My Sister's Detective

by T. J. Jones

  Sitting there doing nothing, I felt guilty, like I was one of the rich kids and was too self-entitled to help my mother if she needed it. "Angie, I better go in and see if my Mom needs any help, okay?"

  She glared at me. "Bullshit, you just want to go hang out with the hot Mexican girl."

  Angela Jeffries jealous? It didn't seem possible, but I took advantage. "She is pretty, isn't she? Junita, I think that's her name, and she's really nice too."

  "What, and I'm not nice? I put up with you all those years when no other girls would even look at you. That was nice, wasn't it?"

  "Honestly, I always figured that was just because Davey and I were friends."

  "Maybe I was just biding my time. Now we're grown up and consenting adults. You actually got pretty damn good looking since school." We were sitting on the couch with our feet resting on the coffee table, kind of sprawled out. Angie suddenly rolled over on top of me and started kissing me, grinding against me and sliding a hand to my belt. Things were getting pretty heated when I heard the glass slider open and Junita's soft voice. In her defense, the back of the couch blocked her view of what we were doing.

  "Ah, Eric, your mother asked me to come get you, she needs a hand?"

  Angela leapt off the couch, furious. She would have started screaming, but I got up quickly, standing between her and Junita, partially to prevent a scene, partially to hide the bulge of my erection. Junita spun and fled into the house, undoubtedly sure she was about to be fired. Angie stepped back and gave me a black look. "Go home Eric. If you play your cards right, maybe you'll get to fuck the help." She ran up the stairs to her bedroom and locked the door. No amount of begging would get her to talk to me. I finally went home, embarrassed and crushed again by Angela's ever-changing moods.

  I was working on the roof the next morning, replacing the last of hail damaged shingles when Angie pulled up in the driveway and walked up to the house. It had rained again early, but now it was heating up, lifting a small cloud of steam around me as I moved shingles around. I look down at her quizzically as the sun beat down on us both; the dorky redheaded teenager grown into a man, and the blond-haired love of his childhood. She looked incredible that morning, all smiles, wind-swept hair and flashing blue eyes. She was wearing a blue skirt and a white blouse a size too small. It was open halfway down the front and she had nothing under it. Even from the roof I could see her nipples clearly and the outline of her full breasts pushing against the sheer fabric.

  She smiled up at me like the previous afternoon had never happened. "I saw your mother's van pull in next door to my house about half an hour ago, so I knew you'd be here alone. Are you going to come down and screw me, or did I waste a trip?"

  I almost broke my neck getting off that roof. I knew it was because of Junita. Angie didn't really want me, she just wanted to be sure nobody else had me. I didn't care. I had built it up in my head to be this magical moment. I wanted to make love, not just fuck her. But if I'm being honest, sometimes the distinction is difficult.

  It was hot and crazy, but not passionate the way I hoped for. It was sex, and as satisfying as that can be, I think we both wanted it to be something more. It wasn't. I guess I was expecting the earth to move and my life to change, but that didn't happen.

  I can't say if it was me not living up to her expectations or the fact that she knew she hadn't lived up to mine, but it turned awkward really quick. I tried to hold her, planning to reassure her that the next time would be better and that we just needed time to learn each other's rhythms; but before my breathing had slowed and my heart rate settled into a normal pace she was up and pulling her skirt on. I could hear her sobs as she ran for the door, half dressed, pulling her shirt around her as she jumped into her car and sped out of the driveway.

  I didn't see her again the rest of the time I was on leave. She wouldn't answer my calls, and Rosa had instructions to not let me in. Eventually she texted me and said it had been a mistake, but that she hoped we could stay friends. It reset the relationship we had always had. I was the moth, she was the flame.

  By the time I returned to Point Road again, she was married to Charlie.

  ***

  Maggie knocked on my door the morning after our night out. I offered her a sugary donut and got a dirty look for my efforts. "Slater, you can't eat that crap and get in shape. I ran my ten miles this morning, where were you?"

  "We left my pickup over at the club, remember?"

  "I switched to water. You're the one who drank too much beer. It's only two miles over there, so if you jogged it, you could have brought your truck back here, ran over to meet me, and finished the last half of my workout with me. All that poison would be out of your system by now."

  "And I'd be dead from a heart attack. I know that's your secret plan."

  "I have plans for you, but not that. Seriously, if we're going to work together, you need to be able to keep up."

  "Work together? Keep up? What is it we're working on?"

  "Figuring out what happened to Davey, of course. I'm going to have to go to Miami with you. You really need to learn some Spanish."

  "Settle down, you have way too much energy. Eat a donut and screw up your metabolism like the rest of the human race." She grabbed a donut and bit into it. Soon she had a powdered sugar mustache, cutest thing ever. I handed her a napkin and motioned to the general area of the problem. "What about your job, and Angie?"

  "Classes end Thursday, but what about Angie? Are you afraid she'll get jealous?"

  "She couldn't care less, I'm sure. Nothing to be jealous of anyway, unless your plan includes something fun. I'm game if you are."

  "Down boy," She laughed. "But the state Angie is in, she might be weird about it. Still, we better fill her in, let her know you think it's worth checking into. If she offers you money, take it, she has money coming out of her ass."

  I raised a brow. "I really don't get you sometimes, you don't seem very compassionate where she's concerned."

  She shrugged. "I love her like crazy, Slater, of course I do. But I've spent so many years watching her be like she is, so beautiful and warm one minute, then cold and mean five minutes later. It's hard, and it's hard not to get numb to it. I've tried to convince her to see a shrink, really get some therapy, and she won't do it. I got her to go years ago, when I was living in Charleston and couldn't be around to watch out for her. She went long enough to get a prescription for anti-depressants, but she ended up refusing to take them. She self-medicates with booze and sleeping pills. I don't know what to do anymore to help her or why she's like she is sometimes."

  "People like me, enablers I think they call them."

  "It's more than that, something deeper, a really basic unhappiness. But like I said, she is really good at getting people to do what she wants. I'm as guilty of it as anyone. I can't help it, she's my sister and I love her."

  I had sense enough to keep my mouth shut for once. I wasn't sure I could say I loved Angie, it was more of an obsession. But I was working on it. "So, we go to Miami together, two rooms? I should book something."

  "One room, two beds Slater." She broke into a welcome smile. "No funny business either. Girly crush or not, my divorce kicked my ass. I'm off men for the foreseeable future."

  "Never occurred to me." I lied. "I'll grab that notebook. There are some cards too, clubs he frequented, I think. He hid a few of them, and some were just lying around." I retrieved the small notebook and the cards from my office and put them down in front of her on the kitchen table.

  "I'm no detective Slater." She said, opening the notebook.

  "Maybe not, but you might see something I haven't, and you talked to him more in the last few years."

  "So, it looks like he was keeping track of some sort of shipments, right? See the lines and arrows? When each shipment reached its final destination, he circled it. Like this one, it started in Seattle, came to Miami, then went to SP. What's SP?"

  "Sau Paulo? Yeah, kind of what I thought too." It wasn't, bu
t I wasn't about to admit it. "But what was he moving around? Drugs?"

  "Maybe. Do you think Davey would get involved with something like that? And why would drugs go to three or four locations? It's definitely a distribution network of some sort. What are the numbers? Quantities?"

  "Your pretty good at this." I admitted.

  "Why write this down and hide it in his childhood bedroom if it's something legit?"

  "Look at the last page, just a list of seven women."

  "Well, we know he wasn't dating them. Maybe they were his Mules. But if he was shipping drugs, what point would there be in keeping a written record and identifying his accomplices? And what about the dates?"

  "Dates? I thought those were page numbers."

  "Why would he number pages when they're attached to the notebook? And they start at 09, not 01. Davey didn't move to Miami until 2008. I think it's a record of transfers for each year, two pages each, then four pages for the last two. Business was booming, whatever it was."

  "Obviously." I shrugged.

  "Slater, is that what you got out of it, or am I wrong?"

  "Honestly, I didn't have a clue. You're as smart as you are beautiful."

  She smiled shyly and looked up at me, suddenly warm and close. "Thanks, that was only slightly sexist. You think I'm beautiful?"

  "Yeah, of course, really beautiful." We stared at each other like idiots, but I let the moment slip away.

  She looked back down at the notebook, laughing. "But not as beautiful as Angie, right?"

  As if on cue, her phone rang and I saw the caller ID, Angela. I gave her some privacy, used the bathroom, then went to the bedroom I called my office. I read a couple emails and the news until she came looking for me.

  "You're invited to supper tonight. Angie wants to know what you're planning, as far as investigating this thing with Davey. She knows you talked to Edith, and she knows we went out to eat last night. I'll bet Stacey Lane was on the phone five minutes after class. Angie was in bed by the time I got home and I went running before she got up."

  "Is this the way it's going to be? Are you two going to fight over me all the time?"

  "You wish!" She scoffed. "I have to say, there is enough of you for two women."

  "Isn't that politically incorrect? You're fat shaming me, and it's hurtful." She didn't seem at all sorry. "Are you going to tell her that you're going to Miami with me? I can't see her being jealous, it isn't like she wants anything to do with me, romantically speaking."

  "But she's like that, like a little kid that doesn't want a toy until somebody else has it, then it's their favorite and they can't live without it. My Dad is exactly the same way."

  "I feel so used." I mocked. "But seriously, I don't know if we should tell her you're going along. What if she decides she wants to come too. It's not a vacation or just for fun. And if someone actually did kill Davey, they might not like us poking around. There's an outside chance it could be dangerous."

  "You don't care if I'm in danger, but you don't want Angie to get hurt?"

  I knew better than to take that seriously, so I messed with her. "I can't protect you both, watching out for one woman will be hard enough."

  "Slater, you sexist ass!" She spotted my smirk and stopped her rant, but gave me a backhanded slap on the shoulder. "Trust me, I can take care of myself."

  "No doubt, I saw you at the gym. Should we take the Piper down there?"

  "It's only six hours, we can take my car. If we took your crop-duster, we would just have to rent something when we got there, if we got there."

  "I'm starting to think you're scared of flying, or is it just my flying?"

  She shrugged and glanced out the window. "Nice day, want to go up? Really, I like flying, I used to go with my Uncle Gary once in a while when I was little."

  "Yeah, we could run out to the coast, maybe see if there are any sharks circling the beaches. You'd be surprised how many times I've seen some big ones close to shore."

  "They say there's getting to be more every year. You going to let me fly that thing?"

  "Now I'm the one that's scared. We'll see."

  ***

  The Piper fired up on the first turn and I showed Maggie how to do the preflight while it warmed up. My plane is a four seat Piper Arrow. A very common, hence affordable utility plane that is easy to fly. The model I have includes retractable landing gear to increase airspeed. It was a perfect trainer, and I had taken more than one budding pilot up, paying it forward, since that was the way I had learned.

  We flew south to avoid the congestion of Jacksonville proper and the extra traffic around the Naval base. I put the plane in a slow climb then turned east. Once we were comfortably high, I eased back on the throttle and leveled off. The coastline came up quickly and we followed it south for fifteen minutes.

  "Want to take the controls for a while?" I asked.

  I was surprised when she frowned and shook her head. "My Uncle Gary ended up yelling at me every time I tried."

  "How old were you?"

  "Twelve, maybe thirteen."

  "Just try it okay? We're half a mile up, you can't do anything that I can't correct before we hit the water."

  She did a couple of slow turns while I explained the rudder operation and showed her how everything worked in unison. She nodded but seemed to be unsure of herself, concentrating. She started making slow sweeping turns and I let her have the controls, watching her enjoy the feel of the plane.

  After a couple of minutes, she reached out suddenly and added power, climbed into a tight turn, then rocked sharply back in the other direction and put us into a spiraling dive. She all but put the Piper on its back more than once, all while making tight, balanced turns, no skidding or slipping. Then she dove again, dropped a thousand feet, and pulled up on a heading for home, flying straight and level. I'd been had. She gave me back the controls and laughed when I glared at her.

  She was still amused with herself when we climbed out of the Piper. I have to admit, I was pouting. I had really wanted to teach her to fly. She helped me with the moorings and it was clear she was familiar with the process. She didn't say anything until we got in her car and headed back to my house.

  "Come on Slater, don't be mad at me. I had to mess with you a little. My uncle did take me flying when I was thirteen, and he did yell at me. But it worked out for the best. Like I said, Dad's like Angie. He barely knew I existed until he heard about Gary letting me fly his floatplane, then he insisted that I learn to fly his Mooney. It was pretty much the only thing we ever did together. Angie was always his perfect daughter and I was just the tag along. But I got to know my Dad a little bit, just because of flying. I never got my license, but I used to fly back and forth to Miami when he had to go down on business."

  "Does he still have that plane? Mooney's are nice rides, not that there's anything wrong with my Piper."

  "No, he sold it a few years ago. When Uncle Gary went down in his float plane that was it. There wasn't enough of him to bury after the alligators finished. But I like your plane, Slater, duct tape and all."

  "Not duct tape, you know that, right?" She continued kidding me until she pulled into my driveway. I sat in the car for a couple minutes, picking her brain about her Dad's airplane, then reached for the door handle.

  "What time should I come over tonight? Six-thirty sharp, like last time? Do I dress for dinner, or do you have a house jacket?" She laughed lightly, and turned toward me, smiling and close. I didn't move but suddenly she leaned across, her hand around the back of my head, pulling my face against hers as she kissed me. Her lips were full and soft and her tongue barely touched mine, hinting of better things to come. My blood boiled and I slid my hand around her neck, trying to gently deepen the kiss. It didn't last nearly long enough.

  She pulled away, smiling warmly. "That was for Too Small, the little girl that always wanted to kiss you. And I'm sorry about tricking you. Maybe you can help me get my pilot's license?"

  "I will help you do
anything you want." I said enthusiastically. "Want to come in for a while? You can make fun of my airplane some more!"

  "I better not, Slater. I promised myself no men for a while because of the divorce, and then I went ahead and kissed you anyway. I have no willpower."

  "Willpower is highly overrated, I break promises to myself daily. It's why I'm fat."

  "And we're going to work on that. Just friends for now, okay?"

  "For now? That sounds good, but it's undefined. How about now, any change?"

  She laughed and pushed me away again. "Still too soon, I'll be sure and drop a hint when I'm ready. Dinner is at six-thirty, now get out of my car."

  I climbed out and waved, grinning like an idiot. It wasn't like being that horny teenage kid again, this was much better.

  Chapter Six

  I had just dressed after a shower when my phone rang. Edith Templeton. She sounded upset and possibly a little drunk.

  "Eric, I've been thinking about everything we talked about, about things with David. There is something I didn't tell you, something that's probably important. I just didn't want to tell you about it because it makes David look bad."

  "Are you alright?"

  "I'm fine. Eddy and I had a big argument. He doesn't think we should be digging into David's death. He says he killed himself because he was gay, and we just need to put it behind us. That's bullshit. He wasn't ashamed of being gay, and if he killed himself, that wasn't why. Besides, losing a child isn't something you ever put behind you, it's there every day." Her voice dropped and I heard her crying. "It's the first thing I think about in the morning and the last thing at night."