Undercover Tales

by Blayne Cooper

  I wished with every ounce of my being that I could deny that. But I couldn’t. “I know I did. I don’t have an excuse. I got in so deep that there was no good way out. I was going to tell you everything tonight. I couldn’t stand having this between us anymore.” I searched for something else to say, for a way to redeem myself, but there wasn’t one.

  I studied Keilana for a long moment. Oh, God, she wasn’t going to forgive me. I could see it in her eyes and I felt like throwing up. “I’m not a bad person. Please believe me. I’m so, so sorry.” I wrapped my arms around myself, trying to ward off the pain that was making it hard to breathe or think or ...

  “You betrayed me.” She started to cry again and I felt like I wanted to die. “I trusted you.”

  “Keilana—”

  The cries turned into sobs. “I believed you were my friend. I t-told you things. I confided in you and you tr-tricked me!”

  Oh, Jesus, I really was going to be sick. I swallowed hard, then remembered my case notebook. Frantically, I crawled over to it and picked it up. “I know you don’t believe anything I’m saying to you now. And I don’t blame you.” I held it up. “But I never thought you’d see this. It was locked away and meant for my eyes only. You have to believe this if nothing else! I wasn’t lying to myself. Read it and you’ll know everything.”

  She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “I already told you that I know enough.”

  Stunned and sick, I sat back on my heels. “Things don’t have to end like this for us.” Now I was crying too. “You can decide to forgive me.”

  Just then the front door opened and Smelly shot over to me like a bullet, flying into my arms. I hugged him tightly against me, letting him lick my salty face and drawing comfort from the only friend I had left. “You have to believe me.”

  She sniffed a few times and whispered, “Don’t you get it? I do believe you.” She smiled sadly and looked away. “I just can’t trust you.” She paused. “So what’s the point?”

  “ We would be the point!”

  “There is no we or us, Cad—Belinda.” She let out an unsteady, but resolved breath, and looked at me with heartsick eyes. “There’s only lies.”

  I blinked stupidly. This couldn’t just be the end, could it?

  She stood up and slowly walked to the bathroom. “Leave your keys on the table.”

  yx

  It was a chilly Sunday afternoon in November when I taped shut the last cardboard box and glumly looked around my office. It hadn’t been impressive before, but I’d done my best to make it appear inviting and professional. Now, with everything packed up and its white walls naked, it looked downright depressing.

  True to my word, I’d returned the Poppenhouses first couple of paychecks. I’d even paid them back for their expensive haircut and the designer clothes I hated. True to what Mrs. Poppenhouse had said, they hadn’t paid me for my final couple weeks of work. That meant I couldn’t make October or November’s office rent.

  So, with no jobs looming on the immediate horizon, Blaisdell Investigations was moving. Where? I still wasn’t sure.

  I sat down and dug a screwdriver out of my toolbox so that I could pry my nameplate from the placard outside the front door when someone came knocking. I’d glanced up and felt a sense of familiarity wash over me. I’d seen that shadowy silhouette through the privacy glass hundreds of times. But this was the first time it wasn’t welcome.

  “I know you’re in there,” Russ called out, rapping loudly. “Let me in, will ya?”

  “Fuck off,” I yelled back.

  It had been weeks since I’d said more than that to him and I saw no reason to spoil my perfect streak now. My anger had cooled, but the hurt was still there. Keilana wouldn’t talk to me and I wouldn’t talk to Russ. All the rotten bastards I knew were getting just what they deserved.

  Russ rapped sharply on the glass. So hard, in fact, I figured it would shatter at any moment. “I’m not the tenant anymore, Russ. You can break the glass for all I care.”

  “Belinda,” he groaned, “enough with this horse shit. Just let me in. Please?”

  I don’t know what compelled me to open the door. I didn’t want to talk to him. I didn’t want to see him. I didn’t want to have anything to do with the two-faced traitor. And yet, I found myself at my door, flicking open the deadbolt.

  “Finally!” He rushed inside and wrapped me in a tight hug before I could move away. I bit my lower lip as I forced my arms to stay at my sides. I’m not one of those people who holds a grudge forever. My anger burns hot and then when I can think straight, I can usually forgive. But I wasn’t ready to return Russ’s hug.

  He released me with a frustrated, slightly wounded look.

  “Why are you here, Russ?”

  He tilted his head to the side. “Why am I here? Why do you think? I want us to be friends again. I want us to hang out and surf and laugh and for you to come over to my house for dinner. I want you to forgive me.”

  “No.”

  “How can you say that? How can you stand there and be so unyielding when I’m asking less from you than you are from Keilana. I don’t even want lesbian sex!” He gave me a sheepish grin. “Well, okay, I do, but I can live without it if I have to.”

  I didn’t want to smile. I didn’t.

  “Aha! I saw that!” Beaming, he pointed at my face. “I saw that. You smiled.”

  I scowled. “You saw nothing.”

  “Did too.” He let out a relieved breath. “You smiled. You’re forgiving me even though you don’t want to. I’m wearing you down with my groveling and charm.”

  I walked over and sat down on my desk, pulling my knees to my chest and wrapping my arms around them. “Just because I smiled, doesn’t mean we’re friends anymore. We’re not. Friends, I mean.”

  He sat down next to me. “You’re wrong,” he said softly.

  I blinked. “Are you saying I don’t know who my own friends are?”

  “Yeah.” He nodded and shrugged broad shoulders. “Pretty much.”

  My eyes turned to slits. “I hate you.”

  “And sometimes I hate you. That’s how it is with us. Doesn’t mean we aren’t friends. It just means we’re twisted.”

  I socked him in the arm. Hard.

  “Ow!” He made a face as he rubbed his bicep. “That hurt!”

  “You spied on a friend! On me. How can I trust you after that? You screwed me for money!”

  He looked stricken. “I didn’t think I was screwing you. I thought it was an easy job and that I would be able to get you to see that what I’d done wasn’t such a big deal. I thought that right now we’d be planning a trip to Australia to catch the perfect wave. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

  “And you say I’m wrong a lot?” I gestured crazily. “You’re ... you’re ... wronger than me!”

  “Wronger?”

  “Eat shit and die, Russ.”

  He turned to face me and gazed at me with puppy dog eyes, the soft sweet ones that I couldn’t resist all those years ago. “See how much fun we’re having?” he said. “Tell me you can live without this.”

  I had missed him. And I didn’t want to live without our friendship. But still ... he’d invaded my privacy and made a bad situation ten times worse. “Stop cracking jokes. This is serious.”

  “I know it’s serious. But if I don’t laugh, then I’ll cry, and you’ll call me a girly man again!” His gaze turned beseeching. “I’m desperate here, Belinda.”

  He did look on the verge of tears. And I would have called him a girly man.

  “Just give me another chance not to screw up, okay?”

  I rubbed my eyes with the back of my hand. “I don’t think I can.”

  “You want Keilana to forgive you but you can’t forgive me? Why is this so different?”

  “I guess doing the forgiving is a helluva lot harder than asking for it. And this isn’t like what happened with Keilana and me! You and I have been friends since I first started as a P.I. You weren’
t trying to help me by spying on me, you were trying to help yourself. You screwed a friend, not a stranger!”

  “Fine.” He held his hands up in a placating gesture. “I was trying to help myself. I know it sounds crazy, but I didn’t think this was that big of a deal when I agreed to do it. It seemed more like harmless snooping for an obscene amount of money.” He ran his hands through his short hair. “I’m sorry and I was wrong.”

  “I hope whatever you bought with the money breaks.”

  “I was trying to help you too.”

  My eyes widened. “Oh, sure you were,” I said sarcastically. “How are you going to help me next? Shoot me in head?”

  Russ began counting his fingers. “I was helping you keep your job, smartass. I was doing my best to keep Mrs. Poppenhouse off your back. I was trying to be there to remind you what a bad idea it would be to get involved with Keilana so you wouldn’t get yourself into a mess you couldn’t get out of. I—”

  “You read my case notes! You knew I was in love with her.”

  “I didn’t.” He let out an exasperated groan. “I tried to tell you all this that night, but you were so hell-bent on talking to Keilana that you wouldn’t give me a chance. I checked out your notes the first time I copied them and then not again until the night Mrs. Poppenhouse showed up. The first time I looked at them there were one or two personal comments and that’s it. It was no big deal and all businesslike. I didn’t think you were going to add some sort of weird running narrative!”

  I rested my head against my knees. “Looks like you were wrong again.”

  “I think we covered that.”

  “Not enough, Russ.”

  He scrubbed his face and sighed. “I messed up bad. I hurt you. I’m sorry. I love you and don’t want to lose you.” All traces of teasing were gone. “You can trust me.”

  I snickered.

  “You can! I know what I did was wrong and it won’t ever happen again. I’ve learned my lesson. Being without my best friend sucks.”

  I studied him intently, and despite not wanting to, I found myself believing his words. Russ wasn’t a complicated guy and even though he had horrible judgment at times, he tried his best to be honest. “It’s going to take some time, Russ. No promises.”

  His face lit up like a Christmas tree. “I understand. And I’m going to work to make things up to you. Thanks.”

  “Don’t thank me yet. I’m still pissed.”

  He tried to smile. “I know.” He reached into the pocket of his leather jacket and pulled out a white envelope. “But I’m going to earn back your trust and make things right. And this is how I want to start.” He handed it over. “Here.”

  I looked at the envelope, and then back at him. “What’s this?”

  “Two things. First, inside is a receipt for three months rent for this place. You’re paid through New Year’s.” He glanced around. “Sorry I didn’t catch you before you took down your pictures.”

  “Russ!” I started to jump off the desk but he held me back.

  “Don’t bother saying you can’t accept it, because it’s already done and I can’t get the money back now anyway. The place is yours.”

  Dumbfounded, I just stared at what was in my hands. “You can’t afford to help me.” Three months’ rent was close to ten thousand dollars. My office was small but the location was choice and brought in business all on its own. “You’re saving for a house.”

  “I can’t afford not to do this,” he said seriously. “Besides, even though I messed up, I do know the right thing to do when I see it. And this is it. You’re like a sister to me, Belinda. Family sticks together when it rains shit.”

  My back stiffened as a nasty thought crossed my mind. “I won’t take the money the Poppenhouses paid you.” My eyes glinted dangerously.

  The corner of his mouth shot upward. “Stubborn to the end, eh? This isn’t their money. I know how you’d feel about that.”

  My jaw worked. Russ knew how much my business meant to me. He also knew that my brother was just scraping by and that my parents were retired and living on a very modest fixed income. I didn’t have anywhere else to turn. “What does Sarah think about this?” I turned the envelope over in my hands. “This is a lot of money.”

  “It was her idea.” He waggled a finger at me. “But I get credit for being married to her and having the sense to agree with her.”

  I snorted. “She called me last week and begged me to take you back.” I smiled a little. “Apparently you’re spending way too much time at home on the weekends and in the evenings, and she’s about ready to drink poison.”

  “The women in my life are all evil,” he muttered, rolling his eyes.

  “I dunno, Russ. I’m not even sure I should be speaking to you, much less taking your money.”

  “If the positions were reversed would you do it for me?”

  “You know I would. But—”

  He took my hand in his and squeezed. “Please don’t be too proud or angry to accept my help. You’ll always be my best friend, even if I’m not always as good a friend as you deserve.”

  I didn’t know what to say so I settled on a hoarse, “Thanks.” I cleared my throat a little and focused on the envelope. “You said there were two things in here? Is the other a pony? ’Cause I’ve always wanted a pony.”

  “Go on.” He nudged my foot with his. “Open it.”

  I did, blinking slowly when I saw what was inside. “A plane ticket?”

  “Uh-huh. To Hawaii.”

  My heart lurched. Keilana.

  “She’s there visiting her grandmother while she’s on Thanksgiving break.”

  I shot him a look and he braced himself as though I might take a swing at him.

  “Don’t go crazy, Jesus! I’m not spying on her or anything. I went to Madonna Del Mar and knocked on her door like a regular person. She’s got a new roommate, by the way, ugliest girl I’ve ever seen, and that’s who told me where she was.”

  I closed my eyes. “She won’t talk to me, Russ.” I wanted to cry, something I hadn’t done in what? Hours? “I’ve tried a dozen times. I’ve emailed, I’ve called, and I’ve shown up at her door only to have it slammed in my face again and again. The campus police know my car and towed it last time!”

  He looked surprised and just a little disappointed. “So you’re giving up on her then?”

  My expression sobered. “No way. I’m just ... just ...”

  He bumped my shoulder with his and looked straight ahead to give me a little privacy as my eyes teared up. “Regrouping?”

  “Floundering!” God, it felt good to be talking to him again. It would take some time, but we’d be okay. We always were. “I’m miserable without her.”

  “So don’t be without her.”

  I blew out an annoyed breath. “It’s not that easy. You know that.”

  “Of course it’s not. But it’s not getting any easier with you here and her hundreds of miles away.” He paused.

  I could tell he wanted to say something but was holding back. I would probably be sorry I asked, but as usual, I couldn’t help myself. “What?”

  “Is she the one?”

  He didn’t have to say more for me to know exactly what he meant. Sarah was the one for him. Anyone who knew him could see that that was true. They fought like cats and dogs, but in a way that most people really couldn’t understand, they completed each other.

  Was Keilana Poppenhouse, that willful, guarded, intelligent, witty, kind young woman the one for me? I thought about the sort of person she was deep down inside and the way I felt just being near her. I turned to look at Russ. “I think she might be, but I never got the chance to find out.”

  “Well, then.” He jumped down from my desk and brushed his hands off on his jeans. “What are you waiting for?”

  Good question.

  yx

  A warm, fragrant breeze blew off the water and ruffled my hair as I approached Keilana’s grandmother’s house. It had taken me two plane trip
s and a short boat trip to get to this tiny island, whose name I’d already forgotten. The boat driver had given me simple directions to stop at the first house I found, and I was finally here.

  The house itself was at least seventy years old and the grounds were lush and beautiful. They overflowed with colorful flowers and plants that were a dozen shades of green. It wasn’t as opulent as I’d expected though. There were no gates or servants manning the driveway or guard dogs. It was just a charming old house that was clearly well-maintained and loved.

  To be honest, I hadn’t expected this level of moderation from anyone in the Poppenhouse family, even Keilana.

  I held my breath as I knocked at the door. I hadn’t eaten anything since the day before because I was so nervous I wasn’t sure I’d be able to keep it down. Now, however, I was a little lightheaded and hadn’t even seen her yet!

  The door opened and I found myself looking at a white-haired woman with weathered dark skin and lively eyes as black as coal. She was old but it was impossible to tell just how old. “Hello,” she said.

  She couldn’t have been more than five feet tall! “How in the world did you have a baby that huge?” I exclaimed. Then I froze, mortified that my thoughts tumbled from my brain to my mouth with no stops in-between. I felt my face heat and I clamped my hand over my mouth before I could humiliate myself again. “Oh, God,” I said through my fingers. Carefully, I peeled away my hand. “I’m so sorry. I—”

  But to my relief, she just laughed. “I guess you’ve met my son Kale. And, yes, it wasn’t easy, he was nearly eleven pounds!” She smiled at me, warm but cautious. “You must be Ms. Blaisdell.”

  I shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the next. “You know about me?” I glanced behind her in case I was wrong about the guard dogs and I was about to become breakfast.

  “I do indeed.” She stepped aside. “Keilana mentioned that she had a falling out with her roommate.”

  Whew. “Yes, that’s what’s happened.” I hesitated even though I desperately wanted to talk to Keilana. I knew my unannounced visit was rude. “I apologize for coming by so early.”

  “Nonsense. Besides, you’ve already been sitting at the foot of my driveway for three hours. I was starting to wonder if you’d ever come up.”