“You can’t save everyone, Jackson, you know this. It’s like you’re constantly chasing that same ghost.” I lean forward, putting my arms on the desk.
“I don’t want to save her.” He shakes his head to clear his thoughts. “I just want her to know she’s safe.”
“What the fuck are you doing?” I ask when I see him start typing in Nan’s name.
“I need to know what her story is, Mick.” Right before he can pull up anything, I call his name.
“It’s her story to tell, Jackson. Not yours to find out. If she is the way you say she is, there’s no way in hell she’s going to be cool with you looking into her before she’s had a chance to tell you.”
He shrugs at me, not ready to admit I’m fucking right.
“Yeah, I know you aren’t going to stop searching till you find out those answers. You want to keep her safe.” I pause, cocking my head to the side. “Who is going to keep you from yourself, Jackson?”
“I have no idea, but something is pulling me to her, something I can’t even explain. I’ve got to get home. I promised to mow her lawn.”
“Which lawn we talking about?” I duck when he throws a balled up piece of paper at me. “How are you going to explain Kendall?”
“There is nothing to explain. We’re friends, just friends, from now on.” He grabs his keys off his desk, not interested in finishing this conversation.
“I hope you know what you’re doing, for both your sakes,” I tell him right before he walks out of the room.
I stare at the case file in front of me. A young girl who just up and vanished with a guy no one knows about. I don’t know what it is but something in my gut tells me this case isn’t what it appears to be. My instincts tell me we won’t be closing it any time soon.
I read over the notes a few times, trying to find some kind of clue.
Having done all I can do for today, I get up to leave. I make my way out the door and head home to my empty house, my empty fridge, and my empty fucking life.
The next day Jackson and I decide to hit the streets to find out if anyone knows anything. We may be looking for a needle in a haystack right now, but we need something, anything, to go on.
“No one is fucking talking, Mick. Plus, all the people we want to talk to are probably still sleeping it off,” Jackson says right before he puts his water bottle to his lips.
“We should come back down tonight, catch them in action. You up for it tonight? Or are you still nursing your sour mood?”
“Kendall and I have run its course. It’s over. Been a long time coming.” He places his hands on his hips, waiting for my snarky comments.
“It’s about time you set her—and yourself—free. I’ve been waiting for this. There was nothing anyone could have said to make her turn around and walk away from you. It was always going to have to be you who pulled the plug. She’s a good girl. She’ll be just fine.” I turn to walk to the car. “What was the last straw?”
“I can’t really pinpoint one thing,” he tells me while getting into the car. “I got home, she was on my couch watching television, and it just felt wrong. Then my neighbor dropped off cookies, and my head wasn’t there. She sensed it, we had a conversation, and now we’re just friends, without benefits.”
I pull out into the street, making my way back to the precinct.
“Your neighbor brought you cookies? That threw you off?” I turn around in my seat, taking off my sunglasses to look at him, thinking he has lost his mind over cookies.
“Leave it be.”
I relent, knowing he’ll talk when he’s ready.
“What time do you want to head out tonight?”
“I think around ten should be good.”
We make it to the precinct, and he nods his head. “I’ll pick you up tonight. I’ll get an unmarked car.”
“Sounds good. I’ll be at home if you need anything.” I open the door, leaning into the car. “Hey. Bring me a cookie tonight.” And just like that, I close the door before he can reach over and smack my head, belly laughing the whole way to my car.
Chapter Four
Mick
I finally get the last of the groceries put away when the doorbell rings followed by a knock and the door pushing open.
“Baby?” I hear Sandie’s soft voice calling.
I open the beer in my hand and take a long pull. I don’t have to answer. I know she’ll find me.
She walks into the kitchen, dropping her purse down on the table. She looks like she just stepped out of a fashion magazine. Everything matches, right down to the jewelry she’s wearing. She has some kind of complicated scarf around her neck that drapes over her stylish shirt that coordinates perfectly with her flowered skirt, all leading down to a sexy pair of wedge sandals. Hell, her outfit probably cost more than my couches.
She walks up to me, snaking her hand up my chest to wrap around my neck. “Hey, baby, I missed you.” She leans in, kissing me on my neck.
“Yeah.” I find it very hard to believe that she missed me. “My cock maybe. But me? That’s debatable.”
“You know I miss you. I sent you a text.” She places both arms around my neck.
“Really?” I ask. “I didn’t get anything.”
I can see the fucking lie on her face. I’m a detective, for Christ’s sake. Doesn’t she realize I can see right through her?
“You know, I’ve been thinking, Sandie.” I take her hands from around my neck, pushing her away gently. “How much fucking longer is this shit going to go on? Aren’t you fucking tired of leading a double life?” I pick up my beer, taking another pull from it. “I know I’m about fucking done. You’re never going to leave him, and I’m tired of being that other guy.” I place the beer back down and assess her. Tears are welling in her eyes.
“I just finished filing divorce papers. He is being served tomorrow. It’s time we start our lives.” She comes to me again. “It’s time I show the world that I’m yours and you are all mine.”
These are the words I’ve been waiting to hear for seven years, words that make my heart beat faster, words that make me feel wanted for the first time in my life.
“Promise?” I ask her, not sure if I should take the bait, if I should get my hopes up.
“Promise, baby,” she says right before she smashes her lips on mine, and we spend the next few hours fucking in my kitchen.
Lying on the couch with her on top of me, I hear my phone ringing from my jeans that are heaped in a pile on the kitchen floor.
I run to them to see Thomas’s name flash on the screen. Fuck!
“Sup?”
“Hey, Mick, it’s Thomas. Got a call from a woman named Marissa about her runaway daughter, Lori. Captain says it’s your case.”
I put the beer that I was just about to open down on the counter. “Yeah, it’s our case. What you got?”
“Kid called home, mother was hysterical. Good luck with that one. I texted you her address.”
“Thanks. I’ll check it out and take care of it.” I hang up, looking at the text at the same time I’m dialing Jackson.
“Yo,” he answers, his voice tight.
“We just got a call from that girl, Lori’s mother. She got a phone call from her today. She is freaking out. Called the precinct looking for you, but they called me first.”
“I can be ready in ten. Where should I pick you up?”
I hear him rushing around, knocking shit down.
“Um, how about I just meet you at the station in about thirty minutes?” I look over at the couch where Sandie hasn’t moved.
“Station, eh? Should I even ask where you are or are we not getting into it now?”
“I’ll see you in thirty.” I hang up without acknowledging his question.
By the time I make it outside, I’m already running through the details of the case. Lori, age seventeen, started hanging with the wrong crowd, and then one day, she just didn’t come home. Her mother hasn’t seen or heard from her since. Until tod
ay.
Friends say she’s been in touch with them. The thing is, she’s seventeen, so it’s hard not to consider that this might be a case of a teenager just wanting her freedom. Her mother said that lately she’d become more distant than usual, and her grades began slipping. When she confronted her, they had a big argument that ended in Lori storming out of the house and not coming back.
I make it to the precinct at the same time that Jackson pulls up. I wait for him to get out of his car before I leave mine.
“Your shirt is buttoned wrong.”
I look down at my shirt and see that my shirt is, in fact, buttoned wrong. After hanging up the phone with Jackson, I was too busy rushing to get out of there, placing a kiss on Sandie’s head with a promise to text her later.
“Fuck.” I go about righting my shirt. “I wasn’t expecting to be called in. I was…”
“You don’t have to explain yourself to me. I just hope you know what you’re doing.” He makes his way over to our unmarked car.
“I know what you’re going to say, so we can just skip this whole bullshit conversation right now.” I pull into traffic, heading toward the center of town.
“I wasn’t going to say anything. You’re a grown ass man. You know what you’re doing.” He stares straight ahead.
“She says she’s leaving him. I have to believe her,” I say to the windshield, instead of turning to look at him.
“She said that last time, too, didn’t she? Strung you along for four months before she told you she couldn’t do it right then. Then there was your birthday, when she showed up and spent the whole weekend telling you she left him, only to go back home on Monday. Trust me, I remember. It was me who found you after you lost yourself in the bottom of a bottle of Jack. It wasn’t pretty.” He isn’t fucking wrong. It’s been a fucking roller coaster, to say the least.
“She said it’s finally time. She loves me.”
He shakes his head, knowing this is a game Sandie is playing with me. He knows she’s been stringing me along for the last seven fucking years now.
“I want nothing more than for that to be true. You know this. But it shouldn’t be this hard, Mick.” He wants to continue, but knowing that he’s going to start sounding a bit too much like Dr. Phil, he backs off and continues staring out the window.
Chapter Five
Mick
When we pull up to the address on the text that Thomas sent me, Lori’s mother’s house, I’m instantly on alert because we’re now in the projects. The five matching apartment buildings are known around here as Welfare Avenue.
A couple teenagers on the corner try to be intimidating and let us know we’re on their turf, puffing out their chests and taking us in. Right in the middle of the group is the leader of the pack. The two I suspect are his seconds are right beside him, chewing on toothpicks, sizing us up with their cell phones in their hands.
We open the door, unsurprised the lock is broken, allowing anyone to just walk in. The hallway is dark, with just a few lights working, while most are broken and a few are flickering. I bring my hand to my nose to block out the burning sensation from the stench of urine. We get to the third floor and make our way to the door with the number five on it.
Jackson knocks on the door twice, taking a step back while I look over his shoulder, making sure we aren’t going to be ambushed.
We hear the locks clicking open, but neither of us is prepared for the sight we are met with.
A tiny girl, maybe all of five foot one, opens the door, wearing tight booty shorts and a tank top that has seen cleaner days. Brown hair that is at least clean sits in a messy bun on the top of her head. Her face is free of makeup.
“Are you the cops?” she asks, her voice soft, yet trying to be hard.
“Yes, ma’am. Are you Marissa, Lori’s mom?” Jackson says, flashing her his badge. “May we come in?”
I don’t bother with mine since she moves to the side holding on to the open door, ushering us in. I look around once I get in, and I have to admit I’m kind of shocked. Inside is completely neat and clean. The furniture looks almost new, and a television sits in the corner. There is a small kitchen with no table, just two stools.
Two bedrooms open to the living room, both rooms looking clean with beds and a few other pieces of furniture. I can tell one is obviously a teenager’s from the posters hanging on the wall.
“Please have a seat. Can I get you anything?” She’s nervous. I know this because she is wringing her hands.
“We’re good, thanks,” Jackson answers her while he goes to sit down, and I stand by the kitchen, leaning against the wall. I’m letting Jackson take the lead with this one.
“So you called in saying Lori got in touch with you?”
“Yes. I got a call on my cell phone sometime after ten a.m. I was asleep, but the minute I heard her ringtone I flew out of bed.”
“What did she say?”
“She said she was fine and to call off the dogs.” She looks between Jackson and me.
“You weren’t here when she went missing, right?” I ask her from my side of the room.
“I was here when she left, but it was when I got home from work at three a.m. that I noticed she hadn’t returned.” She looks down at her hands. “I was working. She usually just texts me, but since we got into a fight the night before I just thought she was pissed off.”
“You’re a stripper, right? Is there any way she got ahold of your drugs or saw something she shouldn’t have?” As the words come out of my mouth, even I’m shocked. I have never ever assumed the worst of anyone in my life. But the fact that she is a stripper is hitting pretty close to home.
My mother was on the same road as Marissa here. When I lived with her, she was in and out of the house at different times of the day and night. Sometimes high, sometimes not, usually with a different guy. If she kept a roof over my head and food in the fridge, in her mind that was her being June fucking Cleaver.
Jackson whips his head around to glare at me with a clear ‘what the fuck’ expression on his face.
Marissa’s shoulders go back like she is gearing up for a fight. “Yes, I’m a stripper, but no, I don’t do drugs. If you want, we can take a piss test right now to ease your mind, Detective.” Her sassiness comes out full force.
“Won’t be necessary,” Jackson cuts in.
“A seventeen-year-old sees her mother as a stripper. You don’t think she’ll follow in your footsteps?” I won’t give in that easy, so I just continue.
“I don’t know, I think her knowing you have to work for things isn’t such a bad lesson. Considering her father left me with his bookie debt of eighty grand and the only way the guy he owed the money to wouldn’t take it out on us was if I agreed to work for him. I think showing her you don’t run from your obligations, like her weasel father did, but instead you keep fighting and working to earn the things you want is good. So, if you came here just to pass judgment on me and my job while not taking my daughter’s disappearance seriously, I think we’ve both wasted our time.” Marissa goes to stand up, her hands shaking.
Jackson grabs her wrist, stopping her, making me stand up straight with the need to rip it away from him. I make a mental note to go and research the douchebag who left her and his daughter to clean up his mess. I’m not sure what it is about this chick that’s getting me so riled. It’s confusing as fuck, especially considering I just met her five minutes ago.
“I’m going to apologize for my partner and his mood today. Please know finding your daughter is very important to us.”
She looks, or rather glares, at me, waiting for me to say something, but I just shrug my shoulders. I’m afraid my voice will deceive me if I open my mouth again.
“I asked around at work and there’s a new guy who has been coming in. I don’t have his name yet, but he’s been in a couple of times. He is also in scumbag Bentley’s crew. Owns a pawn shop, isn’t fair, and sells whatever you bring to him to the first person who wants to buy it befo
re you even get a chance to get it back yourself. He also doesn’t care how you get his money just as long as you do.”
“I need you to not try to do anything on your own and let us handle things.”
“Oh, yeah, it looks like you guys are really handling things. She’s been missing for a week,” she whispers, and a tear escapes her eye, rolling down her cheek.
I want to reach out and catch it. Instead, I push my hands into my pockets to stop myself.
“We are working on it, Marissa, but if you’re interfering, it’s just going to create extra work for us. So please, if you hear anything or see anything, call us first. Don’t just go charging in, call me first.” He takes out his card and hands it to her. “My cell number is on there so you can call me whenever you think you need to.”
I just barely manage to stop myself from snatching it out of her hand and throwing it back in his face. I shake my head from the scene in my head.
She wipes her cheeks with the back of her hand. “I’m doing all of this for her. So I didn’t uproot her and take her away from everyone and everything she knew.”
He stands up, for sure making notes in his head about this fresh new face out there. We must be thinking the same thing; that we need to pay Bentley another visit. It’ll be the fourth time this week.
“Thank you for calling us with this update,” Jackson says to her.
I barely get through the door into the hallway before it is shut right behind me, almost bouncing against my head.
“What the fuck was that bullshit in there? Since when did you become such a judgmental asshole? Spewing bullshit like that to a victim’s mother, what the fuck, man?”
I don’t even answer, I just walk away.
I storm to the car without saying anything. Jackson doesn’t even have the door closed before I peel off from the curb and slap my hand down on the steering wheel twice.
“FUCCCKKKK!” I pull over one block down. Whipping the door open, I jump out and slam it shut before I kick it in.
“I’m going to go out on a limb here and say your head isn’t in the game today,” Jackson says while he’s standing in the open car door one foot still inside, while he places a hand on the roof of the car.
Pieces Of Heaven: Pieces Of Heaven (Heaven & Hell Book 2) Page 2