“You keep laundry in the trunk of your car?” Enid said, eying his western-style shirt.
“Boy Scout motto: Be prepared,” Jack answered.
“That’s the Girl Scouts.”
“It’s still good advice.”
“I’m hungry,” Enid said. “Are you planning to feed me anytime this century?”
Within twenty minutes, they were sitting in an ugly orange booth chomping on chicken at El Pollo Loco.
The silence was starting to get to Enid when Jack wiped his mouth and said, “So, tell me about your mom.”
“What do you care?” she snapped, before she could stop herself.
“Shift the attitude into neutral. We are going to do this thing. We are going to have a normal conversation. Like two mature individuals.”
Enid made a sour face.
If he thinks I’m going to talk for his entertainment, he’s got another thing coming.
After several moments of silence, Jack said, “Okay. I’ll get this party started. I’ll tell you what I remember about your mom…”
Enid’s eyes flew open in alarm. She did not want to hear this – not any of it!
“I never even knew her last name,” Jack said.
“How romantic.”
“No. It wasn’t.” Jack said calmly, “I was as much a one-night stand to her as she was to me.”
Enid dropped her chicken wing. “I’m going to barf.”
“Listen, kid – you want me to treat you like a clueless moron, I’m happy to oblige. You want to talk in truths – here I am. I’m your dad. Am I happy about it?” Jack made a face, “Are you?”
Enid glared at him.
“Your mom had great legs,” Jack said, taking a bite of his chicken.
“Doesn’t anymore.”
“When – how did she die?”
Enid blinked, caught off guard. “I’d rather not talk about it.”
“First time I met her, she grabbed my butt.”
“Gross!”
“She made me laugh. And her hair smelled terrific.”
“Is that before or after she blew chunks all over your carpet?”
“We all eventually blow chunks on somebody somewhere.”
“Not me!”
Jack smiled.
“Were you ever married?” Enid said.
“Nope.”
“You have any other kids?”
“Nada.”
“Do I have grandparents?” Enid said, trying to hide the eagerness in her voice.
Enid’s mom had grown up in foster homes and Enid had always fantasized about having grandparents. She envisioned them living in a big farmhouse that they would let her explore – an attic where she would stumble onto clues to unsolved mysteries and treasure maps that would lead her into wildly exciting adventures. For Christmas, she imagined they gave her a horse named “Star.”
She glanced at Jack and was surprised to see a pained expression on his face. She forced herself to say in a breezy voice, “Is that a ‘no’?”
“Dead.”
Sharp disappointment made her frown. “How’d they die?”
Jack didn’t answer. He suddenly seemed a million miles away and it wasn’t in a good way. She cleared her throat.
He looked at her, startled.
“Fair’s fair,” Enid said, imitating Jack as she repeated back to him, “You want to talk in truths – here I am.”
“You’re one-quarter Apache.”
Enid’s eyes widened in pleasure, “For real?”
“Your great-grandmother was a medicine woman – a healer.”
“Jeez,” Enid breathed, thrilled.
“She helped raise me. I lived with her on the reservation for two years while – ” Jack’s voice trailed off.
“While what?”
“How did your mother die?” Jack said.
Enid took a bite of chicken, answered with a mouth full of food, “Ee’s ot ead.”
“What?”
Enid took her time, swallowed. “She’s not dead.”
“Is that the truth?”
“She drinks too much.” Enid watched Jack’s face for any signs of pity – any signs of anything that would piss her off. Nothing. But it was a good kind of nothing. “Do you drink?”
“Sometimes. Do you?” he said.
“No!” She shook her head in disgust.
“Does your mother know where you are?
Enid winced, regretting telling him her mother wasn’t dead.
“Don’t you think you should let her know you’re alive?”
“She doesn’t care.”
“I guarantee, she does.”
“You’re not going to send me back!” Enid said angrily.
“I’ll make you a deal. We call your mom and tell her you’re okay and – aren’t you out for summer?”
“Yeah,” Enid answered suspiciously.
Jack shrugged nonchalantly. “You can - hang out here. For a couple days.”
Enid said, “Do you have any – horses?”
“I have a cat and one guest bedroom.”
A flush of happiness warmed her face. After a few moments, she pretended nonchalance and shrugged. “Maybe a few days.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
A little more than kin, and less than kind.
–William Shakespeare
As Jack pulled up to his house, he couldn’t help but feel a sense of pride. It wasn’t much – but it was his. It was built in the 1940s, which, in Phoenix, made it a historical building. Every house on Hoover Street was historic, which was a Phoenix way of saying you lived in a quaint house with bad windows and suspicious plumbing. He never got around to the time and cost of updating the windows and, over the years, found he enjoyed the pleasantly dangerous shaking and rattling sounds they made when a monsoon was brewing. The utility bill was ridiculously high in the summer, but so was the price of putting in all new windows. The clean lines of the house were almost hidden by his poorly tended – yet pleasant – landscaping.
Jack pulled into his driveway to the blare of Katy Perry emanating from Annie Cisco’s blinged-out boom box. Annie and her girlfriends were washing her brand-new cherry-red Mustang.
Jack had known Annie since she was a toddler and had been disconcerted when he realized that she was nursing a serious adolescent crush for him.
Her father, Nick, was an ex-Marine with a penchant for guns. He and Jack had been friendly acquaintances over the years – until Annie started showing an inappropriate amount of interest in Jack.
Annie had transformed from a coltish tomboy to a bikini-clad beauty overnight. Between sunning herself in the front yard and washing the Mustang in her bikini – Jack avoided the hell out of her.
“Who’s that?” Enid said.
“Neighbor’s kid.”
They got out of the car.
Annie posed with the hose and gave Jack a look beyond her years. “Hey Mr. Fox! Wanna help us wash the Mustang?”
Two teenage girls lounging on the porch, painting their toenails, erupted in giggles.
“Annie, Enid,” Jack said awkwardly. “Enid, this is Annie.”
“Hi,” Enid said with a polite reserve that surprised Jack.
Jack opened his mouth to speak, but Annie flicked the hose at him, getting his shirt wet. The porch girls dissolved into nervous giggling.
Nick stepped out onto the porch, face dark.
Jack waved politely to Nick, who managed a tight-lipped nod. Jack didn’t look back as he walked to his house.
Once behind closed doors, Enid said, “Creep-a-delic.”
“Tell me about it,” Jack said wryly.
It must’ve been the right answer, because Enid grinned.
“It ain’t much, but it’s home,” Jack said.
Spare furnishings were interrupted with various ex-girlfriends’ half-hearted attempts at decorating. No matter how the relationship ended, Jack made it a point to leave their touches on his house – a reminder of the women he had let thro
ugh the door.
Sylvia had hung the framed photograph of the sunset from one of their weekends in Rocky Point. An eight-inch wooden nutcracker statue had been a gift from Gretta – it was a “Sam Spade” style detective with fedora pulled low over the eyes and his jaw ready to crush walnuts. His foot had broken off and Jack had left it sitting by the figurine for the day he remembered to glue it back. Mary had bought him burgundy pillows for the couch that were now faded and threadbare, and Mallory gave him the coffee table book of birds that sat on an end table. Stella had left a gash in the wall where she had hurled a coffee mug at his head, purposefully missing his skull – at least he always liked to think she aimed to miss.
A black cat jumped onto a nearby chair. Jack picked Harriett up in one arm. “You like cats?”
“I don’t know,” Enid said, eying the cat.
“Then you’re even. She doesn’t know if she likes you either.”
Enid made a face.
Jack led her down a short hallway to a tiny bedroom that contained a twin-sized bed, chair, and nightstand with a driftwood lamp. Jack pointed down the hall, “Bathroom’s there. Towels in the closet. Use your own bar of soap. Do you have any luggage?”
“At – a friend’s house.”
“I thought you didn’t know anybody in town?”
“She’s – a mutual friend.”
“That’s right,” Jack said, wagging his finger at her, “Sam said he picked you up from Jeni’s apartment.”
Enid nodded.
“Sam also said he thought you had a gun.”
“Well, I don’t.”
Jack stroked the cat.
“Do you have a gun?” Enid said.
“I don’t like guns.”
“Aren’t detectives supposed to have guns?”
“Detectives are supposed to have brains. Much more dangerous than a gun.”
“Yeah, right.”
“What grade are you in?”
“Why?”
“You going to college?”
“Maybe.”
“What’s your favorite color?” Jack asked.
“Why?”
Jack sighed. “Because I intend to take this highly dangerous information and use it against you. Isn’t that obvious?”
Enid scowled. “Do you have a girlfriend I need to know about?”
An image of Eve’s face rose in Jack’s mind and the thought of her being anybody’s girlfriend, much less his, seemed ludicrous. Eve Hargrove was above anything so common as things being someone’s girlfriend.
“Why don’t you get settled in – I have work to do,” he said, abruptly heading for the kitchen.
Jack breathed a sigh of relief when he heard the click of the sparebedroom’s door closing behind Enid. He was glad to be alone. He wasn’t used to having a kid shadowing him, blowing snot on him, doubling the lunch tab, smashing the hell out of his car and bawling hysterically – not to mention hassling him constantly with her teenage attitude.
Where the hell does she get that moxie?
In the kitchen, Jack fed the cat and brewed a pot of coffee. He sat down to the table with his laptop. Sitting at the kitchen table and looking out the window that overlooked the backyard was his favorite place to think. The backyard had simple desert landscaping and mesquite trees that reminded him of his grandmother’s house, which gave him a sense of comfort.
He did an online search for “The Sugar Shack, Phoenix” and smiled when he saw that it was categorized as a “drinking establishment” featuring topless dancers. It opened in 1952 and ran continuously until it burnt down in 1978. The owner, Cormac Delrow, had been suspected of arson for insurance fraud, but no charges were ever filed. A search for Cormac Delrow showed that he was currently living in Apache Junction. Jack entered Cormac’s contact information into his phone. It was just after three o’clock and, if he left now, he could be on Cormac’s front step in forty minutes.
He hesitated, irritated at the thought of taking Enid with him, but reluctant to leave her alone in his house. He went to her door, knocked softly.
No answer.
He wrote a note and was taping it to her door when she jerked it open.
“What?” she asked, irritably. She snagged the note from his hand and read it. “Apache Junction? Do we have relatives there?”
Jack felt his heart sink.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.
–Friedrich Nietzsche
Lunch in hand, Bud pushed open the door to the tiny room where he had left Chip sorting through files. He was startled to hear a woman’s voice and, entering, he stood staring in shock.
Eve Hargrove was sitting – no, draped – across Chip’s utilitarian desk.
At the sight of him, Chip’s face flushed with guilt and Eve’s eyes sparkled with delight.
“Daddy dearest,” she said mockingly.
Chip shot her a startled look, but Eve never took her eyes off Bud as she playfully said, “Your son’s trying to seduce me.”
Chip’s face burned red.
Scowling, Bud slapped the paper bag lunches on the desk.
“What’s for lunch, Pops?” Eve said with a devilish glint in her eyes. She looked in the bag, wrinkling her nose in distaste.
“What do you want?” Bud said through clenched teeth.
“It’s a business call. Unfortunately, it’s not your business.”
Bud said, “Nobody I need murdered – so…?”
Eve gave a silky smooth laugh.
“What do you want?” Bud said.
Eve pouted, slid off the desk and stood. Her movement caused her exotic perfume to drift over him. Chills jangled down his spine.
Eve said, “I’m here to see Frank Ficus.”
Bud narrowed his eyes, surprised.
What’s she up to?
Chip interrupted, “She came here looking for Frank.”
“He hasn’t been on the force for over ten years,” Bud said, his eyes narrowed with suspicion.
Eve shrugged helplessly, “My bad.”
“What do you want with Frank?” Bud asked.
“You know, Bud, I’m not sure you’re the right person to be confiding in.” Eve turned to Chip, caressed him with her eyes, “Tomorrow night?”
Bud grabbed Eve’s arm and pushed her out the door. Bud slammed the door behind them and shoved Eve into the wall, “You stay away from – !”
“Old man,” Eve hissed.
Bud froze.
Her words seemed to capture vapors – silent fears that shape-shifted up from deep within him. She had put a voice to his darkest fears.
Witch.
Eve stepped up to him. He could almost taste her perfume. She leaned in like she was trying to whisper a secret into his mouth – like she was out to kiss him...
Afraid to breathe, Bud had the sensation of being caught on a barbed wire hook. Any motion, any thought – would cause her poisonous barbs to dig deeper into his flesh.
As if reading his thoughts, she gave him a wicked smile that dumped ice water down Bud’s spine. An instant later, she was gone and Bud realized that he was trembling.
Old man.
Bud wiped sweat from his brow. Her words, that repugnant smile – they echoed in his head. He clenched his fist and barged into the file room where he grabbed a fistful of Chip’s shirt. “You’re not seeing her – you’re not ever going near her!”
Chip broke free of his grasp and opened his mouth to speak, but the ferocity in Bud’s eyes halted him. Chip hesitated and, looking away said, “Yeah. All right.”
Bud felt a searing pain race down his left arm and he reflexively gripped it, sagged backwards with a groan.
Chip jumped to his side, “What is it? Your heart?”
A relentless weight hunkered down on his chest and then two blasts of searing pain. Bud heard Chip’s voice saying som
ething – frantic – what was it? The ominous, oncoming monsoon – he was out in the open, unprotected. He flinched at the distant sound of Eve’s laughter. He reached out, trying to touch it – her – his fingers finding purchase on the thickness of nothing as he slipped deeper and deeper into the abyss. The last thing he remembered thinking was…
She is the darkness.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
All universal moral principles are idle fancies.
–Marquis de Sade
Flying down the highway with Jack at the wheel, Enid gazed wide-eyed at the Superstition Mountains that, even to her untrained eyes, looked stark and dangerous. She couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to hike up there, unless they had a death wish. They were heading toward Apache Junction, which Jack had told her was famous for being the home of a ghost town and the Lost Dutchman’s Gold Mine.
Her imagination fired by the thought of lost treasure, she peppered him with questions until he finally gave in and told her the story. She settled back and let his words flow over her as her eyes rested on the mountains that seemed so aptly named.
“The story my grandmother told me was that a German settler named Jacob saved the life of a member of one of the richest families in the area. To thank him, they told him the location of their mine, which was full of gold treasure. Jacob’s business partner got greedy, attacked him and left him for dead. Jacob survived long enough to draw a map to the gold mines and gives it to the doctor right before he died.”
“What then?” Enid said.
“Thousands of people for the past hundred years searching for the lost gold – nothing.”
“You think it’s real?”
“I doubt it. I think Jacob was messing with people’s heads.”
“Why?”
“Maybe he wanted to be remembered for something and that was his last chance – who knows.”
“You ever look for it?”
Jack grins, “I don’t think you can call yourself a Arizonan unless you hiked up there at least once looking for the lost treasure.”
“Nobody hikes in Florida.”
Gunning For Angels (Fallen Angels Book 1) Page 11
