to?” Micah prodded after I knocked on the door.
“A guy who claims Kade beat him up.”
Micah raised a brow.
“You should know that Kade never leads with his fists. He’s not hotheaded at all.”
“But this guy says different?”
Which confused me much like the “rape” had. It was out of character for Kade. “According to Kade’s dad.” I knocked again. There was a car in the drive. My records search showed only one person registered to this address. I heard a little yippy dog barking from inside somewhere away from the door, but no sign of movement.
Since it was almost seven at night, I sort of expected the guy to be home. I pulled out my phone and dialed again. The sound of the jingle echoed through the phone and the house.
“Maybe he’s sleeping?” Micah said.
Internally, I groaned. When had going inside a house when someone didn’t answer ever been a good thing for me? Was Tony dead? Did I really want to see another body? Growling, I tried the doorknob. The door was locked. That was a surprise. Most of the time when I was supposed to meet with someone and they didn’t answer, I was met with an unlocked door and a dead body. I really hoped there wasn’t a dead body inside.
I pounded on the door again. “Mr. Meoloni?”
The dog barked and yipped again.
“Looks like he’s not home,” Micah said.
Only I didn’t believe that. I stepped off the stairs and peered through a window into the living room. The place was a mess. Like it’d been tossed. Normally I’d have called the police, but I didn’t trust the police in this town not to arrest me just for being a concerned citizen, so I made my way around the side of the house. The six-foot fence had an easy-open latch and appeared more to be a pen to keep the dog in than any security. He did have a pool, but apparently so did every other neighbor on the block, since all of their yards were fenced just as his was.
Micah hesitated to follow me. “Isn’t this trespassing?”
“Welfare check,” I muttered at him as I made my way to the patio door. “You should stay out here.”
The patio door was unlocked and slid open easily. The dog still barked somewhere. I stepped inside, careful not to touch anything more than the door handle. Of course Micah didn’t stay put. I sighed but didn’t argue with him.
“Holy crap,” Micah whispered. “What happened here?”
This wasn’t the mess of a guy too busy to clean up. This was like someone went on a rampage. Tables and chairs were flipped over, couch cushions everywhere, drawers emptied, the big-screen TV smashed. It didn’t look like a robbery. Not with the MacBook Pro lying crushed on the living room floor. It was total destruction. I couldn’t imagine being so angry with someone that I’d puncture holes in their walls and take a baseball bat to their TV, which is what it looked like had happened. Thankfully there was no blood spatter to indicate that I’d find someone dead somewhere, though I kept looking.
The house was small, not all that much bigger than Sophia’s had been. I glanced through the living room, not seeing anyone, then went room to room. Micah, true to his word, stuck right behind me, so close I could almost feel him hovering.
“Don’t touch anything. We’ll call the police in a minute.” When we found Tony. If we found him. I really didn’t want to find another body.
Tony was in the bedroom. Maybe. At first I thought it might be a woman. The short shorts and the legs I caught a glimpse of made me think woman at first. Lithe and mostly hairless, they could have been my legs if they’d been a little longer. When I rounded the bed, it was obvious it was a man, as he was wider through the shoulders than through the hips. Nothing else about him was discernible because he was covered in blood. He lay facedown, unmoving as far as I could tell.
I held a hand out to keep Micah back. There was no reason for him to see what I thought was a dead person, but he flew by me, dropped to his knees, and began checking for signs of life.
“Micah…,” I began.
But he wasn’t listening. He flipped the man over, baring a battered face caked with blood. “He’s breathing,” Micah said after a moment. He tilted his head so his ear was above the man’s swollen mouth. “I can hear fluid in his lungs. We have to call an ambulance.”
I couldn’t hear anything because the damn dog was still barking.
“Do you smell that?” Micah asked.
“I smell blood.” I stepped around the battered man to reach the door the dog was crying behind.
“I smell rotten eggs.”
I opened the door, and a tiny dog darted out. A Chihuahua who had to be half the size of Newt flew at us. I scooped him up, hoping he didn’t bite but not wanting him playing in his master’s blood or hurting the man further. Then my brain pinged on some memory, and like Micah, I smelled rotten eggs. Gas….
“Out,” I cried at Micah. “Out of the house now.”
He stared at me.
“Rotten eggs…. Natural gas…,” I said, already heading for the door with the dog in hand. If I’d been thinking instead of panicking, I might have dropped the dog to grab the injured man, but all the lights were flashing warning in my head.
Thankfully, Micah seemed to be thinking much clearer than I. He hauled the wounded man up, practically throwing him over his shoulder and carrying him toward the open patio door. It felt like forever and seconds all at once before we hit the backyard. Terror beat at me, fear of getting Micah hurt and of not being able to escape myself. I heard something behind us fall in the kitchen; likely one of us had knocked something off one of the counters.
For a few suspended seconds, I thought we were safe, that the house wouldn’t go up, but then the explosion hit so hard the ground shook. I fell into the pool, clutching the wriggling dog in my grasp, and only vaguely heard Micah’s splash.
The fire raged over my head so bright it was like the sun exploded. Then it was over. I rose to t
he top of the water, let the dog go, and watched him dog-paddle away. Micah was already at the side of the pool, dragging the hurt man out of the water and onto the side. There was an odd silence for a minute before my hearing seemed to pop and return. Then it was deafening. Sirens. Alarms. The crackling of fire. The house was gone. Leveled. The neighboring homes on each side were damaged, siding blown off, windows broken. People were beginning to exit their houses in an exodus, standing on lawns and staring with wide-eyed disbelief.
I had just pulled myself from the water when the first fire truck and a mass of police cars arrived. EMTs rushed to Micah’s side and the wounded man. I had to grab the dog again to keep him from attacking the police.
And then there were guns pointed at us. Well fuck.
Chapter Twenty-Two
WHATEVER CORRUPTION was going on at the police station had not bled over to the fire department and the group of EMTs that had arrived. The firefighters were not happy about the cops pointing loaded weapons at us in an area still filled with natural gas. I was a little light{MISSING SYMBOL}headed, but not sure if that was from the lingering gas or the explosion we’d barely escaped.
They loaded Tony into an ambulance and took off while I explained to the fire chief about the welfare check and smelling gas. And I was very vocal about them separating Micah from me. The last thing I needed was them putting him in a cop car and driving away with him to do only God knew what to him. I demanded he stay by my side, which made some of the police really growly, but the firefighters and EMTs didn’t seem bothered when they sat us down on the back of another ambulance together.
We were given towels by the second group of EMTs who looked us over, and a lot of attitude from the cops. The neighbors, one nosey one in particular from across the street, recalled with detail how we’d knocked on the door several times before going through the fence. The house had blown only minutes later.
Micah repeated the story to anyone who asked. It helped that it was the truth. We’d come to talk to a man, saw from the window that it looked like there had been a struggle, and went inside to check on him. The bluster about arresting us was stonewalled by the fire department, who were all over the house documenting the gas leak that blew the house so high it must have been running for a while.
“You’re lucky you two aren’t sick,” the fire chief told me. “Gas that heavy can down a person pretty fast.”
“We weren’t in there long. A minute, maybe two,” I said. It was a miracle my phone call hadn’t set off the explosion with us standing on the porch. The idea made me shiver.
“You’ll need a tow,” he said, his eyes flicking to my car. All the windows were blown out, and it had been half tipped by the blast, landing back on one side had popped two tires. Overall the damage wasn’t bad. But it certainly wasn’t drivable in this state.
“I just bought that car,” I grumbled. And was paying through the nose for insurance because of what Donovan had done.
The sun was setting, and I needed to get Micah back to our hotel before Kade and Sophia worried. “Do you know if Tony is going to make it?” I asked the chief.
“Sounded like he was critical on the way to the hospital, but they were working on him.”
I really hoped he lived because I had questions to ask.
“That was quick thinking, getting everyone out.” The chief looked over Micah, who oddly wasn’t shaken at all.
“I did an EMT summer camp last year,” Micah said. “Am CPR and first aid certified and everything.”
Something else I hadn’t known about him. This kid was amazing. “Kade would be so proud of you.”
Micah flushed.
“Kade?” the chief asked. “The Almantey Kade?”
“Kade Alme,” I corrected the chief. “His family has treated him like a pariah, so he’s left them behind. Kade is Micah’s dad. We’re taking Micah and Sophia up to San Francisco with us.”
The chief seemed to think that over for a minute. I wondered if he would insist we were arrested now. But he just nodded.
“Micah! Oh my God!”
“Ma’am, you can’t come in here.” A police officer was trying to keep Sophia back. Kade stood right behind her, perched on his crutches, a deep frown on his face.
“We free to go?” I asked the chief.
“As far as I’m concerned, yes.”
The thick-necked cop from earlier glared at us, but I made my way to Kade and Sophia, with Micah practically glued to my back. “I hope you got a decent-sized car,” I told Kade.
He grabbed me fiercely and kissed me like he was trying to crawl into me. By the time he let me go, we were both panting. “Don’t. Do. This. Again.” He growled at me, then swore like he never did.
“I didn’t do it on purpose.” I would never have put Micah in danger on purpose, which I suspected was why Kade had sent him with me. “Your kid’s okay too,” I whispered to him.
He cursed. “Shit, I have a kid.” He glanced back at Micah, then to me.
Sophia hugged Micah in a death grip.
“Jeez, Mom, you’re gonna bust a rib. I’m fine. Wet but fine.”
“I should never have sent him with you. I thought maybe you’d slow down a bit before just charging in.” Kade let out a long sigh. “Won’t make that mistake again.”
“I’m fine,” Micah asserted. “It wasn’t like Oliver knew the house was going to blow up, and that guy could have died.”
“It was all over the local radio station,” Kade said, not letting me go. He seemed to just be content holding me and breathing in my scent, which was probably of chlorine and maybe natural gas. “I called you but got no answer. You weren’t at the hotel, so we headed here. The radio was talking about traffic backups and the neighborhood being closed for a possible gas leak. I hoped it wasn’t….”
“I’m fine,” I said. “We’re both fine.”
He let out a long sigh. “I should never have signed off on your PI license. You’re such a trouble magnet.”
“Not my fault,” I growled at him. “How was I to know someone beat the guy and tried to blow him up?”
The thick-necked cop was back. I groaned, bracing myself for whatever he was going to hit us with next. “We’ll need you to come down to the station for questioning.”
“Micah and I already answered all your questions.” A dozen times, with firefighters and EMTs standing over us.
“Not you,” the cop said. His eyes were on Kade. “Almantey.”
“The name is Alme,” I corrected him. “And why the hell would you want to question Kade? He wasn’t even here.”
“Of course he wouldn’t be, since he rigged the house to blow after beating up poor Tony.”
“Who?” Kade asked.
“Tony Meoloni,” I supplied. “The guy I came here to talk to. He was on your dad’s list as someone you beat up all the time.”
“Who?” Kade repeated. “Tony? I don’t remember any Tony.”
I didn’t point out that his memory wasn’t all that reliable. “I have details on my tablet.” Which had gotten soaked when I landed in the pool. “Shit.” I pulled my phone out of my pocket and tablet out of my bag, then flipped on my tablet. They were both toast. “At least I back everything up frequently.”
The cop was pulling out cuffs.
I held a hand out. “No fucking way. He can’t walk without crutches. How is he going to walk cuffed? Plus he wouldn’t have had an opportunity to hurt Tony. He’s been with me all day, and the short window he wasn’t, he was at a car dealership with Sophia.”
“And a dozen other people.” Kade pulled out his phone and held up a scan of several receipts, including dinner at the diner and the car, which he’d purchased for Sophia. Apparently they’d gotten a two-year-old Sonata, which he’d paid cash outright for. He also had receipts for his flight, a bottle of water he’d gotten at the airport, and the cab to the hotel. Kade was always thorough when documenting expenses and where he was, should someone question him. And of course, now I knew
why.
He also had a receipt for checking out of the hotel I’d checked into.
The cop glared.
“If you really want to play this game, I’m going to have lawyers and media all over this town in an hour,” I said. “I have video of you singling him out at the restaurant just a few hours ago. Seriously, he had no opportunity to do this. He doesn’t even know who this guy is.”
“So you say. So he says.”
“He can’t drive,” Micah said, pointing to Kade’s crutches. “Did he somehow take a cab here and ask the driver to wait while he beat the shit out of some guy and trashed the house?”
“Micah,” Sophia scolded. “Language.”
He flushed. “Sorry, Mom. But I got an A in logic.”
“He could have had his boyfriend drive him,” the cop said, glaring at me.
Micah waved at the neighbors who were all nosing around. “Do any of them remember either a cab or Ollie’s car prior to the explosion?” He gestured to the one in particular who seemed to have our movements down to the minute. “That guy is like the neighborhood watch on steroids. Maybe you should question him as to who was here before us. Obviously it wasn’t Kade.”
I wanted to hug the kid.
Another cop, this one older with lines of age and distrust on his face, called the cop away from us. Then he waved a meaty paw at us in dismissal. They already had all my information anyway. But I wasn’t about to let the opportunity to escape pass us by. Micah retrieved his bag from my car, and I dialed for a tow on Kade’s phone as I dragged Sophia, Micah, and Kade away from the crowd until Sophia snapped out of her daze and led us to her new car. It was a shiny metallic silver, sparkling and clean. It took a minute of fidgeting and arguments to decide who was sitting where and how to get Kade’s crutches in the car. Sophia handed Micah and I towels from her packed bag, so we wouldn’t soak the seats.
“Should have gotten an SUV,” Kade grumbled when he had to resize his crutches down as far as they would go to fit. Then he insisted on sitting in back with me.
“Don’t ever make me get in a car with Ollie driving again, please,” Micah said to Kade.