by M. S. Parker
“Yeah, Jalen, it’s the whole world ganging up against you.” I shook my head as my voice dropped. I was still pissed, but that wasn’t the dominant emotion anymore. “You decide how the world is and that makes it so. Must be nice to know everything.”
“I actually thought you were different.” He dropped the flowers, stepping on them as he left.
“Bastard!” I shouted as he slammed the door shut behind him.
Tears burned against my eyelids, but I pushed them back. No way in hell was I going to cry over Jalen Larsen. Not anymore. I was done with him and his inability to trust. I’d thought I had issues, but I was nothing compared to him.
“Rona, are you okay?” Clay put his hand on my shoulder.
“Fine.” I glanced at him. “But would it kill you to wear a damn shirt?”
“We both know it’s not about me not wearing a shirt.”
He had a point.
“I’m sorry for my part in it,” he said. “I shouldn’t have let him come in. I thought you knew he was coming.”
“It’s not your fault,” I said, moving out from under Clay’s well-meaning hand. Between my dream and Jalen’s accusations, I wasn’t feeling particularly comfortable with my friend touching me right now.
“Did you tell Jalen that you and I used to…be a thing?”
“I did,” I said as I picked up the flowers and set them on the counter. Some of them were crushed, but I was still going to check to see if any of them could be salvaged. No point in wasting them. “And I also told him that it was over. That we’re friends.”
“You have to admit,” Clay said, “from his side of things, it did look pretty bad.”
I almost threw the donuts at him, but it would’ve been a waste of good sugar. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I’m just saying, I know I’d be pissed if I showed up at my girlfriend’s place some morning and a gorgeous, shirtless man answered the door.”
“Gorgeous?” I raised an eyebrow. “You think a little highly of yourself.”
He grinned at me, but I didn’t quite have it in me to smile back.
“Anyway, it doesn’t matter,” I said. “I don’t care what it looked like. He’s crossed the line more than once.”
“Don’t you think it’s because he’s scared?” He held up a hand when I opened my mouth to argue. “He is, Rona. He’s absolutely terrified that he’s going to lose you.”
“Then he should talk to me instead of behaving like a child,” I countered. “He should trust me.”
A little voice in the back of my head reminded me that Jalen had good reason to be untrusting. Elise had done a number on him.
But he should know that I wasn’t Elise. It wasn’t fair to me to be held responsible for the infidelities of his crazy ex-wife…excuse me, wife. Besides, it wasn’t like I didn’t have my own baggage from my past to deal with. He’d seen most of it.
Maybe that was the problem. He needed someone who could handle his shit without him having to deal with theirs. The thing was, I had no problem working with him on his issues. It seemed like he didn’t want to try to get better though. He just wanted me to accept things the way they were. Maybe some women could do that, but I couldn’t.
Twenty-Seven
I probably shouldn’t have eaten that second donut, but it’d been either a chocolate donut with sprinkles or a shot of tequila, and I didn’t think alcohol before work was the best idea. So, I’d gone with sugar, and now I was having a serious sugar crash.
I stared at the computer screen, reading the same email for the third or fourth time, but not processing it any better than I had the first time. It wasn’t even an email that I would’ve read thoroughly before. A privacy policy change that I normally would’ve skimmed. Except today, I couldn’t seem to get past it. I’d move on to the next one, but then I’d start getting anxious, worried that I’d miss something important, and that would send me back to the email. It wasn’t rational, but the brain wasn’t always rational.
I needed to pull myself together. I’d done it before, multiple times, and under much more difficult circumstances. After what happened with my parents, I’d made a new life with Anton. After he died, I made another new life, this one alone. When I’d lost my place at the academy, I hadn’t known what I’d do. Then I’d come here and decided that this was where I wanted to start again. Again.
Except I didn’t want to uproot my life again. This was my new life, and I wasn’t going to let what happened with Jalen scare me away from a city I loved, a job that made a difference, and friends like Jenna, Rylan, and Clay.
Which meant I needed to get through this damned email before my one o’clock appointment with a potential receptionist.
Still, I breathed a sigh of relief when I heard someone come in. A client was an excuse that my brain understood.
“Hey, are you busy?” Jenna came back into the office with a smile. “If you are, that’s fine, but if not, I’d like to talk about my cases.”
“Anything specific you want to talk about?” I asked, speaking way too fast. “Help yourself to coffee and donuts too. I’ve had way too many of both.”
“I talked to Stacey again yesterday,” she said as she poured herself something to drink. “Her parents grounded her for a month for taking off instead of talking to them, but I have a feeling they’re going to cave and let her out early. They’re having some serious guilt about hiding the truth from her.”
“I couldn’t imagine what I’d do in their position,” I admitted. “Deciding whether or not to tell a kid they were adopted. When to do it. How.”
“She’s actually more frustrated with them for keeping me from her than she is about the adoption thing.” Jenna sat across from me and reached into the box to pull out one of the jelly-filled donuts. “But they’ve made it very clear that I’m not supposed to tell Stacey any of the…bad. I completely get it. They want to protect her. But it does make it harder for me to be honest about my past, which makes it harder for her to get to know me.”
“What do you tell her?” I asked.
“What I can,” Jenna said and licked some sugar from her finger. “If it’s something her parents don’t want me to talk about, I keep it vague and say that maybe I’ll tell her more when she’s older. I’m pretty sure she tried googling me, so she knows there’s some bad stuff in my past.”
Bad stuff. That was an understatement.
“Does that mean you’ve changed your mind about not wanting to find the rest of your siblings?” I’d wondered how resolved she would continue to be about that or if it’d been more of a heat of the moment sort of decision.
“I’m not sure,” she admitted. “Searching for Stacey did put her into danger.”
“Danger of her own making,” I put in. “Hers and her parents. If they’d been honest with her, she might not have reacted the way she did.”
“True, but we can’t know what any of my other siblings know about who they are or where they come from. Or how they’ll react when we find them.” She took a thoughtful bite of her donut.
“I can gather the information and then let you decide if you want to reach out,” I said. “Just because I find them doesn’t mean they need to know.”
Jenna sighed, her expression sober. “What do you think, Rona? Do you think I’m being selfish, wanting to find them, wanting them to be in my life?”
I leaned toward her, resting my elbows on the desk. “You’re far from selfish, Jenna. If I was in your position, if I had a chance to have family that wasn’t my psychotic father, I’d take it.”
She finished the last of her coffee and got up to pour herself another cup. When she sat back down, she looked at me. “Okay. Keep looking, but don’t approach them or their families. I’ll decide if I want to do that once you have another name or two for me.”
I nodded and finished my own coffee. I didn’t get up for more. I had way too much caffeine in my system as it was. “I’m glad you came by. I needed to talk to you about those
census records you had me get.”
“I’ve got an algorithm running on the files I have and the pictures you sent me. I should know more about any discrepancies soon.”
“That’s great, but it’s not about that.” I thought for a moment, then amended, “Well, it sort of is. When I got home from the courthouse yesterday, Clay was waiting for me.” I ignored the stab of pain that came with the memory of the things that followed. “He told me that I was ruffling feathers.”
Jenna straightened, her eyes narrowing. “What?”
I recounted my conversation with Clay as close to word-for-word as I could manage it but didn’t add in any of my personal thoughts on the matter. As I spoke, I watched Jenna’s eyes darken and her mouth twist into a scowl. When I finished, I leaned back and waited for her reaction.
“Fuck me,” she breathed, shaking her head. “Someone’s up to no good.”
“So, it’s not just me then?” I asked, leaning back in my chair. “I’m not the only one who thinks it’s suspicious?”
She tapped her index finger to her lip, looking thoughtfully at the wall. “I can’t believe how blatant that was. Maybe that’s why they thought no one would think anything of it. Because only an idiot would run things down the chain of command like that.”
“Unless whoever needs us to stop digging into things chose messengers who wouldn’t be traced back to them. You said Clay only knew who told him to talk to you, and you’re certain that he’s not into anything shady?”
I didn’t even have to think about it. “He’s not. Especially not in anything like human trafficking.”
“Which is probably why he was the perfect choice to talk to you. He probably thinks it’s because of some investigation that’s being worked already.”
I nodded. “I didn’t ask him, but that sounds like what he’d think.”
“I trust Agent Matthews,” Jenna said, “and you trust Clay, but I think you and I need to make sure we play things close to the vest. We need to be careful of what we tell even them. We don’t want to put them into a position where they’ll get caught in the middle.”
I loved that she hadn’t even suggested that the smartest thing to do would be to drop the investigation and move elsewhere. Neither one of us were going to walk away from this. If anything, we were both more determined than ever to root out every bit of corruption and filth we could reach.
Those assholes wouldn’t know what hit them.
Twenty-Eight
On paper, Maggie Carlyle was a risk. Twenty-eight years old, and she’d had more than a dozen jobs in a decade. Not just different jobs, but different addresses all over the country. She’d worked at a toy store in Boise, Idaho, and a shoe store in Miami, Florida. She’d been a housekeeper in Sacramento, and a seamstress in Austin. Her job ranged from the banal to the unique.
Still, something in my gut told me to bring her in, and after talking to her for the past ten minutes, I was glad I had. She was energetic and sweet, willing to work hard. Her references were glowing, despite the fact that she’d never worked any place longer than seven or eight months.
“One final question,” I said as I put down my pen. “And I’m sure you already know what I’m going to ask.”
Her smile faltered a bit, and the light in her eyes dimmed, but she squared her shoulders and nodded. “I do, and I understand why you need to know. I’ve moved around a lot, had tons of different jobs. I know how it looks, like I’m not reliable. I won’t lie and say that I plan to be here for years, but I can promise that I will show up on time, and I won’t leave early. I rarely call off, and I always work hard.”
She paused, and I knew she was waiting for me to tell her none of that mattered. Instead, I made a gesture for her to continue.
“I didn’t have a stable childhood, but I’ve always wanted to find a home.” Her fair complexion flooded with color, but she didn’t flinch. “After I graduated high school, I didn’t really have anywhere to live, so I got on a bus and left. I tried different places, but nothing ever…stuck.”
I wanted to reach across the desk and tell her that I understood, but I wasn’t looking for a friend. I needed an employee first. I didn’t think she’d take advantage of me if I was more friendly than professional, but as I’d proven recently, I wasn’t the best judge of character when it came to people I hadn’t known long.
“I’ve never left an employer in the lurch,” she continued. “If I’m going to leave, I’ll tell you and give you as much time as you need to find someone to take my place.”
I had the strangest sense of déjà vu as I looked at her, but it wasn’t because I’d been in this position before. I’d been her only a few months ago. A stranger in the city, looking for a job after having moved around because nowhere felt like home.
“I’d like to see if this would work for us,” I said with a smile. “Can you start first thing Monday morning?”
Her entire face lit up. “I can. Thank you, Miss Quick. Thank you.”
“You can call me Rona,” I said.
Before I could move anywhere past that, the front door opened. Shit. I’d forgotten to turn over the sign to say that we were closed. It was a Wednesday afternoon, and the weather was shitty, so I hadn’t expected anyone to come by.
“Hello?”
“I’ll be right out,” I called before turning back to Maggie. “Monday, eight o’clock.”
She stood and shook my hand. “I’ll see you then.”
I followed her out of the office, turning my attention to the tall, burly man brushing snow off his massive beard. “I’m Rona Quick.” I put out my hand. “How can I help you?”
“I’m Dave Orville.” His hand engulfed mine, but he was careful not to squeeze too hard. “My Suzie’s missing.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” I said. I motioned to my office.
“I don’t need much of your time, miss,” he said, shifting from one foot to the other. “I just need to know if I can hire you to find my Suzie.”
“I’m often hired to find people.” If he didn’t want to sit, that was fine with me. “Do you have a picture of Suzie?”
The best thing about smartphones was that most people had at least one picture on it of whoever it was they wanted me to find. Sure enough, he held out his phone with a picture pulled up on it.
Suzie was a cocker spaniel.
I bit back the sigh that wanted to escape me and smiled up at him. “When did you last see Suzie?”
I shivered and pulled my coat more closely around me. I was crazy for taking this case, but Dave had been sincerely upset that he hadn’t been able to find his little dog after she slipped off her leash during their morning walk, and there was something about seeing a man like him so distraught over his dog that had made me want to help him.
Besides, if I hadn’t taken his case, I would’ve gone back to staring at that stupid email I couldn’t get through while trying not to think about Jalen.
“Suzie,” I called as I walked down the street.
I doubted that calling the dog would do much good since she didn’t know me, but I felt pretty foolish walking with a dog leash in one hand and a treat in the other. Calling for a dog at least made it clear I was searching. If someone had found her and they heard me calling, they’d know to bring her to me.
I’d sent Dave back to his house in case the dog found her way home. That’s what I was hoping for, anyway. I didn’t know much about the intelligence of different dog breeds, but I thought spaniels might be smart ones. And there were always stories about how dogs found their way home.
I turned onto the next street, and a prickle went down my spine. I stopped, nearly slipping on the sidewalk. Someone was watching me. Again. I could feel it, a gaze burning into my back. I looked around and snowflakes caught on my lashes. I blinked them away, my vision blurring for a few seconds. When it cleared, I saw a few people on the other side of the street, a few ahead of me, and some behind. Not crowded at all, but not too sparse either.
&nb
sp; I didn’t see anyone paying any extra attention to me, or any attention, actually. It must’ve just been one of those weird things. Like a chill when it wasn’t cold or the sense of another presence when alone.
I turned back around and resumed walking, calling for Suzie. I passed a couple of elderly women who smiled at me, and I smiled back. They probably thought I was looking for my own dog, but the only dog I’d ever had died years ago. He’d been one of those big mutts that looked scary but was really a big softie. My parents had gotten him before I was born, and he’d been my protector from moment one.
He died when I was ten, and I sometimes wondered if things would’ve gone differently that day if he’d still been around. Would he have been able to stop my dad from attacking my mom? Or if he would’ve been with me, my mom might have still died, but Petey might’ve been able to stop my dad before he hurt me, before he killed the others.
It wasn’t the first time I’d thought of that. Nearly a decade was a long time to come up with plenty of ‘what-if’ scenarios. What if we’d gotten another dog? What if Petey had still been alive? What if I’d spent the night at a friend’s house? What if Mom and I had left Dad when he started acting weird? What if Dad hadn’t gone to work that day? What if he’d followed all the safety precautions he was supposed to?
I’d quickly learned that it was easy to get buried in those ‘what-if’s, buried so deep that I lost sight of what I did have. Anton had helped me through it the first time, and I’d dealt with it myself after he died. The desire to head down that path was still there, and sometimes it was hard to stop myself, but today, I was able to move past it because I had something more important to focus on.
Namely, a cocker spaniel named Suzie.