Dispatched Confessions (The Love is Murder Social Club Book 2)

by Talia Maxwell

  “Yes, I am full of surprises,” Holly said with a sad smile. She stood up. “The best one being…I’m not a night owl.”

  “You’re kicking me out.” He knew—he knew immediately. And he lost the look of pure desire and replaced it with knowing and understanding.

  “I want to kiss you,” he said.

  At first, Holly didn’t understand and she squinted and said, “What?”

  “I’m practicing this Holly Bloom thing of just saying whatever you want out loud and hoping for the best. And I want to kiss you.”

  Holly put her hand up over her mouth and dipped her head. Fuck. Too fast. Too fast. Too fast.

  “It doesn’t always work out the way you want it to,” she answered when she lowered her head and sighed. “You can’t kiss me. Don’t kiss me.” It pained her to say no. “The timing—” she tried to offer as an excuse before stopping herself. He’d have to accept waiting.

  “I just wanted you to know…that I wanted to.”

  She nodded. And she walked to the door. She swung right by him and to the front of her house. When he stepped into the doorframe, half inside, and half out, he dipped his head to give her a hug and she kissed him on the cheek. She let her kiss linger and then she stepped back to make sure he knew it ended there.

  He didn’t push. He didn’t try to swoop in and catch her lips. She didn’t have to swat him away or bat him off, or play coy if she wanted to see him again. He simply backed off and left it there.

  “Thank you for helping me,” she said and she meant it.

  He handed her a slip of paper.

  “This is where your car was towed.”

  “How romantic,” Holly whispered and she burst into laughter, happy to let the tension, sexual and otherwise, out into the night.

  “Get some sleep,” he replied. And he reached over and smoothed down a piece of her hair. Her heart jumped as if he’d pinned her against a wall and stuck his tongue down her throat—the action of grooming her was nearly as exciting.

  Holly muttered a response and he left, although she wondered how, and by the time she thought to open the door and check to see if she needed to call him a car, he was already gone from the driveway and out of sight.

  She knew sending him away was the best choice, but she wished it hadn’t been like that. It wasn’t for a lack of willingness. It was for a lack of mental injury. Her body could’ve gone through the motions just fine and an orgasm would’ve been a nice distraction. But that’s all it would’ve been: a distraction. And no one deserved to be someone else’s distraction; it was unfair.

  Still. The timing gnawed at her. Her son was gone and out of town, and she hadn’t been with a man in forever. Years. Joel was tall and fit and muscular and she was certain he was large, and she couldn’t stand it—she hated herself for not allowing herself small indulgences.

  She texted Maeve and Kristy on a group chat. She’d wait to tell them about Alex until the morning.

  Holly: He just left. He oozes sex. He actually said he wanted to kiss me.

  Maeve: A true gentleman.

  Kristy: He can ooze sex anywhere, anytime. Why are soccer players the cutest athletes?

  Maeve: Because most of them are European.

  Holly: It feels like a power play somehow. Or not. I don’t know. He’s hot.

  Maeve: Gloria and I have this covered, too. New batteries in the top kitchen drawer.

  Kristy: I suggested nipple-clamps but they said that was too far.

  Maeve: Vibrate and dream. Text in the morning.

  Holly exited out and texted Gloria next.

  Holly: The bitch took him tonight for a week.

  Gloria: Should’ve taken that bet. I’m sorry, Holls. But she’s done this before and he comes back okay.

  Holly: He comes back indulged.

  Gloria: You can’t win this war. Use the time with us to figure this out. My kids are on it, too. He’ll come back to reality, Holly. He’ll come back home. You’re home. Love you.

  Chapter Eight

  Holly was on his mind.

  He’d found her; the enigma, the girl he’d wondered about and thought about off and on for all those years—he’d found her and she’d been impervious to his charm and his desire and his honesty. Holly kept him thinking, kept him realizing that she wasn’t going to climb into bed with him, she wasn’t going to throw herself at him.

  The timing was awful. For both of them. But if he didn’t take a risk now, he could lose the connection, and that was something Joel didn’t want to risk. He was going to have to work for it.

  The idea of working for it exhilarated him far more than it should—he thought of ways he could impress her. Sure, he’d chosen a less than glamorous job, but he could cook and sing and his parents owned a string of properties at the coast he could whisk her away to, so he had options.

  She’d stayed with him and she was everything he’d imagined her to be and more.

  But she out-classed him with her house and her car and her luxury. There wasn’t anything he could get for Holly that she couldn’t get for herself, and it intimidated him a bit to think of having a chance to kiss her, really kiss her, and to admit that he used to think about her a lot—that spitfire girl who said what she wanted and didn’t care.

  He decided to go for a run.

  Outside, he tightened his laces and stepped into the beautiful Portland autumn air. The leaves outside were still green, but a few of them knew fall was around the corner and had started to turn to vibrant orange and yellows. With a deep breath and an adjustment of his headphones, Joel took off.

  Running was a sacred time. A chance to let go and let his brain run right along with him—he thought of Holly and Alex, that kid with the sunken eyes and defeated scowl—and if there was a way to reach him, really reach him. He wondered if he could run all the way to Holly’s house up in Mt. Scott and the idea of it inspired him.

  In quick and fleeting fantasy, he brought himself up to her door, in his jogging outfit, sweaty from the uphill battle, and he’d kiss her.

  He understood her rejection the other night. Timing, she’d said, and it was true. But he hadn’t imagined that they’d been building on that lost connection. High School was sixteen, seventeen, years ago? And everything about Holly was better. Maybe everything about him was better, too. They’d ironed out the sharper edges of their youth; they’d settled into knowing themselves.

  This was their time.

  Around the city he went, flat against the waterfront, the gentle glistening Willamette River by his side, a faithful jogging companion. Through Portland, Joel traveled, with Holly never far from his mind.

  They were on full-time with grief counseling. Nothing else happened—Claire, who was known but not beloved, was now everyone’s best friend or classmate and memories of her flowed day in and out. Her connection spread far and wide as students tried to insert themselves into the drama of her death. It was predictable but time consuming, and Joel was exhausted.

  Carla, his colleague, popped her head in between appointments. She sighed.

  “This is draining,” she said. “I don’t know if I have it in me to see more kids today with a sob story about Claire Gregor. It’s awful, but…”

  “Did the police talk to you?” he asked.

  “Twice,” Carla responded and put up her fingers. “You?”

  “Once,” he said and shook his head.

  “Don’t worry. They’ll be back around to you soon. They mention suicide to you the first go-around?”

  “Yeah,” Joel said, but he knew they were just trying to scratch the surface of the girl’s life. “What’s your take?” he sat back in his chair and motioned for her to come inside. She looked relieved to give her office a break; he could hear her phone ringing from the other side of the wall. He motioned to a chair and she sat, exasperated. They’d aged in a week.

  “There’s gossip and the kids have all sorts of weird things. Drugs?”

  “Is that what the kids were saying?�
� he asked. It seemed almost quaint: most of the kids he knew admitted to dabbling in drugs recreationally and their parents had no idea. They’d soar through meals high and tired parents hardly noticed. “It’s possible, but I don’t think she died over drugs.”

  “Then what’s your take?” Carla asked.

  The glass walls separated the counselors from the line of kids forming outside. Someone knocked and Carla shooed them away and held up a finger. She turned back around to Joel and waited.

  “She pissed off the wrong person,” he said.

  “Police are still looking at Alex?”

  “That’s just ridiculous.”

  “Yeah, you said he had an alibi?”

  Joel didn’t remember telling Carla that he knew Alex had an alibi, but maybe the week was running together. The truth was he only knew what Holly told him—and he believed her. He felt hollow thinking about it.

  Could Alex be guilty? Not of pulling the trigger, but of masterminding the death? Was that possible for a kid to do? And beyond that: Alex was locked up. It was ridiculous to entertain the idea that he had a physical hand in the murder. But. Could he have been part of it? Well. That opened up a different argument.

  Could Holly know of his guilt? Was she being manipulated, too?

  Gun to his head? He didn’t know.

  “He was at the Donald Cooper Juvenile Detention and there was no way they let him out for a few hours to hit up a park half the city away. I suppose he could’ve had an accomplice,” he said, but he didn’t mean it—he didn’t. Something deep inside him felt like he’d betrayed her by even admitting to his colleague that it still could be Alex. It felt like betraying the boy, too.

  “What did the note say again?” Carla asked. She tried to make it look casual like she’d forgotten or it was important, but he knew she remembered and just wanted to hear him tell her again. It was salacious, no doubt, especially in light of the events.

  Joel cleared his throat. “No specific explanation as to why he hates her. Just a vehement declaration of rage and hatred…”

  “He really seemed like a good kid.”

  “Everyone can come unhinged,” Joel said, feeling like he owed it to Alex to stand-up for him. “We literally don’t know what the letter is talking about…he won’t open up. Not a word to his mom or me.”

  “You’ve tried?” Carla asked, picking up on the implied intimacy. He regretted mentioning the last part, slipping.

  “His mom had me visit,” a white lie, “and thought he’d open up to a guy. There’s no dad…”

  Carla broke into a wide smile and it took Joel a second to recognize her expression in light of the conversation.

  “What?” he asked.

  “Shit, she was hot for you,” Carla said and shook her head. “Seriously, damn. That’s a good move, Mrs. Gamarra, for sure.”

  “Come on,” Joel tried to play it off, but she was unrelenting.

  “Many homes…many homes…have kids without dads, Joel.” She tsked at him and shook her finger, twice his age and nearly retired, she’d earned a right to silence him into listening when she demanded it.

  “No,” he tried again.

  “Moms do not invite guidance counselors into their houses to have private sessions with their teenage sons unless they think that guidance counselor is single and fine.”

  Joel was suddenly embarrassed by the conversation and he flashed a smile to hide the growing discomfort with the topic. “Please,” he said to his colleague, dismissive. “We knew each other in high school…it wasn’t pre-meditated on her part. I promise you.”

  Carla didn’t try to hide her skepticism and she allowed herself to shake it off and jump back into the conversation unscathed. “Let’s go back to the thing where you said he wouldn’t open up to you…”

  “He didn’t know me,” Joel said.

  That didn’t satisfy Carla. “It’s not that simple. Even if he didn’t know you, if he trusted you to keep his secrets and keep him safe, he’d tell you.”

  “Of course,” Joel nodded. “He didn’t trust me.”

  “Kids don’t talk when they’re afraid. That’s it. No other reason. It’s just one-hundred-percent about fear and if you can help them not feel afraid, they’ll open up. He’s afraid. Either he’s guilty and afraid or knows something and is afraid, but yeah. That’s awful.”

  Another kid tapped on the glass. Joel was irritated by their impatience and he drew in a sharp breath and stood up, and opened the door, peeking his head out into the fray.

  “Wait patiently,” he instructed, unable to muster anything rougher for the kids who’d come to see him. “Just…give us a minute.”

  Some jackass said he’d time it and Joel shut the door louder as a response. He leaned against the back of the door and stared at the beige carpet of his office. He imagined Holly in the chair—looking stricken and shocked—and he wondered how he must have looked to her: like a kid, probably. With the Star Wars lights and the pictures of himself on his desk. He realized he looked like a bachelor asshole and he added it to a list of reasons why she’d escorted him out the other night.

  “Don’t mention the alibi thing to anyone,” he said.

  Carla mimed zipping her lips together and throwing away the key, which didn’t seem entirely congruent, but he understood the sentiment.

  “I shouldn’t know it,” he added as if it needed qualifying. “I feel guilty.”

  “Look,” Carla said as she stood up and walked to the door. “If you believe the kid didn’t do anything to Claire,” she stopped and weighed her words, “start selling that. Because the last visit seemed pretty targeted.”

  “Shit,” Joel said.

  “Yeah, well,” Carla said. She grabbed the knob and opened the door into the fray. “Sometimes pretty girls can lead you astray.”

  The troublemaker from before said, “Good advice Mrs. Brecchio, and that was under a minute, Mr. Rusk. You owe me a buck.”

  “That’s not how that works,” Joel said and motioned for his next appointment, a moon-faced girl and bright blue eyes who was having anxiety about someone shooting her at the park. Claire, of course, was in two of her classes.

  Just like Carla predicted, the police came that night to his place to talk to him again and their focus was on Alex. Joel did his best to obfuscate his relationship to Holly because, despite his attraction to her, they were merely acquaintances. Old friends. Old acquaintances. Old barely acquaintances.

  “We’re operating from the position that something related to the fight,” one of the police officers said, “that day was a trigger.”

  “And that Alex kid is off on a trip with grandma. Gave a statement with a lawyer though. I mean, Mr. Rusk, we appreciate your position, but we need something from him and this situation. Their blow-up is our only lead right now. ”

  “I know,” Joel replied and he rubbed his hands over his eyes, tired and cranky from answering questions he didn’t know on repeat. “But I didn’t know him well. He’d been in my office a handful of times and he was never a problem on campus until the day the girl found the note.”

  “And then you found the gun in his locker.”

  “In his bag. We searched it.”

  “Gotta love those student rights,” the first police officer said. “Reasonable suspicion. I walk around with reasonable suspicion at all times…imagine what I could find.”

  “There weren’t bullets,” Joel reminded them. He had the gun and that was enough for an expulsion, but he didn’t have bullets on him or in his locker and so if planned to pull the gun on Claire, he either assumed it was loaded or had no intention of hurting her. Immediately, Joel wanted to call Holly.

  If her crime club was going to take on the case of Alex, then they needed to know that they’d have to act fast. Alex looked guilty of being involved with something, it was true. He had motive if not opportunity. The rest was a crapshoot; Joel knew that.

  “He hid them?” the second officer posited.

  Joel coul
dn’t even imagine where.

  “I don’t think he was intending to harm Claire.”

  “But then she turns up dead,” officer one said.

  “Maybe more than one person had a reason to be upset,” Joel said. It seemed idiotic that the police hadn’t thought of that themselves. Although, their silence implied that maybe they had—maybe they just didn’t care.

  “Let us know if you learn of anything relevant,” officer two said and flipped a card in Joel’s direction. Joel took it and tucked it into his pocket. He stared until the men realized he had nothing more to say and left him alone, ending with quick goodbyes and a silent walk to the door. When he was sure they had left, he picked up his phone and called Holly. No answer.

  He didn’t even know what he was going to say if she answered, only that he felt she had a right to know.

  “Hey,” he said to start the message as if she’d know his voice, his number, “police came by tonight and I’m worried about Alex and you, so I thought I’d check up.” After a beat, he added, “It’s Joel.”

  He hung up, walked over to the wall, and rested his forehead against the cool paint. Joel knew he’d held a torch for Holly Bloom for longer than it was reasonable to admit, and he’d never understood the danger of letting that crush manifest until he realized there was a chance he was chasing a ghost.

  Holly entered his life at the worst possible time for herself. How was he supposed to carve out a place for himself right in the middle of her nightmare? Someone leaked Alex’s identity to the news media and even though they couldn’t publish his name, they made something very clear: the police have a person of interest, a fourteen-year-old boy who’d brought a weapon to school to harm the girl the day she died. While he’s not a suspect in the actual murder, police have reasonable suspicion he could point them in the right direction.

  Everyone knew that person was Alex.

  And that meant everyone knew Alex had a giant target on his back.

  Chapter Nine