Chapter Thirteen #2
The door opened, and her small hand slipped into his, lacing their fingers.
The touch was light, shy, almost innocent, a juxtaposition of the sultry smile she cast over her shoulder.
The combination was heady and dangerous and triggered a war of indecision, along with something new, the sudden instinct to savor and protect when all he wanted to do was to wreck and ravage… to ruin.
Something crackled under her feet, and her smile faded. “Oh my god.”
He followed her gaze to the shattered mirror hanging askew. Glass. She’d stepped on glass. The table was upturned. Pink flower petals littered the entry floor.
She reached for her blue jean jacket and came away with only a sleeve. The rest lay in pieces at her feet. A small cry filled the confined space, jarring Avery into action.
“Don’t touch anything.” Wrapping an arm around her, Avery guided her back to the hall and dropped the bag of food outside the door. He fished out his keys and pressed them into her hand. “Go back to the car. Call 9-1-1 and wait for the police.”
“No.” She grabbed his arm as he moved toward the door. “You can’t go in there alone. They might still be in there.”
“I don’t think so. It’s too quiet. Go.” He gave her a push toward the stairs and reentered the apartment. Just in case he was wrong, he avoided stepping on the glass and alerting anyone still lurking and slowly made his way to the combination living room and kitchen.
Jesus.
The aftermath of war. That was the only way to describe what he saw.
A bloodless war. Couch cushions lay like dead bodies, strewn across the room, shredded, their foamy guts ripped out.
The skeleton of a coffee table was broken, legs smashed to kindling.
Even the drapes hung in tattered ribbons, like torn flesh.
Glass cracked behind him. He spun toward the door, hoping the police had arrived, only to find Jo closing in on him, her expression as devastated as the room she had yet to see.
“Damn it, Jo,” he whispered as he rounded on her, trying to block her view, “I told you to wait in the car.”
She lifted a trembling hand. “I have mace.”
Of course, she did. A woman, living alone in a shithole like this… He was surprised she wasn’t packing.
He pried the small canister from her fingers, more to assure her than anything else. He had no idea how to use it and would probably end up spraying himself in the face. “Did you call the police?”
“Yeah, but a B&E isn’t a priority in this neighborhood. It could be hours.”
“Jo—”
“I’m not leaving you,” she whispered, both scared and determined.
“Come on, then.” He reached for her hand. We’ll both wait in the car.”
“No.” She dodged his grasp. “I—” She met his gaze and his chest constricted at the resignation in her eyes. “Whatever it is, it’s mine to deal with. I have to see it.”
“I have to clear the other rooms first, and I can’t do that if I’m worried about you.” He pushed her toward the kitchen. “Get down behind the counter and don’t come out until I tell you.”
She nodded, and he crept down the hall. The door was open to the first room.
It was empty except for the remains of a vacuum cleaner.
The bathroom across the hall was a mess.
Another mirror shattered, the shower curtain a repeat of the living room drapes, and shower walls smeared with red lipstick… A fucking scene from a slasher movie.
Avery stopped in the doorframe of the next bedroom, Jo’s bedroom, where he’d planned to spend the rest of the day learning every curve of her body, memorizing every breathy sigh. The afternoon sun poured through the windows, its golden beams a spotlight on the continued destruction.
Her bedspread, the curtains, even the mattress had been sliced open.
A small lamp, broken and bent, lay on its side, the picture frame next to it shattered, the photo of Jo and Brooke ripped in half.
Several tubs, as empty as the closet, looked like they’d been thrown across the room.
Pieces of clothing covered the floor like a colorful rug.
Avery scrubbed a hand over his face. This wasn’t just a break-in. This was personal. But whoever’d done this was long gone.
A low keening pierced the silence.
Jo.
He bolted down the hall and circled the peninsula to find her slumped against the cabinet, surrounded by another field of collateral damage. She clutched something to her chest.
“What is it?” He cleared a spot of glass and debris with his boot.
“No!” She clawed at a shard of a green plate that he’d moved aside and hugged it close to the other. A sob gurgled in her throat as he knelt next to her.
“Jo?” He brushed the hair from her face. “Did you cut yourself?”
Icy blue eyes stared past him. Her lower lip trembled, and a tear rolled down her cheek. “It was the only thing I had left of her.”
Her?
Avery looked at the plate. It wasn’t a pottery. It was metal. He scanned the kitchen floor, identifying matching parts of machinery, the inner workings and outer shell of the mixer he’d made fun of and she’d defended so vehemently. Her grandmother’s mixer.
Ah, fuck.
“She’s gone,” she gasped on a shudder as another tear followed the first, then another, creating a river of mascara on a snowy canvas. “She’s really gone now.”
He sank down beside her and pulled her onto his lap. “It’s okay, baby.”
“No, it’s not.” A sob shook her so hard he felt it in his bones. Her fingers clawed at his shirt. “It’s not okay. What if I can’t hear her anymore?”
“Ssshhh.” He had no fucking idea what that meant, but he knew enough to understand she was losing her grandmother all over again, and there wasn’t a goddamn thing he could do about it except hold her and utter fucking useless words of comfort while she shattered in his arms, one heart-wrenching sob at a time.
He kissed her forehead and rocked her from side to side, “I’ve got you, baby. I’ve got you.”
“Sh-she was the only one who w-wanted me.”
****
Avery wasn’t sure how long they sat there amidst the debris and heartache, his chest constricting with every broken sob wrenched from Jo’s slight body.
At some point, the room had grown darker, and she’d gone quiet except for an occasional hiccup and the tremor that followed.
His shirt was soaked through. The metal she clung to dug into his shoulder, and he was pretty sure a piece of glass was stabbing his ass.
A loud rap on the door they’d left open startled her. “Police. We’re coming in.”
“We’re in the kitchen,” he yelled up and over the counter, then lowered his voice as he looked down at her, “Jo, the police are here.”
“Yeah,” she breathed then took a deep breath and exhaled slowly.
“We need to get up.”
“Yeah.” She lifted her head, looking anywhere but at him, her eyelids puffy, her nose red. With a swipe of her sweater’s sleeve, she smeared the black tracks on her cheeks across her face and crawled off his lap, still clinging to her salvage like buried treasure.
Stiffly climbing to his feet, he indicated one of the wrought-iron chairs. The glass table top was gone, fodder. “Sit here, but don’t touch anything. There’s glass everywhere.”
The crunch of boots grew louder. A flashlight flickered over his face, blinding him temporarily, then lowered. As his eyes adjusted, he made out the silhouette of two officers, one built like a mountain, the other short and wiry.
“Is there anyone else here?” came from shorter of the two.
“It’s just us.”
“Is anyone hurt?”
“No.”
The overhead lights came on, and the burly officer jutted his chin toward the hall. “I’ll check it out.”
The other one nodded, then holstered his flashlight. “Which one of you lives here?”
Jo sighed. “Me.”
“I’m Officer Benning. That’s Officer Sanchez. What’s your name?”
“Jo Hayes.”
He turned to Avery. “And you are?”
“Avery Preston.” He pulled a business card from his wallet and handed it to the officer.
“And what’s your relationship?”
“I’m her boyfriend.” Avery didn’t know why he said it, but thank fuck, she didn’t argue.
“We took a B&E call a few weeks ago at this address. Where’s the other girl who lives here?”
“She moved out.”
Benning grunted, as if to say, “Smart girl.”
“All clear,” Sanchez said, returning to the living room. He started taking pictures with his phone.
Avery watched both cops for some sign of what they were thinking, but they weren’t giving anything away, which forced him to ask the obvious question. “Do you think they’re related?”
“Doesn’t seem likely.” Benning said. “Lotta B&E’s around here.”
“My tire was slashed the week after the break-in,” Jo said, her tone matter–of-fact.
Avery stared down at her. “Jesus, Jo, why didn’t you say something?”
“Because I didn’t think it had anything to do with the break-in and it was before we…started dating.”
Benning nodded and asked questions about what time she left her apartment, when they’d returned, if the door was open.
Jo sighed. “No, it was locked, same as before.”
“Can you tell if anything’s missing?”
“I haven’t looked,” She stared down at the metal in her hand, and his heart broke for her all over again, “but there’s nothing here worth stealing.”
“Do you know anyone who’d do this?”
“No.”
Avery could think of one person. “What about Murdi—doch?”
“Who’s that?” Sanchez asked.
“My ex-boyfriend.” She frowned up at Avery. “He’s an ass, but he wouldn’t do this. And I took his key back after last time.”
“We’ll need his full name to check him out.” Benning nodded at the mess surrounding them. “You got a place to stay?”
Jo nodded.
Avery didn’t know where she thought she was going, but she was coming home with him. He wasn’t letting her out of his sight until he knew she was safe.
She stood. “I need to get a change of clothes from my room.”
He took her hand to steady her. “We’ll stop and get whatever you need.”
“It’ll only take—” Her gaze skipped from cop to cop to his, and she sank back down on the chair. “It’s like this. My clothes? Everything?”