by G. G. Andrew
“Lily can’t stop talking about her new babysitter,” Bette had said. “It’s Kim this and Kim that.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“She’s quite a looker, isn’t she?”
“Bette, are we actually going to have this conversation?”
He’d driven past Laurel Xavier’s home, seen her car missing, and driven around the city to think things through. He didn’t know where she was, but he guessed it had something to do with finding out the contents of that flash drive.
She still hadn’t spoken, so he added, “Good afternoon.”
“Is it?” Kim shook her head. “Nevermind, let’s go put this fucking thing in my mailbox and be done with it.”
He snagged on the edge of anger in her voice. That hadn’t been there last night—at least, not like this. “Everything okay?”
“Not at all.” She walked to the passenger door and yanked it open. “Are you coming?”
He uncrossed his arms and got into the driver’s seat. As concerned as the tone of her voice made him, he was perversely pleased that she’d gotten into his car so easily. He’d expected a fight, especially after last night.
Maybe he was wearing her down. Good. If he was going to help her, he needed her to come clean and tell him whatever she was keeping close. He started the car, trying to hold back from the onslaught of questions he wanted to ask her.
They drove to Kim’s apartment, neither of them speaking for the first few miles. But every molecule of his body was aware of her. In brief glances while he turned corners, he read her body language and what she said without uttering a word.
The borrowed sweater told him she hadn’t expected to stay at her sister’s last night, that it was a last-minute decision. But why? She was wearing lipstick, but it looked like she’d chewed some of it off. She was nervous, maybe even afraid. From the jittery movements she made and the anxious expression on her face, he guessed the latter.
Why are you scared? was the first question he’d ask her if he could. But she probably wouldn’t answer. She wasn’t the type of woman who’d want him to see her with her eye makeup smeared or her defenses down. What are you not telling me? would be the next question on his list, and she’d already dodged that one. He couldn’t fathom how she’d respond to the final question, one that’d been eating at him for days: Why do you take things?
As they approached her apartment, he started small. “Did you find out what was on that drive?”
“Yes.”
“Who helped you?”
“Prue Davenport. She’s an IT consultant.”
“I know the name.”
“Right.” She was looking away, but he caught a glimpse of her in the passenger side mirror. She stared out the window, chewing off more of her lipstick.
He caught her eye.
“Your detection skills are impressive,” she said.
“That’s what all the ladies tell me.”
She turned around to him. “Was that a joke?”
“Now look who’s being good at detection.”
He was relieved to see her smirk.
Jerking the wheel, he parallel-parked on a side street two blocks away from her apartment complex.
“What was on it, the flash drive?”
She sighed. “I’m not one-hundred percent sure. But whatever they’re doing, it’s fucked up.”
“It give you any clues who might be doing this?”
Her voice rose an octave. “Can I just do this? I don’t want this thing on me anymore.” She slid the animal-print drive out of her jeans pocket and held it like it was radioactive material.
He tapped his fingers on the wheel. “It’s evidence of a crime, isn’t it? What’s on there?”
“I think so.” A flicker of fear crossed her face. “It’s a list of women’s names and addresses, some pictures and stuff. But Prue found a couple who’d been harassed online.”
“Multiple women?” Scott rubbed his temples. “That’s evidence of a crime. I need to see that list.”
“Well, I’m about to become the next piece of evidence in a crime if you don’t let me put this in my mailbox.”
He lowered his brow. “Did something else happen?”
Kim grabbed the door handle, but she hesitated. “Prue made a copy of the document. She put it on another flash drive for me. You can have it.”
He exhaled. “Thanks.”
“But I need to turn in the original,” she said. “Right now. Whoever wants this probably knows I can’t open those files myself, and so doesn’t think I’d be able to figure out what’s on it. If I turn this in, maybe he’ll leave me alone.”
He exhaled again, but he conceded the point. He hoped she was right about the copy of the contents of that flash drive. In the meantime, he was more concerned with how jumpy she was. “Kim,” he repeated, “did something else happen?”
She opened the car door. “You can follow me from a safe distance, but don’t be too cop-like and don’t startle the crap out of me. I’m freaked out enough as-is.” She got out and walked swiftly towards the complex.
He watched her walk away through the rearview mirror, his muscles tense. Something else had happened, and this was bigger than he’d thought. What Kim had seen on that file, and the security that’d prevented her from opening it without a professional, suggested something nefarious was going on. Something organized. Something harmful to women.
Though as he slipped out of his car into the overcast afternoon to follow her, hands twitching to grab the gun stashed in his waistband, one woman concerned him above all others. Something had happened to her. He knew it. Why hadn’t she told him?
When Kim reached the complex, he knelt down to tie his shoe while she climbed briskly up the steps to her apartment. A few cars passed on the street in front, but it was relatively quiet on a Thursday afternoon. A dog barked in one of the apartments as Kim passed. Then she reached her mailbox and, without ceremony, dropped the flash drive in, turned, and moved away.
As she climbed the steps back down, an older woman pulled into the apartment parking lot. She smiled at Kim and walked to her trunk, unloading groceries. He spied Kim’s vehicle two cars down from the woman’s. He knew she hadn’t driven it downtown last night, but as he squinted closer, he noticed a scratch in the paint that wasn’t there before. Like someone had keyed her car.
His eyes sharp, Scott slowly walked away from the building, allowing Kim to move in front of him and beat him to the car—and not, as she put it, startle the crap out of her. He scanned the area, but few people were out and about during work hours. He lost sight of the apartment and walked down the sidewalk under the shade of the trees newly blooming in springtime. From a distance, he saw Kim climb back into the car, and he used the short walk to remind himself to not interrogate her immediately.
When he opened the driver’s side door and slipped back in the car, she was breathing heavily but noticeably more relaxed.
“You okay?”
She nodded.
“I’ll drive you back to your parents’.”
“No—don’t.”
He looked over as he pulled into the street.
“I’m staying at Laurel’s now.”
His fingers gripped the steering wheel. “Does this have anything to do with that scratch on your car?”
Her voice, when it came, cracked. “He knows where they live. That mark? He did it while I was in the neighborhood. While I was watching Lily.”
He nearly missed a red light. “How do you know?”
“I just know. I heard a car go by slowly that night. I thought it was you. That’s why I said I thought you’d come by twice after I woke up with Lily. I was too out of it to realize you’d said you only drove by once, and you probably didn’t think to—”
“Damn it. Why didn’t you tell me when you saw the mark?”
“I wanted to.” She stopped for a second, like she’d startled herself with the truth. “When it first happened, I wanted to. But you were asle
ep and—”
“I’ve been woken up for lesser crimes.”
“I put your daughter in danger.”
“You didn’t do this.”
“Yes, I did!” Kim squirmed in her seat belt to face him. “No, I didn’t do it, but I brought this upon myself, and upon my family. And yours. If I didn’t have my little problem, I wouldn’t have taken that flash drive. And if I hadn’t taken that flash drive, I wouldn’t have had this asshole trashing my apartment and leaving a knife on top of my car.”
He braked hard at a stop sign. Their bodies heaved forward. “There was a knife on your car?”
“Yeah. That’s what he used to make that scratch.”
Scott was so enraged that for a moment he almost saw stars. He hadn’t moved past the stop sign yet. “Jesus,” he ground out. “He’d better pray when we catch him that I don’t smash his face into a brick wall.” He didn’t want some knife-wielding perp in his neighborhood and especially within a million feet of his daughter. And the thought of such a person threatening Kim in that way was more than he could process.
A horn honked behind him, and he realized he was backing up traffic. He drove through the intersection and turned right to drive down Laurel’s street.
“You need to file a police report,” he said.
She paused. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
She sighed. “Okay.”
“I’ll need that knife, too.” He shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts. She’d been holding out on him, all right. “What’d you mean by your ‘little problem’?” he asked.
“What?”
“You said if you didn’t have your little problem, you wouldn’t have taken that flash drive.”
She went silent for the rest of the drive, not even speaking when he parked in front of Laurel’s house.
He twisted the key to turn the car off, his frustration reaching a boiling point. He was frustrated that his hands were so tied. He was frustrated that Kim hadn’t filed a police report days ago, and that they might’ve just turned in original evidence to a crime that was bigger than either of them imagined. And he was beyond frustrated that Kim Xavier didn’t trust or like him enough to tell him what was going on with her.
He turned in his seat towards her. It was late afternoon, and the sun was starting to drop. The sky was colored in pretty pastels, the setting sun painting the clouds a sweet pink against baby-blue clouds. Her profile was growing dim as they sat in his car.
“Kim,” he said, struggling for control of his voice. “Why did you steal that flash drive? They’re cheap. They’re everywhere. You can get them at the checkout counter by the Chapsticks and the Pepsi.”
“Maybe I’m lazy.”
That wasn’t it.
“Why do you steal things?” he pressed. “You have a job, you make money. Your parents probably have a lot of money. Why are you doing this?”
She clicked the release button on her seat belt. “Thank you for taking me to the apartment. Have a nice night.”
She threw a flash drive into his lap, opened the door, and climbed out.
“That’s it?” he said, but she slammed the door over his words.
Not good enough. He pocketed the device, jumped out of the car, and followed her to the doorstep.
The street at sunset was strangely silent, deserted of everything but a manic squirrel skittering out from behind a garbage can. Soon cars would be pulling into the driveways up and down, but they were in a liminal stage, a brief moment between when one thing ended and another began.
In Laurel’s yard, KaveMan was doing a piece. An installation, Scott thought they were called. It looked like it was going to be a giant animal eventually, but for now the thing only had tall, thin legs and an anemic body. It was casting a long shadow in the late day light, and at dark it’d look monstrous.
“Kim, wait.”
She paused on the doorstep. The porch light was on, and the stir of curtains at the front window let him know Laurel was waiting for her sister to walk in. Scott didn’t care. He needed answers.
He reached her, already long past his vow to not interrogate her, but in the porch light he saw her eyes shimmering with tears.
A stab of regret shot through him. Without thinking, he put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “Kim.”
Her eyes fell, but he kept his hand where it was. He told himself he was comforting a victim as any cop would. But who was he kidding? The reason he wanted to touch her was less about his duty as an officer and more about his feelings as a man. She was hurt. She was hurting. More than answers, he wanted her less scared, less sad.
He reached his hand up to cup her face. Her skin was smooth and sent a warm tickle down his spine.
Her eyes still downcast, she leaned her face into his palm, showing him she wanted the touch every bit as much as he did. A tear slipped out of one eye and slid down her cheek.
“Kimberly.” His voice was raw and husky, strained. He wanted to do so much more than this. He wanted to ask her to come home with him. He wouldn’t try to bed her; she was upset, and he wasn’t that type of man. He just wanted to put his arms around her, to kiss her fear away, to hold her until she fell asleep if she let him. God help him, the more he tried to avoid this, the more reasons he tallied why it wouldn’t work, the more he wanted her. He stepped close to her.
A second tear fell from Kim’s lashes. She raised a hand and covered it over his, her fingertips light against his knuckles. “Don’t,” she said softly. Then she looked up.
Her eyes sparked with anger.
Far from the vulnerability and fear he’d expected, her brown irises were hard and furious.
She removed his hand. “Don’t start anything you’re not willing to finish,” she said, her voice wavering with tears but firm.
He exhaled. Took a step back. “Sorry,” he said in a low tone.
Without another word, she turned and walked inside, leaving him alone on the stoop.
Chapter Twenty-One
Hutch
The next day, Hutch parked his car outside Hot Haven and watched for Kim through the clear front of the coffee shop. The sun was out, and people were coming and going through the front door with the season’s first iced drinks. Hutch reclined back his seat, lowered the window, and propped his feet up on the dash. He lit a cigarette, dangling his wrist partly outside.
Twelve minutes later, Kim still hadn’t appeared. He was almost satisfied she wasn’t working when that brunette he’d seen the other day came out, a laptop bag slung over her shoulder. He watched her in the rearview mirror. Her designer jeans showed off her slim legs and the curve of perfect hips, and her long brown hair in a ponytail would’ve made him think girl next door if he’d grew up living in a good neighborhood.
A pair of big black sunglasses covered her eyes, but as she neared the car next to his and hit a button that made the car beep, she spotted him and propped the sunglasses atop her head.
“Hi,” the brunette said, tilting her head and studying him curiously through the open window.
“Uh, hi.”
“You’re Kim’s friend, right?”
“Riiight.” He drawled out the word, adding an ironic inflection. He wondered why this woman was giving someone like him the time of day. She was probably just being friendly.
When she got in her car, she was probably going to hit the door locks right away.
“What are you doing?” she asked, still watching him.
The question pulled him up short. Did she mean right then, or in general, in life? He didn’t fucking know the answer to either. He stubbed out his cigarette on the ashtray by his seat, and when he noticed his feet were nervously twitching, he dropped his legs from the dash. “Just enjoying the sunshine,” he finally said lazily, and then, as if to emphasize that her question hadn’t thrown him, he asked, “What are you doing?”
“I finished up some work,” she said, readjusting the laptop bag on her shoulder. “Figured it was time to get on the
road.”
“Yeah, you and Jack Kerouac.”
“What?”
“Nevermind.” He squirmed in his seat. “Guess you’re not an American lit person.”
The corner of her mouth turned up. “Are you an American lit person?”
“I’m vast. I contain multitudes,” he replied. What was with all the questions? Was she judging him? Did he fucking care? She hadn’t got his Kerouac reference, that was for sure, but he didn’t think she was any empty-headed beauty either.
“Okay,” she said, sounding like she was through with his games. “Well, Kim’s not working here today, so if you’re looking to talk with her, you’re out of luck.” She opened her passenger door and dropped her laptop inside.
He watched her as she walked to the driver’s side. “I wasn’t looking to talk with her,” he called, but the sunglasses were back on her eyes, and she slammed her driver’s side door shut. A second later, he heard the beep that signaled she’d hit the locks.
Yup.
As she drove off, Hutch put his own car into reverse and backed out of the parking lot of Hot Haven, headed for Kim Xavier’s place. He kept the window down.
At Kim’s apartment, he parked a ways down the street. He waited until the patrol car came by. He knew it was only a matter of time. Kim was keeping odd company lately, and Officer Scott Culpepper of New Haven PD obviously had a hard-on for her. Hutch guessed she’d told him about the flash drive, and when he saw the white police vehicle, he knew it. Fucker was trying to protect her, catch the bad guys. That’s what they did, and Hutch had a sore arm to prove it. He hunched down in his seat and lit another cigarette. He could spot a police car a mile away.
He waited another hour, until he got a sense of how often the patrols were happening. It was erratic, which meant he was a smart cop, but he couldn’t drive by the apartment complex his entire shift. As the car drove away for a third time, Hutch got out. He walked down the sidewalk slowly, watching the other cars. He walked straight up the steps to her apartment door, but instead of knocking, he peeked into her mailbox. A couple grocery circulars and a bill sat in the box, but down at the bottom he saw an animal-print flash drive.