by H. B. Stumbo
I sighed before I picked up my persistent phone, “Just not, Rita.”
Rick furrowed his eyebrows and then glanced over at the dark haired girl who was comparing shades with another intern; he shrugged his shoulders and walked away.
“This is Charlotte, can I help you?”
“Charlotte, it’s Diane Forks, you sound well.”
The sound of Diane’s voice sent shivers down my back and I swallowed the lump in my throat that formed immediately. We hadn’t spoken since the incident and I was trying my hardest to forget it all happened. Vance had kept me pretty preoccupied and thankfully I hadn’t had a lot of time to dwell over the recent encounter with Jackson, but he was still there, burning a hole in the back of my mind.
“Diane, how are you?”
“I’m good but I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind meeting me sometime this afternoon? I wanted to talk to you; I have something to show you.”
I shut my eyes and hoped to God it wasn’t anything horrible, “Yeah, I can come down just tell me a time.”
“Let’s say two?” There was a smile in her voice and it made me feel at ease.
“Two is fine, see you then.” I hung up and rubbed my temples some more. I wondered what Diane wanted me to see and I wondered how it fit into what was going on with Jackson. I tensed all over at the sound of his name; that was something that would probably never go away for good. Opening up my wounds to Vance was hard enough last night, but having to possibly talk more to Diane about it left a large hole festering in my stomach.
At one I headed to the break room and pulled a salad out of the fridge. I munched idly on it but my thoughts were a million miles away. I thought about Vance a lot, and the last forty eight hours I had spent with him. I smiled to myself and felt my cheeks flush as I recalled some of our events. I was momentarily interrupted by Rita entering the break room with a sour look on her face. I hadn’t spoken to her much after the incident at Vance’s house and she had tried to avoid me. She headed to the fridge and pulled out a protein drink and sipped on it.
“So how’s Vance?” Her voice was high and melodic and I stared up at her oddly.
“Excuse me?”
She tilted her head back and laughed which didn’t help my current level of anxiety.
“Oh please, I saw you both at the fireworks display. You can’t deny it and I don’t know why you tried to act like there was nothing going on between you.”
I sat my fork down and sighed. “Rita, you’re right there was and is something going on between us, something deep. I’m baffled by why you tried to tell me he was off limits and to stay away from him?”
She pushed her cropped hair behind her ears and rolled her eyes, “Don’t change the subject.”
I stood up and grabbed the rest of my lunch and tossed it in the trash. “You know Rita; I really don’t even want to waste any more time on you. I don’t know why you even care really.” Before she had a chance to say anything else I disappeared from the break room and headed to my desk. I still had a half hour before I needed to be at the station but I grabbed my things and headed out to my car. I blasted the air conditioning for a few minutes before turning it down and resting my head against the back of my seat. The day was only half over and I already wanted it to be done with.
My mind was rushing through the last few days and I tried to calm it down and focus on the good times I had recently had with Vance. I smiled to myself at the thought of his name and I so badly wished he was here with me. He was like a healing medication that went straight to my soul. I hadn’t felt this free and this happy in years, with Vance everything was so effortless. The only negative to this was that he was making me hate not being around him, I was becoming dependent on him.
I sent a message to Kim and asked how she was doing, she responded almost immediately.
Kim: Bored, in a meeting. How’s Vance :)
He’s good…really good actually. Kim we need to talk, I think I might be in too deep.
Kim: WHAT? No, you’re not in too deep. I approve. Rich and Lara approve, Micah will approve. It’s okay to be happy Char.
I know, and I am…really happy. I told him about Jackson.
Kim: Oh shit. How’s he react?
Better than I could have ever hoped. I don’t deserve him, he’s perfect.
Kim: Oh shut it yes you do! Hey – Lara filled me in on Jackson, why didn’t you tell me?
Why do you and Lara talk so much???
Kim: Someone has to keep me in the loop. Are you okay though…it freaked me out…bad.
I’m fine; he probably just wanted to scare me.
Kim: I hope that’s all it was. Look gotta go, I’ll call later. Love.
I glanced at the clock and decided to just go to the station early. Whatever Diane had to go over with me I could get out of the way and take the rest of the day off and head back to Vance’s. The thought of getting off early and showing up at his house sent a thrill through me. The feelings I had for him were deep and powerful, I needed to sort through them a bit but right now I needed to get everything finished with Diane so I could see him.
Chapter 24
When I arrived at the station Officer Maloney was smiling at me. “You look well Charlotte. I hate to dampen your spirits but I have to ask. Have you heard anything more from Mr. Greene?”
I shook my head and sighed, although I knew he was just doing his job. “No I haven’t. Have you found anything else out?”
He stretched a little and shifted his weight onto his other leg. “Just the warrant for arrest in Houston has been enforced, as well as the warrant he has here. Other than that he has been off the grid since he disappeared last March.”
“So it’s safe to assume he is not in Houston right?” A shudder ran through me.
Officer Maloney fidgeted with his coffee mug. “Yes, the man is smart I’ll give him that. They lost track of him somewhere in Northern Louisiana a few months ago. We’re trying to get other states involved but until something happens in their own state, they’re staying out of it. Besides that it sounds like he is running around using a false name which makes the bastard harder to track. Just know that he is nowhere near Alabama, the entire state is on top of that much.”
I nodded my head but found words difficult to get out. Even though I knew I was safe, I still felt scared and defenseless. Jackson was good at making me feel that way.
Diane broke my train of thought and her kind smile helped to calm me down.
“Charlotte, you’re early. Why don’t you come with me and we can get started.”
I nodded and said my goodbyes to Officer Maloney before disappearing into a small, enclosed room at the back of the station. I had been in the room before; it was where they brought me to tell me the news about Jackson after he disappeared. It was where they told me the first girl had not been as lucky as I was; it’s where I learned the truth about Jackson Greene.
I sat down and Diane smiled again but it was laced with concern. She was nervous about something and it made my stomach churn.
“Thanks for coming in today, I really appreciate it.”
I nodded and traced the lines on the table, “What is it you have to talk to me about?”
She sighed and pulled her laptop over so that it was situated between us.
“I spent the last few days researching your case and Jackson Greene. This is what I do, I look deeper into cases that aren’t quite cold and that may have minor details overlooked.”
I raised my eyebrows, “Minor details?”
She nodded and pressed a few buttons on her laptop.
“When a police officer or a unit investigates a case that is out of the norm for them, they can easily overlook small things that end up being much larger things. I’m specifically trained in abusive cases as well as homicide. I want to find overlooked details and get a better idea of things.”
I nodded but I wasn’t sure if I wanted to know anything else about Jackson or about why he did what he did. I had wasted
hours upon hours trying to think of a reason, there was never one in sight.
“Throughout my research I found a lot out about Jackson. When he was younger he was in trouble a lot for small incidents. Fights at school, theft, typical cry for help stuff.”
“Cry for help?”
She nodded. “Jackson’s parents were splitting up while he was in school. Instead of talking things out with him, he witnessed them fight and spew hatred towards each other. Most parents would keep that behind closed doors, but unfortunately for Jackson they shoved it down his throat. His parents split and his Mom moved to California, she didn’t apply for custody for him or for his brother Daniel, instead they stayed with their Father who treated his employees better than his sons. Jackson bore the brunt of his Father’s hatred, his older brother became successful and took care of himself. Jackson was always in trouble. I found records on him from several different high schools. He would get expelled for one reason or another and then be forced to go elsewhere. Eventually he was sent to a private boarding school where he was forced to finish or he’d be sent to a military school up North. He must’ve finished, I have no transfer records after that.”
I knew Jackson and his Father didn’t have a relationship, I knew his family and he weren’t close, and I knew he had secrets, but I didn’t expect it to be that bad. It was similar to my own and it was easy to feel anger when no one wanted you around. Lucky for Micah and me, we had Rich and Lara, Jackson had no one. I could imagine Jackson being violent in school, violence like the kind he showered upon me didn’t just bloom overnight. Violence like that was a gene, a tick, a trait he had been born with.
“Because I investigate homicides, clearly I came across his problem with Emily West.”
My body went rigid at the sound of her name. Of course I knew who she was and I shook my head in disgust at the thought of the woman he killed. I wondered if she had been brave enough to stand up to him or if she just let him kill her. I thought about Emily West a lot more than I should have because I felt like I owed her something. I lived and she didn’t.
“I read the reports from the coroner, the ones that were released after Jackson was acquitted of the charges. They couldn’t try him for the same trial twice but her autopsy reports proved that she struggled to stay alive. She was strangled and beaten to death and there was no skin under her nails, no hair or no defensive wounds on her hands. She didn’t fight back, it wasn’t a self-defense story or an accident like his lawyer or like Jackson played it out to be. He murdered her in cold blood and he would have done the same to you if it wasn’t for the fact that someone heard you screaming.”
I felt sick as my fears about Emily West were confirmed. I remember Officer Maloney telling me that Jackson’s father paid North Carolina’s most reputable lawyer to take on the case, I remember the theories they had about Jackson’s father fixing the trial and the jury to find him innocent. I didn’t want to believe any of it was true but deep down I knew it was. Jackson had been found innocent because of blood money and who he was, who his Father was, and Emily West was dead because Jackson was crazy.
Diane smiled at me again and sighed, she could tell I was dwelling on things and did her best to change the subject. “You know where Jackson’s story goes next, his next chapter was you.”
I nodded but I didn’t need to relive it again. I had just given Vance a brief yet detailed version of the story not quite forty-eight hours ago.
“We’re not going to talk about that, but there is something I want to show you, something I came across when I was digging through stuff.”
I nodded towards her, anything to get my thoughts off of Emily West.
She turned the laptop towards me and smiled. “Have you ever seen the footage from the night he disappeared?”
I shifted in my seat and shook my head.
“I got this from the hospital; I’ve watched it a few times, just trying to find new details. You said you don’t remember much and I don’t want to upset you by showing you something that I think will affect you negatively.”
I nodded again but I wasn’t entirely sure if I wanted to do this. Diane seemed to be able to sense my concern and she smiled at me again. “I can always turn this off Charlotte, you just tell me when.”
I relaxed and offered a weak smile and she pressed play. The film was in color but a little grainy. At the top left hand side of the screen the date and time appeared and I watched as two nurses worked at the admitting desk and seemed to be relatively bored with their jobs and an equally bored looking officer was sitting next to the ER doors skimming through a magazine. There was no sound on the video but I could tell the nurses were talking and laughing with each other, that was until something from in front of them caught their eye. One of the nurses ran down the hall and disappeared from the screen, the other rose quickly and ran to the front of the desk and shouted for the officer as a figure came into view.
Diane glanced at me and I noticed distress on her face, she nodded towards me and smiled again. The man who had me in his arms was tall and had a sweatshirt on with his hood up. The nurse covered her mouth with her hand and I noticed her shaking her head as he seemed to be speaking. The officer on duty looked stunned, like he didn’t know what to do, he hadn’t had training for this. I was cradled in the man’s arms and I looked lifeless. My face couldn’t be seen because he had me huddled against his chest. The nurse reached for me but he stepped back and seemed to shake his head. She nodded like she understood whatever he was saying to her. Suddenly there was a flood of people surrounding the nurse and the man whom I owed my life to. I recognized Dr. Mott immediately and the look of sheer terror on his face made my blood run cold. He yelled something and within seconds another nurse appeared with a gurney and the man was lowering me onto it. It looked like he wasn’t willing to let me go but he did and just as quickly as he had placed me down I was wheeled out of view. Dr. Mott rested his hand on the man’s shoulder before he spoke something quickly and disappeared after me. The man stood there and spoke to the nurse who nodded in an understanding way way before running back to her desk and picking up her phone, I had a feeling she was making the call to the authorities. The officer on duty was speaking into his radio and disappeared from the screen. I watched as my savior stood in the now empty hospital lobby and looked down the hall where they had taken me. It was as though he wanted to follow and I wish he would have. I wished that I had the chance to thank him. I sniffled and Diane paused the video.
“Charlotte I’m sorry to upset you.”
I shook my head as she handed me a tissue. “No…its fine I’m glad I got to see this, I just never got to thank him.”
Diane nodded understandingly. “I spoke to the nurse who was on duty that night as well as Dr. Mott, they both said he never left his name and neither of them recognized him. The chances are he was a passing tourist who just happened to hear you. There are good people in this world. Strangers pull people from flaming homes or save people from runaway cars, it happens. It’s a very real possibility that this passerby just happened to be your guardian angel and it’s a good thing he heard you.” Diane spoke her peace like it made her feel reassured that there were still people like this in the world. I assumed from her past that this wasn’t the worst case Diane had worked on, she needed to have a silver lining to look for in order to get through her day. I understood what she was saying but I still felt like I owed this man something for saving my life.
“Speaking of Dr. Mott,” Diane spoke again and shook her head. “I wasn’t aware that you had recently been hospitalized.”
I winced at the memory of the night at the club and nodded. “It wasn’t that big of a deal, it happens to women a lot, I was just lucky it wasn’t worse.” The night of the club was the memory that easily stayed tucked out of my mind, mainly because my memory was so thin of it, and because it wasn’t the worst thing to ever happen to me. Jackson Greene was.
Diane’s lips pierced together and she sighed. “It shouldn’
t happen to women a lot. And it seems like you’re very lucky. That’s twice you have been saved.” A small chuckle escaped her lips and she shook her head. “Someone’s definitely looking out for you.”
I stared up at her as the words resonated through me and Vance’s face filled my mind. “Yeah…” I managed to mumble out.
The door opened and a short, male officer poked his head in. “Forks, you’ve got a call on line two, says it’s urgent.”
She nodded at him and then looked back at me. “I’ll be back shortly.”
I nodded at her but my thoughts were millions of miles away. She excused herself and shut the door behind her.
I sat in the silence as her words rolled through me.
That’s twice you’ve been saved.
As much as I didn’t want to I thought of the night at the club. I thought of the brown haired man who handed me the drink and the possibility that he had been the one to slip me the drug. I thought about the way I fell into Vance’s arms and for a fraction of a second I remembered the look on his face when he realized something was wrong. The look on his face was an emotion I could place instantly, it was complete and utter terror, but why? He hardly knew me, what did he care if I was in harm’s way.
I tapped my fingers against the table and glanced back at the screen. I fumbled with the mouse and pressed the play button. The man who saved me lingered far too long in the hospital corridors. I thought back to the night at the club and bits and pieces of it entered my mind. I thought about Vance’s anger when he looked at the bottom of my empty glass, and then I thought about how he wrapped his arms around me and held me close to him before my body gave way and I became lifeless. I could remember that.
It was a familiar way to be held; pressed safely and securely against someone’s chest so that they could protect you from anything else that might happen. It was too familiar. I rewound the tape to the beginning and watched it intently. I stopped breathing when we came into view. I was being held in the same way, protectively close.
