by Mima
“So what did you think, of Jorge?” Jolene asked curiously, her words light as if she had immediately forgotten the more serious side of their conversation. “He’s nice, no?”
“He’s nice,” Chase agreed. “I would never suspect…”
“I know! He is so handsome,” Jolene’s eyes grew in size as she spoke, a smile formed on her burgundy lips as she made her way toward the door. “Diego, he thinks he’s handsome too.”
“He’s ok,” Diego sniffed and showed no commitment as he held his laptop close to his chest.
“He thinks he’s so handsome,” Jolene continued to tease, winking at Chase as she reached for the door and the two men followed her. “He gets all weird around him.”
“I do not Jolene,” Diego was insistent. “It’s business, you can’t be drooling over someone you are doing business with, at least, I don’t think so.”
“You don’t worry about me,” Jolene commented as she opened the door. “I have a meeting with him later today. Did he say why, Diego?”
“No,” his reply was abrupt as he passed both Jolene and Chase and went into the office.
Jolene merely shrugged and went into her own office.
Chase glanced back toward Deborah.
It was almost lunchtime.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
While growing up in Hennessey, Chase remembered his father once telling him that there often was an eerie calmness before a storm. It was a tranquil, beautiful silence that only people in the country grew to recognize as a subtle warning of what was to come; creating an inner calmness that was about to erupt and fade away.
It was difficult to hear in the city; where noise loomed all around, the vehicles alone filling the atmosphere with the sound of engines purring, music blaring and horns beeping would be enough to cause anyone to feel like silence simply didn’t exist. It was a distraction and like most distractions, if done properly, no one ever realized what was about to take place.
Chase would have many distractions that week. After his meeting with Jorge Hernandez, it almost seemed as though everything picked up the pace. The mood in the office shifted from calm to a more impatient, nervous energy that was hard to miss. Suddenly, everyone seemed more snappy with one another and the worst contributor of all to this air of frustration was Diego, who was upset with his sister.
“She says,” Diego complained after slamming the office door closed and stomping toward his desk. “That she is supposedly going to have meetings with Jorge about business but I know better. Clearly, there is something more going on between the two of them and she’s hiding it from me. If they really had business to discuss, wouldn’t I be part of the discussion?”
“It would make sense,” Chase was hesitant to offer his opinion, feeling like a child that had to take sides after his parents argued. It was unsettling but at the same time, Diego did have a valid point. Why was Jolene meeting Jorge in private? It seemed unusual. “But I don’t know. I mean, what did she say?”
“What did she say?” Diego plunked down in his chair and made a face. “She says that I have talked to him privately in the past, so why is this any different? She claims that she would feel better if she could be reassured that we were safe in this situation, which by the way, has been going on for some time but now, what? It worries her? I don’t understand.”
Chase didn’t reply. His brain searched for an answer but he simply didn’t know. He could see that Diego had his own suspicions.
“I told her that we will be fine but she said that to feel reassured that she had to talk to him herself, to look into his eyes and she would know,” Diego shrugged. “I mean, I know they talk about women’s intuition but us men also have instincts and I think I would know if he suddenly couldn’t be trusted. What do you think?”
Chase considered his lone meeting with Hernandez and shrugged. “I don’t know what to tell you. I went along with what you thought and trusted it.”
“Exactly!” Diego commented as he pulled his chair closer to the desk. “That’s what I say but no, she won’t believe me and now she has this meeting with him and I think that it’s total bullshit. I think it’s an excuse to hang out with the ‘handsome man’ rather than what she is telling me.”
“But you know, even if so, is it a big deal?” Chase hesitantly countered.
“Ah yeah, you don’t shit where you eat,” Diego insisted, his eyes grew in size as if it were the most obvious thing in the world and Chase was suddenly brought back to his days in Hennessey, hadn’t Bud told him the same thing at one time? Then again, hadn’t Jolene told him the same thing too? Diego often said it but did he mean it? “Especially when the person you’re working with is in the line of business that this man is in if you know what I mean? He’s not the kind of man she wants to get involved with for so many reasons but she won’t listen to me. I told her that and she insists that nothing is going on. But I know better. I know Jolene.”
Chase thought for a moment and shrugged. “I can’t see Jolene doing that,” He spoke honestly but saw the doubt in Diego’s eyes.
“You, you only see one side of Jolene,” Diego insisted and pointed toward the wall between their offices. “Here, she is another person from the outside world. You only know her work personality, you don’t know her outside of work.”
“Is it really that different?”
“It’s really that different,” Diego insisted but didn’t elaborate instead opening his laptop and went back to work.
Diego was miserable for the rest of the day and into the weekend. He disappeared for a few hours on Friday night and Chase wondered if he had gone to talk to Jolene out of whatever he thought she was doing. He somehow didn’t think it was what Diego suspected and yet, he couldn’t help but be intrigued by his words earlier in the week. What was Jolene like outside of work? Did she have a lot of affairs? She certainly had the femme fatale vibe and the fantasies of her seducing him shamefully filled most of his own daydreams for the rest of the weekend, including when he was having sex with Deborah on Saturday night. He envisioned Jolene moaning in ecstasy, touching herself, engrossed in ever second.
He had to end his affair with Deborah. It was simply getting out of hand and those fantasies alone were suggesting that he wasn’t even attracted to her; not that she appeared to be attracted to him either. They used one another. It made him feel disgusted with himself and wondered how he became this person? Why he allowed it at all? It wasn’t just because of Leland dying - although that hadn’t helped - but that he let life happen to him and not ever going after what he wanted. But what did he want?
After arriving home late on Saturday night, he noted that Diego wasn’t around and was about to take a shower when his phone rang. It was Audrey. She was crying.
“What happened? Is it one of the boys?” Chase felt panic fill his heart as he broke out in a cold sweat. Closing his eyes, he attempted to calm himself but felt like he was sinking.
“No,” Audrey sniffed and took a deep breath. She was silent for a moment. “They’re all saying that it’s me.”
With that, she let out a loud cry and her voice shook uncontrollably. “They’re saying it’s my fault that Leland died. That I allowed him to stay with your mother and everyone knows she isn’t all there. That I was sick of listening to three kids crying and I sent him there for the weekend.”
“That’s ridiculous!” Chase snapped, his anger crept up immediately replacing his anxieties. “Who the hell would say that?”
“Everyone around town,” She sobbed and hesitated for a moment. “They’re saying that your mother should be investigated for not looking after Leland properly because he was her responsibility. I feel like everyone in town has turned against us. They don’t blame Luke Prince and say it’s our fault for letting our kids always ‘run wild’ and that Leland shouldn’t have been in the woods in the first place. That Luke had no way of knowing that a
child would be there, alone, so early in the morning. They’re turning it against us.”
“Who? It obviously can’t be everyone in town,” Chase attempted to correct her. “That doesn’t make sense. It’s probably his family trying to make him sound like the innocent victim in this situation but there’s no way that the court will see it that way.”
“His lawyer, though,” Audrey continued to sniff. “His lawyer wants to have social services investigate us because they say there was obviously something wrong that a child was out wandering by himself so early in the morning, that maybe he wasn’t being taken care of properly.”
“That’s fucked up!” Chase felt anger rise in him and he started to pace as he talked. “First of all, he wasn’t at home and second, little kids wander all the time. Parents do the best they can but sometimes, things happen. I can’t believe they’re saying such cruel things.”
“They are, though,” Audrey replied as her voice calmed and she cleared her throat. “It doesn’t seem to matter that he was at your mom’s place. We allowed him to go there and now, they’re trying to gather people who say they’ve seen us be neglectful in the past. We allowed Kelsey to babysit the kids and then she ended up being in underground porn, for fuck sakes! How does that look? It looks like we’re terrible parents who don’t care.”
“Unreal,” Chase snapped. “This whole situation is insane! This is obviously Luke’s lawyer attempting to take some of the heat off him before the trial. He knows that small towns thrive on rumors and he’s hoping to sway things in their favor. As if Luke was innocently out practising that morning, sober, and has no idea he shot Leland. That’s fucking insane!”
Silence followed. At first, he thought Audrey hung up on him because she wasn’t speaking or crying.
“I think you’re right,” She finally replied and with heavy emotion in her voice, she finally replied. “Chase, I don’t have it in me to do this anymore. I don’t have it in me to go to trial and to fight. I don’t have it in me to tell people that these rumors aren’t true and now when I take the kids anywhere, I feel like everyone is watching us as if they want to see us make a mistake. It’s like a popularity contest and Luke wins, so we have to lose. I just can’t do it. I don’t want to even live here anymore. I want to get out of this fucking town. I never thought everyone would turn against at the worst time of my life.”
Chase felt his original anger deflate as she spoke. It wasn’t right. It was unbelievable to him that people would turn against Audrey at that moment. Even he, who had a lot of issues with his ex-wife over the years, would never hold this against her. Even if Leland had left her house that morning and snuck out, any original anger would’ve quickly faded away upon seeing her face the day their son died. Her heart was completely broken and the fact that her town turned against Audrey was unbelievable to him. It made Chase sick to even consider.
“Are you sure, Audrey?” He gently asked, hoping that maybe she was actually exaggerating or paranoid. He took a deep breath. “Maybe there’s a part of you that blames yourself and you think people are blaming you too. I know I kind of blamed myself at first.”
“No Chase, this is the crown prosecutor,” She replied simply and hesitated to continue. “He told me because he wants us to take this case to another district so we will get fair treatment. He said Luke Prince has too many family and friends in the community and none of them want to believe he’s guilty. Get this, they don’t think it’s right that his freedom be taken away because he made a ‘mistake’ that they claim was our fault for not properly looking after Leland.”
Hearing Devin crying, she ended the call and left Chase with his thoughts. He sat on the couch in disbelief, feeling as though he had to tell someone this horrible news and yet, he couldn’t move. His brain raced and he couldn’t think of a single person to share this with other than Diego and who knew where he was that night. He was probably on his own rendezvous. Then again, who else was there to confide in?
He sent Diego a quick message and didn’t receive a reply. Just then the door flew open and his cranky roommate of earlier in the day strode in as if nothing were wrong in his world.
“You rang?” He said in a haunting voice with a smile on his face as he closed the door behind him. As he approached Chase, the smile fell from his face.
“What’s wrong, amigo?”
Chase opened his mouth to say something but hesitated and shook his head. Diego silently nodded.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Where most people in Luke Prince’s situation might try to keep a low profile after being arrested for a crime as heinous as shooting a child, he was contrary. Rather than being apologetic, he was defensive. Instead of being tight-lipped on the subject, he was vocal on his innocence and was insistent that he was a scapegoat for Louise Jacobs’ irresponsibility. The real kicker was when Chase started to hear that he was hinting to many residents in the small town that Leland’s grandmother had a ‘problem with the alcohol’. The ironic statement sent Chase into a rage and he found himself at the gym, blindly pounding on the heavy bag in the basement; fortunately, no one was around to witness his fury or they may have questioned his sanity.
The real issue, as Diego would later point out, was personality. Some people, he insisted, flocked to strong personalities who said what people secretly wanted to hear or expressed their own dark thoughts and fears, therefore, making them feel it was acceptable to do the same. Many, he insisted were the sheep and lead by a few, lone wolves.
“But me,” Diego added during that particular conversation that followed the frustrating news from Audrey. “That’s why I make sure to always be a wolf; sly, strategic, ready for anything and never turning away from a fight. I was like that as a teenager when those boys beat me up and I’m like that to this day. And you, Chase, you need to learn to do the same.”
“As I always tell you,” Diego continued, his eyes sympathetic while his voice full of unexpected compassion as he sat beside Chase on the couch. “You’re a follower, not a leader. You must be careful because some people will lead you to greatness and some people will lead you astray. You can’t let life happen to you, you need to take on life and go after what you want, not just take what you can get. Only beggars take what they can get and no beggar has ever owned a condo like this,” He swung his arms around without breaking eye contact with Chase. “No beggar drove their dream car or went to bed with the person they really wanted. No beggar has the life they truly desire because they don’t know what that is and they underestimate their own value.”
“I don’t think I’m that bad,” Chase muttered as he slumped over, feeling defeated.
“No but it’s a slippery slope, my friend, trust me on that one,” Diego continued as he turned toward Chase, his accent becoming stronger as he spoke. “I’ve watched you, observed you since we first met. You’ve got so much potential and you can’t let a tragedy like your son’s death pull you under. And it can happen fast.”
“When my father disowned me as a kid back in Colombia,” He continued as Chase turned in his direction. “That could’ve pulled me under but I wouldn’t let it. I made plans. I made decisions and this is my life now. I didn’t allow his shame of me become my shame too. You can’t let that redneck town or their decisions on you or your ex-wife’s parenting skills shame you. That’s what they want. That’s what this Luke asshole wants. He wants you to believe his story along with the rest of them but you, you know better. You must be stronger than him and trust that eventually, he will get what’s coming.”
Diego was right. It was so easy to fall down and not get up again and he was starting to see that Audrey was doing just that; to the point that he received a phone call from Albert a few days later to discuss how she was slowly moving away from the person she had always been. No longer strong, defiant and aggressive, she was now encompassed by a depression. It was understandable but at the same time, as Albert pointed out, she sti
ll had two children who were very much alive.
“She doesn’t even want to leave the house now,” Albert spoke honestly and it was those words that haunted Chase the most. Long after the call, he thought about the woman he had met years ago; the same woman who was very aggressive with him, making it clear that she wanted him and him alone. Audrey had controlled his life for years before she finally realized that it wasn’t giving her the results she craved; it didn’t make him love her and in fact, had the opposite effect. It was a painful realization but she got through it. What if she didn’t get through this one?
Christmas was around the corner and some of Audrey’s family had apparently decorated the house, helped to buy gifts for the boys and attempted to bring some spirit to the household. Chase was grateful for their help. Other than money, he had nothing to give. There was no way he could return to Hennessey at that point. His anger was too intense and if put in the wrong situation, he feared he would become the same animal he was at the gym when standing before a heavy bag. He would stay in Toronto.
Jolene hosted a dinner for Diego and Chase on Christmas, inviting the two to her apartment for a traditional meal. Wearing a dress and heels, she didn’t seem to think it was unusual to strut around the kitchen in such formal attire for a relaxed meal at home. Although very much like she was at work, there was a more relaxed presence as she joked, often bursting out in laughter. Diego had even accused her of being drunk.
“Drunk, I am not drunk,” She was insistent, even though she was drinking one of many glasses of wine that evening. “It is Christmas, you know how I love celebrating. I thought this year, I would do as you Canadians do it with this turkey and stuffing. I do not know. I just talk to Beverly and it sounded very nice so I thought, I will try.”
“This isn’t how you celebrate in Colombia?” Chase asked and watched as both Diego and Jolene shook their head no.
“I have done both,” Diego replied with a shrug. “I mean, in America, of course, we did all your traditional things but it’s still kind of new to Jolene, who hasn’t been in North America as long”
