Chapter Two #3
Closing the door behind her, she tossed her keys on the half-moon table and shrugged out of her jacket. The sooner she let them get back to whatever was going on, the sooner she could wallow. “What’s up?”
“Didn’t you read my texts?” Brooke asked, taking her jacket from her and hanging it up.
“No, sorry. Stuff…happened.” Jo dropped her bag on the floor, then glanced from Brooke to Aaron. “What?”
“We had a break in.” Brooke’s voice rose a notch with every syllable.
“What do you mean?” Jo asked again. Her brain wasn’t firing on all cylinders. “In the complex? One of our neighbors? Who?”
“Us—we’ve been robbed.” Brooke grabbed Jo’s arm, charged forward, shooing Aaron out of the way, and dragged her into the compact living room/kitchen.
At first glance, everything seemed normal, then the blank wall where the sixty-inch TV hung stood out like a blank canvas.
Jo didn’t watch television—no time for it—and wouldn’t miss the monstrosity. Aaron had said he bought it for Brooke so she could stream her favorite shows, but the only thing ever playing on the screen was the big game. “Sorry about the TV.”
“It’s not just the TV.” Chewing the corner of her lip, Brooke darted a glance toward the kitchen. “I’m so sorry.”
Jo’s gaze followed Brooke’s, and defeat slammed into her like a fist in the gut. A whimper clawed its way out of her throat. “No. No. No, no, no.”
The brand new, stainless-steel, commercial-grade mixer she’d been so excited to finally order was gone. She’d spent a month’s salary on it, waited for weeks for it to get here, and only used it once.
A vase of red roses sat on the counter where she’d left her laptop—also gone. It stored her entire marketing plan for her someday shop. Thank god for the cloud. But the replacement for both would put a huge dent in her savings.
Numb, she blinked at the bare wall adjacent to the refrigerator, the one that should have showcased her grandma’s decorative pans. Why? Why take those? Their only worth was sentimental.
She didn’t bother checking her bedroom. Nothing of value in there, sentimental or otherwise.
“Fuck.” Like a zombie, Jo staggered to the couch and plopped onto it, letting her head fall back. She closed her eyes. “Worst fucking day ever.”
But hey, it can’t get any worse.
Except it could. They had no renters insurance. She and Brooke had talked about it but couldn’t afford it. They’d never need it since they had nothing worth stealing or that couldn’t be replaced.
Guess the jokes on us…on me, anyway.
Images of the night’s events rolled like a bad movie on the back of her eyelids. Avery Preston’s pursuit and asinine proposal, getting fired, and now this—it was all so comically tragic.
A giggle burst past her lips, spilling out into the dead silence, inappropriate but unstoppable. Bad luck comes in threes. That was what her grandma used to say, but all in one night?
“You think this is funny?” Aaron asked incredulously.
That just made Jo laugh harder. It was either that or cry, and there was no crying allowed.
“Sorry, sorry.” She rocked forward, holding her stomach, vaguely aware of Brooke mumbling something and pushing Aaron toward the front entry.
“Aaron, babe, don’t you know a meltdown when you see one?”
A meltdown. Yeah, she was having a meltdown. Since her grandma died, her life had been one streak of bad luck after another. Normally, she held it together. Grandma had taught her to be strong and to face her troubles head-on.
“I’m not leaving you here. They could come back.” He cupped Brooke’s face with both hands and rested his forehead on hers. “Come home with me.”
Brooke swept an arm wide to encompass the room. “They got everything they wanted. There’s no reason for them to come back. We’ll be fine. I just…”
Something about the tenderness of their conversation and the silence they left behind as they disappeared into the entryway sobered Jo and heaped on the guilt.
She sucked in a long breath. This wasn’t just about her. Brooke was a victim here, too.
“I’m sorry,” she said when Brooke returned. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah.” Brooke swept past her to the kitchen. A drawer opened and shut. “He means well, you know. And he’s worried about us.”
“I’ll apologize tomorrow,” Jo offered. Aaron wasn’t a bad guy. He’d been good to and for Brooke, but the residue of tonight’s fiasco with Preston had left a bitter taste in her mouth. “Fuck, I need wine.”
“Nah.” Brooke plopped down next to her, one jean-clad knee tucked against her chest. “This calls for the hard stuff.”
Holding two pints of ice cream, she handed Jo a pint of her favorite, a spoon sticking out of the rich creamy vanilla.
In unison, they pulled out their spoons and clinked them together in a tinny toast.
“Cheers,” Brooke chimed.
“Cheers,” Jo echoed, finding comfort in the ritual they’d picked up in fifth grade when Jo’s grandma had let her spend the night with Brooke on New Year’s Eve.
She’d marveled that they were allowed to stay up late and have sundaes at midnight.
And as the ball dropped, Brooke’s parents had toasted with champagne, prompting Brooke to tap her spoon to Jo’s.
From that moment on, it was their thing.
“So, what’s going on?” Brooke asked around a mouthful of strawberry cheesecake swirl.
Jo sank deeper into the thick cushions, one of the reasons they’d picked out this ugly couch. That and it was the only one they could find within their budget that wasn’t broken or infested with bedbugs. “Duh, we just got robbed.”
“That was not the Jo I know. That was full-on crazy town. Did something happen tonight?”
“Tell me about the break-in first, then I’ll tell you about crazy town.” Jo dug into her ice cream.
“Not much to tell, really.” Brooke shrugged. “We were out all day. I got some gorgeous sunset shots at the waterfall wall. That place’ll be great for my engagement pics—um, for future clients.”
Pictures. Jo sucked in a sharp breath and swung to take in Brooke’s flushed face. “Oh, my god, I haven’t even asked. Did they get your equipment?”
“No,” she said, spoon pausing halfway to her mouth, “but I almost didn’t take the case with me.”
“Good thing you did.” Tension drained from Jo’s tired muscles. Losing that camera and the lenses she’d collected over the years would have devastated Brooke.
“Yeah, I don’t know what made me change my mind.” Brooke shook her head. “Anyway, we got back around nine and the door was open. We called the police, and that’s that.”
“I’m glad you weren’t here when they broke in.” Jo shuddered, and her stomach rebelled against the sugary concoction she’d just swallowed. If anything had happened to Brooke…
They’d been inseparable since kindergarten, always there for each other.
Jo had held Brooke’s hand when her parents divorced.
Brooke had done the same for Jo when her grandma died, and then again when Jo was forced to leave the only home she’d ever known and move in with a father she barely knew and a family who resented her presence.
As soon as she and Brooke saved enough money, they moved to Houston to escape their dysfunctional families and a small town dying a slow economic death.
Brooke dove into building a photography career, working for a local studio, while Jo used every last dime her grandma left her to attend the culinary institute and worked nights to help pay rent.
After Jo graduated from the institute and found a better-paying job, they moved out of the tiny one-bedroom shithole apartment into a bigger two-bedroom, only slightly less shitty one.
Jo still slept on a mattress on the floor and used tubs for a dresser.
Thrift shop scavenger hunts had provided a comfortable couch, a coffee table, and a small wrought-iron table with a glass top and four chairs meant for patio dining.
They didn’t care. They were living their best lives, working toward making a better one, working toward their dreams.
Brooke waved the spoon in the direction of their surrounding neighbors. “Of course, no one in the building saw anything.”
Jo rolled her eyes. “No surprise there.”
“The weird thing is, the cops said there was no damage to the door, and all the windows were locked. Whoever it was had to be good at picking locks or had a key.
“You and I are the only ones with keys.”
“And Aaron.”
“Right.”
“And creepy Lambert,” Brooke added.
“Hmph, I wouldn’t put it past him.” The apartment manager gave Jo the creeps, always lurking in the hallway.
“And doesn’t Chase have one?”
Jo blew out a long breath. Asshole never did give her key back after they broke up. “Yeah.”
That was a one-time shot when he’d helped them move in, but every time she’d asked for it after that, he’d forgotten it or didn’t remember where he’d put it. She’d asked again at Christmas, but he’d picked a fight and stormed out.
“They also said it could have been a former tenant. They’re going to look into it.”
Jo didn’t hold out hope the police would even investigate, much less recover their stolen property. They were overworked and underpaid, and petty crimes like this, with no witnesses, were hard to solve. Insurance was the answer to restitution, and well…enough said.
“I gave the cops a quick inventory of what was missing,” Brooke went on. “I told them about the mixer. They got my laptop.”
“Awe, man.”
“I hoped you had yours with you.”
“Nope.”
Brooke grimaced. “We’ll call the police in the morning and add it to the list.”
“And Grandma’s pans.” ’Cause why not?
“Huh?”
“They’re not there.”
Bracing one elbow on the armrest, Brooke twisted and peered over the couch toward the kitchen. “Shit.” She flopped back around and spooned another bite. “I’m sorry. I don’t know how I missed those.”
“You were dealing with a lot.” Jo poked at her ice cream.
Brooke’s elbow nudged hers. “Okay, it’s time for crazy town.”
Jo let her head drop back and closed her eyes. “I lost my job.”
“Good.”
“Hmph, you won’t think so when we’re living on ramen again.”