Heat Wave

by Jill Marie Landis

  “It just happened, that’s all. It wasn’t anything passionate. I told her it didn’t mean anything.”

  “Did it?”

  R.J. knew, in that split second, he could choose the truth or he could choose to salvage thirty years of friendship.

  He chose their friendship.

  “It didn’t mean a thing.”

  There was another stretch of intense silence before Ty responded.

  “Was she angry enough to leave?”

  “I have no idea. I didn’t think so, or I wouldn’t have sent her home.”

  “I’ve got to hang up.”

  “Look, call me when she gets back.”

  “Call me if you hear from her.” Ty hung up first.

  It was almost midnight. Clouds obscured the sky, hanging so low they hugged the black water. R.J. knew he wasn’t going to get much sleep tonight, not with the boat riding the angry swells that swept through the small boat harbor.

  It was a lot easier to convince himself the storm would keep him awake than to admit that he would be worrying about Sunny and Alice and the irreparable damage he might have done to his friendship with Ty Chandler.

  AS KAT DROVE back through Twilight, most of the shops along Cabrillo Road were closed. Foot traffic had thinned to a few couples lingering in the moonlit park or strolling along the walk overlooking the cove.

  Her tears had dried by the time she slowed her car to a crawl along the deserted main strip.

  She tried to focus—not on Ty and what had just happened, but on finding Sunny. Taking refuge in her work had always served her well. She fell back on it now.

  A closed sign was hanging on the door at Selma’s diner, but there was still light streaming out of the kitchen.

  Whipping the wheel to the right, Kat drew the car up to the curb and parked. She walked up to the diner door, leaned toward the glass, and started knocking. Within a few seconds, Selma Gibbs came strolling out of the kitchen, hastily running a hand over her hair, then tucking in the hem of a knit tank top that would have looked great on someone twenty years younger.

  Selma waved, opened the door, and ushered her in. Kat realized there was a lot to be said for small towns where a shopkeeper recognized you and opened up no matter how late.

  “The kitchen’s closed, but if you want something cold, a salad or sandwich, I can have Joe rustle it up.” Selma’s lipstick looked like it had just taken a beating. Obviously Joe had been rustling up more than a sandwich.

  “I’m just here for a little information,” Kat replied.

  Selma’s interest suddenly piqued. She lowered her voice to a gravelly whisper. “Are you working a case?”

  “Ty’s daughter, Sunny, isn’t home yet and he’s concerned. Was she in here tonight?”

  Selma shook her head. “I still can’t believe Ty Chandler has a kid. Why, I’d just come to town when he was a quarterback at Twilight High. What a good-looker that kid was—”

  “So, have you seen Sunny, Selma?”

  “Actually, she came in late this afternoon. Waited on her myself. Let’s see . . . she ordered a grilled chicken salad, and some fish sticks and toasted cheese for French Fry. Who’d of ever thought to name a child French Fry?”

  “Exactly when was Sunny here? Do you know?”

  “About four thirty. Maybe a bit later.”

  “Was she alone? Except for French Fry?”

  Selma nodded. “Yes. A couple stopped by the table to talk to her. An older couple. Complimented her on French Fry’s good behavior. First time I ever saw Sunny smile like that.”

  “You didn’t happen to see her with a guy with dreadlocks, did you?” She went on to describe Jamie Hatcher.

  “Is that a bunch of hair all matted together? If so, I didn’t see anyone like that.”

  Joe—middle-aged, with quite a belly beneath his spattered white apron—walked through the darkened diner and stood so close to Selma their shoulders touched. He smiled down into Selma’s eyes and Kat found herself tempted to dare to want the same thing for herself.

  “You know Ty’s kid? Sunny?” Selma asked Joe.

  Joe nodded. “I saw her when I went out to empty the trash.”

  Kat rubbed the back of her left hand, tried not to wince as she practiced curling her fingers into a fist. “In the parking lot out back?”

  “Yeah. She was talking to some guy with a shaved head. Not completely bald. Stubble. You know the look.”

  “Could you hear what they were saying?” It may have been Jamie, maybe not.

  “I wasn’t paying attention. She was standing next to her car. Her little one was getting fussy. Sunny looked ready to leave, but the guy just kept talking.”

  “You didn’t actually see her leave?”

  “No. You think she’s all right?”

  Kat had no idea, but the man’s dark eyes so expressed his obvious concern that she decided to put his mind at ease.

  “I hope so.”

  Kat thanked them and walked out. Maybe Sunny had left town on her own. Or maybe she’d talked someone into giving her a ride back to Southern California. She would have known it would be easy to trace the Camry, and she might not have wanted to risk being found.

  The question was, had she gone back to Hatcher and the others, or had she taken off for parts unknown? And if so, why? Had she been that upset with Ty and R.J.?

  There was only one way to find out, and that was to look for Hatcher and see if he would lead her to Sunny.

  Chapter 30

  IN THE WEE HOURS of the morning, with her palms locked in a death grip on the wheel, Kat turned onto the 101 off-ramp and into a well-lit Carl’s Junior parking lot. She rested her forehead on the backs of her hands and took long, cleansing breaths.

  The windshield wipers swished and clicked, swished and clicked rhythmically, cutting the stillness of the night. She killed the motor and sat there, staring through the rain on the windshield into the glaring emptiness of the fast-food restaurant.

  The streets were slick, deserted, and shimmering beneath the haunting amber glow of streetlights. Normal people were home in bed, not out on the road alone in the middle of a storm.

  Beyond the plate-glass window fronting Carl’s, two lone employees stood at attention at their posts. She sighed, longing for the taste of hot coffee, even bad hot coffee, but she couldn’t bring herself to move.

  The constant rain, the sultry weather, were all too reminiscent of the day of the accident on Kauai.

  Kat shuddered, stared at the lights distorted by the rain smearing her windshield, and let her mind drift.

  AFTER HEARING FROM Justin, she stops leaving messages. Somehow she struggles through the week, fights to stay sane, to carry on as usual.

  Pretty hard when you’re five months’ pregnant, your fiancé is cheating on you, and everybody knows it.

  Without telling her, he switches to an earlier flight and arrives home while she’s at work. By the time she gets home, he’s already been by the apartment. His half of the closet is empty. The dresser drawers hang open. She stares around in shock, realizing what he’s done.

  Coward. Shit-for-brains.

  They’re having a baby. Doesn’t that mean anything? Doesn’t she mean more to him than some silicone-enhanced 8x10 glossy trying to pass as a real woman?

  She grabs her car keys and tears out of the apartment, headed for his parents’ estate near Po’ipu, certain that’s where he’s gone.

  A couple of blocks from the condo, she turns left onto the bypass road that winds its way through the cane fields, but she’s forgotten that it’s June, that school is out and the annual caravans of teens are cruising the island.

  She’s forgotten that reckless young drivers, kids naive and foolish enough to believe they are immortal, play chicken on the bypass r
oad.

  Even in the rain.

  THE WINDSHIELD WIPERS’ monotonous song brought her back.

  She laid her hand over her abdomen. The emptiness was always there. She’d lost her baby girl that night. Her body had slowly recovered, but not her spirit.

  Riddled with guilt, she’d tried to go on with her life on Kauai, but in the end she had to leave Kauai behind to survive.

  She’d run fast and far—from all the sorrow in her family’s eyes, from their worried glances and hushed whispers.

  It was much easier not to open up to anyone. Not to love or be loved, not to risk all that pain spilling out again. Better to wall up her heart than take a chance on being hurt, knowing next time she might not survive.

  Before Twilight Cove, before Ty Chandler, she’d given up on love. It was the one thing she feared most. Loving too much. Losing control. Losing everything again.

  But now, because of the shooting in Seal Beach, because of the things Jake said, but most of all because of Ty Chandler, she had to decide whether or not she was strong enough, brave enough, foolish enough, to let herself love again.

  Chapter 31

  DAWN CRAWLED across the hazy L.A. skyline, tinted miles of glass in the high-rise windows a bright, Day-Glo pink. Traffic on the 101 was nearly at a standstill when Kat exited the Franklin off-ramp in Hollywood. She stopped long enough to grab another cup of coffee and a breakfast burrito before she threaded her way through the busy streets to Sunny’s old apartment.

  The shady side street was relatively quiet. There was no one in the courtyard garden, no sign of life. One porch light was still on, faded to almost nothing under the early-morning sun.

  She pulled over a few yards away and parked on the opposite side of the street, where she could watch the apartment door. Reaching for her cell phone, she checked her voice mail. Two missed calls from Ty, one from Arnie Tate, and a message from a Mitch Carson.

  She tried to place Mitch, then slowly the memory of a heavyset stockbroker with brown hair and hazel eyes came back to her. She’d met him at the gym, had dinner with him, and had gone back to his swanky redevelopment loft in downtown Long Beach for a one-nighter. That was her old life—running from any meaningful relationship, trying to become the exact opposite of the starry-eyed, naive virgin she’d been before Justin.

  Mitch said he wanted to take her out to dinner again. She knew what he really wanted.

  She played the message twice, and before she could change her mind, called and left Mitch a voice mail, telling him she’d meet him at the bar at Kelly’s Restaurant in Naples at six.

  What better way to stop thinking about Ty than to go out with someone else? Wasn’t that what Jake had advised? Get out more?

  She didn’t remember much about Mitch Carson. She’d thought at the time he seemed like an okay guy. She’d never really given him a chance.

  Kelly’s was an institution—crowded, dark, and smoky, with deep burgundy leather booths and rich prime rib. At least she had a hearty meal to look forward to.

  She polished off the burrito and coffee and waited. Two hours later, she recognized the old woman who walked out of an apartment in a ratty chenille robe and worn slippers to pick up her morning Times. The woman shuffled back inside, and for a good thirty minutes more nothing happened.

  Kat glanced at her watch. It was almost eight in the morning. She holstered her gun beneath a light-brown blazer that complemented her khaki pants, then she stepped out of the car and headed across the street.

  She knocked on the door, waited, listened, knocked again. There was no response, no muffled sounds behind the door. She headed for the apartment across the courtyard. As she passed the old woman’s window, the draperies shifted. She caught a glimpse of the woman’s face staring back.

  Kat waved, and the drape fell back into place. She rang the manager’s bell.

  A lanky, dark-haired man with a lock of hair falling over tortoiseshell glasses blinked and rubbed his hand across the night’s growth of stubble on his chin.

  “We got nothing available,” he informed her, looking her up and down.

  “I’m not looking for an apartment. My name’s Kat Vargas. I’d like a little information.” She pulled her wallet out of her blazer pocket, flashed her library card, and shoved it back in her pocket. It usually worked like a charm, and did this time, too.

  He didn’t ask her to step in. “Yeah? Go ahead.”

  “Your name?”

  “Charles Gomez.”

  “Mr. Gomez, I’m looking for someone who lives in number nine.”

  “Aren’t we all? They’re behind on the rent.”

  “You know where they hang out?”

  “No. The best time to catch them home is early morning.”

  “It is early,” she reminded him.

  He yawned. “Nah. I meant three or four in the morning. They leave when it gets dark, come back in the early morning hours. They didn’t come home last night. I’ve been watching for them. They owe somebody else?”

  “May I see their rental agreement?”

  His lip curled slightly, but he nodded. “Yeah. Let me get it.”

  She waited on the porch, kept an eye on Sunny’s apartment, while the neighbor lady kept an eye on her. Sparrows flitted in the branches of a crepe myrtle in the garden. An old orange tree loaded with blossoms attracted bees. The air was almost clear after the rain.

  “Here it is.”

  She turned, took the application, and quickly scanned it for a place of employment. The form was dismally lacking in information, the apartment originally rented to Dodge Radisson and Jamie Hatcher. Finally she had Dodge’s last name. Sunny Simone wasn’t listed, nor was anyone else.

  “Do you know Dodge Radisson?”

  “I haven’t seen him around for months. Over half a year at least.”

  “What about the pretty girl who was living here? You see her yesterday?”

  “Long, reddish hair? With the kid? She hasn’t been around lately either. Probably got fed up with that little turd Hatcher. He’s a bastard.”

  “In what way?”

  “Thinks he’s hot shit with that car of his.”

  “Neon-yellow Civic?”

  “Yeah.”

  She glanced down at the form again. Noted both Hatcher and Radisson had listed an address in the Valley as their place of employment. California driver’s license numbers were listed. No Social Security numbers. She pulled out a small spiral notebook and quickly copied down all the numbers, handed the form back to the manager, pocketed the notebook and pen.

  “Thanks.”

  “They in trouble?” He appeared hopeful. “I’ve been wishing they’d move.”

  “I’m only looking for the girl.”

  “Good luck. If you see them, tell them the rent’s overdue.”

  Before she could thank him, he closed the door and disappeared inside.

  She went down the walk, past the birdbath and broken statue. Where the saint’s head should have been, a plain brown sparrow perched atop St. Francis’s empty cowl collar.

  Just before she reached the curb, a late-model Mitsubishi Eclipse whipped into the open space in front of the apartment building. Kat realized she’d been surfing car sites on the Net too long when she mentally started to tick off the car’s features at a glance: electric-blue pearl finish, alloy wheels, and Yokohama Parada tires. She couldn’t hazard a guess as to how much muscle might be under the hood or how much money the young man who stepped out and hit the power lock had spent on his ride.

  “You looking for Jamie?” She hoped that her looks-younger-than-she-really-is gene was working overtime this morning.

  Five-ten, brown hair, with a clean-shaven full face, he frowned, more hesitant than wary, from beneath the brim of a navy ball cap. He might have a
fully loaded car, but the kid’s expression was fairly blank.

  “Yeah. Is he here?” His glance strayed to Jamie’s apartment door.

  She shook her head. “No one’s here. I thought maybe I’d find him at the warehouse. Is he still using the one over in Van Nuys?” She named the address listed on the rental application.

  He shrugged. No help at all.

  “I’ve got an insurance check for him,” she improvised. “You have any other idea where he might be?”

  “Probably at the new place.”

  “He really needs this check and I promised to hand-deliver it.” She pulled out her spiral notebook, acted as if she was flipping to an address. Her heart was knocking a mile a minute, amped on excitement, too much coffee, or both.

  Moments like this, she loved her job, but she’d never had so much riding on it before. The high was better than drugs. “Are you planning on going over there?”

  “Naw. I just stopped by ’cause I was close.”

  “Exactly where is the new place again?” She held her breath, waited. The new warehouse could be anywhere in Southern California, but she was betting the kids wouldn’t have gone too far afield.

  He gave her another location not far from the one on the rental application.

  “Great.” She flashed him a flirty smile and tucked her hair behind her ear. “That’s a great car.”

  “Thanks. Tell Jamie to call Brian.”

  “Sure.” She didn’t look back until she was almost across the street. Then she glanced over her shoulder and caught him staring at her butt. She waved, and he raised his chin in acknowledgment before his eyes dropped to her rear again.

  Boys will be boys.

  Once inside the car, she adjusted the rearview mirror. Sunglasses hid her bloodshot, tired eyes. She was reaching for her L.A. County Thomas Guide directory of street maps as the blue Mitsubishi squealed away from the curb.

  She punched in Fred’s number at the L.A.P.D. before starting the car. He still owed her. Maybe it was time they made a deal.

  “Westberg.”

  “Fred, it’s Kat. If I can hand you Jamie Hatcher, will you help me out with someone close who’ll testify against him?”