Good Morning Heartache

by Audrey Dacey

  She had been with Jimmy a whole day already, and it was the best day of her life. They hadn’t done anything exciting. In fact, most of the time was spent packing or cleaning, but she wasn’t at boarding school or with her sister, so the day didn’t have any choice but to be better.

  She was leaving Franklin for the last time. Jimmy was driving his friend’s truck loaded with his stuff, and they were going to meet in Boston. Riley decided to leave later. They were just going to a hotel tonight, and it was better for her to avoid the major interstates and travel when it was dark. Her sister certainly would have reported the car stolen by now, and she needed it until she could get into the city.

  Jimmy knew a guy that would give them good money for it, even if the police were already looking for it, and that’s what they were going to live on until her trust was released on her birthday. It should be more than enough to support them both.

  She sped down the 140, but not too fast. Every once and a while she would gun it to 65 miles per hour and then take her foot off the gas and let the car slow back to the lame speed limit of 45 where she would stay as long as she could stand it.

  Riley still had most of the drive ahead, but she was struggling to stay awake because the night was dark, the street was unlit, and she was exhausted from all the work she did that day. She stretched her eyes open, and the cool air hitting her face helped keep her focused.

  She wished she could stop somewhere for a cup of coffee, but Jimmy was strict in his instructions to her. She couldn’t have food or drink in the car because they wanted to get as much money as they could for it, and she couldn’t stop because she’d be more likely to get caught. Riley was lucky to be driving the Porsche at all. Jimmy sounded a lot like Alexis when he was lecturing her about the car, but it didn’t matter because he was trying to protect her, whereas Alexis would only be worried about her car.

  Originally she had planned to take the Volvo. She couldn’t believe her luck when Alexis had left the Porsche’s keys on the counter. It was more risky, but the payoff would be much better.

  Riley drove into a wooded stretch, where she knew cops couldn’t hide, and she sped up to 55 miles per hour. It was even darker on this part of the road, and she was eerily alone. It wouldn’t be long until she was in the suburbs of Boston, and the roads wouldn’t be black and abandoned.

  She put all of her focus on the illuminated area in front of her car. The road curved slightly, and suddenly a small, dark figure appeared in the middle of her path. She swerved to miss the creature and lost control of the car. It spun and slid off the side of the road and came to a sudden and violent stop. Riley was smacked in the face by the air bag and her head hit the seat hard. Then there was a sudden stillness.

  Riley’s head spun, and she threw up on what was left of the passenger seat. The last thing she was aware of before she passed out was the putrid smell of skunk spray.

  §

  Jarrod Saltalamacchia, catcher for the Boston Red Sox, stepped up to home plate, bat in hand, at Yankee Stadium. He stared at CC Sabathia, an intense glare against the late afternoon. Sabathia wound up and sent a slider gliding toward Saltalamacchia, who began to swing, but checked up when the pitch didn’t break.

  “Strike one!” bellowed the ump behind him.

  “C’mon, Salty! Hit the ball!” Alexis yelled at her big screen TV as she threw a decorative pillow at the wall just beneath it. “That ump’s gotta be out of his mind to call that a strike. It was outside by a foot and a half at least.”

  “You want another beer?” Ryan asked from behind her.

  “No,” she snarled back. “If Riley calls, I need to be sober.”

  “Okay, okay,” he retreated with his hands up defensively. “Are you sure you want to be watching baseball right now? I think it’s winding you up.”

  “This is the only thing keeping me from going out of my mind.”

  It had been almost two full days, and Riley still wasn’t home. She hadn’t even called. Alexis was beginning to think it wasn’t going to happen, but she didn’t want to risk that Riley would need help, and she wouldn’t be around to take her call or greet her at the door.

  Ryan had stayed at her house since the morning she called. He was a beacon of good sense and rationality when Alexis had none. After he’d first arrived on Thursday morning, Alexis was ready to go out scouring the state, but he’d stopped her. At the time, it had made sense to her, but he convinced her that it was pointless and the chances of Alexis finding Riley that way were almost nonexistent.

  He did convince her to file a police report that morning, but the sheriff’s department didn’t seem to be too concerned with the situation, which really shouldn’t have surprised her. They traced Riley’s credit cards and determined she was in Boston, and then turned it over to Boston PD. They hadn’t heard anything on that end. Again, Alexis was ready to drive down each road of the whole city and do the detective work that the police department apparently didn’t have time for, but Ryan told her to let them do their jobs and wait for news.

  Waiting drove Alexis crazy. She wasn’t one to wait around for other people to do things, but realistically, this wasn’t something that she could do. Not with the little information that she had. At least not effectively. She couldn’t help but wonder if she would get lucky and see her car parked out on the street somewhere.

  Alexis stood up as Salty made contact with the ball. It lined hard and low, hitting the dirt just to the left of second base and past Derek Jeter’s gloved hand.

  “Ha, ha!” Alexis clapped her hands quickly. “Did you see that? That’s why I need to watch the game. Nothing could put me in a better mood than that.”

  Ryan smiled at her, and she turned back to the TV. “How about something to eat? I could make something.”

  “With what? There’s no food in the house.”

  “We could order something,” he suggested.

  Alexis ran a hand over her stomach. She hadn’t had more than a few crackers since Riley left, but her stomach ached, and she didn’t want to eat.

  “Order something for yourself. I’m alright.” He’d been pressing her all day to eat something, and their conversations were becoming repetitive.

  She’d been enjoying Ryan’s company. After he was there for a while, Alexis could feel herself relaxing a little bit. She even wrote a couple of new short stories and the first chapter of her novel. Writing, like the baseball game, distracted her from the fact that she had failed as a sister and guardian. When she wasn’t lucky enough to have a Red Sox-Yankees game to watch or the motivation to write, Ryan kept her distracted with Scrabble or a movie or something. The one tactic he didn’t use was sex.

  Everything had changed between them. The guy who couldn’t keep his hands off of her at the beginning of the week hadn’t touched her except to hug her when she asked him to. And while sex would be the ultimate distraction, she was strangely comforted that he wasn’t taking advantage of the situation.

  He didn’t speak of love or relationships any more, and she wondered if the encounter had happened at all or if it was just a symptom of heat stroke.

  The doorbell rang, and Alexis jumped up off the couch. A nervous tickle swelled in her abdomen. Please be her, she thought as she charged down the hallway.

  She unlocked the deadbolt and swung the door open while she drew in a deep breath and closed her eyes. When she opened them, Officer Danny Moreno was standing on her stoop.

  “You never bring good news,” she said, her whole body visibly shaking. “What happened?”

  With an even tone and a blank face, he said, “Ms. Conner, we have located your missing vehicle.”

  “And Riley?” Alexis’s chest ached and she was sure that her heart was beating so fast it was going to give her a heart attack.

  Officer Moreno’s face dropped and he looked at the floor. “She wasn’t in there. There was an accident, but we have no way of knowing who was inside the car when it happened.”

  Alexis swayed backwar
d. She was sure she was going to fall, but Ryan stepped behind her and held her up with his body and an arm around her waist.

  “What did happen?” she choked out.

  “It appears that the driver lost control of the vehicle. When the driver attempted to regain control, the vehicle spun off the road, hitting a tree. The passenger side of the car is severely damaged and the air bags were deployed.”

  Alexis didn’t have anything more to say, so she walked away and sat on the bottom step of the staircase.

  She heard Ryan and Danny Moreno talking but couldn’t hear what they were saying. She couldn’t think, much less concentrate on a conversation. Every time a thought passed through her mind, it was too painful to think any further.

  Ryan stood in front of her. “This could be a lot worse,” he said quietly.

  “I know.” Alexis bit her lip hard and sniffled. She looked down at her watch. It was almost five. She couldn’t delay any longer. She had been dreading this, but now it was the only reasonable thing she could think of doing.

  “Can you hand me my phone?” she sighed. She could feel the tears welling in the bottoms of her eyes.

  “Don’t call her again. She’ll call. Maybe not tonight, but she will call.”

  “I’m not going to call Riley. I have to call someone else.”

  He gave her a suspicious stare but then went into the kitchen. When he came back, he slowly handed her phone to her. With a few touches, Alexis could hear the line ringing. By the third ring she hoped that she hadn’t missed her chance, so she was startled when she heard a voice on the other end of the line.

  “Make it fast. I was just about to leave.”

  “Dr. Lehrer? It’s Alexis.” The phone line was silent for a moment, but the woman on the other end didn’t acknowledge her. “I can’t make it on Monday. Something has come up.”

  The line was silent again for a few moments. “I have everything set up for Monday. If you can’t make it, I don’t know if I’ll be able to do it again.”

  Alexis bit the side of her lip, holding back her tears. “I understand.”

  “This could be it for you. Regina doesn’t take well to being cancelled on. This is last minute. Are you sure?”

  “I’m sure.”

  Alexis hung up the phone and flung it on the stair before Dr. Lehrer started asking too many questions.

  Ryan was staring at her with disbelief. “Why did you do that?”

  She’d shared with him the content of her first call with her mentor but hadn’t let him in on this part of her plan.

  “If I’m not out there searching for her, I’m not leaving the house. Not until I’m sure she’s at least alright. I certainly can’t drive four hours away.”

  Ryan picked up the phone and held it in front of her. “Call her back. I’ll stay here.”

  “I have to be here. Riley doesn’t know you at all. Besides, you’ll be back in New York on Monday.” A tear broke free from her lashes.

  “I don’t have to…” he started.

  Alexis wiped the tear from her cheek and stood up. “Let’s just watch the game.”

  Chapter 16

  Riley looked despairingly at the grocery clerk. “I don’t understand. It worked yesterday.”

  The large man behind the credit card machine didn’t look like he cared. “Well, it’s not working now. Do you have cash? Another card?”

  “Can’t you just give me the food and start a tab for me? I’m going to inherit a lot of money in a few months, and I’ll pay it all back then.”

  The man’s dark eyes glared at her. He reached over and picked up the phone that rested next to his register. “I need a manager and security to register three,” he announced to the entire store.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me! I just said that I’d pay for them.” Riley was turning a deep shade of pink. How could this guy think so little of her? How could he treat her like any other person? She was a Conner!

  “Listen, sweetheart, we’re not a bar. We don’t have tabs. You pay now, you get groceries now. You pay later, you get groceries later.”

  A man in dark blue pants and a matching shirt that read “security” on the shoulders stopped at the end of the register.

  The fat cashier looked at him and said, “Please escort this young lady out of the store.”

  The guard moved toward her and attempted to grab the bicep of her right arm, but she shrugged away from him. “I’ll leave.” Riley pushed past him and headed to the doors at the front of the store. The guard followed her until she was outside, then he stood at the doors and watched her.

  This was ridiculous! She bet Alexis had something to do with this. She probably cancelled her card.

  Riley stood in the dimly lit parking lot and looked around for Jimmy’s Daewoo. This was not the paradise she imagined, and though it had only been a couple of days, she thought that things would be at least okay by now. They weren’t.

  She looked down at the only physical sign she was in a car accident, her swollen, black-and-blue wrist. It hurt like hell, but she couldn’t see a doctor without Alexis finding her. She had to live with the constant ache, and now she couldn’t even afford a small bottle of generic Tylenol.

  Jimmy had no money, and she had to put down the deposit for their new apartment with a cash advance on her credit card and buy furniture to make it livable, which amounted to an absolute hellhole filled with junk. It was in the basement floor of some old brick building downtown. It was tiny and expensive, and she’d seen a rat. Not in the actual apartment, but close enough to the front door that it freaked her out.

  Jimmy spent most of his days practicing with his band in their tiny living room, and Riley felt invisible most of the time. Both nights at least one of the band members crashed on their futon, and they’d had no time alone together.

  He’d promised that after Riley got groceries, they would go out to dinner—his treat. He had to go do something while she was in there. He didn’t say what but promised to be back in half an hour.

  Riley looked at her watch. It had been forty-five minutes. She pulled out her phone. She thought it was lucky that it still worked and that Alexis hadn’t used it triangulate her position like she saw on Castle once.

  Jimmy’s phone went immediately to voicemail. It was probably dead. His phone was always dead.

  Since she didn’t have any groceries, she decided to start walking back to the hellhole. It wasn’t far, and she figured Jimmy would see her on his way or figure out that she went home. She gripped her purse close to her body as a smiling bum eyed her from behind a grocery cart filled with garbage. She held her keys with a tight grip with the longest one jutting out, creating a makeshift weapon in case she needed it. It was the one thing her sister had taught her that she considered useful, and she hadn’t needed the knowledge until two days ago.

  This really wasn’t what she imagined when she thought about moving to the city. She took three showers a day and begged Jimmy not to leave her alone, but when he wasn’t practicing, he always had something to do or somewhere to be. He claimed it would be boring for her to go. She had spent several hours alone with nothing to do in the shabby little apartment, and every minute she hated it a little bit more. On Saturday, his band had a gig at a local pub, but he told her she couldn’t go because if he got caught bringing an underage girl in he’d be in big trouble. He didn’t have a problem with it when they were in Franklin.

  Tomorrow she’d insist on tagging along. She’d rather be bored with him than without him. She turned down the dark street where her new home sat and quickened her already fast pace. She’d feel a little bit better once she got inside and locked the door.

  Jimmy’s beat up car was parked on the side of the road in front of their apartment. It took Riley by surprise, but she figured that he had just stopped off to pick something up before coming for her. He had no other reason to be there.

  When she got to the door, she turned the knob and pushed the door with the weight of her small body,
but the door didn’t move. Jimmy had locked the deadbolt, which made sense. The owner, who lived upstairs, told her that they should always keep the door locked.

  Her key clicked into the lock, and she turned the key and the knob simultaneously, but when she pushed on the door, it stopped short again, opening only a few inches.

  “Hey babe, what are you doing here?” Jimmy’s breath was labored, and his skin was flushed, including his bare chest. He held the door almost completely closed and covered most of the opening with his body.

  Riley looked into Jimmy’s brown eyes; he was hiding something. “Let me in, Jimmy. I don’t want to stand out here any longer. It’s freaking me out.”

  “Jimmy!” a high voice from inside called. “I can’t find my thong!”

  Riley stood there blinking, her mouth agape, hoping Jimmy would jump in and explain why there was a woman in their apartment looking for her thong.

  But he didn’t. He asked what color it was.

  Riley pushed past him and into the small studio. A tall blonde stood in the kitchenette. The feature most noticeable to Riley, besides the perky breasts that were probably twice the size of hers, was that she wasn’t wearing any pants. She was completely nude from the waist down.

  “What the hell?” Riley whispered to no one in particular.

  “Don’t do this, Riley.” Jimmy replied.

  Her eyes widened in rage, and then in sadness when he put his hands on her shoulders. “What am I not supposed to do? This is my apartment. You left me at the grocery store to have sex with someone else.”

  “Found it!” came a squeal from the other side of the room. Riley glanced over Jimmy’s shoulder to see the woman stumbling into her underwear and jeans. The thong was pink, Riley noted absently.

  “I would have come to get you if you just waited.”

  “That’s so not the point. The point is that you are having sex with someone else—here—in our place.”

  The blonde came over and pulled Jimmy’s face to hers, kissing him deep and wet on the mouth. Riley had to swallow the vomit that had risen just past her throat. Hot tears stung the back of her eyes.