Chapter 26
Stuff happens fast after that. Caitlin calls the police while we're still sitting there in the parking lot. I call Mack.
He answers on the first ring. “Gabriella? You ok?”
I might think it was a weird response, but I never call him during the day. I'm usually too busy.
“Sort of?” I wince. “I mean, yeah I'm ok now.”
“What happened?”
I tell him the whole story. Or at least the abridged version.
“We’re on our way,” he says. “Wait for me or Dylan to get there before you start answering any questions from the Sheriff.”
I grimace, because I don't want to lie to law enforcement. in the end, My worry is unfounded. Dylan and Mack arrive before the deputies do. I don't even want to ask how fast they were driving.
Mack enfolds me in his arms and presses his lips to my hair. “You ok?
“I think so.”
I refrain from telling him the truth, that until he hugged me I wasn't quite sure. Dylan introduces me to the Sheriff, a guy named Mike, who only asks me enough questions to confirm Caitlin’s story.
Apparently she was going to meet me at our table for coffee and came out in time to see the guy throw me into the trunk.
After I answer his questions, the Sheriff shoots Dylan a meaningful look and they stop off to the side to talk. Mack hasn't stopped touching me since he got there. He keeps his arm around my shoulder, keeps checking in with me.
The entire parking lot seems packed with people. Our boss is out there talking to the deputies, there's a crime scene van lumbering up the driveway, and a bunch of the residents are staring at the outskirts. They don't get much of this type of entertainment. This kind of thing never happens here.
Finally, after what seems like hours, Dylan tells us that it’s ok for Mack to take me home.
But when we get to the house, my front door is wide open.
Mack’s jaw clenches. He reaches across and grabs his handgun from the safe in his console. “Stay here.”
He doesn't have to tell me twice. I’m suddenly so tired, so sick of all of this. I lean back in my seat. Mooch props his paws on the console and hunkers down, staring through the windshield.
Several minutes later, Mack returns, his expression grim. He opens my door. “I’m sorry, Gabs. They searched your place the same way they did Alex’s.”
I shake my head, tears already gathering in my eyes. What an epically shitty day. Still, it’s not the worst one I’ve ever had. I’m still here. As far as I know it, Alex is still alive, too.
“Do you want to see it, or do you just want to leave?” Mack asks.
“I want to see it.”
My reasoning is that my imagination is often worse than reality.
Maybe it’s not as bas as I think it is? But when we walk into the house, I realize that for once, my imagination was the kind version.
It’s a sea of destruction--it reminds me of the news footage they show after a tornado runs through a neighborhood.
“Do you think they were watching?” I ask, with a death grip on Mooch's leash.
I keep wondering what would have happened if Mooch had been home when this happened. Though he was good-natured, he was also a dog who understood where his home was, or at least where his home was for now.
The errant thought makes me sad, and I scratch at the top of his head. I don't know how to tell Mack that I want to keep the dog after this is all over. Maybe he'd be happy about it. After all, he did say that the dog was a rescue that was foisted on him.
“They might have eyes on the house.” Mack stares around the wreckage of the living room with a grim expression. His lips are no more than a furious slash, and the corners of his jaw keep ticking as he clenches it.
“I'm sorry, Gabriella,” he says, his voice low and rough. “I should have taken this more seriously. I should have installed cameras before now.”
“This isn't your fault.” My voice sounds as shell-shocked as I feel.
I've heard people describe home robberies as a violation before, and I always agreed with them on principle, but I never quite understood it. But there on the floor, beneath the shreds of the sofa that Grandma and I picked out, are the scattered pages of my family photo album.
It looks like someone stepped on the top one and slid. I hope he broke his fucking ankle, whoever he was.
Mack follows my stare and clears his throat. “I'll get a couple guys over here to start cleaning this up.”
I huff a humorless laugh. “Cleaning. There's no point in cleaning. Might as well just get a dumpster and have that be the end of it.”
Tears prick in my eyes because even though my words sound melodramatic, they aren't too far off from the truth.
I keep walking, my footsteps crunching on papers from my desk, the remains of a ceramic lamp I bought at a garage sale. Thankfully, Midnight perches atop the fireplace mantel, tail twitching--there’s plenty of room now that someone swept all the picture frames off.
I don't know what's worse--the total destruction or the fact that whoever did it seems to have had fun. Several of my bras and panties hang from the broken ceiling fan in my bedroom. The fan itself is hanging by the wiring, barely connected, but still they took the time to hang my underwear up.
I scrub at my face with one hand and I’m embarrassed to find wetness on my cheeks.
Mack grips my shoulder. “It's gonna be okay, Gabriella.”
“I know,” I mumble, “this is just stuff. As long as Alex is okay, that's all that matters.” But my voice sounds hopeless, a hollowed out shell.
Mack nods. “In the meantime, I think you had better come and stay with me. It's not safe here.”
I shake my head and huff my disgust at the suggestion, but the destruction kind of speaks for itself. Even if I wanted to stay here tonight, it would be damn uncomfortable--the bastards shredded my mattress.
All at once it crashes down on me--my missing brother, the men, being shoved in the trunk of a car. My shoulders sag and my chin dimples and wavers. Mack folds me into a hug before the first tear has a chance to fall.
"It's ok," he murmurs.
I feel the words as much as hear them--my ear is pressed to his chest, my fingers clutched into the front of his t-shirt.
"No, it's not," I warble.
I hear his smile. "You're right. But it will be ok, someday."
"How do you know that?"
"I just do."
I let myself have a pity party for a few minutes. It's cozy and safe in Mack's huge arms, and I can't remember the last time anyone else really hugged me. Alex has never liked hugs--even as a little kid, he'd whine and pull away. He had the same reaction now, only he didn't whine anymore.
Besides, Mack smells good, some combination of manly pheromones and scented deodorant. I can hear the soothing thump-thump of his heart beneath my ear. He isn't scared, not a little bit.
It's just stuff, I tell myself. It's not me. It's not Alex. Midnight's ok. Everything else can be replaced.
"Alright," I finally say, sniffing and stepping back. I'm a little embarrassed that I held on that long--his t-shirt has little wrinkles on either side where my fingers dug in.
But Mack doesn't look like he thinks my reaction was weird.
"Let's pack you a bag. I can have some guys here tomorrow to help clean up."
Neither one of us mention how truly trashed the house is.
The sliding louvered closet doors in the hall have been yanked off their tracks; Mack has to lift them out of the way so I can climb through all my stuff to get what I need.
I find Midnight's cat carrier in the hallway, but the wire door got flung across the living room.
I choose the least damaged duffel--an old canvas one with a knife slit in the side, and shove clothes in from where they've been tossed around my room.
I'm grateful to find some bras and underwear in the mess, too, though I leave the pairs that have been hung from the ceiling fan.
On those, the crotches were slit to ribbons.
I block the thought from my head, but that took time--that was a message.
I know that Mack sees it though, 'cause he goes very, very still and his jaw works so hard I think I hear his teeth grinding together.
Finally the duffel is so full that clothes are bulging out the ruined side. Mack wordlessly takes it from me, shoots one last dark look at the ceiling fan, and we head for the door.
Surprisingly, it isn't hard to get Midnight into his carrier. He's a little tuna slut at heart, and I keep an emergency stash to get him to do what he's supposed to, at least for a little while.
I find one of the cans in the mess on the kitchen floor amongst my shattered dishes. I try not to notice that the assholes ripped a bunch of the drawers off the tracks and doors from the boxes while they were searching.
A kitchen remodel was always the plan--down the road when I won the lotto. I sigh. I guess I'm replacing Goldie with a used Buick instead of the new Ford Explorer I had my heart set on.
I latch the cat carrier and load Midnight into the backseat of the truck. He's purring and smacking, oblivious to his predicament. That's going to last another two minutes; then he’ll be yowling and butting his head against the door.
Mack closes the front door behind us as I beat back another wave of tears. He starts his pickup and we head to his house.