Steele Resolve (The Detective Jasmine Steele Series Book 1) (3 page)

“You look like you could use a friend.” I look up and see Frankie leaning on the door frame of my office. “Victor called me, said you sounded frantic. I said it was normal, but he said it was frantic in an abnormal way. So, here I am.”

“Shouldn’t you be at work?”

“I have an open schedule today. You want me to leave?”

I smile weakly at her and shake my head. She closes the door behind her before taking a seat across from me. “You want to tell me what’s going on?”

“I got a phone call.”

“From?”

“I don’t know.”

“Okay.”

I see the confusion on her face. This is hard for me to say so I get up and begin pacing around my office.

“I got some call from someone I didn’t know and basically they informed me Chase is in danger.”

Every now and again I look her way and she just keeps watching me as if every word is very important.

“The person on the phone said that?”

I stand up, trying to figure out my thoughts with my footsteps. I wave my arms around trying to emphasize how serious I think this situation is.

“Something about not being untouchable, it doesn’t really matter. I’ve got to pull him from school.” Confident I’m making the correct decision; I stop pacing and grab my office phone. I feel Frankie rest her hand on mine, preventing me from picking up the receiver.

“You need to slow down.”

“Frankie, you’re the shrink, you know how criminals act.”

“Yes, I do. However, taking him out of school before we know anything only has negative consequences.”

“Yes, saving his life is negative.” Okay, that came out harsher than it sounded in my head. Her face falls and her gaze becomes harder than before. Slowly, she pulls her hand away as she slides back fully into her chair. Her face tightens, her stance more rigid, she’s closing off from the personal and making it all business. I doubt an apology would help.

“I’m sorry. I’m just out of my element here,” but the excuse is out of my mouth before I can stop it.

“Don’t worry. I got used to your temper,” she says calmly. Her voice never wavers and it’s causing my blood pressure to rise.

“I don’t have a temper,” I quickly shoot back at her at a volume above any normal human register. This is where our relationship is now, two opposing views unable to compromise. She’s not giving me one damn inch to say I’m sorry before she pushes the next button.

“Case in point,” she stands and almost robotically heads for my office door.

“Frankie, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you, but this has me a little more on edge than normal.” Frankie stops in front of the door. Her back remains facing me, so I don’t know if she’s listening, but I continue, “What are the negatives?”

“He’s still trying to understand his parent’s death. If you add this to his already full plate, it might break him mentally and emotionally.” She turns around and slowly, systematically, walks back to the chair and sits back down. I see her eyes look up at me and the glimmers of her opening up again shine through.

“I can help him through it.”

“You can barely take care of yourself. Besides that the court might not take a liking to you placing him in harm’s way.”

“This affects me how?”

“You’re his legal guardian, not his biological parent. If the court ever feels like you can’t take care of him, they could take him away.”

“Like the foster care system is better? Even on my worst day I’m a better parent than any of those people out there!” I hear my tone changing as my volume once again rises. The emotion spilling out, tears trickling out of my eyes and my raw fear on display for all to see. Before I could wipe the tears away, Frankie’s in front of me, grabbing both my hands in hers.

The sudden contact causes me to stop breathing. She tries to meet my gaze but I look away. As long as I’ve known her, I couldn’t meet her eyes when I was afraid. My family taught me to be strong, be fierce. I wasn’t made for this. I don’t know how to look at someone so brilliant and show her how weak I truly am.

“Look at me, Jasmine Marie.”

My mother always called my middle name when I was in trouble. After many years, hearing my middle name always brings my eyes to attention. Frankie lets go of my one hand and brushes some stray hair out of my face.

“It’ll be okay. You’ve been here before. What do you normally do when a witness is threatened?”

“I get them into a protection program as soon as possible.”

“You know that doesn’t work for every case. What would you do for the lower profile ones?”

“Notify the department of a possible threat and tail the witness all the time.”

“Okay. So, notify the department of the phone call. You don’t need a tail since he has you.”

“But I can’t be around him all the time.”

“Then make sure the school security knows and keeps an eye on him. If you’re running late, Victor, Hadley or I will pick him up so he’s not alone. Nothing will happen to him. Trust yourself to handle this the right way. Don’t fly off the handle like a new parent.”

Parent? Did she just call me a new parent? How do I respond to that? My grandmother told me I have the heart of a lion and I’d be an amazing mother.

“I’m not a new parent. I’ve been around Chase since he was born. Hell, he peed on me when I changed his diaper for the first time.” She watches me shrug off the comment and change the tone of the conversation.

“But you never had to make decisions that affected him the way these do. Deciding what fast food joint to go to doesn’t cut it.” She brings it right back to her point at hand, this is the first time my decisions truly affect a minor.

I let what she’s saying soak in, but my eyes wander down to her hands on mine. It still feels so natural for them to be there. Every moment of every day I wonder how I can make it work. Women have done it for centuries, having the family, the job and the spouse. Why can’t I just accept help and reach out to her? As if a higher power had something else in mind for me, there is a knock at my office door. I look up to Frankie’s eyes, seeing the hesitation there. She tries to pull her hands away, but I stop her.

I watch her, looking for any sign I should let go. Her face remains the same, calm. Gently, I pull our merged hands up and place them over my heart. Seeing tears form in her eyes lets me know my silent message has gotten across. The knocking at the door moves my attention for one second, but it’s enough to allow Frankie to move. She backs away from me and opens the door revealing Officer Garrison and Captain Tyler Udall.

“I’ve got an appointment so I’ll catch you later, Jasmine.” She leaves the room so fast I can only wave and hope she saw it. Damn when that woman wants to flee, she can flee in record time. Trust me I know from this experience and her moving out.

“Officer Garrison, Captain Udall, how may I help you both?” Garrison walks in with Captain Udall right behind him with a file in one hand. “I found something on your phone. I know you requested it be under wraps, but it would go against protocol,” Garrison states simply. While I want to smack him in the face, if I expect him to follow protocol it has to be with everything not just his hat.

I motion for them to sit down. I try to calm my breathing as I walk behind my desk. I need to know what he found out, but I don’t want to know at the same time. I seriously wonder if I was ever on the right line when being processed up there. Garrison places my cell phone on the desk. I see his smudges over it. I pick it up and nervously rub the phone in my shirt. Not just removing the smudges but avoiding hearing about the inevitable. Someone knows me and for whatever reason threatened me and my nephew.

“And?”

“The caller wanted you to find where the call originated from. There was no attempt to cover the location at all. In fact, we pinpointed it to an old warehouse in Harlem. It’s an office building now, but they still have a large fallout shelter in the basement.”

“What does this have to do with me?” Captain Udall hands me the file. I wait for him to speak before I open it. I think I’ve already pissed him off with my request for secrecy. I don’t need to make it worse.

“I figured since you were covering up using the city’s man-hours for your personal matters, I thought it was wise to check out the location before speaking to you. Unit was around the block on lunch, they found him lying in the fallout shelter. According to the coroner, liver temp says he’s been dead for about twenty-four hours.”

“In other words, he killed the individual in advance, dumped the body and waited for the perfect time to contact you.”

“That appears obvious, Office Garrison. Did you figure that out all by yourself?”

“Excuse me?” he nervously says. I know I’ve hit a nerve, but I shouldn’t have. He was doing me a favor, but when someone threatens my family everyone needs to be on notice. I will lash out, I have lashed out and I will continue to lash out. The only difference between those times and now – I have no reason, need, nor desire to apologize.

“Officer Garrison, would you give us a minute please,” the captain says. Garrison stands and pushes his shoulders back. He’s trying to look dominant, but he just looks like a kid trying to play with the big boys. Before he leaves, he turns and gives me a sly smile which lets me know everything. I watch with increased anxiety as Garrison closes the door. I don’t know much about technology, so I have no clue how he managed to get my conversation off the phone. I just know the Captain has heard it. If he hadn’t, he wouldn’t want alone time with me. I feel like I am in a very large pile of shit right now and I don’t own a shovel.

“You should have come to me, Jasmine,” he says sincerely worried.

“I was going to once I had more information. Garrison was out of line talking to you first,” I nonchalantly reply to him. I’m trying to cover my ass and protect what’s mine.

“In your opinion he was, but he has your best interests at heart.”

“Or his sights on a detective’s badge,” which isn’t far from the truth.

“Either way, you should have come to me before speaking to anyone. I’m ordering Chase to have a shadow until we know more.” This is not making me happy. He’s laying down the law, but I’ve never been one to stand idly by and let someone dictate anything to me. I call it a flaw, Frankie refers to it as my fight or flight instinct.

“Tyler, Frankie and I discussed it and I don’t want him knowing anything,” I lean back in my chair, cross my legs and look as calm as a cucumber.

“I’m not surprised you spoke to her before me, but rest assured the shadow will be just that,” he soothes. He used to use that tone when I was a rookie. My sister-in-law was best friends with his daughter so he’s been there for me through thick and thin. He knows when to stop me and his soothing voice always manages to do that. I also know it means there could be some negotiation.

“Okay, but I want to look over the crime scene, see if he left anything for me to find.”

“This might not be connected to the other two, Jazz. It doesn’t fit the profile.”

“If the signatures the same, it’s connected.”

“Figure out the signature first. Then we’ll see. This could be a random freak you put away years ago that is coming back now. We’ve all got one, two or fifty of those,” Tyler stands up, opens the door to my office and walks into the cacophony of noise from the day shift.

“Like you said, we’ll see,” I mumble to no one.

Picking up my coffee cup, I see it’s empty. We might be lowly law enforcement but our precinct has the best coffee in all of Manhattan thanks to the captain’s heroics. I get up and head to the coffee machine. I can feel eyes focusing on me as I move through the main areas. Word must have travelled faster than a bad clip on YouTube. Slowly filling up my mug, I can hear the whispers; feel the shame creeping up from my chest to my face. Now they all know I’m weaker than they all thought. Now they see my vulnerabilities. The world is closing in and I need air, now. Picking up the pace, I break free from the double doors and inhale deeply. My coffee a forgotten treat.

I look up into the sky and see the sun has moved a lot. When the hell did that happen? I look at my watch and see time has slipped from me once again, just not as bad. I have too much work to do and scheduling for me is an issue. Unlocking my rubbed clean phone, I dial Frankie.

“Hey.” Simple yet effective opening I guess. I can hear the concern in her voice.

“I know I don’t have a right to ask, but can you do me a favor?”

“Name it.”

“Pick up Chase from school and stay with him. Turns out the call originated from a murder scene. I need to figure out as much as I can today. I might be late.”

“I’ll bring something to sleep in.”

“I might not be that late.”

“Jasmine, when your mind is focused on something it means you’ll be very late.”

I know it does. Hell, I don’t know if I will even be back before the morning. It might be Friday and most people don’t have to work late, but for me it never ends. I want to shut off the analytical side of my brain and forget about all of the open cases, but I can’t. I try to give closure to others because I can’t give it to my nephew. That is my driving force now and it’s usually at the expense of said nephew.