As Travis clicked on each link he saw the nerd posing in pictures with his fraternity brothers and members of the city council, and there was even a picture of him with the governor of North Carolina. It looked as if Mr. Hobbs was a very popular person who was not only in the know but many people knew him also.
He clicked on each site and found Darrin mentioned in a favorable light. Other than the misdemeanor assault for which Darrin didn’t do any time, Travis couldn’t find anything else negative about the man. He looked virtually squeaky clean. Of course a lot of people looked squeaky clean until they got caught, especially the white-collar ones. And from the looks of it, Darrin was about as white-collar as they came.
Travis printed out some of the articles he found about Darrin with the various affiliations the man had. He seemed to have it all: connections, a home in a gated community, and his own business. But in all the pictures and stories Travis had reviewed about the man, there seemed to be one thing missing—a family.
It looked to Travis as if this was something that Darrin was currently working on. Beryl and the boys were a ready-made family. All Darrin had to do was slip the wedding ring on Beryl’s finger, say, “I do,” and sign the papers.
Then Travis wondered what Darrin’s plans were for after they consummated their marriage. People normally showed their best selves during the dating stage, and their true selves after the honeymoon was over. Darrin was already showing that he was overly controlling and acted as if he couldn’t trust Beryl. In Travis’s mind it would only get worse.
He felt a tap on his shoulder. “Sir, your time is up for the computer.”
He looked at the clock on the computer. Time had flown by. It was already noon. As if his stomach were connected to the clock on the computer, he all of a sudden felt hungry.
“Okay, sorry about that,” Travis said to the librarian.
He went to the printer, paid for all of his copies, and placed them in his book bag. Then he drove to the park and sat at a picnic table to eat his lunch while he went back over the information he’d gathered on the Internet.
“What to do now?” Travis said to himself. He checked his phone again, but there weren’t any missed calls or messages from Beryl. Throwing caution to the wind, he went ahead and dialed her cell phone number. After it rang four times he heard the voice mail message with Beryl’s voice saying to please leave a message.
He left a quick message about setting up a time to see the boys. The whole time he spoke he tried his best to disguise the concern in his voice. He left the superficial message, while wanting to yell a different message to her voice mail. He wanted to tell her that something wasn’t right about Darrin and that she needed to leave and just cut her losses.
After finishing his sandwich, Travis got an idea. Now that he had Darrin’s home address and now that he had his own car, he could go over there. He wouldn’t actually go to the door, but he could do a drive by and check it out.
With newfound energy, he threw the napkin and sandwich bag from the sandwich he had eaten into the trash can, and headed to his car. When he got into his car, he only had one problem. He had no idea how to get to Darrin’s house. He didn’t have a GPS, nor did he have his trusty city map.
“Think, Travis, think,” he said to himself.
There were three options. He could buy another city map, he could go home and get his own city map, or he could go to the local library and print off directions straight from the library to the house. He opted for printing off the directions at the library. Already he was doing enough guesswork trying to figure out how to help Beryl and he didn’t want to contend with the hassle of trying to drive and look at streets on a city map the whole time.
According to the directions Travis printed out, Darrin’s house was somewhere in the subdivision he had just entered. He marveled at the homes he was passing. They were like mini-mansions. Each home had nice sprawling lawns, and some had three- and four-car garages.
He picked up the paper he’d printed out with the directions from his passenger seat. The directions said for him to turn left on Greenleaf and then to turn right on Chamberlain Drive. He followed the directions and looked to the left for the odd-numbered homes.
As he drove down the street he whispered to himself, “One fifty-five, one fifty-seven ... Okay, here we are, one fifty-nine Chamberlain Drive. Bingo.” He didn’t stop in front of the house. Instead he drove a little bit farther down the street, then turned around in one of the other driveways. A couple of houses down from Darrin’s there was a home for sale. Travis pulled into the driveway all the way up to the garage and turned his car off. He didn’t want to be too close to the house for fear that either Beryl or Darrin might see him.
He wished there were a way to see or know what was or wasn’t going on inside the house. Questions popped into his head. Was Beryl even home? It was hard to tell since people in this neighborhood actually used their garages for their cars and not as a storage area.
Beryl was still unemployed so there was a chance she was inside but she might also be out running errands. He guessed that Darrin, who had so many hats to wear, was probably in his office or making a business deal somewhere. He wondered how long he should sit there.
His cell phone rang. And as soon as he saw the caller ID he was disappointed.
“Hello,” Travis said.
“Hey, nephew,” Travis’s Uncle Billy said.
“Well hello, stranger,” Travis said. He didn’t have an ounce of sarcasm in his voice.
“I know I’ve been off the radar for a while. Sorry about that,” Billy said.
“No problem.”
“Hey, man. I need to ask you something.”
“Yes, what’s up?” Travis asked.
“I need for you to be my best man at my wedding.”
“You two set a date?”
“Yeah, New Year’s Eve.”
Travis could hear the joy and excitement in his uncle’s voice.
“New Year’s Eve? Why New Year’s Eve? That’s like in two months.”
“Because we wanted to start the New Year off right.”
“Okay,” Travis said. He closed his eyes. The lack of sleep from the night before and the dip in adrenaline was finally starting to catch up with him.
“So can you do it?” Billy asked.
“Of course I can do it. I am there for you, always,” Travis said. He was honored that his uncle wanted him to be his best man.
“Great. I’ll let Ashley know.”
Travis laid his head back on the headrest. “Just let me know what I need to do and where I need to be.”
“I knew I could count on you,” Billy said.
“Hey, let me call you back a little later. I am in the middle of something right now,” Travis said.
“Oh, okay. Hit me back later,” Billy said.
“Will do.” He hung up the phone and opened his eyes. When he looked back down toward Darrin’s house, he saw movement. The garage door was closing. He wondered if he had just missed either Beryl or Darrin pulling in to it. But when he looked both ways down the street he saw Darrin’s black Lexus with the unmistakable EXCEL license plate. Darrin was leaving the house.
Travis cranked his car back up and pulled out of the driveway of the home that was for sale. He figured if anyone had seen him, then maybe they would think he had actually been there to see the house.
He drove slowly down the street in the same direction Darrin had gone in. “So where are we going this fine afternoon?” Travis spoke to himself, wondering out loud.
Darrin drove through the streets of the subdivision until he hit one of the main streets where he picked up speed. Travis did the same, picking up speed to try not to lose him. When he got three car lengths away from Darrin he slowed down a bit, keeping a couple of cars in front of him.
Travis honestly didn’t think that Darrin would notice him in his early-model, nondescript Honda Accord, but he was going to be careful just the same. When a light turned red, D
arrin stopped and so did Travis. At that point there was one car separating Travis’s from Darrin’s. Travis could see Darrin through the car in front of him and it looked as if the man was on his cell phone. It made Travis wonder if he was calling Beryl to check up on her.
Darrin pulled to the side of a street and parked and Travis did the same. When Travis looked around he saw an elementary school with cars were lined up in front of it. He read the sign in front of the school that said TRINITY PARK ELEMENTARY. He remembered that Cameron went to Trinity Park Elementary. In the line of parked cars waiting for school to be dismissed, Travis saw Beryl’s car.
He wondered why Darrin was at Cameron’s school. It looked obvious that Beryl was there to pick Cameron up, so there was no reason for Darrin to pick him up. So he looked back and forth from Darrin’s car to Beryl’s car. At one point he saw Darrin pick up his cell phone to make a call. Then through Beryl’s transparent windows he saw Beryl answer a call.
After a minute or so, Beryl hung up the phone and Darrin also hung his up almost simultaneously. Maybe they are supposed to be meeting or something, Travis thought. But his intuition told him differently. So as Darrin sat and watched Beryl, Travis sat and watched Darrin.
The bell for school rang and the cars started their succession of pulling up to the school to pick up children. Travis got a brief look at his little boy as he ran to the passenger side of the car and got in. Beryl pulled off and headed out of the school’s parking lot.
Darrin cranked his car up and followed Beryl. Travis cranked his car back up and followed Darrin. While Darrin made it a point to stay at least one car length behind Beryl, Travis did the same, keeping his eye on Darrin. He was starting to get the feeling that there wasn’t any need to worry about trying to follow Beryl himself, because Darrin was already doing that. If he kept up with Darrin’s distinctive Lexus, then Beryl wouldn’t be too far ahead.
The fact that Darrin hadn’t gotten out of his car or blown and waved to Beryl to let her know that he was waiting near the school made Travis think that Beryl had no idea he was following her. That coupled with the fact that Darrin was tailing her and making it a point to stay out of sight.
Within a few minutes, Darrin again pulled over on a side street and parked. This time Travis saw Beryl pulled up to a daycare center. The colorful sign in front of the building with pictures of cartoon-drawn children said TENDER LOVING CARE. It was Jayden’s daycare center.
Beryl and Cameron got out of the car and walked toward the building. Just before getting to the front door of the center, Beryl stopped and pulled out her cell phone to answer it. Travis looked over toward Darrin’s car. Again it looked like the man was talking on his cell phone and again after a minute Beryl hung up and Darrin did also.
Travis was getting a very bad feeling. Why in the world would this man be following Beryl? And why was he calling to check up on her when he could clearly see her from where he was parked? It might be worse than Beryl was thinking. Not only was this man trying to control Beryl and all of her actions, he was also stalking her.
Travis followed Darrin as Darrin in turn followed Beryl. Beryl continued to run errands, stopping to fill her car with gas and then making a trip to the grocery store. After all of Beryl’s errands were complete, Travis followed Darrin and Beryl back to the house on Chamberlain Drive. While Beryl remotely opened the garage to pull into it, Darrin slowed down before getting too close the house. The man pulled over to the side of the street to watch and see that Beryl made it completely inside.
Once the garage door was closed, Darrin pulled off again, driving back out of the subdivision. Travis followed him. As he drove, Travis had to wonder if Beryl actually had an inkling that Darrin had been following her around. It wasn’t like Darrin’s car was inconspicuous. Travis had been following Darrin for a couple of hours and it didn’t look as if the guy had a clue that he was being followed. But then again, what sane person would think that they were being followed all day by somebody?
Darrin pulled into the parking lot of a business building. The signage out front listed several businesses that were in the building. One of the businesses was called Excel Investing, Inc. Travis made the connection in his mind between Darrin’s license plate, which read EXCEL, and the name of the office. Darrin got out of his Lexus, locked it, and entered the building.
Travis sat in his car, trying to figure out exactly what to do with all he had learned that day. He had learned many things. He now knew where Darrin lived and worked. He also knew that Darrin had a criminal record, and that Darrin was controlling and liked to stalk Beryl, in addition to being a nerdy-looking freak.
He had to talk to Beryl and let her know what was going on. He called her cell phone hoping she would pick up since she was home without Darrin. The phone rang and rang. “Come on, Beryl, pick up.” The phone went to voice mail. He didn’t leave a message. For a moment he thought about going over to the house, but had no idea when stalker Darrin would show up at his own home.
After an hour of sitting in his car and watching the building, Darrin finally emerged back out. Travis followed him straight to his home again and watched as the man pulled into his garage and closed it. He then wondered what was happening behind the closed doors.
Again, for what felt like the twentieth time that week, Travis sent a prayer up to the Lord. “Dear Lord and my Heavenly Father. Lord, Jesus, I come to you as humbly as I know how with the utmost sincerity. Lord, I need for you to continue to protect Beryl and my boys. There is an evil going on and it is threatening to consume them. But, Lord, I am pleading the blood of Jesus for their protection and I stand on your Word, knowing that no weapons formed against me, Beryl, or my sons will prosper.
“Lord, please guide me in what I should do to get my family out of the devourer’s hands. He means them no good. Lord, I pray you will give me the strength to do what I need to do, and the wisdom and knowledge to handle this situation and lead my family to safety. I thank you, Lord, in advance for your covering and continuing protection. Thank you, Lord. Amen.”
With reluctance Travis pulled away from the curb and drove back home.
Chapter 26
Travis tossed and turned that night, unable to sleep. When his cell phone rang, he picked it up on the first ring. “Beryl?”
“Yeah, it’s me,” she whispered.
“Oh, my Lord, are you okay?”
“Yeah, why? What’s wrong, Travis?”
Travis had to keep in mind that Beryl was not privy to all the information he had learned the previous day. While she had some misgivings, they weren’t concrete. He had to be careful as to what he told her and how he told it to her. The last thing he wanted was for her to freak out while Darrin was possibly lurking upstairs.
“I just wanted to make sure you were okay. You got off the phone pretty quickly last night. I called you today and left a message,” Travis said.
“Yeah, I know. I’ve been nervous all day. I tried to do some sketching but couldn’t concentrate. Every time I looked around Darrin was calling me. I got to the point that I hated to hear the phone ring.”
“It was a message about setting up a time to get the boys. I didn’t really want to say anything else just in case Darrin checked your messages.”
“Thank you,” Beryl said.
“Beryl, are you sure you are okay?”
“No, I’m not,” Beryl said. “Travis, I got to thinking about the erased phone calls and my phone detail as well as a few other things that did not seem to really add up to me.”
“Yeah, and ... ?”
“Do you remember that I told you I got fired from my job?”
“Yeah,” Travis said.
“I was fired because a few events that happened all within a span of a week. First I got some complaints from customers who anonymously didn’t want to leave their names. All three customers were male, supposedly. Then I made a major error on a report I submitted, which cost the company over a hundred thousand dollars.”
&nb
sp; “Seriously?” Travis asked.
“Seriously. The only thing is that in all the years I worked there I’ve only had two complaints and they were because a customer wasn’t pleased with the warranties on their products and they blamed me for it. I was justified in how I handled their calls and situations. And then all of a sudden I get three complaints in one week, from people who said I was rude to them. They said my name specifically. I was floored to say the least,” Beryl said.
“I bet you were,” Travis said.
“And I know the numbers on my report were right when I did it. I checked and rechecked all of my information. But the copy that I submitted to my boss had a comma out of place when it came to order history, which caused purchasing to order way more product than we needed.”
“Wow, over a hundred thousand dollars worth?” Travis said in disbelief.
“Yeah. I honestly don’t know why a red flag wasn’t sent up somewhere before the order went through. But anyway, that’s beside the point. I know my numbers were right when I did the report. I worked on it at work and even took it home to run the numbers again. By the time I went to sleep that night I could probably recite the information contained in the report almost verbatim, and I know my numbers were right.” Beryl said.
“So what are you saying?”
“Someone changed the numbers on the report,” Beryl said.
“Do you think so?” Travis asked in disbelief as he wondered why someone might do that.
“Yes, and I am pretty sure I know who it was,” Beryl said.
“Who?” Travis was curious to know.
“Darrin.”
“Darrin?” Travis asked. He got a sinking feeling in his gut.
“Darrin was there with me that night. I had fallen asleep on the couch and he encouraged me to go ahead to bed. My computer was still on when I went to sleep. The next morning Darrin had lovingly set all of my things by the front door for me and had even fixed me some breakfast. I didn’t really think anything else about it until just recently,” Beryl said.
The Marrying Kind Page 18