Phoenix: Ride With Me Series

5. River

Meetingwith the FBI was not how I saw my morning going.

It has been about a week since the incident at the Mickelson Ranch, and I could not get it out of my head. I saw those girls’ faces every time I closed my eyes. I heard Maddie’s silent screams. I could feel her clutching me. It broke me in half every night.

Today, I was sleep-deprived, grouchy, and PMSing. Lord help anyone that irked my nerves today.

I had fifty other things I needed to be doing, but this meeting was important. I looked in my rearview mirror to see Laura asleep in her car seat. We’d dropped the kids off at school already. Since Mom was, once again, MIA and not answering her cell, I had to keep her with me today. I didn’t mind having her, the opposite actually. Since she’d come home from the hospital, she has been like mine. Mom was just…Mom. There was zero accountability there. She only worried about herself.

Looking back at her again, I smiled. I could see the syrup still smeared on her face. I pulled into the Sheriff”s office parking area, found a spot, and backed in. Yes, I was one of those people. Sue me. It made life easier in a busy parking lot. Especially when I had a whole herd of kids’ heads to see through.

I got out and climbed into the back seat. I gently used a wet wipe to clean her hands and face. Her clothes had miraculously made it through our McDonald’s breakfast unscathed. Even with bibs, she always wore her food. Kids were messy little gremlins.

I unbuckled the straps and gently pulled her from the seat. She curled into me and thankfully didn’t wake. Waking a gremlin from a nap, Lord, my sanity couldn’t take that today. I grabbed the backpack I used as her diaper bag. Yes, even at the age of four, she needed things in the event of an accident or boredom. It held a few toys, a change of clothes and shoes. There were snacks and an iPad.

Walking across the lot, I scanned the area. It was a habit I would never break. I wanted to see who was around me. Spatial awareness was a lacking skill in most of today’s society. I wanted to see if you were coming at me so I could react appropriately.

I pulled open the main doors and walked in. The next set of doors led me into the station proper. I looked around. There were chairs along one wall. Desks in the center of the room. Men and women milled about the space.

“Good morning, can I help you?” I looked to my left and smiled at the woman coming my way.

“Good morning. I have an appointment with the Sheriff and someone from the FBI. My name is River Knowles.”

“Oh yes, please, you can have a seat here. I’ll let him know you’re here.”

“Thank you.” I sat with Laura, shifting her so she was comfortable. Resting my cheek on her head, I waited, people-watching. A few men came in, cuffed and scowling. Hey, no sense in all of that. If you got cuffed, that was on you.”

“What are you looking at, bitch?” one snarled at me.

My head came up, and I had to remind myself I had a toddler on my lap. And that I was in public. I just gave him a saccharine smile as I spoke. “Call me a bitch again, and I will forget we are in the police station.”

“Oh, I’m so scared,” he taunted.

“Clifton, shut it,” one of the deputies called out, slamming a file cabinet drawer.

So he was on a first-name-basis with the law. Go figure.

The man didn’t listen though. “You some kind of freak?” He looked at me, and I knew he saw the blonde hair and the thick patch of black on the right side. It was a statement piece. Didn’t make me a weirdo or anything.

I didn’t have to explain myself to the likes of him.

I raised a brow but said nothing. I could tell he was drunk. He wasn’t worth the energy.

My silence though just seemed to piss him off more.

“You one of them dikes? Can’t get a man?”

Ignore him, River. He’s not worth a rap sheet of your own. Remember the kids. They need you. Ignore him.

He was only trying to get a rise out of me. That was a normal thing nowadays. People had no fucking respect for others. It wasn’t just men either. Somewhere along the way, values and manners were lost. My granny woulda gone over and washed his mouth out with a bar of soap and a bottle of hot sauce.

Ask me how I knew that.

Chuckling to myself, I shifted in the chair. Laura started to get restless and wake up. She was a grouch when she first woke up, normally. Today though, she seemed to be doing okay. I wiped the sweat from her forehead, brushing her blonde curls out of her face. She was the only sibling that had blonde hair. The others had a mix of mousy brown to dark brown.

I thought that was why she was mistaken as mine all the time. She might as well be.

I cleared my throat and spoke to her, keeping my voice soft. “Do you want some juice?”

She nodded. “Pwease.”

Smiling, I dug out her sippy cup and the bottle of apple juice I had in the insulated pouch in the bag. “Can you hold your cup for me?”

She nodded, her little hands wrapping around it tightly. I poured some of the juice in then added some water on top of it. “Good job, baby. Almost done.”

I hadn’t realized the office had gotten quieter in the last minute or so. The men who had been cuffed in the chairs were gone, and Phoenix stood in the doorway, his dad and Maddie with him. He was watching me, his lips ticking up into a smile.

“Here, let me put the lid back on. There you go.”

“Tanks you.”

“You’re welcome, baby.”

“She’s adorable,” he said, coming to sit beside us.

“She’s a stinker. Don’t let the cuteness fool ya none.”

He chuckled.

Laura leaned back watching him as she drank. She didn’t normally shy away from strangers. She was the kid who would run up to strangers and hug their legs just to say hi and run away. It was cute but scary as fuck too.

Maddie came over and sat on her dad’s knee. Her hands moved slowly as she asked him something.

“She wants to know if this is your daughter?”

“No. This is my little sister Laura. Laura, can you say hi?” She waved but kept drinking her juice. “She’s normally chatty, but she literally just woke up.”

“How old is she?” Tripp asked, coming to stand before us.

“Four going on forty.”

A few people chuckled at that.

“You here to meet with the FBI too?” I asked.

“Yeah. They want to ask Maddie some questions.”

“Good morning, everyone.” The Sheriff came out. He signed as he spoke.

Damn, could everyone in this town use sign? How had I missed that?

“If you follow me to the conference room, we can get started. We don’t want to hold you up; we know y’all have lives to live.”

“Gabe, if you need me, I’ll be down at the courthouse. We have a warrant to check on.”

“Will do, but I think we will be okay.”

Tripp kissed Maddie’s cheek and sighed something. She smiled wide and nodded, then he was gone.

Maddie tapped my arm to get my attention. Her mouth moved as she used her hands to sign. Her voice was soft, but I could hear her.

“Can you sit with me in there?” She pointed to the door that the Sheriff had exited.

“Of course, as long as it’s okay with your dad.”

“It’s fine with me.”

I gave them a gentle smile.

Laura chose that moment to announce to everyone that, “I habs to gooooooooooo potty!” I hung my head and laughed softly.

“Ma’am, inside voice. That is not something you need to tell everyone in a five-mile radius.”

“I habs to goooooo!”

“Okay, okay.” I knew that wiggle. “Bathroom?”

“I’ll show you, follow me.” I followed the woman from earlier into the back hall and into the bathroom.

When we came back out, Laura toddled out first. Her sippy cup in one hand, she wobbled like she was on a balancing beam. I shook my head. This kid was a ham. A very cute little ham.

Anna, the office’s clerk, volunteered to watch Laura for me. I agreed because I didn’t want her to be a part of what was going to go down in that conference room.

An hour later, I was ready to jump this table and throat punch an old FBI agent. Agent Carson was the nice one of the group. Special Agent Masters was a hard-ass but seemed to actually be listening. But this fucker though, Agent Killerman—oh, he was a grade-A asshole with little dick syndrome.

I was so glad Maddie had already been escorted from the room.

“It has yet to be determined why the minor child would be there in those conditions. The others were in their mid-twenties. One has a record; the others have clean ones, but they have a reputation on the campus. Maybe they got into the wrong vehicle or?—”

Was he actually implying that these young women had asked for this to happen? I was hearing him wrong; I had to be. I didn’t think he was considering what he was saying as he spoke.

I wasn’t the only one about to snap. If Phoenix clenched his jaw any tighter, he was going to grind his teeth to dust. I reached out to rest my hand on his, squeezing softly. His gaze fell to mine. I watched as the tension started to ease from him.

“I’m sorry, am I boring you two?”

“No, but you’re sure as fuck pissing me off.” I turned, snarling at the jerk. “Do you hear yourself? Like seriously? You pompous windbag.”

“I beg your pardon?” He scoffed.

I stood slowly, leaning over the table. “Do you fucking hear yourself? They had a reputation on campus? Are you suggesting that they in any way deserved what happened to them? That they asked for this shit?”

“That is not what I said!” He stood, glaring at me.

“You sure as fuck implied it. It’s men like you that make the shit women go through so goddamn hard. You old school, women belong to men, they should stay barefoot and in the home, motherfuckers make me sick.”

“A woman’s place?—”

“Is wherever in the fuck she wants it to be!” I felt an arm come around my waist and pull me back.

“Easy, tiger.”

“No. Men like him make me violent.”

“What would you know of men like me, little girl?”

“Little girl!”

The motherfucker. Everyone started to talk at once. I pulled free of Phoenix’s grip and charged the table. I was over it with one push off of my hand.

“Let me tell you about men like you.” I poked him in the chest. “You think women shouldn’t be anything more than a maid. We shouldn’t have jobs. We shouldn’t be in the Military. Do you know how many of your limp dick assholes I encountered in the eleven years I served my country? Hundreds. But you know what? It made me want to be better.”

“I got the highest marks of my entire platoon for my ability to hit a target. If there was bad shit that went down, I got sent in first. They didn’t care that I was a woman. I was damn good at what I did, and no one else could keep up.

“I can guarantee you, even to this day, my security clearance is higher than yours. I dealt with shit you would run home to your mommy to avoid.”

I was once again pulled back from him, the grip on my waist enough that I was up and off my feet. Could I have gotten free, fuck yes. But I wasn’t going to take my anger out on Phoenix. He didn’t deserve that.

“Well, I think we have what we need,” Agent Masters said, giving his fellow agent a hard look. Carson, though, was outright chuckling.

“You need to change your briefs, Killerman?” he teased the older man before turning back to me. “Ma’am, it was a pleasure to meet you. If we have any follow-ups, I will contact you. Right, Agent Masters?”

“Yes, yes, of course.” He shook himself. “Sheriff, we’ll be in touch. Hatcher will be here in about an hour. He is yours as long as you need him.”

“Thank you. We will find these assholes.”

“No doubt, old man.” They shook, and it wasn’t until the room was empty of all but a few that Phoenix lowered me to my feet.

“Are you okay?” He stepped around me, lifting my chin so I was looking up at him.

I swallowed hard and nodded. “I have a bad temper sometimes.”

His smile sent my heart racing. “Yeah, you do.”

After a few seconds of us gazing at each other, a throat cleared. I blinked and looked to the door where the Sheriff stood.

“Anna took Laura and Maddie to the park just up the street so they could play with some of the other kids.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. Was she being a busybody?”

“No, not at all.”

“Come on,” Phoenix said, “I’ll walk you down there. The Sheriff’s grands and some of the other younger kids that aren’t in school go there every day to run off energy.”

“Ah, okay. Cool. Thank you. I think I need to walk off my own energy.”

He chuckled, took my hand, and led me out of the conference room.