Chapter 23
Tessa
“Oh, buddy…”
The last thing I expected was the rib-crushing hug Remi gives me as he walks in the door. His face pressed in my neck, and his body tense in my arms.
My eyes find Jason Mancuso still on my doorstep. He wears a grin, instantly settling my flash of panic at my son’s greeting.
I press a kiss to the side of Remi’s head.
“Sorry, Mom,” he mumbles before quickly disentangling himself from my hold and beelining it for the stairs.
Only then does Mancuso step inside, carrying Remi’s duffel bag.
“Just drop it right there, I can take care of that later,” I tell him, closing the front door. “Would you like some coffee?”
I just put on a second pot. I’ve had a pretty busy morning already and only had one cup after I got up and before I hit the ground running.
Clem came over again last night with Mouse, but this time he cooked for me and ended up staying the night.
Linc had made plans to go to a party with Naomi, so he didn’t come home until late, when Clem and I were already in bed.
I briefly woke up, heard him talk to the dog downstairs, and promptly fell back asleep.
Clem left early to get to the firehouse before eight, and Linc ran out the door not long after to be on time for his football practice at the school.
I got dressed and stocked up at the grocery store, cleaned the sheets on all beds, ran a few loads of laundry, and ran the vacuum.
I was about to mop the floors when I saw the large black SUV pull up alongside the curb.
“Please. My Friday flowed straight into Saturday so I haven’t slept and need the caffeine to keep my eyes open.”
“Case heating up?” I inquire, pulling a mug down from the shelf for him.
I’ve skipped plenty of nights’ rest myself when I was in the thick of a case. There comes a point in every investigation—usually when you get close to apprehending a suspect—you can’t risk letting up for even a second. It could be the difference between a successful arrest or a fugitive on the run.
“You could say that again,” he confirms. “But I’m happy to report we were able to apprehend Doyle Benjamin early this morning.”
I almost drop my coffee mug at the news.
“Seriously?”
He nods, a smirk on his face.
“What brought that on? Were you able to unearth more evidence?”
Instantly his smirk disappears and his eyes slide to the stairs.
Shit.
Whatever it is has to do with my boy, and I’m not liking that.
“Tell me,” I prompt him.
He leans in closer, and I automatically do the same.
“We arrested him for the murder of Ryan Wells,” he says in a low voice. “Remi was able to give us enough information to get an arrest warrant.”
Nausea hits instantaneously, and I have to fight the contents of my stomach surging to the surface.
“What do you mean?” I manage breathlessly.
“Your son was able to place Benjamin in the stolen Mustang with Ryan Wells on September sixth.”
I recall the date on the security feed showing the theft of the Mustang was September fifth, and Ryan’s mother reported him missing on the seventh. But I can’t for the life of me remember September sixth. I’m wracking my brain, trying to remember what we might have been doing that day.
“It was a Sunday,” Jason supplies helpfully. “Remi remembered the date because he said it was his father’s birthday.”
“Oh yeah, that’s right.”
I didn’t even clue in. I find it significant my kid does remember that date.
“He said you were working, and he’d been down and missing his father, and ended up talking with Benjamin in their private chat. Benjamin then mentioned he had an errand to run not that far from Silence and offered to swing by and pick the kid up.”
A fresh surge of nausea steals my breath as I consider every single possible thing that could have happened. Was Remi in the car with them?
I’m almost afraid to ask, but force myself.
“Did he go?”
“No,” Mancuso immediately returns.
The air I’d been holding explodes from my lungs with an audible groan. Thank God.
“Your boy recognized Ryan in the passenger seat, and mentioned he’d seen him before at his brother’s football game. According to Remi, the teacher seemed taken aback by that and suddenly announced he had to get going, and left him standing on the sidewalk.”
“Why the hell wouldn’t he have said something before?” I wonder out loud.
“Shame, fear, I mean, he’d already had the snot beaten out of him before he even found out Ryan had been killed. It freaked him out.”
“Was that Benjamin too? Beating on Remi?”
“No.”
I’m surprised to hear Remi’s voice respond, and my eyes dart to the stairs to find him on the bottom step.
“I mean, I don’t think so,” he moderates immediately as he walks into the kitchen. “I just can’t believe he would do something like that.”
My child looks almost heartbroken as he walks to the back window and stares outside blindly. My boy’s trust was crushed again. My anger at fucking Doyle Benjamin is burning a hole in my stomach. What I wouldn’t give for five minutes alone in a room with that bastard.
Mancuso picks up on my angry vibe and gives his head an almost imperceptible shake.
“I should get going,” he states out loud. “They’re waiting for me back at the office, but I wanted to deliver Remi home myself.”
“Of course,” I quickly reply. “And I really appreciate it.”
He walks over to Remi, who is still staring outside and claps him on the shoulder.
“I’ll be in touch. You’ve got my number, yeah?”
Remi turns to face him. “Yeah. Thanks.”
“You did good, kid.”
With a nudge of his head for me to follow him, Mancuso heads for the front door. I follow him out to the front step.
“I may be overstepping here, but your boy is feeling rough, Tessa. Give him a chance to take a breath, it’s been a pretty intense week, and he’s carrying a truckload of guilt. Maybe allow him to focus on something else for a bit.”
Maybe I should feel offended he’s telling me how to deal with Remi, but I don’t.
Instead, I feel grateful there are still good men, caring men, who give a fuck about my child.
He needs all the support he can get because what my son likely doesn’t quite realize, yet, is that this is only the beginning.
There will likely be more interviews, depositions, and even possible testimony at some future trial.
Remi is going to feel the consequences of his one step in the wrong direction for a while yet. It’ll be a hard lesson.
So I nod, and convey my gratitude.
“Thanks, I will. I assume we’ll hear from you?”
“Yeah, I’ll be in touch.”
I wrap my arms around my body against the chill as I watch Mancuso head to his SUV, brush the thin layer of snow that fell while he was inside off his windshield, and climb behind the wheel.
“Mom?”
I turn around to find Remi standing in the doorway.
“Yeah, Bud?”
“Is everything okay?”
He moves back as I step inside and close the door behind me.
“It’s fine. Are you hungry?” I ask, making my way back to the kitchen and my abandoned mug of coffee.
“Nah, Jason stopped to pick up some takeout at Frank’s Diner on our way.”
I flash him a bittersweet smile; Frank’s Diner is Remi’s favorite place to eat in Spokane. We’d go there at least once a month for breakfast or lunch when we still lived there.
We need to start doing stuff like that here in Silence. It’s not like I have a lot of time left to make new memories as a family.
“But…” Remi continues hesitantly. “I was wondering if I could maybe go to the firehouse to work on my truck for a bit.”
I suppress the firm and instinctive, “No,” wanting to slip out, remembering Mancuso’s gentle caution. Thinking about it for a moment, it’s probably a good way for him to find some distraction. Plus, he’ll have Clem right there to keep an eye on him.
“Yeah, okay. But I’m driving you.”
Clem
I moved the Civic I worked on into the parking lot for pickup, and am just closing the overhead doors against the snow starting to blow in earnest, when Tessa’s Jeep pulls into an empty spot.
I knew Remi was supposed to come home today, but I’m still surprised to see him getting out of his mother’s ride.
I’m waiting with the regular door open and wave them inside.
“Hey, kid. Good to see you.”
“Hey,” the boy mumbles in response, his eyes fixed on the floor at his feet.
“Hope this is okay?” Tessa asks tentatively. “He was hoping to get his hands dirty on the truck.”
Ignoring Remi, I hook Tessa around the neck and pull her in for a firm kiss.
“Hey to you too,” I mumble against her hair as I quickly breathe in her scent before letting her go.
“You know where everything is; what are you waiting for?” I prompt the boy, whose eyes I find fixed on us now.
When he moves to the coat hooks just outside my office, the dog pokes her head out to investigate. When Remi spots her, he freezes in the middle of shrugging out of his coat.
“That’s Mouse,” I call out. “She’s mine and she looks fiercer than she is.”
The kid still doesn’t move as Mouse inches closer, wagging that tail of hers and smiling her smile; which I only now realize could easily be misinterpreted as snarling.
Tessa catches on to her son’s unease too and immediately joins him, sinking down on her haunches and giving the dog a proper greeting.
Mouse sticks her smiling face in the air and gyrates her body as she’s getting some good scratches.
“She’s a sweetheart,” Tessa mumbles to Remi as she gets to her feet, takes his coat off the rest of the way, and hangs it on an empty hook.
He cautiously offers Mouse the back of his hand, which she proceeds to slobber enthusiastically.
The kid cracks a smile as he tries to wipe it on his jeans.
Then he crosses the shop to his truck, which I’d tarped up for the time being.
Mouse follows on his heels and plops down beside the engine block, where she can keep an eye on him.
Guess she found herself a new buddy.
“I was just heading upstairs to grab a drink, wanna come up?” I direct at Tessa. “Or do you have stuff to do?”
She grins. “I’ll never run out of stuff to do, but I wouldn’t mind another coffee. I never quite got to finish my second cup of the day.”
“It’s really coming down good,” she comments, looking out my kitchen window a few moments later.
“Shouldn’t last too long though,” I supply as I drop a pod in the coffee maker. “It’s supposed to be only a couple of inches and blow over by late afternoon.”
“I hope so. Linc and a few friends drove out to Newport to catch a matinee at the Roxy. I don’t want them coming back in a blizzard.”
The Roxy is the closest movie theater there is, other than the summer viewings in the park here in Silence a few of the local vendors organize every month between June and September.
Newport is about a forty-five-minute drive from here, right on the border with Idaho, where the Pend Oreille River crosses into Washington State.
“They should be good by the time the movie gets out,” I reassure her. “But we’ll keep an eye out. If it looks like it won’t let up, I can always go get them.”
“Stop being so dang perfect,” she complains, but she does it smiling. “You’re making me look bad.”
The coffee machine gurgles its final drops and I quickly add some cream and sugar to Tessa’s mug before I bring it over to her.
“I wouldn’t be able to if I tried,” I share as she takes her first sip and moans a little. “But you shouldn’t be making noises like that, not unless you want me to—”
The loud overhead ringing of my business phone cuts me short. Kyle is off this afternoon and Manuel is downstairs, welding a new muffler under a RAV4, so I should probably get that.
“Excuse me for a minute.”
I walk over to the wall-mounted phone and lift the receiver.
“Main Street Mechanics.”
The old geezer on the other end doesn’t bother with introduction and launches straight into particulars.
“I’m pretty sure I have one that’ll fit, but I ain’t going out in this weather to look. This for the truck I sold that kid?”
“Yeah, for the Chevy pickup,” I confirm.
“Well, you’re gonna hafta come over and look for yourselves. I’m here ’til six.”
“Won’t be today, Wally, but I can do tomorrow if someone’s gonna be there.”
Today would be too late anyway; by the time I’d get there I’d have lost daylight already. Better tomorrow so I can actually see something.
“Should be,” the old man acknowledges.
“I’ll see you then.”
I end the call and join Tessa, who has her eyebrow raised.
“I’ve been hunting for a part for the boy’s truck, and it looks like I may have found it. Do you think he’d want to tag along tomorrow? Same junkyard.”
“I’m sure he’d love that.”
I walk over to the banister, leaning over as I yell down.
“Yo, kid! You up to go on a hunt for a new transmission tomorrow?”
Remi turns his head and grins up at me.
“Hell, yeah!”