Slow and Steady 1

by J. H. Croix

  Way to go, Johnny. I wasn’t sure if I’d read the book the woman was searching for, but if it was anything like the ones by the same author I had read, Johnny sure would’ve been a keeper. “I hope we can find it for you. If that doesn’t work, I can make some calls and see about finding it for you to buy and have it delivered.”

  “Could you? That would be marvelous. Absolutely marvelous. My daughter would think it’s silly since she says she can have it for me with the click of a button, but having a tangible book is just so much better.”

  “I couldn’t agree more.” I loved my e-reader, but my apartment was a mini-version of a library, filled with books. My parents had instilled a love of books and reading in me. Even though both of them had passed on, sitting down with some tea and a book always made me feel like they were right there with me. “Don’t worry, I’ll help you find it.”

  “Thank you, darling. That’s very sweet of you.”

  Sweet. That’s me. I sighed internally. “No problem.”

  We found the novel she was looking for once we reached the right row, its spine well-worn from years of use. The woman beamed at me, thanking me over and over while I checked it out for her and walked her to the door.

  To my surprise, my best friend was hurrying up the steps outside, her blonde hair nearly blowing back with her pace. Karen Harte was always buzzing with energy. Beyond the fact she was loyal as they came for a friend, and there whenever I needed her, her bubbly enthusiasm was an instant pick-me-up. She practically skidded to a stop when she saw me. “Niki! There you are. I’ve been waiting at your apartment for almost an hour.”

  I frowned, waving goodbye to the customer before meeting Karen’s wide, brown eyes. “Why? You know I work until four. And why aren’t you at the daycare?”

  Karen worked as an assistant at a local daycare. She didn’t have any children of her own, but she adored the kids at the daycare as much as I adored books. With an exasperated huff, she raised her wrist to my face so her watch was practically in my eyes. “It’s past five already, that’s why.”

  “Oh.” How was it that late already? “I guess I didn’t notice.”

  Karen smiled and shook her head with a sigh. “Must be hard keeping track of time when hardly anyone ever comes here. Having an actual customer must’ve thrown you off your game.”

  “Shut up.” I couldn’t quite keep the corners of my lips from curling up. I was all alone in the world as far as family was concerned, but Karen was like a sister to me. I could always count on her to tease me and push me past my comfort zone.

  Our friendship was perfectly balanced, with Karen being wild and carefree, and me being, well, boring and responsible. Karen disagreed with my assessment of myself whenever it came up, but I knew it was true.

  I was who I was. I’d come to accept it, even if I occasionally wished for a bit more excitement in my life.

  Turning my gaze to the parking lot beyond the library steps, I realized it was empty. Leaves were rustling in the breeze in the edges of the lot, and a few cars drove past on the street. The sun was sinking low, and it was definitely time to close up shop for the day.

  “Come on in. Let me just get my stuff and lock up,” I told Karen, leading her back inside the library.

  She followed me to my desk, completely ignoring the signs calling for silence as she asked, “What are your plans for tonight?”

  Cringing slightly at the volume of her voice, despite knowing the library was empty, I pulled open the drawer where I kept my purse and slung it over my shoulder. “You know, the same thing I do every night. Try to—”

  She slapped a hand over my mouth, giggling even as she shook her head disapprovingly. “We should go out. We’re not even close to old yet. There’s a little bar about a thirty minutes’ drive from here that’s supposed to make killer margaritas.”

  “Why would anyone want their margaritas to kill them?” I asked when she dropped her hand, widening my eyes as I feigned innocence.

  Karen groaned. “You know what I mean. And that was a really lame joke.”

  “Those are the only jokes I tell, baby.” Taking a deep bow, I winked as I straightened. “Thank you, thank you. I’ll be here all week.”

  “I don’t know why I bother with you.” She clasped her hands over her eyes dramatically, blinking at me when she removed them. Obviously deciding to change her approach, her gaze softened. “Please, please come out with me tonight. Just one drink. It’ll be fun, I promise.”

  I turned my back on her attempt at puppy dog eyes, digging my keys from my purse. “Nope. I have a new book I’ve been dying to start.”

  Karen sighed and feigned a pout as she walked beside me, waiting outside the door while I locked up. “You never want to come out with me. I’m better company than a book, I promise. You can read this weekend.”

  “I can come out with you this weekend too,” I pointed out, wiggling the doors to make sure they were locked tight. “In fact, let me think about coming out with you this weekend instead of tonight.”

  “But you won’t.”

  “I promise to consider it.” We walked down the stairs side by side, falling into step with our arms linked together once we reached the sidewalk.

  “Okay.” Karen sighed, running her free hand through her wild curls. “As long you promise you’ll consider it seriously.”

  “I do. I promise. Just not tonight, okay?”

  “Okay, okay,” she agreed.

  Both of us knew I wasn’t going to go out with her over the weekend, but I didn’t lie. I would think about it. I just already had two more books I’d been looking forward to. Though Karen would tease, one of the reasons I loved her as a friend was she didn’t really care. Oh, she would enjoy it if I joined her, but she accepted me for who I was. I loved nothing more than losing myself in a make-believe world for hours.

  Karen and I both lived in apartments not far from the library. Our buildings were on opposite sides of the street, but it meant we could walk home together when our schedules jived.

  It also meant I could borrow a cup of sugar from an almost-neighbor I actually knew when the need arose. Not that I didn’t know my real neighbors, I just didn’t mingle with them much. Nobody would ever accuse me of being a social butterfly that was for sure.

  Saying goodbye to Karen when we reached our buildings, I climbed the three flights of stairs to my apartment—the only exercise I got outside of walking to work. The staircase was narrow and the carpets worn, but I loved my building.

  An old, colonial home, it had been renovated into apartments. My small apartment was homey and cozy. Decorated in warm colors with a bookshelf against every wall, walking into my apartment never failed to soothe me. I supposed since my parents had passed away, creating a space that felt like mine meant a lot. I didn’t have a family to return to, so my apartment was it.

  Dropping my purse on a small, antique dining room table I picked up for a steal at a yard sale once, I headed straight into my bedroom to change into my pajamas. The second I got home, even my most comfortable clothes came off in favor of the pajamas.

  Winding my braid around itself several times, I fastened it into a knot atop my head and padded to the kitchen to fix a cup of tea. My kitchen was little more than a countertop separating my living room from the area that made up the kitchen, but I didn’t need anything more.

  Gourmet cooking wasn’t going to get done here, but with me as a tenant, it never would have anyway. While I waited for my tea, I dug around the small box of new books I’d had delivered over the weekend.

  I was in the mood for a romance novel after my talk with the customer back at the library, and luckily, one of my new books would hit the spot. The cover featured an insanely ripped man and promised a love story for the ages. Epic the cover declared.

  “Perfect,” I mumbled to myself, smiling as I carried the book and my tea to the couch.

  After fluffing a pillow behind my back and curling my legs on the couch, I took a sip of tea and flip
ped the front cover to the prologue. It was always nice to believe that love was real somewhere, even if only in the pages of my novels.

  Chapter Three

  Sonny

  Life got weird fast when searching your own father’s name on the internet and then printing out the publicly available stuff which led to reading something resembling a criminal courtroom drama. But it wasn’t a fictional account of deception, betrayal and criminal mastermindery. Not so much.

  As hard as it was to believe, it really was about my father’s case. Dear old Dad was described in these accounts as everything from a scoundrel and thief, to the greatest con artist of his generation in Georgia, to a criminal lowlife who besmirched his family name and was undeserving of any sympathy.

  The last one was supposed to be a quote from an aunt’s cousin twice removed or something. Whoever they were, I’d certainly never heard of them, and they weren’t qualified to speak about my damn family name.

  My fists tightened, and I paused to take a sip of coffee. Swallowing my bitterness and anger, I reminded myself it didn’t mean a damn thing what other people said about my family. During the trial, we’d learned to endure this and much, much worse.

  Never let them see you sweat. Words that used to be our motto. I chanted them to myself constantly during those days, and I knew my brothers did too.

  Breathing in a whiff of the fresh coffee permeating the air in the coffee house, I forced myself to ignore the opinions in what I was reading. I wasn’t rehashing this news to grind an ax, or to relive the emotional fallout. I was looking for something to prove my dad might be innocent. Anything.

  The more I read, however, the harder it was. Pushing away my cooling coffee, I turned to the next article.

  It was dated several days into my father’s trial, just after one of the prosecution’s star witnesses had taken the stand. My father’s assistant, as clichéd as it was, had testified against him. I remembered the day well, but I hadn’t seen this article back then.

  Roy Lovett’s trial continues today in Georgia. Roy, the only son of the late mayor Lyle and his wife Barbara Lovett, is facing charges of, amongst others, embezzlement and extortion. Roy’s former assistant testified yesterday that he often asked her to leave the office before taking meetings and shredded a large number of documents in the weeks leading up to his arrest. She also testified that she’d witnessed many suspicious characters lurking around outside their offices at closing time.

  I clearly recalled her testimony and had wondered at the time just who the hell she was talking about. The wording she used conjured up men wearing trench coats and a host of unsavory images. Sounded like a bunch of bullshit to me, but it didn’t matter. If there was one thing I’d learned during that whole fiasco, it was that when the tide of public opinion was against you in a small town, you’d damn near drown.

  By that point in the trial, my father had been as good as convicted. Darla, his assistant, had merely served as the star witness neatly hammering the nails into his proverbial coffin. His choices to send her away repeatedly, shred documents, and meet with people she deemed suspicious didn’t look good. Those choices provided within the context of the other evidence presented throughout the trial made him look bad.

  His assistant didn’t stop there though. Hell no.

  Taking a deep breath before allowing my eyes to drop back down, I tried to focus on the low hum of people chatting around me, on the clear blue skies outside. I had to take a minute, breathe, clear my mind.

  Reading all this stuff still hurt, like tearing an old scab off. But I had to get over it, to learn how to look at it objectively. Forget it was my dad they were talking about. Sucking in another breath, I went back to the article.

  The D.A. has also presented evidence of wire-transfers totaling millions of dollars being made through accounts controlled by Lovett. Lovett’s own accounts now reflect zero, or negative balances, causing speculation that he even cleaned out his own family trust.

  “Hey, man,” Waylon said. Glancing up, I met Waylon’s gaze. The barista here went to school with me years back. He was a year younger than I was, but we knew each other. Waylon had hardly aged. His floppy hair still hung down to his ears, and his brown eyes were still eager.

  Waylon was a burnout, an overly friendly one, but he started as a barista working after school, and he’d never left. I couldn’t imagine him anywhere else.

  “What’s up, Waylon?” I tried covering the article I was reading with my hand, but it was too late. He’d already seen it.

  Leaning over, he read the headline of the article out loud. “Roy Lovett back in court: the trial so far.” Straightening, his gaze flicked back to me. “I remember your old man’s trial. Talk of the town. What are you doing reading this old stuff?”

  Quickly scanning the tables around me, I released a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding. No one appeared to be paying a lick of attention to us. “Keep it down, man.”

  I knew I wasn’t supposed to be looking into my dad’s case. With both my brother and my father involved, saying it was a conflict of interest for me to even be thinking about touching the case was an understatement.

  Waylon either didn’t hear me, or he simply ignored me. A gleam entered his gaze. “Did you know there’s a whole section in the library dedicated to your father? The local legend, criminal mastermind, cold-hearted boss. No matter what you think, his story is news. Small-town boy made it big in Georgia politics before turning crooked. He’s—”

  “Yeah. That’s enough.” Stacking the papers I had spread across my table, I got ready to leave. Maybe reading up on this stuff at the coffee house wasn’t such a great idea after all.

  Waylon held his hands up, eyes wide with remorse. “Sorry, dude. Didn’t mean to offend you.”

  “Nah.” I waved him off, stuffing my research material into my laptop bag. “I need to get going. I’ll see you around.”

  “Cheers, Sonny. See you,” Waylon called out after me, picking up my half-empty mug of coffee. I was almost to the door when the bell above it jingled. A familiar figure walked through the door. I froze when I saw who it was, turning fast in the hopes he didn’t see me.

  “Sonny!” Chief Harris said, his lips spreading into a friendly grin.

  Fuck. Busted.

  “Chief. How are you?” Please don’t look down, I begged silently.

  When I stuffed the papers into my bag, I was in such a hurry to get away from Waylon and his descriptive words for my father that I knew some of the articles were sticking out. My plea held up at first.

  My boss called his order over to Waylon, greeting a few people before he turned back to me. “Not too bad. What’re you getting up to on your day off?”

  “Just getting some coffee,” I answered vaguely.

  And then my luck ran out. Chief Harris’s cheerful blue eyes dropped to my bag and then narrowed before snapping back to mine. “Sonny? What are you doing with all that?”

  “I—uh.” I didn’t stammer often, but I respected the Chief. I didn’t want to lie to him, but I also couldn’t tell him the truth. “I was reading up on some stuff, that’s all.”

  All traces of humor and cheer dropped from the chief’s expression as he ran a hand through his graying hair. He fixed his gaze to mine, worry etched into the lines of his face. “You shouldn’t be looking into your father. Are you looking into his case?”

  “No, I’m not looking, so to speak. There were just some things I wanted to read up on. Thought I’d get it done today while I wasn’t on duty. I was thinking of heading over to the library to read a bit more. I didn’t know there was a section dedicated to the old man. I wanted to check it out.”

  The Chief blew out a breath, raking a hand through his thinning hair again before answering me. “I don’t want you getting caught looking into this, son. If any of the higher-ups get wind you’re doing so much as reading about your father’s case, it’s going to raise some red flags.”

  Technically, Chief Harris was the
higher up in our jurisdiction, but he never used his position to make us feel beneath him. I knew he was worried about the external authorities when he referred to the higher-ups. Thanks to dear old dad, there was enough heat on me as it was.

  The Chief was a good man. He’d protected me on more than one occasion. The same as he was trying to do now. I zipped the bag up, giving him a grin. “No one’s going to hear about me looking into anything. I’m just reading, Chief. Trying to make sense of things. He is my father after all. I was just as shocked as everyone else by what went down. Trying to understand it might help me come to peace with it,” I explained. Though I had more reasons than that, my words were the truth. If my search led me to the conclusion my father’s conviction was sound, perhaps I would find that elusive peace.

  Pursing his lips, the Chief rolled his head back to look at the ceiling, closed his eyes and then nodded. “Okay. I understand that. You boys have been through some tough times. I get you might need some closure. Just be careful, okay?”

  “I will.” Thank God for giving me the best boss ever. “I’ll be careful.”

  “Make sure that you do.” He sighed, clasping my shoulder. “I’ll see you at work tomorrow.”

  “See you then.” I felt considerably lighter walking out of the coffee shop than I had walking in. I trusted Chief Harris, and I was grateful to have someone understand without telling me immediately to drop it.

  Finally, someone got it.

  Chapter Four

  Niki

  Wiping the dust off my hands after carrying a box of donated books to the appropriate section, I bent and opened the box. The first book I pulled out was written by two spiritual leaders and claimed to focus on ways to find joy and lasting happiness in our chaotic, ever-changing world.

  Tempted to sit down on my butt right there on the floor to settle in for a nice, long read, I had to force myself to resist temptation. I quickly located the correct spot for the book and put it in between its new shelf neighbors.