Secrets On the Clock

by Nicole Disney

  Jenna tried to kiss her. Jenna poured her heart out and tried to kiss her, and she’d pulled away. Jenna did exactly what Danielle spent the last month wishing she would do, and she’d stopped her.

  Danielle glanced in her rearview mirror at the rehab center, then at the brochure for it in the passenger seat. She’d practically memorized it while researching for Brianna. She hadn’t even thought to run Jenna through the list of indicators. So many of the signs she couldn’t possibly know, intense cravings to drink, drinking alone, hidden stashes of alcohol, withdrawal symptoms if they stopped, increased tolerance. She didn’t know if Jenna experienced those things.

  She did know Jenna didn’t black out, didn’t forget what they’d talked about the next day like Brianna always did. She hadn’t lost an interest in the other parts of her life. She never smelled like alcohol. She never appeared drunk at work. She didn’t have flushed skin or bloodshot eyes. Come to think of it, the only time she’d seen Jenna drink was the two times they’d been at the bar together with everyone, and even then, she’d been composed. She hadn’t felt the need to drink at her own house, or at Danielle’s.

  Danielle felt a tingle of panic glide across her skin as she tried to pinpoint a single damning symptom. Why had she been so sure Jenna was out of control? It was just one night, and even though that kind of intoxication made Danielle uncomfortable under any circumstance, the circumstances were understandable. Most of her concern had simply come from Jenna’s reputation among her friends as a party animal, and Jenna was right, they hadn’t even said she got wasted. She’d been the one to connect partying with crazy drinking. She’d done that because of Brianna.

  Her stomach twisted into a painful knot as she replayed Jenna’s surprised and hurt face when she’d pulled away from the kiss she so desperately wanted, as she’d rejected the very reconciliation she’d gone crazy longing for. What had she done?

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Jenna liked being at work before everyone else. The early morning light calmed her restless soul as she drove to the office. Something about not having to keep it together for everyone made it easier to keep it together. It was something she discovered when things started falling apart, and even though Callie was finally finding her way, she suspected she still had plenty of keeping it together to fight through.

  The lawyer they hired to defend their mother was expensive but effective. He all but promised the charges would be drastically reduced. The man her mother attacked was healing faster than expected and seemed to want his medical bills covered more than vengeance, a price that would cripple her financially, but that she was happy to pay for her mother’s freedom. As well as it seemed to be going, though, she wouldn’t be able to relax until it was final. The worry was so incessant the only way she found she could breathe was to sit in her empty, silent office before the day started.

  Jenna parked up front, a right reserved for management that she seldom took advantage of. She struggled to balance her files in one arm, her coffee and jacket in the other, and lock the car without losing control of everything. The parking lot was nearly empty, with only a couple of cars scattered throughout. That seemed to be the case even when absolutely no one should be there.

  Before she made it to the front door, Sasha’s silver Mazda sped up the street. Jenna smiled as Sasha rounded the corner going at least forty before she turned sharply into a parking space and hopped out.

  “Morning,” Jenna said and smirked. “In a hurry?”

  Sasha beamed. “Training up for my drag racing career.”

  Jenna waited while Sasha caught up.

  “What are you doing here early?” Sasha asked.

  “Just getting some paperwork done before the office chatter starts.”

  “That your way of saying you don’t want to talk?”

  “No.” Jenna laughed. “We can talk all the way up the stairs.”

  “Message received.” Sasha laughed. “That’s too bad, because I think it’s going to take longer than that to get the story from the other night out of you.”

  “What story?”

  “The bar. You and Danielle. You were outside together forever, and I remember what that meant the last time.” Sasha winked. Jenna felt like she’d been jabbed in the chin.

  “No story this time.”

  “What? Really?”

  “Really.”

  “I thought for sure. The way she was asking about you. The way she looked at you.”

  “Pretty sure that look was disgust.”

  Sasha shot her a puzzled look. “Okay, I can’t read minds, but it was definitely not disgust.”

  “I don’t really want to talk about it,” Jenna said. She rounded the corner into the stairwell and jogged up the flight. She appreciated all the sudden support from the very people who had resisted the idea most, but she couldn’t listen to another person tell her to go back to Danielle when she had already tried and been rejected. She came to work early to avoid thinking about her problems, not to rehash every detail of her humiliation.

  “Okay,” Sasha said.

  “What brings you in early?”

  “Same. Catching up on paperwork. I may or may not have cut out early every day last week.”

  “Sash,” Jenna playfully scolded her.

  “Shh. Don’t tell the boss.”

  “You’re killing me.”

  “I’m here early making up for it, aren’t I?”

  “All right, but I better not see you out of the office until you’re caught up.”

  “Aye-aye.”

  Sasha veered over to her desk in the common room the caseworkers used. They weren’t cubicles, but the small workstations were arranged close enough together it felt the same. When Jenna received an office she thought she would never need so much room and that it would look mostly empty forever. That had been so very wrong.

  “Catch you later.” Jenna continued down the hall that led to her office a couple hundred feet away.

  She fumbled for her keys, trying again to stack her belongings in a precarious tower propped between her left arm and her body. She fit her office key in the door and turned it while pushing it open with her toes. She flipped on the light switch, then felt something against the back of her head.

  “Don’t scream.”

  Jenna started to turn, but the hard, probing object at the back of her head pressed harder, and Jenna’s stomach dropped as she realized it must be a gun.

  “Ladona?”

  A hand pushed her forward and sent the items in her arms scattering to the floor. The door closed with a thud. She turned and saw Ladona standing between her and the door with a pistol raised, pointed at her face. Ladona’s hair stood on end, scraggly and disheveled. Her large frame blocked the way so completely Jenna didn’t think she could try to run for it even if the door were open, but Ladona wasn’t taking chances; she locked it.

  “You took my babies away.”

  “No.”

  “Yes, you did.”

  “I’m not in charge of your case anymore, Ladona.”

  “Exactly!” she snapped. “You gave it to that other girl, that judgmental little bitch. Don’t act like you didn’t know what would happen.”

  Jenna raised her hands slowly. Her throat was dry. There were a million things she wanted to say, but as the reality of the gun pointed at her set in, she wasn’t sure any of them were right.

  “Ladona, put the gun down, and we’ll talk about it. If anyone sees you with that you’ll never get the boys back.”

  “Oh, now you want to help?” she said. “It’s a little late, don’t you think? They took them away. I’m not even allowed to know where they live. Not even Raylon. He’s with my own sister, and even she won’t tell me. You people ruined my life. You said you were there to help. You told us you would keep us together. You promised!”

  “I promised to do my best,” Jenna said. “I didn’t make you any guarantees. I told you there are certain things we can’t—”

  “S
hut up!” Ladona said. “We trusted you. My boys trusted you, and you just up and left. Got yourself a fancy office, huh? Just move along with your life? Do you even care that you let them down? Does it even bother you that you ruined our lives?”

  “Of course, it does,” Jenna said. Ladona stepped closer, like she’d forgotten she had the gun and had to resort to fighting. Jenna took a step backward, her gaze bounding around the office in a panic. No one even knew what was happening. Sasha was just down the hall, probably working on her reports, clueless. No one else would be in for at least half an hour. She discreetly brushed her hand across her pocket, feeling for her phone, but it wasn’t there. She spotted it on the floor, mixed in with the papers that had fallen from the folders she’d been carrying.

  “How did you get in here?” Jenna asked.

  “What, you think I’m too stupid to break into your office?”

  “No,” Jenna said. “It was just locked.”

  “So? You think we’re all just uneducated morons, that it? Think just because we’re poor we can’t do anything? Can’t even raise our own kids?”

  “No, Ladona,” Jenna said. “You know that’s not what I think.”

  “I think you’re the one that’s terrible at your job. Useless bitch. Don’t know shit about life, do you?”

  “I never wanted this for your family, Ladona. I did everything I could to keep you all together.”

  Ladona laughed. “You did everything you could? Please. You couldn’t even be bothered to show up. You pawned us off on someone else like we were nothing.”

  “I didn’t have a choice.”

  “Bullshit.”

  Jenna forced herself to take a breath. She kept peeking at the gun no matter how hard she tried not to look at it. She didn’t want to remind Ladona she was holding it, didn’t want her to feel like she had to use it, but the pull was strong.

  “I’m sorry,” Jenna said. “I really am.”

  “That’s not good enough.”

  “What do you want?”

  “You’re going to rewrite that report,” Ladona said. “That new bitch said you’re a supervisor now.”

  “Yes.”

  “Good, so fix it.”

  “It doesn’t work like—”

  “The hell it doesn’t. Don’t give me that shit. Fix it.” Ladona jabbed the gun at her and hit her in the forehead. The impact wasn’t hard, but it still hurt. Jenna didn’t want to know how it would feel if she actually took a swing at her with it. “Now!”

  “It’s not my case anymore. I don’t have access.”

  “I don’t believe you,” Ladona said.

  “I didn’t want off the case,” Jenna said. “I wanted to keep working with you. I swear. They locked me out of it because they knew I might keep reading the notes, and I was expressly told not to have anything else to do with you.”

  “You’re fucking lying.” Ladona’s face was full of rage that threatened to tip.

  “I’m not.”

  “If you can’t give me my kids back, I’m going to fucking kill you, bitch. You get the picture? You can fix it, or you can pay the price for destroying my family.”

  Jenna glanced back and forth between Ladona and the computer. Everything she’d said was true. Since Danielle was moved to Chuck’s crew, she’d been locked out of their information. She didn’t even know how to pretend to do what Ladona wanted, but she eyed the computer like it might whisper an idea to her. If she got on the computer, maybe she could send out an email to someone, get someone to call the police.

  “Okay,” she said. “Fine. I’ll amend the report. I’ll say you were in a car crash and that’s why Raylon was hurt. I’ll say it was an overreaction to remove them, that it was enforced prematurely without all the information. If I—”

  “I don’t care what you do,” Ladona said. “Just fix it.”

  Jenna nodded and slowly circled the desk, her hands still half raised. She slid into her chair and turned on her laptop. She waited for it to boot up, her heart racing as she tried to picture the fastest way to get word out. Email was hardly a reliable way to reach people quickly, but she did have a work group set up. If she sent it to everyone she’d have a chance someone would see it fast. She would open the message and tell them not to come to work, and to send police. Maybe that was too long. Maybe she should just type 911. They would see her work email; surely they’d check here. The home screen finally came up. Jenna’s heart jumped as she anticipated her next move, but Ladona circled the desk and stood over her shoulder. The life drained out of her as her plan went out the window.

  “Well?”

  Jenna scanned the folders on her desktop as she tried to think of a way to appear to be helping. She remembered she had some old documents from the Clark case saved in her own files and clicked into them. She scrolled to the bottom, trying to be quick enough Ladona wouldn’t read the specifics, but slow enough she’d see the correct names. She made it to the comments section at the bottom, highlighted, and deleted them. The notes had been unremarkable, but she imagined the visual of something disappearing would be satisfying.

  “What was that?” Ladona asked.

  “That deemed you an unfit parent. I’m going to rewrite it and resubmit.”

  She could feel Ladona’s eyes burning into her back. “Move slower.”

  Jenna nodded. Her palms were sweating. She felt the gun at the back of her head again.

  “No tricks.”

  Jenna opened the online database. If she brought up the list of cases she had access to, Ladona would see that her name wasn’t there. That could be game over. Instead, she opened a new document and titled it, “Amendment.” It would make no sense to anyone who looked at it. It wasn’t the way things were done, but Ladona didn’t know that. With the new case created, she entered mindless information about the Clarks. Their names, address, dates of births, then attached the document she’d just rewritten. She moved her mouse over the submit button and glanced over her shoulder.

  “I’m sending it now,” she said. Ladona nodded, and Jenna hit submit. Ladona closed her laptop, then circled the desk. She sat in the chair across from Jenna, resting the pistol on the desk, aimed at her. Jenna shifted and glanced around the room again.

  “Well, that’s it,” she said. “It’s done.”

  “Good.”

  The silence stretched as Jenna tried to figure out what she wanted now.

  “How long until they’re here?” Ladona asked.

  “What?”

  “My boys.”

  “I…” Jenna paused. “I’m sorry, what?”

  “My boys, stupid. The reason we’re doing all this. When will they be here?”

  “They’re not going to come here. They’ll contact you at home.”

  “No, I want them brought here. I’m not letting you go until I know you did this for real. Jesus, you really do think I’m some kind of dimwit, don’t you?”

  “No, not at all, but they’re not going to bring them here.”

  “And why the hell not?”

  “It’s just not the way things are done. They’ll come contact you at home, apologize profusely, and make arrangements to bring the boys back.”

  “Make arrangements?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s some bullshit if I ever heard it. You all are the ones who fucked up. I want my boys now.”

  “These things take time. They’ll have to pull them out of the homes they’re in now. They have to file a bunch of paperwork.”

  “You just did the paperwork.”

  “I changed the report,” Jenna said. “They still have to do paperwork to remove them from foster care and place them back in your care.”

  “Tell them that’s not how you want it done. You’re the big bad supervisor.”

  “I don’t think it’s a good idea to handle this in an unusual manner,” Jenna said. “You’re holding me at gunpoint. If anyone finds that out they’ll take your boys away for good, and you’ll go to jail. This is alrea
dy unusual; we can’t raise any more red flags.”

  “And I’m supposed to just believe you? What stops you from deleting everything you just did the second I walk out of here?”

  “What stops me from doing that even after you have the boys?” Jenna jolted at her own words, wishing she could take them back.

  Ladona’s surprise melted into a scowl. “You saying I should kill you after I get my boys? To make sure you don’t ruin it again? You’re probably right.”

  “No,” Jenna said. “You don’t have to do that.” Jenna’s mind scattered in a million directions, and for the first time she felt the real possibility that she might die. It had been there all along, of course, but that ridiculous human arrogance, that delusion of immortality kept it from sinking in. She had to think faster. She had to be better.

  “I’ve always thought your sons belonged with you,” she said. “You know that. You’ve seen me manipulate the system for you before. You know I’m willing to do that. Please believe that I didn’t want to be taken off your case. It wasn’t my choice, and I wouldn’t have handled it the way Danielle did. I don’t have a problem returning your kids to you, Ladona. I’m just trying to help you do it in a way that won’t get them taken away again the next day.”

  Ladona seemed to fall into deep thought, and she slowly nodded.

  “I’ll believe you when you bring my sons to me,” she said.

  “You have a gun on you. How—”

  “No one knows that except us, and if you change that you’ll be the first to catch a bullet.”

  Jenna sighed and rubbed her face. “Okay.” She picked up her desk phone. Ladona jerked forward and jabbed the gun at her.

  “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

  “I’m making the call,” Jenna said. “To bring them here.”

  “No,” she said. “No way. Do it online, where I can watch.”

  “It could take all day for them to respond that way.”

  “My schedule is clear.” She leaned over again to watch Jenna type. Jenna felt frustration building as yet another chance to get help disintegrated, but as soon as it had gone, another idea came to mind. She could email now. She’d only be able to send it to one person, not a list. Possible names scrolled through her mind. Sasha would be the most likely to see it immediately since she was definitely on her computer in the next room, but that also ran the risk of bringing her into the office, into danger.