Chapter 4 #2
“FBI,” he said. “You OK? Can you tell me your name?”
The only response was a rattling gasp. Javi quickly holstered his gun as he glanced over at Cloister and gave the quick order for him to open the windows. Cloister padded over and yanked them open to let daylight in.
At the same time, Javi pulled the blankets back. The whiff of BO that emerged with it had a smoky, skunky under-note. As the light hit them, the kid in the bed made a strangled noise as they cringed back, one arm up to cover their eyes.
“The fuc…,” they slurred out, before a bloodshot eye registered Javi through their spread fingers. Alarm flashed over their face, and they reached up to pop a bright green silicone earplug out of their ear. “Who the fuck are you?! What are you doing in my room? Get the fuck out!”
They scrambled back over the bed and kicked out with a bare, bony foot at Javi. The blankets went with them.
“Daaaa-aadd,” they yelled. “Tracy! Wha’ the–”
It wasn’t the time for gentle parenting. Javi reached over and slapped his hand over the kid’s mouth. He held up a finger.
“I’m Special Agent Merlo,” he said. “You need to be quiet.”
The kid tried to bite him. That was fair enough.
Javi grabbed the collar of their sleep shirt and dragged them off the bed. He got them on their feet and pushed them toward Cloister.
“Get them outside,” he said. “I’ll finish clearing the house.”
Cloister looked reluctant, but nodded. He put his hand on the kid’s shoulder.
“We’re going to be quiet, and we’re going to be quick,” he said softly as he hunched over to meet the kid’s gaze. “You can do that.”
On a good day, Cloister looked like someone not to cross. It wasn’t just his height; it was the harsh bones of his face and the battered cant of his nose. Animals and kids loved him, though.
It turned out Joel’s stepkid was old enough that the usual magic didn’t kick in. They bolted for the door, tripped over Bourneville, and fell face-first into the hall. The impact knocked the breath out of them.
Before they could get it back, Cloister grabbed them, hoisted them up over his shoulder, and jogged away down the hall. Bourneville shot after him without even a glance back at Javi.
She might take his leftover eggs in the morning, but on the job, he didn’t exist.
While Cloister got the kid out of harm’s way, Javi drew his gun again to check the last room in the house.
What was a worse sign, he wondered as he opened the door to the master bedroom and checked through it quickly. That she’d left her phone, or that she’d left her kid?
It wasn’t cold.
Tommy clutched the blanket around her shoulders anyhow. One hand held it bunched up in front of her throat. Shaggy purple-red hair fell over her face as she rubbed fingers stained the same color under her nose. That answered one question.
“I don’t know when she left,” she said. “I don’t talk to her if I can help it. Is that OK?”
She was perched in the passenger seat of one of the patrol cars that answered Javi’s call, her bare feet crossed over each other and braced on the door frame.
Short nails picked fretfully at the nap of the blanket as she shifted uncomfortably.
Behind, the sheriff’s department deputies crisscrossed the lawn as they secured the scene.
“I don’t know,” Javi said. “That depends on whether your family dynamics have anything to do with why SSA Joel is currently out of contact.”
Tommy twitched her lip in a sneer and started to roll her eyes. Only to stop halfway through and stare at Javi.
“What the what?” she said. “Nuh-uh. That’s nothing to do with me.”
“No?”
She straightened up from what looked like her habitual slouch.
Red-rimmed blue eyes widened as she met Javi’s skeptical gaze.
“Yeah, no,” she said. “I mean, I don’t like her, she’s my stepmom, who likes them, but not like…
not like that. Anyhow, it’s my dad I was fighting with last night.
So if I was going to make anyone disappear… ”
Her voice trailed off as she looked around suddenly, wide eyes scanning up and down the street.
“Wait, you know where my dad is?” she said, her face scrunched with worry. “Right? He’s, like, on his way? Right?”
Javi crouched down and picked up the bottle of water she’d turned down earlier. He offered it to her again.
“We’re trying to get in touch with him now,” he said. “I’m sure he’ll be here as soon as he can.”
This time Tommy took the bottle. She held it between her knees instead of opening it.
“He’s OK, though?” she pushed at Javi. Then she hunched her shoulders up and agitatedly scrubbed the back of her hand over her eyes. “And, I mean, Tracy too. I don’t want to live with her, but she makes my dad happy. I don’t want, like, anything to happen to her.”
Javi took the bottle from between her knees and twisted the cap off. “The last time you saw her was last night?” he checked. “When you were fighting with your dad about…?”
Tommy stared at him in confusion for a second before she remembered where they’d been in the conversation.
“Oh, um, yeah.” She wiped sleep out of the corner of her eye with one finger.
“It was…they’d found out I’d been vaping and acted like it was a big deal.
Like, the only reason I had it was because they brought me here, and half the kids in my class vape.
And I know he smoked when he was my age, so what’s the big deal?
But they told me to go to my room and cool down.
So I did, popped a melatonin, and that was it until you jump-scared me. ”
“What time was that?” Javi asked.
Tommy pulled an elastic, baffled face. “I dunno,” she said. “Before midnight?”
As timelines went, it didn’t narrow it down much. It was something, though.
Javi handed her the water.
“We’ll let you know as soon as your dad is on his way,” he said.
He nodded at a nearby deputy to take over babysitting duties and left Tommy looking forlornly at the water as he turned to head back into the house.
As he approached Collins, a stocky, acne-scarred deputy whose name Javi only knew because of Cloister, hooked his arm under the police tape that cordoned off the front of the house.
He lifted it so Javi could stoop under it.
“Witte’s still in the kitchen,” Collins provided with a tip of his head in that direction. “Lieutenant Frome is up in San Diego today, but he told us to provide any support your office needed.”
He looked pleased with himself, as if that support was the direct result of his negotiations. Javi gave him a tight smile and a dip of his chin in acknowledgement.
“The FBI appreciates that,” he said.
Collins beamed at him as he let the tape, slack from the stretch, drop again. It reminded Javi not to underestimate his boyfriend, who would have gotten the sarcasm even if he didn’t engage with it. Cloister was easy-going, not stupid. There was a difference.
He probably didn’t need reminders not to dismiss Javi as stupid either, but that was a different set of qualities.
And I’m also a qualified lawyer, Javi reminded himself tartly as he crossed the lawn, so no one is going to think I’m stupid.
Thin-skinned, maybe. Since apparently, he couldn’t even take criticism from himself.
While Collins fended off any incoming nosy neighbors, Javi went into the house. The smell of burned coffee had faded, but the bitterness still lingered in the air. Javi followed Collins’s instructions and headed toward the kitchen.
Javi felt the countdown click on in his head as he patted his pockets down for a pair of gloves.
There was a limited window of opportunity that he could pass off as “building a full picture” before he had to loop in Kincaid.
Once he did…it wasn’t that far from here to LA, and Kincaid drove like a lunatic.
If he wanted to take advantage of this opportunity, he needed to move fast.
And not refer to it as an ‘opportunity’ out loud.
He snapped the thin black gloves on as he pushed the kitchen door open with one shoulder.
Bourneville was sprawled on the floor, chewing meditatively on a knotted-up T-shirt, while Cloister stood in his most loose-jointed slouch and recounted his version of events in his thickest Montana accent.
The one he only dragged out when he wanted people to dismiss his input.
Javi felt a twinge of annoyance that he tried to keep to himself. If Cloister was treating the deputy to his best cowpoke impression, Javi didn’t need to check the badge to know it was Gardner. And if Professional Standards was doing Kincaid’s dirty work, that made his narrow window even tighter.
“Witte,” he interrupted shortly. “Walk me through it. Any sign of foul play?”