Chapter Eleven #2
“Like in the old Batman TV show?” He closed his eyes in a long blink, and when he reopened them, she’d swear the light in those blue depths burned a little brighter. Either that, or she was hallucinating.
“Uh-huh.”
Jake leaned in, clasping his hands between his knees as he studied her intently. “How are things going?”
“Other than the dozens of media calls I’ll have to field because you decided to play home run derby with a drone?”
His lips thinned into a line, but he nodded an acknowledgment. “Yes, other than those.”
“I’m peachy,” she said, keeping her tone light.
“Do you need some medicine for the nausea?”
She waved the suggestion away. “Actually, the increase in speed is working out better for me.” Her phone buzzed in her hand, but she ignored it.
“I’m glad I didn’t ask Bud to forward the incoming calls from the office to this phone.
” She gave her head a rueful shake. “I don’t have the stamina to do much at the moment. ”
“Actually, you’re doing a lot,” he countered.
“As much as anyone parked on a seahorse bench can do,” she agreed, her tone dry as desert sand. “Emma Parker is following up on a lead on our suspect.”
He nodded. “Colonel Aronson said she was going to question someone you arrested.”
Cassidy leaned in, too, bracing her elbows on her knees to help alleviate some of the weight on her back and shoulders. “I barely remember the guy, and his discharge was more than ten years ago. Something doesn’t feel right. Why wait so long?”
“Revenge is best served cold?” He hazarded a guess.
She wove her fingers together and squeezed before shaking them out again.
“Seems like a stretch. I’ve been racking my brain, trying to remember everything I can about the incident.
Baker’s brother was driving him back to the base.
We stopped them at the gate because we suspected the brother was driving impaired. ”
“Was he?”
“Reeked of alcohol, but refused to submit to a field sobriety test.”
“Breathalyzer?”
She shook her head. “I tried to get him to do one, but he refused. Claimed since they were still in line to get past the gate, they were technically on city property, not on base and I had no authority.”
Jake’s eyebrows jumped. “What did you do?”
“Notified Jacksonville police and detained him until they arrived,” she said with a shrug.
“Did you arrest the brother?”
“Oh, yeah,” she said, nodding emphatically. “Trevor got out of the car, shooting his mouth off about how his brother was going to get him busted, and carrying on. We walked him through to the gatehouse then patted him down. Found enough to charge him with possession with intent to sell.”
“And his brother?”
“He was quiet at first,” she said, thinking back. She tried to conjure an image of either man, but figured she was likely superimposing the file photo Emma had sent over on whatever scraps of memory she had. “He was too quiet. Barely said a word.”
“Jacksonville PD took him in?”
“Yeah. Yeah, he had…so much.” She gave a short, sharp laugh.
“Driving under the influence, though, would later get thrown out. His lawyer argued we hadn’t actually seen the vehicle move, so we couldn’t say for certain he was operating it.
” She gave an indelicate snort, and he shook his head, no doubt pondering the many vagaries of due process, as cops so often do.
“Anyway, he had enough of a stash to stock a small pharmacy. Felony possession with intent to distribute. Also found a handgun.” She twisted her lips into a smirky smile. “Unregistered, of course. The elder Mr. Baker had a previous felony conviction.”
“Of course he did.”
Cassidy ignored his sarcasm, lost to her memories as the events of the long-ago confrontation came rushing back to her.
The rainbow of pills.
An avalanche of plasticine packets.
The skunk stench of weed seeping from the upholstery.
Airman Baker’s litany of curses.
His brother’s stony silence.
When she lifted her head, she found Jake watching her closely. She could not escape the niggling sensation that she was forgetting something important or the way Jake’s stare made her feel squirmy inside. Her stomach rumbled and she latched on to the distraction.
“Hey, I wonder if I can get another sandwich or something? The first one got trampled and, oddly enough, I feel like I could eat now.”
The request startled a laugh out of him. “Yeah, I bet you can get your probie friend to bring you something. How’s your water?”
She shrugged. “Gone. I think it rolled off.” Cassidy turned one direction, then the other, trying to catch sight of the firefighter usually hovering nearby. “Hey, T.B.?” she croaked when she spotted him propped up against one of the generator trailers at the back of the ride.
“Ma’am?” he replied.
But Jake spoke up for her. “Can we get some more water and something to eat brought to Ms. Walker? Nothing with onions though.” He paused, turning to look at her, brows knit tightly together. “Or do you eat onions now?”
Her heart slammed into her rib cage and she must have sucked in a breath when she heard him add the special request. She swallowed hard, touched he remembered such tiny details. She shook her head, but her voice was barely more than a whisper. “No. No onions, please.”
“Anything else?” T.B. asked, looking past Jake to her.
She forced a weak smile. It went against the grain to ask anyone to go out of their way for her. Especially when they all had much more important things to do. But she had been spinning around on this thing for hours, and her cheeks and lips were parched and windburned.
“Some lip balm? Or petroleum jelly?” The tentative quaver in her voice annoyed her almost as much as asking for help did, but this was where she was at the moment. Hungry and parched in almost every conceivable way.