Guardian Of The Grove (5 page)

No lies that time. She was telling the God’s honest truth about that. I took a step forward again, and a deep breath. I felt like I was back in control. “Here’s my card. If you see him or if anything comes up, let me know.”

“Ok.” She rolled her eyes again and turned back toward her project.

“I mean it, even if you hear that someone is after him, or something doesn’t feel right. We’re just trying to get the facts straightened out.”

“Instead of blaming him for the murders, you should be out looking for him. Jackson loved his family. There is no way he did this. Every second you waste trying to track him down is a second you are working on the wrong conclusion.”

Truth, every single word of it. She truly believed that there was no way it was possible for him to have done it. I was starting to agree. The only thing that bothered me still was when she lied about seeing him. If I had to put money on it, I would say they had a falling out. I’d seen more than one person take their rage out on a surrogate victim. So I wasn’t ready to throw in the towel just yet.

“Thank you for your time.”

She didn’t acknowledge me in any way, so I turned and walked out of the shop. I slipped back into the car with the rookie. Still trying to think of what move to make next.

“How did it go in there?”

“It went all right; she doesn’t think he did it.”

“They never do.”

“True. In this case, I’m inclined to believe her for now. Any news from the bomb squad?”

“They are still on the scene. For whatever reason, they can’t move or cut the power source to that box. They requested that we return to the scene. They are going to close it down as a threat.”

“I’m surprised they can’t crack it. It just gave me a tiny jolt.”

“So that was the sound I heard.”

“Yep, that was me falling on my ass.”

“So are we heading back?”

“They can wait for a few. Let’s grab something to eat. I’m dying. Your pick and it’s on me.”

“You’re the boss.”

The car pulled out into traffic. I hoped a quiet lunch would bring me some kind of clarity on what to do next. Nothing about this added up. The kid was in the wind, or he had been snatched, but why? Why kill the parents at all? They can’t pay ransom when they’re dead. Unless we got something useful back from the crime techs, this case was a dud. For that to be true, there had to be some big players involved; eighteen-year-old kids can’t clean crime scenes and disappear on their own. Whatever happened here, it was big, and I had the feeling that we would never know what it was. I felt this case growing colder by the second, and my gold shield would remain just out of reach.

* * *

T
he rookie took
me to someplace called Pat’s. It looked like a dump, but I ate two chili dogs, and that was two more than I planned to have when we pulled in. The people who worked there were friendly, and the food was cheap. I almost broke down and ordered a four pack to-go. They were doing something right; even the fries were fantastic. We finished up and headed back to the car. My phone buzzed, and I looked down to see who it was.

“Change of plans, rookie. We are heading back to the station. The lieutenant wants an in-person update.”

“Well, that sounds like fun.”

Well, at least he already knew that getting called back in on a case wasn’t a good thing. Some guys never learned that lesson. We spent the rest of the car ride in silence, which I was grateful for. I still needed time to think, and now I had to come up with something for my boss to work with. We didn’t know anything wasn’t going to fly as an answer.

* * *

W
alking toward the door
, my heart started to beat faster. Twenty-four hours into the case and we still had almost nothing. If we didn’t have a lead by seventy-two hours, then we were probably dead in the water, unless someone came forward with information. I knew I shouldn’t be nervous, but this entire case was a clusterfuck, and I really didn’t want to have to explain it to him. There was nothing like marching into your boss’s office and telling him you didn’t have a single lead.

The bomb squad had called during our trip back to the precinct. They had pulled all their men out and declared the area safe. No explosives on the scene. When I asked them about getting a look inside of the box, they told me it had been destroyed. Fat fucking chance of that, I thought. By destroyed, maybe they meant they tossed a blanket over the top of it to hide their incompetence. There was no way they were moving that thing, and they couldn’t detonate in the house.

Well, at least they had pulled back and released the scene. That meant I could go back inside the house and poke around a little bit more if I wanted to. Whatever I was going to do, I had to do it quickly. We could hold the house for a while, but eventually, we had to release back to the next of kin or whomever they had left it to.

Whatever happened, I needed to find out more about this kid before I could decide which side of the fence I was on. Not only that, but we needed to track him down. I had my doubts that an eighteen-year-old kid could just disappear with no money and no help. His debit card hadn’t been used, and he didn’t have a credit card we could track. The parents’ cards showed no signs of activity, and all of their bank accounts had been frozen. Not that it mattered. No one had tried to withdraw anything since their deaths. Unless I was missing something, this kid was either a criminal mastermind or dead.

I knocked on the glass before entering the room. “You wanted to see me, Lieutenant.”

“Shut the door and take a seat.”

Well, that was never good. If this was only going to be a quick update, the door would be open and I wouldn’t be sitting down. Just what did he have in store for me now? By the look on his face, I could tell it wasn’t good. He had a half-scowl, half-disgusted look, as if someone had taken a piss in his Cheerios.

“I just got a call from the chief of police; they want this case gone. Before you ask, I don’t mean solved. I just mean out of the spotlight and tucked away somewhere that no one keeps looking into it. I’ve never seen anything quite like it before. So tell me you have something so I can fight them on it.”

“It’s a hard one sir, and not one that we should probably fight for. That is, if the media even lets it go.”

“Tell me what you have.”

“Not much, two deceased adults, one missing teen, and not a lot of evidence.”

“You think the kid could have done it?”

“My gut is leaning toward no, but you can never tell. He had a falling out with a girl before the incident and had been pulling away from his other friends for some time. We won’t know until we get him in a room. I’m not sure that will ever happen.”

“You think he’s dead?”

“Probably. If he was home at the time of the incident, then he either has been snatched, killed, or our worst case scenario is that he did it. There is a high probability that he was home at the time of the murders. His car was in the driveway; it didn’t look like enough clothes were missing for him to have been going anywhere. Nothing in the house indicates a vacation of any kind was planned. You have kids, sir. Any chance any of them would leave without their car?”

“Not a fucking chance. Half the time they are at home, they are thinking about driving that damn thing. It’s about the only thing I can take away from them that makes them listen. That and their damn smartphones. It’s like without it they can’t breathe. If there is nothing else, Detective, this case is officially on the backburner. I’ll deal with the media from here, and if we play our cards right, there could be a promotion in it for all of us.”

“You got it, sir. As far as I am concerned, the case is closed. May I suggest at least putting a missing person’s report out on the kid? Nothing flashy like wanted for a crime, just missing.”

“Type it up and I’ll get it circulated. That will be all.”

I walked out of the office more confused than I had been when I was called in. If the department wasn’t going to look for justice for these people, then I was going to have to do it on my own, but it wasn’t worth risking my career. So until that kid was found or came in, I’d just keep a copy of the case file tucked away. It looked like I might be able to take a couple of days off after all.

W
e had a motor pool
. Who knew? I made it down to the garage shortly before seven and walked around for a few minutes. There was just about every kind of car or truck you could possibly think of. It just never occurred to me that when we could create a portal just about anywhere that we would still have cars. I mean, I guess sometimes we had to get around faster than on foot, so it made sense. Moving down a row of trucks, I came to a stop at the sight of a lifted Jeep Wrangler.

There was my mom packing her gear into it. The thing was a real beauty. The beast was black, with thirty-four-inch tires. The doors had been taken off, and a small strip of leather had been pulled over the top of the front two seats to provide a little bit of shade. She had some classic rock playing, and hefted the last bag into the backseat as I walked up. “Whoa, Mom, is this yours?”

“It might as well be as much as I have been using it.”

“Sweet ride.”

“Well, maybe we can sneak off to the trails for a day before we head back.”

“That sounds awesome.”

“Toss your bag in and let’s get out of here.”

I jumped into the passenger seat and put on my seatbelt. Propping a foot in the door jamb, I leaned back and enjoyed the view from up high. This would probably have been my dream car. I wasn’t much for flashy or fast, and one of the things I hated most were those noisy-ass mufflers people put on cars. You know, the ones that made them sound like supercharged go-karts. The worst was when you saw someone who actually had a nice car like a BMW, and then they ruined it with the go-kart explosion muffler. The one you could hear from three blocks away like they just cut their muffler off instead of adding a part to it. A Jeep just seemed to feel right. It had the power if you needed it, and it was tall enough you could see over the cars in front of you.

Sarah pulled the car around in a neat circle and headed toward the back of the garage. Two men opened the doorway, and it began to shimmer. She accelerated toward it, and we burst out of the dark into the early morning sunlight. I knew where we were right away. About an hour outside of Tucson, right around Picacho Peak. The I-10 sparkled in the early morning heat, and we were on our way home.

* * *

I
had forgotten just
how much I missed the bustling streets of my hometown. Tucson was probably the biggest city I had ever been to that didn’t have a highway system. The I-10 wrapped around the city before heading off to New Mexico. Outside of that, there were surface streets everywhere you wanted to go. Looking around, it surprised me just how much things had changed in just over nine months. Things I thought of as fixtures were gone and buildings had been replaced with new, taller, shinier versions of what had been there before.

We cruised down Broadway, picking a hotel close to the university and the center of town. From here, my mom would be able to go anywhere she needed to for her recruiting, and I wouldn’t be too far from any kind of creature comfort. We settled into our room and stowed away our extra bags.

“Think you can hang out here for a bit while I go get some work done?”

“Sure thing. They have internet and cable; I think I’ll be fine.”

“Try not to go too far; I’ll be back after I get the lay of the land and have a meeting or two.” She pulled out a wad of cash and peeled me off five or six twenty-dollar bills. “In case you get hungry.”

“Haha, how much do you think I eat?”

“Well, who knows, you haven’t been back home in a while. Maybe you’ll want to go out and walk around. It never hurts to have a little extra cash in your pocket. I don’t know, when was the last time you got to go shopping? In fact”—she pulled out the cash again and slipped me another hundred bucks or so—“I insist that you buy something fun. Think of it as one of the many birthday presents I owe you.”

“Seriously, Mom, this is too much. You don’t have to do that.”

“Nonsense. I have more cash than I know what to do with. It comes from being alive for so long, not to mention the Ascendancy pays for just about everything else. So go on, grab a shirt or something on campus, grab some lunch, and I’ll be back for dinner.”

“Awesome, I’ll see you then.”

She walked out, and I pulled out my laptop. If I was going to have the day to myself, then I wanted to get the hard stuff out of the way first. I needed to find out where my parents were buried. I also wanted to stop by our house to find out what had become of it. Did someone else live there, or was my stuff still inside? A quick news search led me to the cemetery where they were buried and gave me a rough idea on where to find their tombstones. It had been big news again when the missing son hadn’t turned up at the funeral. The title of the article had been “Where is Jackson Fairfield?” A phone call later and I was in a cab and on the way to go and see them.

We pulled into the cemetery, and the cabbie asked me if he should wait. I waved him off and walked out onto the grounds. I made sure to stay on the paths as much as possible. Walking over people’s graves didn’t seem like the best idea. Especially not after we had battled and destroyed Gaston’s army of undead. I knew well enough how the dead still had plenty of fight left in them.

There was one huge willow tree in the back corner of the cemetery. Underneath it stood two gravestones. I walked slowly toward the tree, unsure of what I would find there. Who had picked out the stones and paid for this plot? Whoever had done it had to have had some money. This kind of space wouldn’t have come cheap. Not under one of the only trees in the cemetery.

I walked between the two stones and laid a hand on each one. “I miss you guys.” I slowly stepped back so I could look at the front of their markers. Names and dates only, but on the ground between them was a separate slab. I wasn’t sure how I had missed it walking up to their markers in the first place. I bent down, brushing some of the trimmed grass from the stone so I could read it.

“As you wish,” was all he ever said to her. She was amazed to discover that when he said, “As you wish,” what he truly meant was, “I love you.”

I fell to my knees and felt the tears coming. Only one person would have picked this line out for my parents. Only Alby would have known how much they loved that movie. That sometimes the four of us watched it together. It was so good that we didn’t even mind hanging out to watch a movie with my parents. I was going to have to visit her and thank her for doing this. For taking care of my parents when I hadn’t been around to do it.

I stood up and looked at their gravestones again. A sense of shame filled me. If I had only known what I was capable of, I might have been able to save them. I wished that I could just talk to them one more time and tell them how much I loved them. Our last days together had been filled with tension and fighting. If I could take it back now, if it meant they would still be alive, I would do it in a second.

I placed my hands on the top of the stones again and whispered, “I love you guys.” I turned and walked away from the cemetery. Maybe I hadn’t said everything I needed to when I was there, but just getting the chance to say goodbye and tell them I loved them was enough for now. I needed some time to clear my head. That had almost been too much for me to handle. I probably should have waited until my mom could come with me. Somehow seeing the tombstone marker where they had been buried made it real. There had always been a part of me that still thought they were alive, that clung to the idea that even now I was in a dream, and when I woke up, everything would go back to normal. My life had taken such a turn that day that sometimes I still struggled to believe all of this was really happening.

I hadn’t known exactly where I was going. My feet just beat the path while my head was buried in the clouds. When I finally looked up, I realized that I had been walking for miles. The cemetery was a tiny spec on the horizon, and I found myself in the middle of my old stomping grounds. I walked through the neighborhood, slowly working my way back to our family home.

What would I find there? Had it been sold? Was another family living there now? I was going to have to be careful when I got closer. The last thing I wanted to do was scare the crap out of people by walking through their yard. I turned up the driveway, keeping an eye out for any signs of life. As far as I could tell, the house was deserted, but the lawn looked maintained, and the outside of the house was still clean and in good repair.

I ducked around the side of the house to get a peek into the backyard, and didn’t see any signs that a family had moved in. All our old furniture was still on the patio. I let myself in the back gate and peered in a couple of windows. I didn’t see anyone, and the house looked the same as if I had only left it yesterday.

My heart hammered, but I shoved the fear back down and moved forward toward the back door. There were no signs of movement, and a single line of police tape hung haphazardly across the door. What were the chances that the key was still under one of the pots? None of them looked as if they had been moved in a long while. What the hell, it was worth a shot. I picked up the pot we had always used, and there it was, a shiny silver beacon of hope.

The key fit into the lock, no shocker there. If the house was empty, I doubt anyone had bothered to change the locks. I closed the door behind me and moved into the home. No alarm sounded. We didn’t have one, but as I opened the door, it struck me that I might have been breaking into someone’s home. My first thought was to avoid the kitchen, but something else pulled me in that direction.

The entire area had been cleaned, but I could still see the stains where the blood had sunk into the hardwood. No point in replacing it until the property was sold, I guess. I wondered who owned this house now. It had been paid off at the time of their deaths, so at least no one was saddled with the expense of the mortgage. That meant someone was paying the property taxes for the place, though.

I moved into the kitchen and ran my hand over the counter. I touched the stool my father had been sitting on when he died. The wood floor was stained more where my mother had bled out. I hoped that their bodies had been found quickly. That they didn’t suffer any more than they had to. Walking around the stained wood, I made my way to the stairs, wondering what I would find up there.

The room was exactly how I had left it. The chest was still on the bed. I opened it up and looked inside. Nothing had been touched. I grabbed my backpack out of the closet and put a few of Dad’s journals inside. I would have time to read them later. I wished that I could take the entire box with me. There was no way I would be able to walk down the street unnoticed carrying that.

This place still felt like home, but without all the sounds and smells that made it come alive. It made me miss them even more, knowing that they would never get the chance to come back here. To enjoy what their hard work had purchased them. A place to relax, to be with family, a sanctuary, our home. There was nothing left for me here now but memories. Those memories stung just as much as they filled me with happiness. I would come back for the box when I could. I wanted to keep it. After all, it had been Dad’s. I slipped back out of the house and put the key back under the pot. I used a bit of magic to settle the dirt around it again so it looked as if it hadn’t been disturbed.

I didn’t see anyone I knew walking out of the neighborhood. For that, I was grateful. The last thing I wanted to do was have a chat with someone about where I had been and what had happened. My feet kept moving, but this time, they had a different purpose in mind. I was starving now. I tracked down our neighborhood Losbetos. A couple of California burritos with guac and a large horchata would do the trick. I’d take the food back to the hotel and turn on the tube. Maybe even rent a movie.

Then all I had to do was wait for Mom to get back. She was going to be pretty busy over the next few days, but if we got the chance to catch dinner with each other every night, that would work. I still needed to catch up with Alby and thank her for all that she had done. I wondered if she still worked at the copy shop. Maybe I could swing by there tomorrow and find out. Things were starting to come together. I was feeling a little bit of closure. I wasn’t sure it would be enough, but every tiny bit helped.