I set my beer on the counter as I pulled out a package of ham, some mayo, and a slice of cheese. By the time I’d turned around again, Earnestine had opened my bottle for me.
“Thanks, sweetie,” I said, giving her another beak scratch.
“My pleasure,” she squawked back.
I’d no sooner made myself a sandwich and taken that first deliciously cool swig of beer than there was a pounding on my door. I glanced down at my Fitbit. It was after two a.m. Who in the hell would be pounding on my door at two in the morning?
I took a quick bite of my sandwich. I half-expected it be Al, Artie, or maybe, if I was lucky, one of the many women I’d slept with since being on the island. Of course I hoped it was the latter. As long as it wasn’t one of Mariposa’s girls, I was down for a late-night booty delivery service. Before I even got to the door, the pounding started up again.
“Yeah, yeah,” I hollered through a mouthful of food. “Coming.”
I opened the door and just about choked on my food.
Giselle Marrero stared back at me.
She was the last person on the island I expected to see standing on my doorstep at two in the morning, and for damn sure the last person I wanted to see.
“Giselle,” I gasped, letting out a chortled cough.
She looked concerned. “Are you okay?”
My eyes watered as I nodded. I held up a finger and went back into the kitchen to slug down half of my beer and wash away the bread that was caked against the back of my throat. When I had myself under control, I cleared my throat and motioned her inside.
“Come in.”
“You sure you’re okay?” She stood in my living room, wringing her hands and wearing what I assumed was a fashionable skirt and top, but to me looked like little more than a matching pair of black leather Band-Aids.
I nodded. “I’m fine. I’m just surprised to see you here. It’s after two. Why are you out so late? What’s going on? Is everything okay?” And then a thought hit me. “Is it your mom? Is Mariposa okay?”
Still fidgeting with her hands, Giselle glanced around the room nervously. “Oh, yeah. Mom’s fine. But I—I’ve got a problem, and I didn’t know who else to go to.”
“Go to? What’s going on?” I shut my front door and then turned to face Giselle again. Her dark hair was down around her shoulders. Her lips were bright red, and a thick layer of dark eyeshadow was glommed to her eyelids. She looked nothing like the fresh-faced girl I’d gotten to know over the last week or so. Her makeup paired with her outfit made her look so much older and not nearly as innocent. “And why are you wearing so much makeup?”
“When we first met last week and you said that I should think of you as my fun Uncle Drunk, did you mean it?”
My mouth gaped. I certainly hadn’t meant fun in a “come over to my place at two a.m. looking like that” kind of way. I held up my hands and kind of shook my head.
“Giselle, I didn’t mean fun like—” My hands bounced back and forth between us. “You know, like you and me—”
Her eyes popped open wider when she understood what I thought she meant. “Oh, gawd, I didn’t mean it like that, Drunk.” She rolled her eyes and sighed. “You said I could come to you for help and talk to you about stuff that my mom might not approve of. Did you really mean that?”
Now that she was actually taking me up on my offer, I teetered on the edge of regret. Especially now that she was at my place dressed so suggestively, I felt like I’d already crossed a line, even though I hadn’t done anything even remotely inappropriate. “Well, I mean, I’m happy to help you with anything, of course, but Mariposa would kill me if she kn—”
Fear flickered across Giselle’s dark eyes. “No, no. You can’t tell my mom I was here.”
“I can’t tell your mom? I don’t know that I can do that. I mean, I promised Mariposa—”
Without another word, Giselle made a break for the door.
I took two steps backwards to get there before she could open it and put a hand on it. “Now, hey, just wait a second,” I said calmly. “Where are you going?”
“If you’re just going to tell my mom, then I came to the wrong person. I thought you were serious that I could come to you if I had a problem. I thought you were the right guy for this. But I was wrong.”
“Right guy for what? What’s going on, Giselle?”
Biting her bottom lip between her teeth, she shook her head. Unshed tears welled up in her eyes. “I can’t tell you if you’re going to tell my mom.”
I took my hand off the door then. My cop training kicked in, and against my better judgment, I decided it was better that someone knew what was going on with the girl, rather than letting her handle whatever the problem was on her own.
I sighed. “Fine, I won’t tell your mom.”
She looked up at me then, her eyes big and watery, but mostly hopeful. “Really?”
I nodded.
“You promise?”
I held three fingers up in the air. “Swear.”
“Go to hell, you motherfucking asshole,” squawked Earnestine.
Giselle’s eyes widened as she looked past me into the kitchen. “What was that?”
I smiled at her. “My parrot. Sorry. I taught her to curse on command. I’m alone here most nights. I don’t have a lot of other things to do when I get off work.” I rushed for Earnestine. “Let me just put her in my room so we can talk. Why don’t you have a seat?”
I grabbed Earnestine and took her to my room. When I came back into the living room, Giselle was seated on the far edge of my cushioned rattan sofa. She had her knees pressed together and was leaning forward with her chin in her palms and her elbows on her knees. The skimpy black Band-Aid top she wore smashed her chest together, making me feel incredibly uncomfortable.
I pointed at her uneasily. “What’s up with the outfit and all the makeup?”
She looked down at herself, noticed her rampant cleavage, and sat up right. “Oh, I was at a concert.”
“You want a t-shirt or something?”
She lifted a shoulder. “No, I’m okay.”
I made a face and glanced at the door. A nagging fear that Mariposa was about to come bursting in through my door ate at me. “You look cold to me. You should borrow one of my shirts.” I left the room and in seconds was back with the first shirt I saw. I handed it to her, and she shrugged it on over her head.
“Thanks.”
That’s when I noticed I’d given her my favorite tank top. It had a Red Cross insignia on the front and read Orgasm Donor. I probably should’ve looked at it before I’d handed it to her, but seeing her covered up put me a little more at ease. I let out a heavy breath.
“You bet. I was just making myself some dinner.” I went into the kitchen and grabbed my sandwich and beer. “You want anything?”
“No, thanks. I’m fine.”
I carried my dinner into the living room and put it on the coffee table, then sat down on the chair next to the sofa. “Mind if I eat while we talk? I haven’t had anything since lunch and I’m starving.”
“Oh, no. Go ahead.”
I nodded and took a big bite of my sandwich and then leaned back in my chair. “Okay. Now you can tell me what’s going on.”
As if someone had flipped a switch, tears began to run down Giselle’s cheeks. “It’s my friend Jordan. She’s missing.”
7
“Missing? What do you mean she’s missing?”
“Well, she was supposed to go with me to the Island Wanderers concert tonight. It’s her favorite band. But she never showed up.”
I frowned and took a drink of my beer to wash down my sandwich. “I don’t know if I’d call that missing. That’s not that big of a deal. Maybe her plans changed.”
Giselle shook her head. The tears were flowing now, making her mascara paint long lines of black down her cheeks. “I don’t think she would have willingly missed that concert.”
“Okay, then maybe she was there, but you just did
n’t see her. It wouldn’t be hard to miss someone at a concert.”
“Our seats were together, though. But that’s not all.”
I stood up and went into the kitchen to tear a couple paper towels off the roll and walked them over to her.
“Thanks,” she whispered before blotting her face.
“Okay. What else?”
“She hasn’t returned any of my calls or texted me back since Friday,” whispered Giselle.
“When was the last time you saw her?”
“Friday. We hung out. We kind of got into a disagreement. That was when she stopped returning my texts and calls.”
I threw up my hands. “Well, then it makes sense that she didn’t go to the concert. You two weren’t getting along. Maybe she just didn’t want to see you.”
Giselle blotted her eyes and wiped her nose. “Jordie’s not like that. It wouldn’t matter if she was that mad at me. She’d still go to the concert and sit right next to me. She might ignore me the whole time, but she’d still go.”
“You don’t know for sure.”
“I do know for sure, Drunk. Something happened to her. I know it.”
I took a drink of my beer and then sighed. This was not how I wanted to spend my Monday night. “Look. Maybe she just doesn’t want to be found right now. Maybe she’s taking a little break. You know, putting some space between the two of you.”
“That’s not it, Drunk. Even if she wanted some space, she wouldn’t make me worry. She’d at least text me back and tell me she was okay.”
I sighed. “Giselle, just out of curiosity, does your mom know that you’re out right now?” I lifted my brows and tipped my head in her direction. “And that you’re, you know, dressed like that?”
Giselle’s eyes widened. “Of course not! I told you you can’t tell her any of this. You promised!” She stood up, like she might bolt again.
I held a hand out to her calmly. “Relax. I was just curious. What does she think you’re doing right now?”
Giselle sat back down and gave me a little shrug. “She knows about the concert.”
“Surely she doesn’t know you’re dressed like that.”
“No,” she admitted, her dark eyes sling-shotting down to her hands in her lap.
“And I have to assume she’s smart enough to know concerts don’t get over this late?”
Giselle sighed. “She thinks I’m staying over at Jordie’s.”
“Ah.” I nodded. “Well, did it ever occur to you that Jordan is exactly where she’s supposed to be? Maybe she’s just at her house, ignoring your messages.”
Giselle shook her head. “When she didn’t show up for the concert, that was the first place I went. She’s not there.”
“Well, surely if she was missing, her parents—”
“She lives with her aunt. Her mom died when she was little. She doesn’t know who her dad is.”
“Well, have you asked her aunt if she’s seen her?”
“Her aunt is in the US. Her grandma has been sick. She went there a couple weeks ago to help take care of her. Jordie’s been staying in their apartment by herself.”
“You’re sure she didn’t go with her aunt to the US?”
“Positive.”
“And you checked her apartment tonight?”
“Yeah.”
“If Jordan’s not there and her aunt’s not there, how’d you get in?”
“The lock on their balcony door is broken. It’s how Jordan and I used to sneak in and out of her apartment when her aunt was home. There’s a picnic table under her window. If you stand on it, you can basically climb up to their balcony and over the railing. So I snuck in. Jordie’s not there, and I don’t think she’s been there for a while.”
“How can you tell?”
“She’s got a cat. Gabby. Gabby’s like Jordan’s baby. She has pictures of her all over her IG account. She even dresses her cat up for holidays and stuff. Gabby’s food bowl was completely empty when I got there, and her water dish was bone dry. She practically attacked me when I came in. She hasn’t had food and water for a while. It was pretty obvious.”
“Huh,” I said, taking another bite of my sandwich while I rolled all this information around in my mind. When I was done chewing, I tipped my head to the side. “How old is Jordan?”
“Sixteen.”
“Has she ever gone missing before?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Does she have a boyfriend?”
“Nope.”
“A boy that she’s been hanging around with?”
Giselle shook her head. “No one like that.”
“How about other family on the island? Cousins. Siblings. Other aunts or uncles?”
Giselle shook her head. “No. She doesn’t have any brothers or sisters, and as far as I know there were no cousins or other aunts and uncles. It was just her and her aunt.”
“What about your other friends? Maybe with her aunt being gone, she didn’t want to stay in the apartment alone. Maybe she went to stay with someone else?”
Giselle lifted a shoulder. “That’s really doubtful. I’m her best friend. I don’t think she has any other girlfriends that she’d feel close enough to stay over at their house. And even if she did, she’d come back to feed Gabby. Drunk, something’s wrong. I’m telling you.”
“Well, if you’re that sure that something’s wrong, then why did you come to me? Why not go to the island cops?”
Giselle’s eyes bulged. She scooted over on the sofa so she was closer to me. “Drunk, I can’t go to the cops. And you absolutely have to promise me that you won’t either.”
“Giselle, I can’t promise anything. I mean, if there’s a missing girl—”
“I mean it, Drunk. You have to promise me!”
I sighed heavily. “I’m not promising anything until I understand what’s going on here. And why can’t your mom know about this? Doesn’t she like Jordan?”
“No, Mom likes Jordan, even though she does think Jordan’s a little wild. But we’ve been friends since we were little. If she knew that I wasn’t really staying over at Jordan’s house tonight, she’d freak out. Plus, she might not trust me and Jordan to hang out anymore. I just don’t want to cause any problems unnecessarily.”
“And why can’t we go to the cops?”
“Well, obviously, my mom might find out about all of this then.”
“But if your best friend’s missing, I’d think you’d want to do everything you could to find her.”
“I am doing everything I can to find her. I came to you. You’re a cop. You saved that woman. And you figured out who killed that guy and took Mr. Balladares. I just don’t want to go to the cops and get Jordan in trouble if I don’t need to.”
“You know, you said yourself that Jordan’s kind of a wild child. Maybe she ran off.”
“Jordie wouldn’t do that.”
“You can’t be sure. I mean, her aunt and her grandmother are in the US. Maybe she decided to hop a plane and go be with them.”
Giselle pursed her lips as she mulled that over in her head. “But then why isn’t she texting me back?”
“Seriously? Why does anyone not text someone else back? They’re busy. Their battery died. They’re mad. They don’t have a signal. They didn’t pay their cell bill. You want me to continue?”
A small, sheepish smile played around Giselle’s lips then. “No. I got it.”
I nodded. “I’m sure Jordan is just fine. Okay?”
“But that still doesn’t explain Gabby. Look, will you do some checking for me? Just to make sure?”
I sighed. I really didn’t want to waste my time looking for a kid who’d probably run off to be with her aunt in the US. “Will it make you feel better?”
“Much better,” she assured me. Her hands went to the center of her chest, and she clasped them together and gave me her best sad puppy dog eyes. I was pretty sure there wasn’t a girl in the world I could say no to with those sad puppy dog eyes.
/> I slumped forward. As much as I didn’t want to go look for some runaway sixteen-year-old wild child, I also wanted to be the person that people could rely on for help. After all, hadn’t I been the one to tell Giselle that she could think of me as her Funcle Drunk? The guy who she could come to when she needed something? This was my own fault.
Put up or shut up, Drunk.
“Fine. I’ll do a little poking around. See what I can find out. But no promises.”
Giselle squealed and launched her thin frame into my arms. “Omigosh, thank you! You have no idea how relieved I am.”
With her arms wrapped around me, I shot a glance at the door once again. Being alone in the same room with Mariposa’s underage daughter made me uncomfortable. Having her arms around my neck made me downright uneasy. I patted her back stiffly and then unpeeled her arms from my neck.
“Yeah, I’ll help. But for now this stays between the two of us. I don’t need your mom giving me a hard time.”
Giselle’s eyes brightened. “Duh. I told you I don’t want her to know. Of course I wouldn’t tell her.”
“So, do you have a picture of Jordan and some details about her? Full name. Address. Links to her social media accounts, stuff like that?”
Giselle nodded and unlocked her phone. Swiping through her pictures, she settled on a close-up of a short brunette with big brown eyes and smooth shoulder-length brown hair. She held an orange tabby cat in her arms.
“This is Jordan. Her last name is Lambert. And that’s her cat, Gabby.”
“I assumed,” I said, nodding. She looked innocent enough. I was confident I’d find her safely in the US. with her family. I walked into my kitchen and jotted down my cell number on a slip of paper and handed it to her. “Send the picture to me and text me whatever you can think of that will help. I’ll see what I can dig up tomorrow.”
“Thanks, Drunk. I owe you big.”
8
After my run and a shower the next morning, I went in search of Al. I found him down by the pool paying miniature golf with Gary “The Gunslinger” Wheelan, Big Eddie, and Ralph the Weasel, three of Al’s card-playing buddies. It was a strange sight to see them all out of their natural habitat, the breezy shade of the clubhouse’s covered back porch. Now leaning on their golf putters beneath the bright Caribbean sun, they all had beads of sweat on their brows and were deep in a heated conversation over whether Al’s last shot had been talent or just dumb luck.
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