Vendetta (WeHo Book 7)

by Sherryl Hancock

  “I promise,” she told McKenna, her look direct and her voice strong.

  McKenna smiled sadly and she nodded. “Thank you.”

  Cody nodded, her look solemn.

  There was the sound of the door opening downstairs then, and someone was calling out to McKenna. She got off the bed and went out to the stairs.

  “Hi,” she said to the person, “I’m coming.” Cody heard McKenna walk down the stairs. She got off the bed, walked over to the doorway, and stood leaning on the doorjamb, listening to see if she could hear the conversation. She couldn’t really hear anything. She looked across the hall and saw that the office was open; it was usually closed. She heard the door to the basement open. She walked back to her nightstand, opened the drawer, and pulled out a small flashlight and her cell phone that she kept concealed in a book.

  After waiting a couple of extra moments at the doorway to make sure there was no sound downstairs, she walked out onto the landing, then into the office. She picked the lock on the file drawer. Looking hurriedly through some files, she pulled out papers, transfer paperwork for different girls. She took pictures of some, noticing McKenna’s signature on them. She pulled out other papers, financial transactions, taking pictures of those, as well as the signature information for the bank that was contained in the file. She carefully put the papers back, making sure nothing was disturbed or out of place. After closing the drawer and relocking it, she went back to her bedroom. She put her phone back in the hollowed out book, and put the flashlight away.

  She lay back down on the bed and stared at the ceiling, watching as the flickering candlelight created dancing shadows all around her. She let her mind explore what could have happened. What could have happened if she’d given in to the insane desire to kiss McKenna. She let herself think about what it would have felt like to feel those hands not on her face, but on her body. She closed her eyes and felt the desire slide through her. She wanted this girl like she’d never wanted anyone before. It was that old cliché of wanting something you couldn’t have.

  Blowing her breath out slowly, she let the gnawing feeling of regret have its way for a while, knowing she was being almost sadistic at this point. It was the only way she knew how to handle desire sometimes, just letting it eat away at her.

  It was the reason she’d been “on edge” as Lyric had described it. For all the times she made women come screaming for her, she rarely if ever allowed the same for herself. It was a troubling situation at times, but she simply would not allow anyone to see that level of vulnerability in her. In fact, very few women had ever seen that side of Cody; it was something she kept to herself and refused to examine too closely. She knew it was something Savanna would want to discuss with her at length; Cody just couldn’t see that happening. What she could do was talk to Lyric. She resigned to do just that the following weekend when she went home.

  Things between Lyric and Savanna became much more casual as Lyric came by the house regularly to talk to Cody and check in with both of them. Savanna often made a point of making Lyric coffee or at least offering to do so. Lyric told Savanna that she drank coffee that tended to be outrageously strong, espresso level, as that was what her father and brothers always drank, so she’d picked up the habit.

  Savanna had discovered that Lyric had three big brothers and that her father was her only living parent. Lyric was part of a law enforcement family, a large Italian family that went back generations all the way to Sicily. In fact, the car that Lyric drove had been in her family for years. Lyric had been given the car by her father, because he had known she’d take the time to restore it as she had.

  There were other conversations that weren’t as benign, however. One such conversation happened after Lyric had spent another afternoon with Cody. Cody had just gone upstairs, and Savanna handed Lyric a bottle of water. As Lyric twisted the cap of the bottle off, she canted her head slightly.

  “So, can I ask you a question?” she said.

  “Of course,” Savanna said as she led the way out to the back patio where they tended to sit and talk.

  “Why didn’t you tell me that you’re gay?” Lyric asked in an even tone.

  “Well…” Savanna said, taken back by the question. She needed a moment to gather her thoughts and in truth try to figure out for herself why she hadn’t told Lyric that piece of information.

  Finally, Savanna shook her head. “I don’t know, really,” she said honestly.

  Lyric nodded slowly. “You know I’m not, right?” she asked then, looking directly at Savanna.

  Savanna looked back at her for a long moment, wanting to argue, if for no other reason than that she really wanted Lyric to be gay. But it wasn’t a surprise to her that Lyric didn’t think she was gay.

  Lyric could see the conflict in Savanna’s eyes and figured it was simply the confusion that most people had with her sexuality. They assumed because she was more of a tomboy with the use of little or no makeup and didn’t wear things like dresses, that she must be gay.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Lyric said, waving away Savanna’s discomfit. “Lots of people think I am.”

  A look flickered across Savanna’s face that Lyric didn’t understand, even as she nodded. “I’m sorry, I hope that doesn’t bother you,” Savanna said then.

  “That you’re gay, or that you thought I was?” Lyric asked.

  “Either, both,” Savanna said.

  “No, neither of those bothers me,” Lyric responded, smiling. “Who people sleep with is none of my business or concern. All I care about is what kind of people they are, and you’re a good person. So the rest…” She shrugged as she let her voice trail off.

  Savanna nodded again. “I have to tell you,” she said, smiling, “that you’re amazing with Cody. She’s come so far out of her shell in the last couple of months and I know that’s because she’s been spending time with you.”

  “Well,” Lyric said, “I think she needs someone to talk to. And I think the psychiatrist in the house,” she said, giving Savanna a pointed look, “probably intimidates her a bit.”

  “But the cop doesn’t?” Savanna asked, grinning.

  “Touché,” Lyric said, inclining her head with a grin of her own.

  “She’s very fond of you,” Savanna said. “You’ve made a real connection with her. And that’s something no one else here seems to have been able to accomplish, including the psychiatrist,” she said with a wink.

  Lyric nodded. “Well, I’m glad,” she said honestly. “She’s really a good kid. I just think there was some seriously bad shit at home that sent her running.”

  Savanna nodded. “What have you been able to get out of her about her home life?”

  “Well, her stepdad is a Baptist minister,” Lyric said. “And Cody thinks she might be gay.”

  “Wait, what?” Savanna said, her shock evident.

  “I said that Cody thinks she might be gay,” Lyric said. “She asked me how she’d know for sure… I actually suggested she might want to talk to you, since I’d just been informed that you were gay…” she said, her voice trailing off as she gave Savanna a mock annoyed look.

  “Okay, okay,” Savanna said, rolling her eyes. “I get it, I should have told you. Sheesh! It really isn’t the first thing that comes out of my mouth you know… ‘Hi, I’m Savanna, I’m gay and oh yeah a board-certified psychiatrist with honors who’s studied for twelve years to get where I am, blah, blah, blah…’ ”

  Lyric was laughing by the end of her diatribe.

  “Point taken, doc,” Lyric said, still smiling as she held up her hands in surrender.

  “Good,” Savanna said, giving her a foul look. “Now, back to Cody. Did she say why she thought she might be gay?”

  Lyric shook her head. “I’m not sure she really knows why she thinks it, but there’s definitely something deep in there related to sex, I just can’t seem to get her to talk about it.”

  Savanna nodded, her mind working through the problem. “Think she might have been
abused at home?”

  “Sexually?” Lyric asked.

  “Yeah,” Savanna said, her look somber.

  Lyric thought about it for a long moment, then nodded. “It would explain a few things. And definitely be the reason she ran.”

  “Yeah…” Savanna said, nodding and grimacing.

  She shook her head, her look mournful. “As long as I practice, I will never understand the perversion of molesting a young girl… Why do men to that?” she asked, sounding appalled.

  Lyric looked back at her for a long moment. She really couldn’t argue the point in men’s favor. The fact was that a very large percentage of molestations were committed by men. It was simply a fact.

  “Have you ever been with a man?” Lyric asked, not sure why she wanted to know.

  Savanna shook her head vehemently.

  Lyric nodded. “Well I lived with four of them most of my life, and I can tell you that they’re not all like that.”

  “I know that,” Savanna said, her voice softer. “I guess I just see it so much more in this line of work, you know? Sometimes it’s hard to keep perspective.”

  “Well, you should come to dinner at my dad’s house sometime. I’ll introduce you to four of the best men I know,” Lyric said, smiling.

  “I might take you up on that,” Savanna said, smiling too.

  “I hope you will,” Lyric replied.

  “Mom?” Cody queried.

  “Mmm?” Lyric murmured, turning her head from reading the paper.

  Cody chewed on the inside of her cheek, a sure sign that she needed to talk. Lyric nodded and picked up her coffee as she stood up.

  “Come on,” she said, nodding toward the backyard.

  Cody stood up and walked toward the back door. Lyric leaned over to kiss Savanna on the lips before following Cody out. Savanna smiled fondly as she watched her girls. Lyric and Cody had always been extremely close; it never bothered her when Cody wanted to talk to Lyric alone. She understood their relationship, and knew that Lyric would share anything with her that she felt she needed to know.

  “What’s up, Code?’ Lyric asked, when Cody sat down and immediately lit a cigarette.

  Lyric moved to sit in the chair next to Cody, stretching her jean-clad legs out comfortably, and crossing them at the ankles. She was wearing her usual Saturday morning outfit, faded, tattered jeans, and a DOJ t-shirt, and her feet were bare.

  Cody blew her breath out. “I’m kinda…” she began, trailing off, not sure what to say.

  Lyric narrowed her eyes slightly, canting her head. “Just say it, don’t worry about it making sense, we’ll make sense of it, okay?”

  Cody nodded, drawing in a deep breath. Lyric always knew what to say.

  “I’m screwed,” Cody said. “I’m really, really screwed right now and I have no idea what to do, or how to handle it… It’s just not something I know how to handle. I can’t sleep, she’s in my head all the time, and she may be a suspect, and what the fuck am I doing? It’s so crazy, and I know it and I know it’s stupid and I know I’m putting my case in danger, and it doesn’t matter because I just want… So much, everything and nothing at the same time… I don’t know what to do here and I’m just holding on so tight and you said things break when you do that, and I’m worried that I’m breaking, Mom…” The last was said with a tremulous voice.

  Lyric grimaced. She got up from her chair to squat down in front of her daughter, taking her in her arms and hugging her like she had when she was fourteen. Cody started crying and Lyric’s heart broke a little for her. She knew there were things that Cody had never dealt with from her childhood; it was the thing that worried Savanna constantly. It came out at times, in the way Cody went through women like socks and in the songs she focused on at points in time. Other times it came out in Cody stepping up her drinking or smoking or the amounts of calls Lyric got from other officers telling her that Cody was doing 120 on the freeway on her Ninja.

  After a few minutes, Cody calmed down, and Lyric pulled her chair closer so she could sit with her hands on Cody’s knees, keeping the connection.

  “Okay,” Lyric said. “Let’s take this one thing at a time. Who are we talking about?”

  Cody blew her breath out. “The wife of the guy that runs the group home that I’m working.”

  Lyric nodded. “Okay, so that’s what you mean by her maybe being a suspect?”

  “Yeah,” Cody said nodding.

  Lyric turned the idea over in her head. “How bad does it look?” she asked.

  Cody took a long drag on her cigarette, blowing it out a full minute later, which told Lyric that her nerves were really shot.

  “There’s definitely a trafficking connection there,” Cody said.

  “Okay, and how involved do you think this woman is?” Lyric asked.

  Cody shook her head. “I don’t know for sure, but I think that he’s just using her as kind of a front, you know?”

  “Why do you think that?” Lyric asked her tone even.

  “Because the other night I baited her, and not only did she not go for it, she actually went the other way.”

  “Explain,” Lyric said.

  Cody shifted in her chair, a sign that it was making her uncomfortable to talk about this, but Lyric knew she needed to stick with it so Cody could think it all the way through. Lyric waited for the answer.

  “I basically told her that I had been prostituting before I’d come to their house, and she wanted me to promise that I wouldn’t do it ever again.”

  Lyric’s brows furrowed. “Okay, yeah, I see what you mean there. Why do that if that’s what you want someone to do in reality…” Then she looked at Cody. “Did she mean it? Do you believe her?”

  Cody looked pensive, carefully navigating her way around her sexual feelings for McKenna to look at what she felt in her gut. Finally, she nodded.

  Lyric nodded too, seeing that Cody was doing her very best to be completely honest not only with Lyric, but also with herself.

  “Do you have any evidence to back that up?” Lyric asked then.

  “I might,” Cody said.

  “Explain,” Lyric said again with a slight grin.

  “I found some documents that have her signature on them, resident transfers and things, but there’s also a bank signature document, and the signatures don’t look exact…”

  “So you think hubby might be forging her signature?” Lyric asked.

  “Yeah,” Cody said, nodding, “I do.”

  Lyric nodded. “Okay, so you get those documents to QD for review,” Lyric said, talking about the Questioned Documents section of the Bureau of Forensic Services with the Department of Justice.

  “Right, that was my plan,” Cody said.

  Lyric blew her breath out. “So… Let’s talk about the rest of it…” she said, her tone softer now, knowing that this was going to be the harder conversation.

  Cody pressed her lips together, part of her wanting to say forget about it, but the part of her that knew how insidious suppressing things could be to a person pushed her forward.

  “I want her, Mom.” Cody said, her tone reflecting the confusion that desire was causing.

  Lyric looked thoughtful. “Is it mutual?” she asked.

  Cody blinked a couple of times, looking pensive. “There was definitely a moment the other night where I knew she wanted me.”

  Lyric nodded again. “But she didn’t act on it, right?” he clarified.

  “Right,” Cody said, knowing that her mother was thinking like a cop at that moment.

  “Good, okay,” Lyric said, looking relieved. “So, do you want to tell me any of the rest of it?” she asked her tone gentle.

  Cody swallowed convulsively a couple of times and reached for another cigarette. Lyric waited patiently. When she could see that Cody was having a hard time approaching the subject, she leaned forward, tilting her head to get under Cody’s gaze.

  “You know that no matter what it is, you can talk to me about it, don’t you?�
�� Lyric said.

  Cody sucked in her breath, her eyes glazing with tears again, but then she nodded.

  “And that no matter what it is, I’m going to love you exactly the same.” Cody swallowed convulsively again, biting the inside of her cheek.

  “Oh babe…” Lyric said, shaking her head. “You need to look at that ring, right there,” she said, pointing to the platinum band that Cody wore on her left ring finger. “That ring means that we’re a family no matter what. There is nothing you can do or say that can ever change how much we love you.”

  Cody looked at the ring on her finger, remembering the day Lyric had given it to her.

  It was Lyric and Savanna’s wedding day. A fourteen-year-old Cody was acting as Lyric’s best ‘man’. As they stood in the anteroom waiting for the wedding to begin, Lyric had tossed Cody a small velvet box.

  “What’s this?” Cody asked, when she opened it she saw that it was a band. “Is this for Savanna?”

  “No, it’s for you,” Lyric said. “We got the word this morning that your adoption is legal as of today.”

  Cody looked at Lyric, her eyes wide. “I’m your daughter now?” she breathed.

  Lyric smiled warmly, nodding. Cody threw her arms around Lyric, in tears immediately. She had been so amazed that these two women had been willing to take her into their home, their lives, and their hearts.

  “So where do I wear this?” Cody asked.

  “Wherever you want,” Lyric told her.

  Cody had put it on her left ring finger. The only time it left her finger was when she was undercover, and then it was on a platinum chain that was long enough to keep it low on her chest near her heart. She always had it with her, always.

  Looking over at Lyric now, she felt so grateful to have her support.

  “When you said that you want everything and nothing,” Lyric said, “what did you mean? From her?”

  Cody considered the question for a moment. “I guess I meant that part of me wants everything, and the other part of me wants nothing from her… Is that crazy?”

  Lyric grinned. “Well, that’s your mother’s department,” she said. “But the part that wants everything… What is everything to you?”