Cross the Line, page 7
“Sometime while I was staying with Marx.”
The man thrust the shovel into the soil of the flower bed again, his attention fixed on us. Judging by how deep he was digging, he was either planting a bush or burying a body. Or planting a bush over a body.
“I think we should get you inside,” Jordan suggested.
Riley’s tail thumped the interior wall, and he whined with impatient excitement as I unlocked the dead bolts. Hand on the knob, I turned back to Jordan. “I’ll see you after my appointment tomorrow.”
“Sounds good.”
I retreated into my small but cozy apartment and relocked the door. My knapsack slid to the floor, and I sagged against the counter. My energy reserves were depleted, but before I could climb into bed, I needed to record my notes for the evening and take a shower.
After documenting the information I gathered tonight, I hopped in the shower. I scrubbed away the sorrow and hopelessness of Brushwick Avenue that clung to me as heavily as Cindy’s cigarette smoke, and then I crawled beneath the blankets with my journal.
Cracking it open, I pressed my purple pen to the blank page, the ink stain growing as I searched my heart for gratitude. Most days, gratitude came easily, but on nights like tonight, after what I’d seen on Brushwick, I had to peel back layers of heartache and disappointment to find it.
Dear Jesus,
Thank you for always being there for me when I was desperate and scared, for always making a way and offering me hope so my desperation didn’t drive me to a path similar to Tandi’s.
Remembering Sam’s unexpected comment on the steps, I added,
And thank you for bringing genuine and beautiful friendships into my life. They make everything better.
10
Sunrise brightened the horizon as Riley and I jogged our usual route through the still-slumbering city, past dark shop windows and across empty streets.
Anxiety from last night’s haunting dream seeped from my pores and beaded my skin as I pushed myself, determined to sweat out every drop.
Most of the dream’s details faded after I woke up, but I remembered enough. A shadowy figure had lunged out of the line of cars on Brushwick and chased me into an abandoned warehouse with a stone block room, and that was where the unpleasant dream twisted into a familiar night terror.
No matter how they began, my nightmares always took me back to that room.
My screams had roused Riley, and he licked at my face, startling me awake a second before the metal door could slam shut and trap me in that torturous prison.
Another early riser pounded the pavement in our direction, the pulse of loud music seeping from the large headphones beneath his hood. Riley let out a warning growl, and I wound his leash around my hand a few more times to reel him in as we stepped into the grass to give the man the right-of-way.
To my dismay the jogger plodded to a stop beside us rather than taking advantage of the open walkway, and I drew Riley even closer to my side.
The man flipped back his hood and slid the headphones from his ears, breath puffing from his mouth. “Holly, hey. It’s been a while.”
His face was familiar, but his name escaped me. It started with . . . a consonant. Yep, that narrowed it down. “Hi,” I said, not bothering to hide my uncertainty.
“Luke,” he offered.
The memories came trickling back—the jogger who used to try to catch up with me, the man who sent a muffin to my table at the café Jace and I used to frequent, the paramedic who tended to me at my apartment.
“Sorry, I’m bad with names.”
He flashed a blindingly white smile. That I remembered. He could be a poster boy for whitening toothpaste.
“It’s okay. The last time we saw each other, you had a severe concussion, and I think you were seeing two of me.”
He had witnessed the unfortunate aftereffects of the roofie Edward slipped into my fruit punch. I didn’t remember everything, but what I did remember made me want to shrink between the sidewalk slabs in embarrassment. “That wasn’t my best day.”
“I tried to come check on you after I dropped you at the hospital, but your detective friend kicked me to the curb.”
That sounded like something Marx would do. “He’s protective.”
“And who’s this handsome fellow?” Luke crouched and stretched a hand toward Riley.
“Um, I wouldn’t do that. He’s protective too.” I doubted Riley would bite him without provocation, but I didn’t want to take the chance.
Luke dropped his hand and stood. “Thanks for the warning.” He scratched at the skin around his fitness band. “There’s something that’s been on my mind since I saw you on the news a few months back.”
My fingers tightened apprehensively around Riley’s leash. “Oh?”
“That day in your apartment, when I was buckling you to the gurney, you said something I haven’t been able to forget. You said, ‘Nobody ever comes when Collin hurts me.’ That guy who kidnapped you a year ago, is that the one you were talking about?”
I looked down at my sneakers, focusing on the unevenly tied laces, as I nodded.
“I’m glad he’s finally where he belongs, but I’m sorry it wasn’t soon enough,” Luke said. “You didn’t deserve to go through any of that.”
No one deserved to go through that. It wasn’t an experience I would wish on the worst human beings I knew.
“Don’t take this as me flirting, because that’s not my intention, but you’re an incredible woman, Holly. And I don’t just mean the fact that you seem to have more lives than a cat. Not many women find the courage to stand up and confront the men who hurt them, and the day you walked into the courtroom despite what happened on the front steps . . . I think you became a hero to a lot of women.”
I fidgeted at the praise. I didn’t think of myself as a hero, and I certainly didn’t feel like one. Paramedics like him were more deserving of that title.
“I’ll let you get back to your run,” he said. “And if you ever decide you’re craving a muffin, catch up with me and let me know.”
“Before you go, can I ask you something about your work?”
He paused with his fingers on his headphones. “Sure.”
“On any of your ambulance runs the past couple of days, have you picked up a teenage girl? Pretty, with a mixture of black and Asian features.”
“No, why?”
“She’s missing. My friend Jordan and I are trying to find her.”
Concern pulled at the corners of his mouth. “I’ll ask around. If I find out something, or even if I find out nothing, I’ll let you know. I suggest checking the hospitals too, in case someone drove her there in a personal vehicle.”
“Thanks.” I rubbed Riley’s head as Luke flipped up his hood and jogged away. That had been a surprisingly normal and pleasant interaction with a man I barely knew.
Maybe my therapist was right, and I was making more progress than I realized. Her advice to do something I had been longing to do drifted through my mind, and I checked the time on my phone. After this exhausting run, I knew exactly what I wanted to do.
. . . .
I sprawled in the grass outside my apartment, coolness against my back while the intermittent sunlight warmed my face and set my eyelids aglow.
I stretched my arms further out at my sides and released a contented sigh. I hadn’t lain outside like this since I was a little girl. Collin had awakened my awareness of the evils in the world, and relaxing out in the open with my eyes closed and music in my ears would’ve left me too vulnerable to attack.
But my monster was trapped behind bars now, and I didn’t have to spend every moment on guard, wondering when I would have to run for my life.
I could sink into the moment with every fiber of my being—the crisp morning air, the sweet scent of flowers, the breeze stirring the baby hairs that curled wildly beside my ears. I dug my fingers into the cool bed of grass, a smile on my lips. Was this what freedom felt like?
Dear Jesus, today I’m grateful just to be able to lie in the grass.
Soon, spring would melt seamlessly into summer, and then I could lie in the warm grass and get a tan. Okay, maybe that was an unrealistic hope, considering fifteen minutes in the sun turned my skin from porcelain to fried tomato.
Coldness stretched across my body, and my eyelids snapped open. A silhouetted figure blocked the sun. I yanked the earbuds from my ears, but before I could draw my legs up and scramble away from the potential threat, a familiar Southern voice quieted my fear.
“It’s only me, sweet pea.”
I dropped my head back to the ground with a shaky exhale and pressed the earbuds to my chest, the worship song vibrating through my rib cage. “Hi.”
Marx crouched beside my head, his features sharpening with his nearness—salt and pepper hair, eyes the color of the grass between my fingers. “Did you fall over?”
“No, I didn’t fall over.” I wasn’t that uncoordinated. Usually. “I’m relaxing.”
“In the damp grass?”
“I’m sweaty from my run, so I didn’t even notice.” Or care, to be honest. This moment was . . . wonderful.
Marx studied my face. Could he see the shadows under my eyes from too little sleep or intuit the nightmares that pushed me out of bed before dawn?
As the lines around his eyes deepened with concern, I decided to shift the subject away from the question no doubt forming in his mind. “Why are you dressed for work on a Saturday?”
He was wearing a suit jacket and jeans rather than the plain T-shirts he typically wore on the weekends. As a detective, he was supposed to wear dress slacks, but Marx wasn’t one to conform without a fight.
“I have a few interviews to conduct today. I had to work around their busy schedules, which are apparently more important than mine.”
“And what brings you by before work?” I asked, feigning innocence even as mischievous anticipation bubbled up.
“A funny thing happened last night. It seems the marshmallow bandit struck again. Left a callin’ card on my nightstand.” He reached into his jacket pocket and then held up a mini marshmallow between his thumb and forefinger.
I pulled my lips between my teeth to hide a smile. “What did he steal?”
“She uncurled my toothpaste container and squished the contents around the tube. I had to squeeze it all back up to the top and reroll it.”
“How obnoxious.”
A smile twitched across his lips, letting me know he found that unpleasant surprise amusing rather than irritating. “But it didn’t stop there.” He stretched out in the damp grass, his head next to mine with his legs in the opposite direction. “I opened my kitchen drawer to grab a butter knife for my jelly toast, like I do every mornin’, and imagine my surprise when I found the silverware organizer missin’. There were butter knives fraternizin’ with the steak knives, spoons bumpin’ elbows with the forks.”
I tried not to laugh at the scene he painted, but it bubbled out of me. I covered my mouth to keep from disrupting the quiet morning.
“It was complete anarchy.” Marx gave me a pointed look. “Where is it?”
My hand slid from my mouth to my chest. “What makes you think I took it?”
He placed the mini marshmallow on the tip of my nose. “Evidence.”
I grabbed the marshmallow and popped it into my mouth with a grin. “What evidence? You can’t prove a thing.”
“I could ask Mrs. Neberkins.”
“She didn’t even see me.”
He chuckled. “And you just placed yourself at the scene of the robbery.”
Oh. Oops.
“Don’t ever commit a crime. You’ll be found out in two sentences,” he said. “And there are no miniature marshmallows for snacks in prison.”
“That’s cruel and unusual punishment.”
He smiled. “A good deterrent for your criminal impulses. Now, where’s my silverware organizer?”
“Under your bed.”
“Mmm. Right where it belongs.” The breeze blew a strand of my hair into his face, and he peeled it away. “You know, if you wanted to see me, you could’ve called.”
“Where’s the fun in that? Besides, you’re moving in with Shannon in a few weeks, and I don’t have a key, so I’ve gotta get all my fun out of the way now.”
“What makes you think you’re not gonna have a key? It doesn’t make sense for you not to have a key when you have a bedroom.”
“I have a bedroom in the house?”
“Of course.” He pulled something from his pants pocket, and light glinted off the metal key. “All of your things from my apartment will go into your room at the house. That way if you ever feel lonely or you’re havin’ a rough night, you can come over.”
I bit my bottom lip as emotion swelled. Sometimes it was hard to wrap my mind around how much he seemed to love me. I hesitantly took the key. “Are you sure Shannon’s okay with this?”
“She suggested it before I could.”
“Why? She doesn’t owe me anything, and we’re not exactly close.” We’d barely spoken to each other since the trial concluded in January.
“There’s somethin’ you need to understand about Shannon. She grew up in a dysfunctional household. There wasn’t a lot of love, and she doesn’t attach to people very easily. Apart from her friend in law school, you and I are the only ones who’ve managed to breach the walls she still hides behind. But I know for a fact she adores you.”
I folded my fingers over the key. “Really?”
“Mmm hmm. She’s not very demonstrative, most likely because nobody ever showed her how to be, but she cares very deeply for you.”
I crinkled my nose in confusion. “She’s not what?”
“Demonstrative. It means openly affectionate.”
I narrowed my eyes in skepticism. “I think you made that word up.”
“If you don’t believe me, look it up in your dictionary. D-e-m.” He pushed up onto his elbows. “I gotta get to work. They don’t pay me to lie around in the grass and watch the clouds roll by. What are your plans this mornin’?”
“I have a meeting with my photography clients around eight fifteen at Jumping Bean Café. Hopefully, they’ll buy the pictures.” I needed them to buy the flash drive of pictures.
“I have no doubt they will.” Marx pressed a kiss to my forehead. “Love you, peanut.”
“Love you too. Thanks for coming to visit.”
“Don’t stay out too long. Rain’s comin’.”
Gray stretched across the sky in the distance, sweeping closer with every second. Spring was in full swing.
I turned the unfamiliar key over between my fingers after Marx’s car pulled away from the curb, still uncertain about how pleased Shannon would be with me having it. I wouldn’t be surprised if she made a copy for me simply to appease the man she loved.
Pushing to my feet, I dusted grass clippings from my clothes and went inside to fetch the fat dictionary from my bookshelf. I flipped through the pages.
“D-e-m.” I slid my finger down the alphabetical list, searching for Marx’s make-believe word. “D-e . . .” My finger stilled. “Openly showing feelings, particularly affectionate. Huh.”
It was a word.
I closed the dictionary and returned it to the shelf. I needed to clean up before my meeting and put on something more professional than my shenanigans sweatshirt.
I showered and changed, then grabbed my knapsack with sample photos, my laptop, and my driving book, and slung it over my shoulder. I kissed Riley on the head.
“I’ll be back for you later.”
I scratched Sausage between his ears, and he slanted a glare my way, still bitter that I had brought home another furry housemate. My cat held on to a grudge tighter than Scrooge held on to shiny coins.
“There’s gotta be forgiveness stored away in those squishy layers somewhere. Maybe under the chin?” I rubbed his favorite spot. His head lifted to allow better access, and a purr rumbled through his chest.
Ah, the sound of momentary forgiveness.
It was a start. I poked his adorable pink nose and then hurried out the door.
. . . .
Ordinarily, I walked to the café, but I couldn’t tote my laptop and book that distance in the drizzle that had broken out.
I lifted my eyes from the driver’s manual in my lap as the bus doors hissed open at another stop, and passengers flowed both ways.
A man dropped into the vacant seat by the doors. He was around my age, with brown eyes and an oddly round face for someone as trim as he appeared to be.
He smiled at me with obvious interest, and I jerked my attention back to my studies. I failed my driver’s test last week, but really, how was I supposed to know I was driving the wrong way down a one-way street? And who wouldn’t shriek and swerve all over the road to avoid the truck coming straight at them?
I scared ten years off my instructor, and her voice was a shrill squeak when she demanded, “Didn’t you see the sign?!”
There were so many signs in New York City. Who could pay attention to them all? That explanation got me booted from the driver’s seat. A bit of an overreaction, in my opinion, but she wasn’t open to negotiation.
I doubted reviewing the book content again would help matters. I closed it with a sigh.
Buying a car wasn’t in my budget, but getting my license wasn’t really about the independence of driving myself. It was about achieving a milestone my foster brother had stolen from me, like graduating from high school or going to prom.
I was going to get my license, and then I was going to get my GED. The bus rocked under the weight of more boarding passengers, and I caught the round-faced man watching me.
“I couldn’t help but notice your book on driving,” he said, as if my passing glance was the invitation he’d been waiting for. “Not a fan of public transportation?”
I shrugged. “It’s fine.” Until someone decided to make things awkward by breaking the unwritten rule of keep-to-yourself.
