Surviving the Chase

by Lisa Renee Johnson

  “That crazy castration gal came by here numerous times, and I knew immediately that something wasn’t right about her. Running ’round here slicing up folks like she ain’t got the sense she was born with. That’s the problem with these young folks today, somebody needs to take a strap to they behind—”

  Before he could reach her, he was met by a barrage of random questions from the swarm of reporters.

  “Dr. James, is it true the woman who held you hostage is wanted for questioning in the castration murders?”

  “Were you two having an affair?

  “Is she going to have your baby?”

  Donathan cringed, but stepped around the cluster of microphones, ignoring the questions.

  “Mrs. Brown, may I speak with you for a moment?”

  “Of course, sugah,” the pecan-colored woman said with a reluctant smile. She made a few steps toward him, her multicolored housedress blowing in the wind. He placed his arms around her shoulders and escorted her the rest of the way across the street, away from the mob.

  “Mrs. Brown, you have to really be careful with these people. Anything you say will be sensationalized and splashed across the front pages of the newspapers and on television, and that’s the last thing I need right now.”

  “Well, you should have thought about that before you went gallivanting around town with that hussy. Herbert and I seen them pictures.”

  “Look, Mrs. Brown. I know it looks bad, but I’m innocent.”

  “Hmph,” she said, folding her chubby arms across her bosom. “Ain’t nothing worse than a wandering man.”

  “Didn’t you just hear me say that I’m innocent?”

  “Maybe if you quit talking that bedroom talk on the radio and dressing like you one of them fashion magazine models or something.”

  Donathan looked down at his black slacks and black dress shirt. He’d just finished a strategy meeting with the radio executives, finalizing how to incorporate him back on the air. Nothing “fashion magazine” about it.

  “Mrs. Brown, I’m serious. I didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “I heard you, but actions speak louder than words, and innocent men don’t hide from the truth. They speak it. I been living here twenty years, and have never seen the likes of this foolishness,” she said, gesturing to the pack across the street. “They remind me of a flock of chickens waiting to be tossed some feed.”

  “Exactly! They just want anything they can use to continue to defame my name.”

  “Your name?” She perched both hands on her wide hips. “What about Sydney’s name? Maybe if you just give them something, it will tide them over for a bit.”

  It was Donathan’s turn to survey the pack. He had been so wrapped up in his own issues he hadn’t stopped to think about how this was affecting Sydney. He would begin his amends with dinner in the city tonight. But first, a quick drive over the bridge to pick up a little pink box from Agent Provocateur and a new pair of stilettos would put a smile on her face and his. And maybe Mrs. Brown was right. It did seem like the more he ignored them, the more they hounded him for a story. And he was tired of the constant media escorts. At this point, he didn’t care what it took. He just wanted his life back. He turned back to Barbara Brown, who had already begun making her way up the stairs leading to her front door.

  “Mrs. Brown, if you see any sign of Austyn Greene, call the police immediately,” he called after her.

  When Barbara Brown reached the top of the stairs, she turned and waved to her paparazzi friends behind him.

  “Don’t you worry, son. I got the police on speed dial, but with all these budget cuts, let’s just hope they show up.”

  Donathan pivoted and walked toward the pack, his strides long and confident.

  “Alright. I’m going to answer a few questions for you guys, then you’re to stop camping out in front of my house and office? Is that a deal?”

  “Have you heard from Austyn Greene?”

  “No.”

  “Has there been any sign of her?”

  “No.”

  “Why did she try to kill you?”

  Relieved that the questions weren’t as provocative as he imagined they would be, Donathan shrugged his shoulders.

  “No one knows the answer to that except Austyn Greene, and once the detectives locate her, I hope we will all find that out.”

  He took a few more questions, and just like that the reporters were gone. When Donathan got into his car, instead of continuing through the security gates, he backed up, watched the gates close, and headed back down Moeser Lane toward the freeway. He had more than enough time to pick up those items for Sydney and get a nap in before their date tonight.

  * * *

  Donathan parked his Mercedes next to the curb outside the Hillstone Restaurant, off the Embarcadero. He exited the car and hurried around to the passenger side to open the door for his wife. Sydney took the hand he offered and didn’t let go once her Jimmy Choos hit the pavement.

  He pulled her into him and kissed her lips lightly, inhaling her scents of lavender and coconut oil before his silent gaze captured hers again. He smiled, still holding her by the hand, and headed toward the cozy brick building. Once they reached the door, he held it open, admiring the chocolate-brown slip dress that brushed across her sexy lean frame in all the right places.

  “Reservation for James,” he said.

  “Right this way.”

  The hostess gathered two menus and escorted the couple to a coveted booth next to the fireplace. The place was practically deserted for late summer, but evenings in San Francisco reached temperatures in the mid to low fifties, cool and breezy at night, making this the perfect place for sitting next to a burning flame.

  After the server left with their food orders, Donathan scooted in closer.

  “I can’t wait to taste you,” he whispered in Sydney’s ear, feeling a familiar tightening in his groin.

  “Maybe we should have stayed home,” she murmured, turned on by his baritone bass vibrating in her ear.

  Donathan eased his hand underneath the table and parted Sydney’s legs.

  “What are you doing?” she whispered.

  “What do you think?”

  For a moment, Donathan caressed her bare thighs before his fingertips wandered higher and seized her lace thong.

  “Relax, baby,” he persuaded. “Nobody is paying any attention to us.” He pushed her panties to the side and stroked her center. Sydney’s eyes glistened with arousal. She quickly surveyed the room, then did as he asked, her body melting into the high-back booth. Donathan touched her in the way he knew she liked to be touched. The more he massaged, the wetter she got. Next, he inserted one, then two fingers and watched her hips roll forward, chasing the pressure he was putting on her G-spot.

  “You like that?” he whispered in her ear.

  “Uhm-hmm,” she purred.

  The beauty of her contorted face and swallowed moans made him want to put her up on the table and make love to her right there. She was so fucking sexy. Suddenly, her walls contracted around his fingers, and he knew he’d hit the jackpot. He was so caught up in his own visual foreplay that it took him a few seconds to realize that his cell phone was vibrating in his jacket pocket.

  He reluctantly removed his hand from underneath her slip dress and licked his fingers as he examined the screen of his iPhone with his free hand. It was Holsey, the private investigator, a number he’d memorized.

  “I need to take this.” He scooted out of the booth, adjusted his black slacks, and pulled down his black zip-front cashmere pullover to conceal his erection. Once out of earshot, he swiped across the screen and accepted the call.

  “This is Donathan.”

  “Curtis Holsey, here,” he said, his voice hoarse and scratchy like sandpaper. “There’s been another murder.”

  “Fuck! Where? How do you know it’s her?”

  “Not a lot of serial killers going around castrating their victims. They found the guy at a motel in Ple
asanton.”

  “Are you close to finding her?”

  “You’re not paying me to find her. Our deal is to find the mother. This tidbit of information is just because I thought you should know. They found the victim last night. The cops are trying to keep a lid on it.”

  “So, what do we do now?”

  “I’ll continue to do what you’re paying me to do. In the meantime, I’d suggest you watch your back.”

  * * *

  Donathan ended the call and took a deep, cleansing breath, then walked back toward the table. By the time he got there, his disposition had visibly changed.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “That was the private detective I hired to locate Austyn Greene.”

  Sydney stiffened. “I thought the police were handling that?”

  He eased into the booth, but this time he kept his distance. “It’s been three weeks, and they don’t seem any closer to finding her.”

  “I still think you should let the professionals handle it.”

  Donathan let out a bark of laughter. “Those professionals didn’t see fit to contact me about a dead body they found in a hotel room in Pleasanton last night. The MO has Austyn Greene written all over it.”

  Horror washed over Sydney’s face. “What?”

  “Exactly,” he said knowingly. “I got caught sleeping the last time, but I’m not about to be blindsided by them—or you, for that matter—again.”

  Sydney glared at him, somewhat perplexed before she responded. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I’ve asked you outright about your relationship with Miles Day.”

  “‘Relationship’?” she said, her anger welling up in her eyes. “Miles and I are colleagues, but I should be the one asking questions about your ‘relationship’,” she said, using her fingers to show air quotes, “with Austyn Greene. Like how the hell did you end up in her hotel room anyway?”

  This time his eyes sliced into her. He had been married to this woman for the past eight years. He knew her well, and she was hiding something.

  “This is not about me, and don’t give me that ‘colleague’ bullshit!”

  “Will you lower your voice? I’ve had enough of being embarrassed by you,” she hissed.

  Checking his anger, he leaned back and exhaled. He couldn’t think straight. He hadn’t meant for this to happen. He’d planned the evening like old times, including the new lingerie and Louboutins he’d left for her on her side of the bed. He didn’t want the evening to end like this.

  “I feel like we can’t have a normal conversation anymore. Why do we keep digressing to this?”

  He saw pain etched on her face. He looked down at his knuckles, the scarring barely visible, then back up to Sydney.

  “Because something happened between you and Miles, and since you refuse to be honest with me about it, I’m going to ask him, man to man, myself.”

  CHAPTER 11

  After an hour of bumper-to-bumper traffic jams and stuntman maneuvers, Tony eased his black Ford Escalade into his narrow driveway.

  He checked his watch: It was almost seven in the evening, much earlier than the usual time he arrived home. For the past few years, unbeknownst to anyone, Tony took classes at night to finish up his bachelor’s degree at Cal State East Bay, and he was one final away from realizing his dream. Not only did he want to make his mother proud by becoming the first person in his family to obtain any type of degree, but he also had his sights set on transitioning to a management position. He wasn’t getting any younger, and he wanted more. More for himself and now more for his sister.

  Today was his first day back at work since his mother’s passing, and getting on and off the UPS truck had taken a serious toll on him. His body ached everywhere. All he wanted to do right now was jump in a hot shower and hit the sack hard, but first, he had to figure out what to do with his sister.

  “Tony!” Najee squealed, stepping off the porch stroking the calico kitten he’d given to her in the wake of their mother’s death.

  At fifteen, Najee Barnes looked a lot like pictures of Shirley Barnes, their mother, at the same age: tall and slender with a head full of wavy brown hair that rested in ringlets just past her shoulders. She’d developed into a beautiful girl with a fierce streak of independence. She wore flip-flops, hip-hugging jeans flared just right, and layers of multicolored tank tops—typical attire for a sixteen-year-old.

  As soon as he opened the car door, she threw herself into him, wrapping her free arm around his body, hugging him tight. Two teenage boys riding bicycles called out to her. “What’s up, Najee?” They both grinned and waved.

  “Well, hello to you, too, beautiful.” He kissed her on the forehead and held on to her a little longer. His eyes tracked the young men as they pedaled past. He’d lived here for several years and couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen boys on bicycles riding past his house. And since Najee attended school in Berkeley, they couldn’t be her classmates.

  “How do you know those guys?” he asked with suspicion.

  “Oh, that’s just Tim and Jayden.”

  “Do they live around here?”

  “Yeah, around the corner. I met them when Aunt Rosemary and I took a walk one day.”

  Why was this the first time he’d heard anything about her meeting boys who lived around the corner? He was definitely going to have a talk with his aunt about this. He thought back to what it was like being sixteen, and the last thing he needed was some slick-ass boys sniffing around. That wasn’t going to happen on his watch. As far as he was concerned, Najee Simone Barnes would not be dating until she graduated college and was at least twenty-five.

  Arm in arm, they made their way toward the three-bedroom bungalow framed by freshly cut grass and neatly trimmed bushes. He took pride in his home just like his neighbors did.

  “Why were you sitting out here?” he said, looking around for nothing in particular. For a bachelor, his neighborhood was pretty safe, but for a sixteen-year-old girl, he was beginning to think that maybe he wasn’t so sure.

  “I was waiting for you. Can I go to the movies with Lauren and Nicole?”

  “Naj, I don’t think that’s a good idea. I’m exhausted, and it’s a weeknight—”

  “C’mon, Tony, pleeeaaasssse,” she whined, letting the kitten down. “It’s summertime, and I’ll be back home by ten. Maybe you can go out on a date with Payton. She left two messages for you today. Who is she anyway?”

  “Nobody you need to worry about.”

  “Pleeeeeaaassse,” she begged as if her life depended on it.

  He stared down at her. Over the past few months, she’d been through a lot. Moving to the Oakland/San Leandro border from Berkeley had to be a huge culture shock for her. She was the true epitome of an independent urban kid. She could get to anywhere in the Bay Area she needed to go on the bus or the BART. He couldn’t even do that himself. Hell, it wasn’t too long ago that he had ridden the BART to Bay Point for the first time when he’d met up with Payton to help her evict Sonya Mitchell.

  Najee held his gaze. Finally, he looked away to deflect her big brown eyes before they turned him into putty. He was tired and didn’t feel like going back out. All he wanted to do was take a hot shower and hit the sack. Besides, teenagers didn’t go to the movies on weeknights, or did they? It just wasn’t safe for her to be wandering around at night. He blew out a ragged breath.

  “Sorry, kid, but I’m going to have to say no. How about you go to the movies this weekend? I can drop you off and pick you up.”

  “Drop me off? Are you cray?” she said, using teenage slang for “crazy.” “I’m not a five-year-old. I don’t need you to drop me off. I have friends who drive, or I can catch the bus. I did some research, and I know what buses I need to catch.”

  Drive? Now, that was another thing. He didn’t like the idea of her riding in cars with a bunch of newly licensed teenagers. He was going to have to teach her to drive, and then use some of the insurance money he’d en
trusted for her to purchase a car of her own. He shuddered at that thought, too. How the hell did parents raise kids without stressing themselves to death?

  “Well?” Najee asked, a determined look in her eyes. “Are you going to let me go or not?”

  “Look, Naj, the thing is, it’s just not safe for a young girl to be traipsing around town after dark. There’s a lot going on in Oakland—”

  “If Mom were alive, she’d let me go,” she said, her brown eyes filling with tears.

  “Well, I’m not Mom,” he snapped, “and my answer is no.”

  A barrage of tears began rolling down her cheeks. “You never let me go anywhere,” she yelled, the tears flowing faster.

  Shit. He reached for her and pulled her tightly into his embrace. “I know this is hard for you, Naj, but it’s hard for me, too.”

  “You can’t keep me cooped up in this house.”

  He dried her tears with the pads of his thumbs and tilted her face up to him. “I was talking to Donathan, and he’s going to talk with Sydney about hanging out with you a few days a week. What do you think about that?”

  “I’m not a kid. I don’t need a babysitter.”

  “I know you’re not a kid, but I think it would be nice for you to, you know, hang out with a girl.”

  She twisted her face at his comment. “My friends are girls.”

  “Najee, c’mon. You know exactly what I mean.” He looked on helplessly as the tears started again.

  “This is not fair!” She stormed off to her room and slammed the door behind her.

  Tony was silent for a moment. He stood there replaying what had just happened. His aunt had warned him that sometimes as a parent he would have to make tough, unfavorable decisions, but he hadn’t expected a movie to be the cause of their first real standoff. If this was any indication of what was to come, he couldn’t imagine what the exchange was going to look like when they had their talk about boys. He sighed heavily. He had his hands full.

  CHAPTER 12