Restoring Hope

by Smith, C. P.

  He knew he couldn’t just stand there and wait for the police to decide she was missing, so he pulled out his phone, and found the number to Detective King of the Reno Police Department and hit send.

  “You have reached Detective King, I am unable to take your call at this time, please leave a number and I’ll get back with you as soon as possible.”

  “King, this is Nic Beuve, call me immediately, Hope’s missing and I need you to light a fire under the New Orleans Police,” Nic growled as he headed for his door and his car. He’d search the city himself until her found her.

  As he descended his steps, a patrol car pulled in front of his condo, and he froze mid-step as an officer peeled out of his car and looked towards his building.

  Nic took the rest of the stairs two at a time and met the officer at his gate.

  “This the home of Nicholas Beuve?”

  “Yeah, I’m Nic Beuve, are you here about Hope?”

  “Sir, we found a white Jeep that seemed abandoned uptown and investigated. We found a purse in the vehicle belonging to one Jessica Cummings, and the vehicle is registered to you.”

  Feeling his world move off kilter at this news Nic responded with “I’ll kill him,” as he tried to get through the gate.

  Hearing Nic’s tone and his threat, the officer narrowed his eyes and demanded, “Kill who?” as he stopped Nic in his tracks with his hand to Nic’s arm.

  “John Cummings, Hope’s brother-in-law, she handed over evidence that will send him to prison, and he wants her dead,” Nic gritted out. How the fuck had he let this happen?

  Twice he’d been unable to save someone he loved, and he wanted to rip something to shreds.

  “Maybe we should go inside and discuss this,” the officer calmly advised as he kept a close eye on Nic.

  “I don’t have time to discuss this, I need to find her, you need to find her before he kills her,” Nic roared.

  “I can understand your concern, sir,” the officer placated as he took a step back, his hand on his service revolver, “But I’m gonna need you to calm down so we can discuss this. Now, let’s go inside your home, and I’ll make a call to the station and we’ll see what we can do.”

  The officer’s tone was grating on Nic. He didn’t have time for this shit, and he ignored the request.

  “Call Detective King with the Reno Police Department, he’ll tell you all you need to know. I’m heading out to look for her.”

  “I’m afraid I can’t let you leave until I have all the facts, sir.”

  “I don’t have time for this shit. You want to help, take me to her Jeep so I can see it for myself.”

  “Is Mrs. Cummings your girlfriend?”

  “No, she’s my future wife,” Nic bit out knowing right then he would marry her as soon as he could. “Now take me to her fucking car,” Nic repeated and watched the officer read him, decided he wasn’t a threat at that moment and then removed his hand from his weapon and stepped back. Nic moved through the gate, and when he moved towards his car, the officer said, “I’ll drive you; I can get more information from you and move the investigation along.”

  Nic nodded and moved to the passenger door as the officer unlocked the doors and they both climbed in. When they arrived at an office building in uptown New Orleans, he saw Hope’s Jeep and his gut tightened as they pulled beside it. When he got out, the officer ordered him not to touch anything in case of foul play, and the look Nic gave him told the officer he knew it was.

  Inside were her purse, her keys and her cell phone, as if she’d tossed them in before entering the vehicle, but didn’t make it. Nic looked up at the officer and caught him watching Nic’s reaction. Statistics showed that when foul play was involved, it’s usually the significant other who perpetrates the crime. He didn’t have time for the police to suspect him he needed them focusing on Cummings.

  “I’m not responsible; you need to call Detective King.”

  “I’ve given the information to the detectives in charge and they are trying to track him down as we speak.”

  Nic looked away praying to God that they were looking for King, and not just sitting around waiting for Nic to trip up, thinking they already had their man. He looked around the parking lot and building wondered why she was here in the first damn place, he’d told her to stay at home until it was time for work, so what was so damn important she left the safety of the condo?

  “What businesses are inside the building?”

  “Doctors, lawyers, a few small businesses.”

  “Do they have security cameras?”

  “Yeah, and we asked them to review it for anything suspicious and they found nothing.”

  Nic’s raised his brows, finding it hard to believe they had nothing on the tape. “You’re telling me a woman disappears from the parking lot and the camera’s caught nothing?”

  “That the security could see.”

  “Then let me look, I know what I’m looking for.”

  “Can’t, they volunteered to look, we need a court order to view the tapes and until we can determine foul play is involved, we can’t get one.”

  Nic turned, leveled his anger on the police officer and ground out, “She didn’t show for work, her purse and phone are in the car how much more do you need to prove she’s missing?”

  The officer didn’t answer him, and the words they need a body entered his head. It would have dropped him to his knees if it hadn’t angered him so fucking much.

  Drilling his eyes into the officer, he dared him to say it. Fortunately, for him, the officer was smart enough to look away from Nic, but not quick enough. He was done with this shit, he needed them to look for Cummings and he needed it now, so he pulled out his phone, searched his contacts for Judge Thompson, a sitting judge he’d done a renovation for and hit send.

  “Fred, Nic Beuve. I need a favor . . .”

  Two hours later, security footage in the hands of New Orleans detectives, Nic entered the police department, and he, Detective Stevens, and Burns sat down at a computer and pulled up the security video from the parking garage. It showed Hope leaving the building, but as she got further into the parking lot, she disappeared from view. Whatever had happened to her had taken place out of view of the cameras, and it took everything he had not to throw that fucking computer across the room. By his estimation, she’s been missing four hours now. The time stamp on the video said 3:30 and it was now 7:30. Nic sat there and stared at the screen. He didn’t have a fucking clue what to do next but search for her. He hit replay on the video and instead of watching the surroundings, he watched Hope. She was smiling, happy, and it occurred to him this could be the last time he’d ever see her. Dieu, on a fuckin’ thirteen-inch screen with her blonde hair blowing in the wind, as she made her way to that bright white Jeep she loved and gave girlie name. Nic felt his lip twitch when he thought about her naming the car snowflake. He’d asked her once why she’d wanted white and not a sleek color like black. Her answer, “Because it reminds me of innocence or purity.” He didn’t get it then, but watching her now, he got it. She’d been through so much shit in her life she wanted to be surrounded by innocence, by purity to help restore her own—to restore Hope.

  Nic wanted this last image of her, he opened the disk drive and pulled out the CD, handed it to the detectives, and asked, “Can I have a copy of this?” Both detectives looked at him, then Burns, breaking the rules, made a copy of the security footage and handed it to Nic.

  Nic searched the streets, looking in every dark corner as he headed back to the condo to check one more time for clues and any messages on his answering machine. When he arrived, he found Rose and Big Daddy waiting out front, and he said nothing to them as they all made their way up his stairs and into his condo. Nic just shook his head when Rose opened her mouth to ask if the tape showed anything. He walked over to his laptop, dropped the cd in and walked away to change clothes as they viewed the footage.

  His phone rang as he was changing clothes, and he grabbed it qui
ckly. The screen said “Detective King” and he answered it on a barked “Took you fuckin’ long enough.”

  “Nic, I got your message to call but I was tied up. If Hope’s missing it’s not John Cummings, as of five o’clock Nevada time, John Cummings was behind bars.”

  “Say that again?” Nic replied confused.

  “We took him into custody at five our time; he was caught trying to cross the border into Mexico this morning. I just got back with him an hour ago.”

  Nic hung up on the detective without saying goodbye and ran into the living where his computer was and moved Rose aside. Something on the tape had caught his eye when they’d watched it and tugged at his memory. He found the part where Hope had moved out of the line of sight, and then watched as the corner of a black car drove past, the right bumper smashed in. Nic ran to his desk, dug through paperwork he had and found the insurance report for damages to one of his vehicles. Katherine Beuve’s Mercedes had damage to the right front bumper.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Time stands still when you think you’re going to die and one of the side effects of this; the ability to pull events from the past as clearly as if they occurred the day before. Hope remembered watching football with her father, making brownies with her mother, even fighting over toys with her brother. They were all pushed to the surface as Hope watched Kat pace. Had she known when she got up that morning today might be the last day of her life, she would’ve kissed Nic a little sweeter, told Rose that she loved her, maybe even stopped at that French bakery and had a beignet. She’d finally had the life she’d always dreamed of, but as she watched Kat mumbling as she paced in front of her, Hope had a bad feeling all that was going the change.

  When she’d tried to enter her Jeep, Kat had pulled in beside her and confronted her. She’d blamed her for tearing her family apart and wanted her to leave town. Hope had laughed of course, not reading the look in Kat’s eyes. If she’d paid closer attention, she would’ve seen the woman was on the edge. When Hope laughed, Kat had lost it, and produced a gun from her pocket then jammed it into her ribs instructing Hope to get into Kat’s car. She’d complied, afraid to fight her, and after several hours of circling the city, while Kat blamed her for everything from the breakup of her marriage to her daughter’s overdose she’d driven home. Kat said she was hungry and needed somewhere she could think, to plan what to do with Hope. With the gun pointed at Hope’s head until they exited the car, she reminded Hope she was raised in Georgia and running would be pointless—ladies of the south had deadly aim don’t ya know.

  With her fingers curled tightly around the wooden arms of Kat’s dining room chair, she wondered what Nic was doing. She figured he’d be frantic by now assuming that John Cummings had rolled into town and taken her. She imagined he had the police searching, unfortunately for her; they were searching for the wrong person. She closed her eyes and thought back to that morning. Nic was in his suit as she’d stood at the kitchen counter making coffee for them both. She’d remembered she needed to go to the doctor to get her birth control shot and had made a quick call for an appointment before work. She’d never gotten the chance to tell Nic about her appointment, she’d been too preoccupied with his mouth. When he’d walked into the kitchen and seen her in a short nightgown, he’d walked up behind her, pressed her into the counter as he pulled the strap off her shoulder. Then he’d buried his head in her neck as his hand came up and wrapped around her breast. It had taken her less time to get his clothes off than it had taken him to put them on, and the memory was so sweet to her now.

  He’d given her so much, much more than he even knew, and she prayed she’d live to tell him. He was her white knight, like the men she read about in romance novels. She never thought they existed, was sure they were figments of some writer’s imagination until he’d swooped in and forced himself into her heart, into her very soul. Now she was at the mercy of his ex-wife, and if she weren’t so fucking scared she would have laughed at the irony—she was in her own romance novel gone wrong.

  Hope was hungry, tired, and thirsty, and she wasn’t about to ask for a thing. She kept her eyes on the gun, her tongue in her mouth, and prayed to God she could figure out what to say to this woman. Kat turned to her suddenly and looked her from top to bottom, a sneer playing across her lips.

  “Whore,” she hissed and Hope bit her lips in anger. Scared or not, Hope still had a temper even after all those years of being slapped around, and she had a tiny scar on her bottom lip to prove she could be flippant. So, she bit her lips harder to keep from lashing out.

  Kat looked around searching for something until she spotted her purse. She moved to it and brought it to the table, laying down her gun and pulling out her checkbook and uncapping her Visconti pen.

  “Name your price,” Kat asked Hope, her words clipped.

  “What?” Hope asked.

  “You’re nothing but a money grubbing two-bit slut. Name your price and I’ll write a check,” Kat explained but she looked on edge, desperate for a solution to her problem.

  “You want to pay me to leave?”

  “You’re only after Nic’s money,” she shouted like the crazy woman she was. Hope jumped at her anger and visible hatred for her, and looked towards the gun she’d laid on the table. Hope started to lift her hand to grab it, but Kat dropped her checkbook and pen when she saw the movement and snatched the gun up, rage morphing her face into something terrifying.

  “Don’t move,” Kat bit out aiming the gun at Hope’s head, holding Hope’s eyes in place as her heart pounded out of her chest. Then, as if she’d forgotten something, Kat moved away from Hope, her attempted bribery forgotten, her mental state sinking further into madness as she paced again.

  Usually the poster child for the sophisticated woman, Kat looked like she hadn’t bathed in days. Her hair was a tangled mess its shine gone and her clothes looked like she’d slept in them. Hope wouldn’t have recognized her if they’d passed on the street, and coupled with her behavior, it terrified her. She’d never seen someone have a nervous breakdown, but she was pretty sure she was watching one unfold before her eyes. The once beautiful woman, full of attitude and her own self-importance had disappeared. What Hope was now faced with was an on the brink, out of control, sociopath. Kat didn’t care that she was hurting anyone she only cared about her own needs. Unfortunately, it was clear the consequences of her past actions and losing her daughter had her on the threshold of murder.

  Hope sat glued to her chair, her eyes following Kat as she became further lost in her own world. She kept talking to herself, trying to work through what she needed to do with Hope.

  “I’m not gonna lose my family to a whore, she needs to go away, how do I make her go away?” Stopping for a moment, as if an idea popped into her head, she whispered, “Maybe I should call momma.”

  She was so busy trying to figure out how to get rid of Hope; she hadn’t paid attention when Nic’s Mercedes pulled into the driveway. Hope was so busy keeping an eye on the gun that she didn’t see Nic walk up the steps, cross the porch and open the door. Kat and Hope both jumped when the door flew open and Nic roared, “Have you lost your fuckin’ mind.”

  Kat was so startled when he entered, her finger already on the trigger, she squeezed it when she jumped. Hope screamed as smoke floated from the barrel of the gun and blood sprayed from Nic’s chest as he flew backwards against the wall and slid down to the floor.

  Like the often-dreamt nightmare when you’re running down a hallway, but never reaching the end, Hope ran to Nic as a scream so shrill broke from her throat that a dog howled next door. Dropping to her knees, choking on her words, afraid to touch him afraid not to touch him, she threw herself on him screaming “Nic, oh, my God, Nic.”

  The pressure in Nic’s chest felt like a vice grip had him in its hold, and he couldn’t catch his breath. He could sense Hope; feel her hands touching him, her tears falling on his face as she kept shouting his name. He wanted to touch her, tell her he loved her,
wanted to marry her, but a light in the distance kept drawing his attention away from her.

  “Nic don’t you close your eyes, do you hear me? The ambulance is one the way . . . NIC!” he heard her shout, and he tried to focus on her voice, but that damn light kept getting brighter. He opened his eyes and looked at Hope, tried to smile one last time at her, as he heard sirens coming closer, and Kat screaming, “What have I done.”

  There was movement to his right, and he heard that damn Cajun accent he’d grown to love over the past seventeen years break into a caterwaul. “My boy, what have you done to my boy? Oh, sweet Jesus, don’t take my boy.”

  He tried to lift his hand, but it wouldn’t move. He blinked, as the light grew brighter still and then heard the sweet voice of his ‘tite ange. “Papa,” Chelsea spoke softly as she reached out her hand. Nic smiled when he saw his daughter’s sweet face and finally lifted his hand to reach out to her.

  Hope clung to Nic, kissing his face as Big Daddy applied pressure to the gaping wound in his chest. Rose tried to pull her off him, but she wasn’t moving from his side. It was bad, she knew it was, and she was determined to fight his leaving this world.

  Rose, her hands twisting repeatedly in panic, trying to make sense of how this happened, looked towards Kat. Her eyes were dead, lifeless, as she kept mumbling over and over “What have I done.” Rose wailed at her “You notin’ but evil, should be you lyin’ on da’ floor not my boy.” Turning back to Nic and Hope her breath caught when she saw Nic smiling over Hope’s shoulder and whispering “Mon ‘tite fille.” Rose whispered “No,” and then made the sign of the cross, knew they were losing him if his Chelsea was here to welcome him home. The need to fight for him was strong, so she kneeled down beside him as the paramedics came rushing up the steps and told Nic “You not done in dis’ world, you need to fight to stay here wit’ Hope, wit’ Nicky we cannot lose you, you hear me?”