Chapter 8
“Okay, I was right the first time, this is boring.”
Micah glanced over at Clover before looking down at his tablet again. “You’re just mad because we’re not going any farther.” They’d followed the tracker via his GPS program to what looked like a relatively remote farm or homestead.
“Well yeah.” She was on her phone doing something as she muttered to herself, her nose scrunching up with each grumble.
She was beyond adorable, something he kept to himself.
He wanted more from her, but until she gave him the go-ahead, he was keeping things professional.
She needed his help and he would be there for her.
He just wished she would open up more to him, explain why helping Ilena was so important.
Other than the obvious fact that her friend simply needed help.
But there was more she wasn’t telling him.
“The vehicle hasn’t moved in twenty minutes,” he said.
“I’ll keep an eye on the tracker tonight—I’ve set up an alert in case it starts moving again—but we’re not going to trespass on private property after dark with no game plan.
We need to do recon beforehand.” And that was always easier to do in the daylight.
He’d pulled up a satellite imaging program to see what was in the surrounding area around the address the vehicle had parked at. It was mostly forest, from the relatively recently updated program. But they’d know for sure tomorrow.
“I know. I mean, I get that you’re right.
I’m just complaining…and here, look.” She held out her phone.
“The property owner of the address is a woman named Betty Anne Kendrick.” She took her phone back before he could actually look at anything.
“She’s almost ninety and…huh, she’s on social media.
Mostly she posts recipes, which is sort of adorable. Oh, and her quilting projects.”
He’d parked along the side of the two-lane highway, so he pulled out and headed back to Sanctuary Falls as she continued working on her phone. He would have found all this stuff eventually, but it was nice to be working with someone.
And not just anyone, but Clover Storm. A woman who consumed most of his waking thoughts.
Now that he knew she’d broken into frat houses to help her friends?
That she’d reported at least one house to the cops for drugs and called her actions Storm Justice?
He liked her even more—to the point it was distracting.
“I’ve got a couple drones we can use tomorrow to scout the property.”
“That sounds like a good plan. Oh, I’m staying at your place tonight,” she said all casually.
It wasn’t the first time she’d slept over at his place—in the guest room unfortunately. The last time she’d told him, not asked him, and he wasn’t sure why, but he loved it.
She was ridiculously direct and apparently that was something he was into.
“I mean if you don’t mind,” she added, looking over at him with a grin.
“I don’t mind.” If she only knew. “Do we need to stop by your place and grab clothes?”
“Ah, yeah. I should probably pick up my car from the jobsite too. Especially since I’m calling out tomorrow for work. If I leave it, my brother will never believe I’m sick.”
“I can do the drone recon without—”
“You better not be about to suggest you’ll be doing anything without me.”
“I’m just saying that the drone stuff is easy and you don’t need to miss work for it. I know how much you love your job.”
“I do, but this is more important. I just…I can’t tell you what a relief it is that she’s alive. And how weird she was,” she muttered. “I really wanted to go knock that guy out and drag her with us.”
“If she is in an abusive situation…women don’t always leave. Technically I know it’s not always women in bad situations, but—”
“It mostly is.”
“Exactly. And it can take a woman up to seven tries to finally leave their abuser.”
“Micah.” Her tone was patient.
“What?”
“I know. I appreciate your intent but I’m well aware of the statistics.” Her expression was hard to read before she glanced away.
Jesus, of course she knew. She was a woman.
“I remember my mom trying to leave my father multiple times when I was young,” she said into the quiet, taking him by complete surprise.
“I was definitely under eight. After a few times, she stopped, just started self-medicating. Looking back, I think he threatened Nick and me. Threatened to hurt us or keep us from her—or kill her. Maybe all of the above.”
“Clover, I’m so sorry.” He’d had no clue. Couldn’t imagine her going through that at such a young age.
She simply shrugged. “Can’t change it.”
“I’m still sorry.”
She was silent for a long moment. “I saw my father the other day. It was weird. Beyond weird. At the grocery store of all places. I was shopping over at the Costco in Wilmington and saw him. He looked shocked to see me. I made eye contact and held it for a long moment so he knew that I saw him, then I turned my cart right around and finished shopping.”
“Good for you.”
“He has no power over me now. I haven’t talked to him since I was eighteen. I just wish…I wish everyone knew who he is. Or what he is—a monster. And that’s not an invitation for you to post shit about him or destroy his life,” she added.
Which was a little scary that she’d basically read his mind. “I…okay, noted.” Because yeah, he’d been contemplating just that and he wouldn’t lie to her. He cleared his throat. “Maybe I could just screw up his life a little?” Or a lot and not tell her all of it.
Her mouth kicked up. “Micah.”
“Fine.” But he wasn’t making any promises.
“I didn’t realize that’s what your parents were like.
” She’d mentioned that her mom had been an alcoholic, but she hadn’t said anything about her father.
Maybe that should have been a sign in and of itself.
No wonder she wanted to get justice for women, to help people.
“It’s not necessarily a secret. Or maybe it is.
I don’t know, Nick and I don’t really talk about it but I’m not trying to hide who my father is.
He doesn’t deserve me being his PR person.
Nick told Berkley about our family of course, but…
” She shrugged. “I actually talked to Ilena about it. She had a similar situation, only her father killed her mother and ended up in jail. It’s part of the reason I’ve been so obsessed with finding her.
She felt like a kindred spirit. And I don’t tell many people about my family history. ”
He’d researched Ilena Grady and knew the raw facts about her parents, but since he hadn’t known about Clover’s history, he hadn’t made a connection. “Thank you for telling me.” He was glad she trusted him enough to. “You said part of the reason. Is there another reason you’re helping her?”
She was silent for a long moment then sighed. “Yeah, but that involves telling you something about myself that I’m not exactly embarrassed about but…Ilena and I might have done something petty together.”
“Berkley sometimes calls me Petty LaBelle,” he said dryly. “I will never judge you.”
She let out a burst of laughter. “Okay, good to know. So…I dated this guy Kurt for a while. No red flags. A few yellow ones, but nothing crazy. Then I came home from a job early. I’d been out of town for a week and he wasn’t expecting me.
I found him in our bed with one of my best friends.
To say I was shocked would be an understatement.
I swear everyone but me knew in our ‘friend’ group.
And no, I’m not friends with those assholes anymore either.
” She looked sad as she said the last part.
And he wanted to burn down the world for her. To make anyone who’d ever hurt her pay. Rational? No. He didn’t care. But he kept his expression neutral enough. “I’m really sorry.”
“It’s fine and I’m getting to the petty part of this story.” She grinned slightly. “Maybe it’s wrong but I don’t even feel bad.” She covered her face and groaned.
“I swear I won’t judge you.”
“Fine.” She looked at him now and her eyes gleamed with mischief.
“Not long after I met Ilena we ended up running into my ex and former best friend. I never had a big blow up or reaction other than shock after he cheated on me. I was too hurt. I was icy when I saw him and then told Ilena everything. She might have come up with the idea to break into their place and get a little payback.”
“Storm Justice.”
Her grin grew. “Exactly. I bought a twenty pack of those small noisemakers. This particular one sounds like crickets. He moved in with Vanessa—that’s my former best friend’s name—and I knew her security code.
She never changed it.” Now Clover winced a little.
“We snuck in when we knew they would be out and planted those things aaaaall over the house. Even unscrewed a few vents and popped them in there.”
“Oh my god, that’s genius.”
She snickered. “I heard through the grapevine that they thought they had an infestation in the walls and had hired a professional to take care of it. I only wish I could have seen both their faces when they found the devices.”
“That’s seriously diabolical.”
“I know. And I really don’t feel bad about it. They were screwing for four months before I caught them. In my bed.” She shook her head slightly. “I don’t even understand the psychology behind people like that.”
“That’s because you’re a good person.”
“Good is debatable.”
He let out a light laugh. “So you and Ilena bonded over that.”
“Yeah. I just…really like her. She’s the first real friend I made since our friend group imploded.
Or more accurately, I lost all my friends who weren’t even friends because they didn’t want me to rock the boat.
They just wanted me to accept that my boyfriend had been cheating.
Just ‘be the bigger person’ and forgive him. ”
He slowed as they reached the turnoff. “I get it now, why you want to help her. She’s your friend. A real one. And those are rare.”
“Exactly. So now you know some of my history and why this is so important to me.”
He wanted to be a friend to her, a safe place she could always come to.
“Thank you for sharing. I promise, no judging from me.” If anything, it made him like her even more. He steered into the parking lot of her current jobsite.
“I won’t be long at my place,” she said, clearly done with talking about herself. “Just need to pack up. If you’re feeling energized, I kind of want to set up a board of all those people we discovered at Cain’s place.”
“It could have nothing to do with Ilena.”
“Oh I know. But now I’m curious and want to know who they are and if he’s, like, blackmailing them. And why.”
“You sure you don’t want to get into investigative work?” he asked dryly.
She just gave him a cheeky grin before she slid out of his truck and hurried to her car.
He waited until she was safely inside, then followed her out of the parking lot. Even though he wanted to follow her home, he knew that was overkill. They weren’t in danger.
Not yet anyway. But he had a feeling that if they kept up what they were digging into, that might change in the near future.