by PJ Fernor
“A missing cat,” I said.
“That’s right, Down,” Garrison said. “There’s your case. Find the pussycat.”
I looked at Garrison and rolled my eyes.
In high school he was the typical jock fool. Pudgy cheeks and dark brown eyes. He still had the same face, just a little less hair and a little more of a spare tire around his waist from not playing football every single day.
“I’ll be just fine with this,” I said.
Garrison laughed. “Allie Down. Still the same.”
“Get out of here,” Laura said again to Garrison. “I’ll have you writing parking tickets instead.”
Garrison backed away and left the office.
“Sorry about that,” Laura said.
“Not a problem,” I said. “I’m sure I’ll have to deal with everyone I bump into.”
Her phone started to ring.
“Listen, I would love to chat all day here,” she said. “Welcome back to Sandemor. Be smart. Be safe. Remember where you live. Don’t be a hero. We’re a small town but we have a lot of resources at our disposal. If you need anything, my door is always open.”
“I bet you regret saying that to Garrison,” I said as I stood up.
“Every day of my life.”
We shook hands one more time and Laura took her call.
I exited the office and looked at the missing cat flyer.
Small town living…
I looked up and stopped dead in my tracks.
“It’s true, huh?”
“Ben,” I said.
My mouth went dry. My throat closed, opened, closed again.
Then opened for good.
“Allie,” he said.
“Ben…”
I hadn’t seen Ben in a…
“Long time,” he said.
I nodded. “You’re… a cop… of course you are.”
“Want me to give you the thirty second tour of the place?”
“Sure,” I said.
I folded up the missing cat flyer and squeezed it in my hand.
Ben… it’s really him…
I shook my head, reminding myself that I had my own past in this town that was just left behind when I left.
I was back.
The past was waiting.
Ben looked over his shoulder and grinned.
I sucked in a breath.
Maybe the small town detective gig wasn’t going to be so bad after all.
Chapter Eight
Jessie
“Hello? Is anyone there? I’m not hurt. I’m not…”
Jessie couldn’t muster up any other words. Her voice crackled and she needed to cry again. That was all she could do. But there were no more tears. The tears were all gone.
Just like the light.
The room was almost completely dark.
Scary dark. Cool. And quiet.
Except for when the man walked around.
When the man walked right over Jessie’s head, she saw dust falling from the ceiling onto her face. Like dirty snow.
It tasted horrible too.
The dirt, the dust, the air itself.
It just smelled… old.
Her right wrist had a thick chain on it. And that chain was attached to a pipe.
It seemed impossible that the chain could hold her.
The place was so old and crappy.
But with each pull of the chain, the pain in her wrist got worse.
That first little while the man just watched her.
He watched as she screamed and kicked. As she ran toward him, wanting to break the chain. But each time she ran, the chain would pull her back. She fell time and time again, hitting the cool, dirty floor. Hurting her ankle. Her knee. Her shoulder. And then falling on her left wrist so hard, she heard a pop and that made her gasp for a breath as the pain soared through her body.
‘Are you done now?’ the man had asked her.
Jessie wept.
Her tears hitting the dirty floor.
The man had left.
But she heard the man upstairs, walking around.
His feet slamming like hammers. And he didn’t stop moving for a while.
Jessie couldn’t figure out what was worse.
Hearing the man walking around or hearing nothing.
Either way she had been kidnapped.
Kidnapped.
This stuff was meant for movies and TV. Those shows Dad used to watch at night.
This couldn’t be real life.
But no matter how many times Jessie shut her eyes and screamed to wake up from the nightmare, it didn’t happen.
The nightmare was real.
It was her reality.
Jessie looked at her right wrist again. She moved to the wall and saw the way the chain was connected to the wall. Wrapped around a pipe that was not meant to move.
She banged the chain against the pipe and screamed for help.
She screamed so loud her throat hurt.
Thudding echoed above her.
Heavy footsteps.
The man.
She shook her head, praying it was the police. They were coming to save her.
The door opened and the footsteps came down into the basement.
“What is wrong with you?” the man screamed at her.
Jessie froze.
She whimpered.
“I have something for you to eat,” the man said. “No more screaming. Understand?”
Jessie nodded. “I want to go home.”
“I tried,” the man said.
“T-t-tried?” Jessie asked.
The man told her this wasn’t for forever. This was just for a little bit. She’d understand soon enough and everything would be okay. He just needed her for a bit.
The man tossed a plate of food to the floor.
Toast with peanut butter.
Then came a bottle of water.
“Eat,” the man said.
“Then can I go home?” Jessie asked.
The man stared down at her. He wore a black baseball cap that shielded a lot of his face. And he talked in a deep voice that seemed fake.
“I’m sorry,” the man said.
“S-s-s-sorry?” Jessie asked.
“Plans have changed,” the man said. “You’re here for a little while longer now.”
Jessie screamed as loud as her body let her.
The man grabbed the plate of food and bottle of water.
And he walked away, leaving Jessie to scream and starve.
Chapter Nine
Me and Ben.
Ben and I.
He opened a door near the steps on the first floor and waved his left hand.
“My little slice of heaven,” he said with a smile that took me back too many years to count.
The boyish smile with a small cleft in his chin was now a rugged, man smile. Complete with some scruff that looked as though it needed to be shaved two days ago. His dark hair was still just as dark but in the scruff on his face there were a few hints of some salt and pepper color, reminding me yet again that time was always a presence in our lives.
Even Ben.
He leaned against an old desk and folded his arms.
When he shook his head, I frowned.
“What?” I asked.
“Go ahead, do your thing,” he said.
“My thing? What’s my thing?”
“Where you take in your surroundings. Every last little detail. I’ll give you a minute.”
“Stop it,” I said. “It’s part of my job.”
“Do you think I’m a serial killer or something?”
“Could be,” I said. “You’d be perfect at it. Nobody would suspect you. You have access to the files, evidence room, and you have influence…”
“Wow,” Ben said. “That moved fast, huh? You should be a writer.”
I laughed. “I couldn’t even write that stupid poem in Miss Landow’s class.”
“I remember that,” Ben said. “Wow. That was a li
fetime ago.”
“You aced it, of course,” I said. “You big dork.”
“Dork? It’s called doing the work, Allie. You were too…”
Ben shook his head and pushed from his desk.
“Too what?” I called out to him. “Huh? It’s been a lifetime, right?”
Ben was now behind his desk. He put his hands flat to the perfectly organized desk. The sleeves of his shirt were pushed up enough to show the muscles in his forearms.
“You were too busy with Tommy,” he said.
“Yeah,” I said, feeling more than one sting of pain in my heart.
“Plus, I got in trouble for the way I wrote my poem,” Ben said with a grin.
“What did you do?”
“I wrote it about a car. And the way I wrote about starting the car and driving it… Miss Landow felt it was too… sensual…”
I smiled. “Ben. I didn’t know you were secretly so dirty.”
“Probably a lot you didn’t know, Allie,” he said.
We both fell silent.
Each of us holding a string to the past. Like a child holding a balloon. We could let the string go and let it float into the sky and disappear for good. Or we could pull the string and bring the balloon down.
I let the string go.
I looked around his office. “Of course your office would look like this.”
“I like things organized,” he said.
“Your father taught you that, huh?”
“More than taught,” he said.
“Hey. Miss Landow…”
Ben shook his head. “Three years ago.”
“Retired?”
“Died.”
“Oh,” I said.
“Heart attack,” Ben said. “While running a bath. Didn’t find her until the next day. House was flooded. It was terrible. Her kids cleaned out what they could and sold it for next to nothing.”
“Christ,” I said. “What a way to go.”
“I’m sure you’ve seen worse,” Ben said. “The city can’t be as kind as they show it on TV.”
I nodded. “Every city, town, and person has a story. So, where’s my office? I have to get cracking on a case here.”
Ben moved from behind his desk and pointed to a window that connected to another office.
“I have to work next to you?” I asked.
“Worst news of your day?” Ben threw at me.
“So far, yeah,” I said.
“Well, it can only go up from here, right?”
Ben folded his arms and stared at me.
He grew up working in his father’s auto garage but always dreamed of becoming a cop. He never told anyone that though. Except me. I knew the dream. He told me his dream all the while I was hung up on…
I turned my head and looked at my office. “Mind if I check it out?”
“It’s your office, Allie,” he said. “Enjoy.”
I exited Ben’s office and felt him following me.
The offices were all old. The doors were half wood, half frosted glass. And they all had big windows with frames that had chipped paint and old blinds that were either crooked or cracked or covered in a year’s worth of dust.
The desk looked like something from a school… metal legs, cheap or fake wood for the desk itself, two big drawers with empty files, and a small drawer for pens and supplies. An ugly green banker’s lamp rested on the corner and the chair was an even uglier orange and brown color pattern that looked and felt like a Brillo pad as I sat down.
I leaned back an inch and the scream the chair made hurt my ears.
“I can get someone to fix that,” Ben said.
“It’s fine,” I said. I took out the missing cat flyer and put it on my desk. I opened it up and spread my hand across it. “I had the pleasure of seeing Garrison.”
Ben’s lip curled. “Yeah?”
“He’s the same, huh?”
“No comment,” Ben said.
“You two still don’t get along?”
“He works across the building,” Ben said. “Right where he belongs.”
“What about Laura?”
“What about?”
“Chief Carano,” I said. “She looks tough. But the open door thing…”
“That’s how she gets your trust,” Ben said. “She plays friendly and attacks when need be. Don’t turn your back on her. I don’t say that in a bad way. She’s been through a lot. She had a few job offers for some big cities but stayed here.”
“And she had the nerve to ask me about why I’m here?” I asked.
“Just part of the game,” Ben said. “Feeling you out. Everyone has a story, remember?”
“Right,” I said.
I leaned back a little more in my chair. It squeaked and then it popped. The pop was the chair letting go from the legs. I managed to yell SHOOT! as I fell back out of the chair.
Ben hurried around the desk and dropped to one knee and caught me. And the chair. Cradling the both of us, a grin on his face. His right hand behind my neck, his left hand gripped tight to the front of the chair to steady it.
“You can’t lean back that far, Allie,” he said. “The chair gives out.”
“I can see that, Ben,” I said.
We were close enough that I could see even more changes in him. A few scars that weren’t there the last time I saw Ben. When he was wiping his hands with a powder blue rag that was then stained grease black, looking at me as I told him I was leaving town. As I wrestled with the notion as to why I felt the need to tell him I was leaving town when I really didn’t tell anyone else.
“Up you go, Allie Down,” Ben said.
He pushed at the chair and it popped again, going back in place.
I quickly touched the flyer. “Missing cat.”
“Yeah,” Ben said. “Miss Westchester’s. Mike. That’s the cat’s name.”
“I’m going to find the cat,” I said.
“I already looked into it,” Ben said. “I’ve been helping.”
“Same old Ben,” I said.
“It’s my job.”
“I was thinking of taking a ride to her house and introducing myself. Closest thing to detective work I’ll probably have here.”
Ben smiled and touched the flyer, way too close to my hand. “How about I take you over there?”
I looked up at Ben and internally sighed.
“Sure, why not?”
Chapter Ten
Ben drove.
His car had some serious life to it.
“How did you get this?” I asked him.
“Car dealership, decent credit, and a lot of debt,” he said.
I laughed. “Noted.”
“So you’re back in Sandemor,” he said.
I turned my head. “Oh, come on, Ben. Don’t try that casual talk to get into more important things.”
“Right. Forgot who I was talking to.”
“I’m sorry about Alex,” Ben said. “I heard all about it over the scanner. I was working something else that night but hurried to get over there.”
I swallowed hard. “You were there?”
“By the time I got there, most everything was cleaned up,” he said. “The investigators got all they needed. She… uh… she was already gone.”
Ben looked at me for a second and tightened his lips.
I nodded. “Yeah. It was a shock to say the least. I tried to get my hands on some of the files but there wasn’t much to go on. I just can’t imagine someone doing that. What kind of vehicle…”
“I know,” Ben said. “I’ve reviewed it all fifteen times, Allie.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Trying to find something that makes sense. Or gives us a hint of where to look.”
“That’s what I wanted to see. The damage. Right? There has to be…” I shook my head. “No. I didn’t come here for that, Ben. I didn’t come back here to track down the person who killed my sister. Even if we found the vehicle… the driver… then what? It doesn’t bring Alex back.”
“No, it doesn’t,” Ben said. “That’s the saddest part of a lot of cases. You know that. But I’m sure you tell the families of victims about closure. And Lo…”
I almost turned all the way in my seat. “Excuse me? Lo?”
“Your niece,” Ben said. “Alex’s daughter.”
“You know her as Lo?”
“Of course.”
That seemed unsettling to me. So much so…
“Does that mean you and Alex…”
“What? No.” Ben looked at me again. “That’s where your mind went?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
“Allie, it’s a small town. You know this place. There’s about five hundred towns squished into the county. You go a mile up the road and you’re in a new town. Or township. Or whatever.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“It means we all know each other,” Ben said. “Did you forget about that when you left?”
“When I left?” I asked with a laughed. “There it is.”
“There’s what?”
“Nothing, Ben. I’m just… I have to keep her safe, you know?”
“Look, I know you and your sister didn’t see eye to eye when you were growing up,” he said. “I guess I assumed that changed when you became adults.”
“Meaning?”
“Lo’s had a few situations,” Ben said. “Nothing bad. Just… kid stuff. Teenagers.”
“You’ve arrested my niece before?”
“No,” Ben said. “Not even close to arresting her. She’s got a good heart. She was in the wrong place at the wrong time. More than once.”
I touched my forehead. “What in the hell does that mean, Ben? Are you going to keep playing this cookie cutter game with me?”
Ben cut the wheel and pulled the car up against a curb. “Fine. I’ll level with you, Allie. She was at two drinking parties. But she didn’t drink.”
“I thought Garrison broke up the drinking parties?”
“Yeah right. He’ll take the beer for himself.”
“Sounds about right,” I said.
“There was another time they were on the tracks. Near the bridge.”
“That’s dangerous,” I said.
“I know,” Ben said. “Had to break that mess up. They all scattered. Poor Lo just kind of stood there, wobbling, terrified. Took me a good five minutes to calm her down and get her off the bridge.”