Harry Hunter Mystery Box Set

by Willow Rose

  Chapter 37

  The gun was steady in my hand as I was reminding myself to be cautious not to overreact. After all, the bumping sounds could easily have been Josie going to the bathroom, or maybe she hadn’t gone to bed at all after we spoke. But the sight of the Buick in the street made me suspect otherwise, and I wasn’t taking any chances.

  I reached the top of the stairs when I saw a shadow move across the hallway…the shadow of a person who looked nothing like Josie.

  “Stop right there,” I said.

  He did as I told him.

  “Hands where I can see them, behind your head.”

  The person obeyed. Hands were placed behind the neck.

  “Now, turn around.”

  As I suspected, I was looking at David Smith. He was shaking heavily.

  “What are you doing in my home?” I asked and stepped forward, holding the gun out. I felt such anger swell up inside of me and had to keep my cool so it wouldn’t run away with me. It was one thing that he was watching us from the street, but having him break into my house where my daughter was sleeping all alone was something completely different.

  “Answer me! What are you doing here? Did you hurt my daughter?”

  He shook his head. “N-no.”

  “What’s going on?”

  Josie came out through her door and looked at us.

  “Are you okay?” I asked. “Did he touch you?”

  Josie shook her head. “No. I didn’t…who is he, and why is he here…Dad?”

  “She was sleeping,” David said, stuttering. “I was just…watching her.”

  “You were watching her sleep?” I asked. “Why?”

  David sank to his knees, crying. “Don’t you understand? She’s all I have left of her. She’s all I have left of Emilia. She has her heart…pounding in her chest, my daughter’s heart.”

  “What?” Josie asked. “He’s her dad?”

  “Is that why you’ve been watching us?” I asked.

  He nodded, sobbing. “Yes. That and because I needed to protect her.”

  “What do you mean protect her?” I asked, confused.

  David pressed back tears and swallowed before he spoke. “Someone wants her dead.”

  “Someone wants my Josie dead?” I asked. “Who?”

  “I don’t know,” David said, crying.

  I stepped forward and placed the gun to his head, then yelled:

  “WHO?”

  David was trembling beneath the gun. “I don’t know him. I don’t know his name or who he is, but I know he works at the harbor. I’ve done a couple of gigs for him, you know…transport. Stuff like that, illegal transport. He imports appliances, fridges, freezers, washer and dryers, stuff like that under the radar. Avoiding taxes and stuff like that. I don’t know much about it except I sometimes drive one of their trucks. That’s all. I owe money, a lot of it, and they pay me well. Better than any other driving job. As long as I don’t ask any questions. Anyway, I heard him talking to someone about it a few days ago, about the girl, the daughter of a detective and how the heart, my Emilia’s heart, had led them to find the body of some guy that they wanted to stay buried. I knew it could only be Josie they were talking about. They talked about cutting that heart out of the girl, getting rid of her. I thought I could protect her. As I told you, she’s all I have left of my girl, my sweet daughter.”

  “Why didn’t you just come to talk to me? You could’ve warned me instead of hanging out in the street like that,” I said, still angry, but easing up slightly.

  “I panicked. I wanted to see Josie, to see her with my daughter’s heart, and then when you came out to the car, I freaked out. I panicked, and then I thought you wouldn’t talk to me after I almost ran you over.”

  “Well, you’re right about that. No one listens to someone creeping around like some snake. I’m not even sure I believe half of what you’re saying right now.”

  Josie came up behind me. “Dad, listen to the man. Look at him. He doesn’t look like much of a threat, does he? Don’t forget what he did for me.”

  “He broke into our home, Josie. This is our sacred place. Here, I expect you to be safe. He violated that.”

  She placed a hand on the gun and lowered it while looking into my eyes. I eased up. No one could soften me up like Josie.

  “Who were these men?” I asked David. “The ones you heard talk about Josie?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t know their names.”

  I lifted the gun again. “You’re gonna help me catch them. But not till we’ve gotten Josie to a safe place.”

  Chapter 38

  “What’s this?”

  Al stared at Josie, her eyes squinting. She was fully dressed, even though it was three a.m.

  “It’s my daughter. Josie, this is Al; Al, meet Josie. Get used to one another. She’s going to stay here for a little while.”

  “She’s what?”

  Al stared at me, but I pushed past her inside and walked to a couch, then told Josie to lie down on it.

  “Do you have a blanket? Josie needs rest. Her heart, you know.”

  Al stared at me, her mouth still half open. She slammed the door shut behind us and put the many safety locks back on.

  “Now, wait a second, I have never…I’m not…children and I are not a mix.”

  “Blanket, please,” I said, ignoring her.

  Al walked to her closet, grabbed a blanket, then handed it to me. I used it to cover Josie, then kissed her, and told her to sleep. It didn’t take a second before her eyes were closed and she was breathing heavily. She needed it.

  “Are you even listening to me?” Al said.

  I pulled her to the other end of the room, so our talking wouldn’t wake Josie. “Listen, I get it. You don’t like children. But Josie is fourteen. She’s not a child. Christ, she’s twice your size, if you haven’t noticed.”

  “A lot of children are taller than me; that doesn’t mean they don’t cause trouble or make a mess,” she snorted. “I’m not the motherly type.”

  I sighed and ran a hand through my hair. “I need this.”

  She gave me a look.

  “Remember your sister and how I found the guy who killed her?”

  Al groaned loudly. “Oh, you’re gonna pull that one on me, huh?”

  “You said a lifetime of help.”

  “I meant on computers. Hacking stuff. Not babysitting.”

  “She’s in danger,” I said. “They want to kill her. I can’t go into too many details, but she helped find a body that was supposed to stay hidden. You’re the only one I trust right now. No one knows this place even exists. It’s a freaking fortress.”

  Al exhaled and fiddled with a dreadlock. “All right, I guess. But I’m not cooking or anything like that.”

  “You don’t have to,” I said and handed her a one-hundred-dollar bill. “Buy a pizza. Buy several since Josie eats a lot. She’s still growing.”

  “I wouldn’t think it was possible for her to get any taller, but I’ll take your word for it,” she said and took the bill.

  “Just don’t let her leave the apartment, okay? I need her to stay hidden,” I said, about to walk to the door.

  “I haven’t left this place in years, at least not in full daylight,” Al said. “I think I can manage. But, hey, be safe out there, will ya?”

  I chuckled. “And you say you’re not the motherly type. That right there was some pretty deep motherly stuff.”

  “Get out of here,” Al said. “Before I kick you out.”

  “Oh, before I forget,” I said and stopped myself halfway to the door. “There is one more thing I need you to do for me, something I know you’re very good at.”

  Al rolled her eyes at me. “You’re the gift that just keeps on giving, aren’t you? Okay, Hunter. Spit it out. What is it?”

  Chapter 39

  I knocked on the door, then poked my head inside. It was the next morning after only a few hours of restless sleep. I had a pounding headache but i
gnored it, knowing Jean would kill me if she knew.

  “You got a minute?”

  Fowler was on the phone when he saw me. He nodded and signaled for me to give him a minute while he finished his conversation. Then he hung up.

  “Hunter.” He looked at his watch. “This early? Something must be up.”

  I sat down in a chair across from him.

  “I know that look,” he said and leaned back in his leather chair, folding his hands in front of him. “It usually means trouble.”

  “It’s the Wolfe murder,” I said. “You know how Josie helped find where he was buried, right?”

  Fowler chuckled. “Allegedly because she dreamt it, yes, how could I forget? Has she had any other dreams recently?”

  “None that she has told me about, but I have reason to believe she’s in danger.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, whoever killed Wolfe is trying to get to her.”

  He got a serious look on his face. I thought about David and how he was doing back at the house where I had cuffed him and put him in the pantry, then closed the door. Camille was the only one in the house, and she would be sleeping most of the day. I reminded myself to start looking for a nurse for her. Jean was wonderful, but it wasn’t healthy for any of us that she came over so often. It broke my heart to think this way, but it was necessary.

  “And you’re certain about this?” Fowler asked.

  “I’m not making this up, if that’s what you’re suggesting,” I said. “I have this from a reliable source.”

  He nodded. “Okay. Have you gotten her somewhere safe?”

  I nodded. “She’s staying with Al.”

  Fowler smiled. “I remember her. You still see each other?”

  “Occasionally,” I said.

  Fowler had been my partner back when we had been on Al’s sister’s case. It was around the time he received news of his promotion, and I had ended up solving it alone while he moved up the ranks instead.

  “Okay,” he said. “And what do you need my help for, then?”

  “I need to re-open the García case. I think they were killed because the girl knew who killed Wolfe. These two cases are deeply connected, and I want the means to solve them. I also think it’s connected to the death of Savannah Hart, who died in a fire last night. I believe she was murdered too.”

  He wrinkled his forehead. “Do you have any evidence to back up this claim? It takes hard evidence to reopen a case; you know that.”

  “I’ll have it hopefully by the end of the week. I have a hunch I will.”

  Fowler nodded. “Okay, then. You’ve always had good hunches. If you can provide proof enough, then the case is all yours, but it won’t make you popular with your colleagues. You’re basically questioning another detective’s work and claiming he didn’t do his job properly.”

  I rose to my feet, phone in my hand.

  “I’m a big boy. I can take it.”

  Chapter 40

  “Do you have any sodas?”

  Josie looked at Al, the strange woman in harem pants who was sitting by her many computer screens, staring at them steadily, her fingers tapdancing across her many keyboards.

  She didn’t answer…maybe because she had on that big headset. Probably listening to music or speaking with someone at the other end of the world. She had been like this for the past four hours, ever since Josie woke up, and she was beginning to get bored. Her dad had taken her phone, so she couldn’t be traced, and she didn’t have her computer or her sketchbook with her either. There was nothing to do. Plus, she was starving. Al had been awake when she woke up, and she wondered if she had slept at all. The constant tapping on her keyboard was annoying, and she didn’t like the way her eyes didn’t look away from the screen…not even once. It was like she was hypnotized by that blue light like her very soul was sucked into the screen in front of her and couldn’t let go. Josie had asked for food, for cereal or even some bread, but Al hadn’t answered her.

  Now, Josie rose to her feet and walked to the kitchen, then looked in the fridge. There was nothing much in there. Just some pomegranate, some kind of weird looking juice, and a pineapple. Was that all this woman ate?

  No wonder she was the size of an ant.

  Josie filled a glass of water from the fridge, then drank it, but it didn’t help anything. She felt weak because she hadn’t eaten for so long. It wasn’t good for her heart to be fasting. She wondered if she should go and ask Al about food, like go up to her and get in her face to get her attention. Maybe pull off the headset.

  Nah, she’s busy and doesn’t have time to take care of you. You heard her last night. She didn’t want to babysit. She doesn’t like children.

  Josie didn’t like to impose or be in the way. She wasn’t one to demand much of people around her, and especially not if she sensed they didn’t like her or want her around. More often than not, she was certain that if she didn’t do things right or behave well enough, she’d lose people—like her dad would get mad at her and leave her. It was a real fear she’d had ever since her mother overdosed. She’d always felt it was her fault, that it was something she’d said or done to upset her enough to make her start doing drugs again. She often feared she was the one who had driven her mother to do the drugs again somehow, and now she was terrified of doing the same thing to her father. That’s why she hadn’t told him about how she felt that something was wrong with her heart before all of this happened. Before she passed out, she’d feel weak from time to time, especially when doing sports; she could get very dizzy. But she didn’t dare to tell him. She didn’t like for him to worry about her. Worry wasn’t good for anyone. It made people sick. She knew that more than anyone because she worried a lot herself. She worried about her dad getting shot at work; she worried her mother would never get back to normal again. She worried that God would take them both from her, and she’d end up all alone. She worried about those things too much.

  Josie felt a pinch in her heart as her stomach rumbled. She grabbed the strange juice and poured herself a glass of it, then took a deep sip. It tasted awful. She spit it all out in the sink, then washed her mouth with water. She went to the fridge, stared at the pomegranate, then decided it wasn’t worth even trying. She looked at her watch.

  “Could we order pizza?” she asked. “My dad said we could?”

  Al was deeply into her work, and, of course, she didn’t hear. Josie sighed deeply, then walked back to the couch where she had slept. The couch was way too short, and she woke up with pain in her legs and hips.

  If only she had her phone, she could call her dad and ask him to bring her food. Had he completely forgotten about her? It was one in the afternoon, and she was starving.

  Josie sat down with a deep sigh, and looked at the door, willing him to come.

  Bring pizza. Bring pizza!

  As she sat there, staring at the door, it was like it suddenly exploded. Josie screamed as men entered the apartment, men wearing black masks and holding weapons. They pointed them at Josie and hit Al with a stick on the back of her head, so she passed out.

  Next, a man entered, a man in a black suit, walking toward her with a grin on his face, his haunting steel-gray eyes glaring down at her.

  “Hello, Josie,” he said. “I think it’s time you and I met properly, don’t you think?”

  Chapter 41

  I ran my bike across town, zigzagging through traffic, making sure that if anyone followed me, I’d lose them easily. I made a quick stop at one of my favorite pizza places on the beach. I asked them to make me a large pizza with ham and cheese, then drove up the small alley toward Al’s building. I grabbed the pizza, ran up the back entrance and up the stairs, whistling. I had a good feeling about this case. I was going to solve it with the help of David Smith, who was still cuffed to a pipe in my pantry. I was going to him next, making sure he didn’t starve to death in my house. I knew it wasn’t very nice of me to cuff him like that, but I had to make sure he didn’t leave. I needed his help
to catch this killer. Without him, I was lost. He knew when the next delivery was due down at the harbor, and that was when they’d be there again, those men that had spoken about Josie and cutting her heart out. He had told me he was hired to do the next job tomorrow night. I just hoped Al would find me some evidence I could use against them. If all went well, I could have a team with me at the harbor and nail them once their delivery came in. But the illegal import of appliances wasn’t exactly enough for me. I needed them to go down for the murder of Wolfe, and hopefully, Savannah Hart, along with Emilia and Jennifer García as well. I just didn’t have all the pieces put together yet, and I hoped Al would provide me with that.

  Knowing her, she’d been at it all day and had completely forgotten to feed my daughter. That was why I brought pizza. I felt compelled to, somehow. Maybe it was just my common sense.

  I ran up the first flight of stairs, pizza balancing on my hand, the intense smell of it in my nostrils, making me realize I was actually starving. It wasn’t exactly heart-healthy food for my daughter, but it was the best I could do right now. It was better than her not eating.

  As I reached the top of the stairs, my heart suddenly dropped. The door to Al’s apartment was gone. I could barely breathe when I saw it. Al never left it open. She locked it with at least five locks. As I approached it, I realized the door was on the floor inside the apartment, splintered to pieces.

  Inside, I saw Al lying on the floor, blood smeared in her hair.

  I threw the pizza down and ran to her.

  “Al!”

  She groaned something and tried to lift her head but couldn’t.

  “Careful,” I said. “You’ve gotten a blow to your head. Come, let me help.”

  I helped her back up into her chair, where she sat for a few seconds, staring at me like she couldn’t focus properly…like she had to figure out who I was. I grabbed her some water, and she drank.