Undeniably Yours (19 page)

Reaching over, I rubbed Scout’s head. According to Mum, he hadn’t left Ava’s side all day, including when she napped. He slept under the crib.

Ebbie kept hissing at the newcomer every time she strutted by, and Grendel kept sniffing his dog bowl as though hoping it would be miraculously filled, and Thoreau was busily investigating Scout’s basket of toys. He barked intermittently at the unfamiliar balls and bones.

Welcome to the family.

Sean hadn’t napped—he was stubborn—but at least he was lying down on the sofa, his laptop propped on his belly. A quick search yielded the information that Corey McDaniel had been released from prison on parole three weeks ago, as Jarvis’s mother had said. Had Kira known? Spoken with him? I hated not knowing how he was involved in all this. He couldn’t have possibly had anything to do with Dustin’s disappearance—he’d been in prison. Unless he’d somehow orchestrated it from behind bars…but why would he?

I sighed. Too many suppositions and not enough answers. Unfortunately it seemed as though the people with answers kept disappearing.

The state police had impounded Cat’s car. On first glance, nothing hinted at anything amiss. But her purse and phone had been found under the driver’s seat along with a wallet stuffed with cash, which didn’t make sense if she was on the run. So where was she? And why couldn’t I see out of her eyes?

Fortunately, Ross Bennett had allowed me to take one of Cat’s sweaters home, and I’d sniffed that thing a hundred times already with the same result. I saw nothing.

I picked up the Little People sheep and
baaaed
as I had it gallop into the barnyard Ava had set up. She smiled and reached for it, giving me the horse instead.

I still hadn’t had any luck getting in touch with Nya Rodriguez, but I had managed to contact Tova Dovell Fisher. We were meeting tomorrow morning. I couldn’t yet rule out that she was using the CFC scandal as a cover-up for getting rid of her husband’s new lover. It would be pretty ingenious, actually.

Scout’s head suddenly came up. A growl rose in his throat. Leaping to his feet, he dashed to the door, barking like mad. Thoreau joined in the barking, even though I was pretty sure he had no idea why he was doing it.

A second later, a sharp knock sounded.

“I got it.” Sean set his laptop on the coffee table and was at the door in two long strides. He grabbed Scout’s collar to hold him back.

I leaned back so I could see who had arrived as the door opened.

“Found him coming up the driveway. He says he’s here to see Ms. Valentine,” one of the security ninjas said loudly, motioning to the young black man who stood on my welcome mat, his eyes the size of Rhode Island as another of the guards gripped the back of his striped T-shirt to keep him from running off.

Scout and Thoreau quieted as I slowly stood up, wincing at my protesting muscles, and grabbed one of my crutches. At the door I studied the teen, who looked afraid to blink. He looked oddly familiar with his gold-flecked eyes… I took a guess. “Are you Jarvis?”

He nodded quickly, like a bobblehead. With long arms and legs and a short torso, he hadn’t quite grown into his height yet. Give him a year or two, and I bet he’d shoot to six feet from his current five foot five-ish.

“You have your mother’s eyes,” I said. To the security ninjas, I said, “He can come in.”

Jarvis slumped in relief as he was released.

My mother elbowed her way to the doorway and said to the security team, “Are you boys hungry? I’m making beef stroganoff. There’s plenty. And I have more cookies.”

They looked at each other, huddled up, and traded whispers. Finally one said, “Can we get it to go?”

“Sure thing,” Mum said. “Give me a minute to get it together.”

“Thanks. Just leave it on the porch,” he said. “We’ll come back for it.” With that, they turned and walked off.

“I’m Lucy.” I made quick introductions of everyone and motioned for Jarvis to come inside. “Have a seat.”

Tugging up loose jean shorts, he stumbled in, still not blinking. Sitting in an armchair, he glanced around, finally relaxing a bit. Sean let go of Scout, who raced over to Jarvis and sniffed.

He reached out to pet the dog. “Does he bite?”

“I don’t know,” I said, sitting on the couch. “He’s new.”

His eyes went wide again, and he pulled his hand back.

“
Baaa
!” Ava shouted, rising to her feet and rushing over to show Jarvis her sheep. “
Baaa
!”

Thoreau hopped right up next to Jarvis as my mother shoved a plate of cookies in his face. “Are you hungry, young man? Here have some cookies,” she said without waiting for an answer.

He took the plate, said, “Uh, thanks” and stared down at Thoreau and then at me.

Welcome to the nuthouse
, I wanted to say, but instead, I said. “How’d you get here?”

Thoreau sniffed his sternum as he said, “Bus.”

“How’d you know where Lucy lived?” Sean asked as he sat next to me.

“Google.” He dug in his pocket and pulled out the business card I had given his mother earlier. “You can find anything on Google.”

Apparently.

“I thought she’d live in the big place up the hill. Is this really where you live?” he asked, looking around.

“Yes,” I said defensively. “Why?”

“I read that you were rich. This here house is a shack. No offense, it’s small.”

“Told you so,” my mother sang.

Jarvis continued, “I think my house is bigger than this place. We at least got two bedrooms.”

My mother chuckled.

“I like it,” I said. “That’s why I live here.”

He shrugged and looked at me like I was all kinds of crazy. “Okay.”

Ava dropped the sheep in his lap and darted back to the farm yard to grab the toy cow. She brought that over and held her palm out to show off her treasure.

“
Moo
?” he said as though asking her a question.

“
Moo
!” she squealed, bouncing up and down. She took the cow and repossessed the sheep and went back to her spot on the floor. Scout followed her.

“Why come all the way out here and not just call?” Sean asked. “The number’s on the card.”

“Something to do?” Jarvis shrugged and bit into a cookie. Thoreau laid down next to him, resting his head on Jarvis’s leg.

“Good?” Mum asked him from the kitchen.

“Yeah,” he said, wiping crumbs.

“Need some milk?” she asked.

“Sure. Thanks.”

Jarvis was going to move in at this rate. I said, “Were you home earlier when we spoke with your mom?”

“Yeah. She hadn’t known I’d talked with that reporter. She’s mad I did.”

“Why?” I asked.

Jarvis lifted dark eyebrows. “When you live in my neighborhood, sometimes talking gets you hurt. Don’t talk, mind your own business, and people mostly leave you alone.” He stuck another cookie in his mouth.

Mostly
. I let out a breath.

“But you talked with Ms. Fitzpatrick,” Sean said. “Why?”

“The anonymous tip money. My mom lost her job as a secretary at an insurance company last month. She hasn’t found another one yet. Money’s tight.”

My mother
tsk
ed as she set a glass of milk on a coaster. “That’s terrible.”

“I can’t get a real job until I’m fourteen,” Jarvis explained. “I babysit sometimes, but it’s not a lot of cash. People can’t afford much.” He shrugged and set his empty cookie plate on the coffee table. “The money that reporter offered was too much to pass up.”

“How much did she offer?” I asked.

“Two hundred dollars. That’s a month of groceries if we stretch it out.” He sipped the milk then backhanded his upper lip to wipe away the residue. “I felt kind of bad about not telling anyone what I saw anyway.”

Grendel abandoned Scout’s food bowl and hopped up on the coffee table to sniff the cookie remnants.

“Is that a cat?” he asked, his eyes squinting as though he was seeing things.

“Yes,” I said.

“He’s huge. You feeding him cookies, too?”

“Sometimes,” I answered, not explaining about the breed.

“What did you tell the reporter?” Sean asked, trying to redirect the conversation.

Jarvis tore his gaze from Grendel and dipped his head. He looked over at us from lowered lashes. “I don’t suppose you all are offering a reward, too?”

Aha. The real reason he’d come here instead of calling.

“No,” Sean said, not playing his game.

“Sure.” Mum pulled her wallet from her purse.

“Judie,” Sean warned.

“Shush,” she said, tucking several crisp bills into Jarvis’s hand. “I was going to give it to him anyway.”

Sean slowly shook his head, but I smiled. My mother was a giver—and I loved her for it. To be honest, I’d planned to send Jarvis off with a little something, too. I had the feeling he’d come knowing he could probably play to our sympathies, but I fully believed that if you had, you should give… That and I was a complete sucker.

“Thank you,” Jarvis said, “but this is too much.” He tried to give some back.

“Nonsense,” Mum said, taking three plastic containers of food, forks, and napkins out to the porch.

“What’d you see?” Sean asked Jarvis again as he pocketed the money.

“It was January third,” Jarvis said. “I remember exactly because it was the first day back to school after Christmas break. I was up early to help my mom deliver newspapers.”

“I thought she worked at an insurance company?” Sean asked.

“The paper thing was her second job,” Jarvis said. “She had to quit it in March because our car broke and we didn’t have money to fix it.”

It was probably good my mother hadn’t heard that or he’d be taking a new car home with him, too.

After another sip of milk, he said, “We’d just gotten back from driving the route—it was about five in the morning. My bedroom looks out at the street, and I saw the blue car with that stupid ball thing on its antenna pull in. I recognized it because I’d seen it before. I thought it was strange because it was early for a visit, but I thought it might be some kind of surprise visit. Lady got out of the car and knocked on the door to the apartment. She went inside, and I got ready for school.”

“But?” I asked, because I felt there was something he still hadn’t said.

“I happened to see her when she came out again.” He wiped his palms on his shorts. “She wasn’t alone.”

“What do you mean?” Sean asked. “Who was with her?”

Jarvis looked up, his eyes filled with uneasiness. “She had the kid with her.”

“O
kay, you mosey on up to the nurses’ station and distract them with your charm,” I instructed Sean as we stood in the hospital’s stairwell. We were mere steps away from Aiden’s room. Only a thick door, a short hallway, and six nurses who buzzed busily around a horseshoe-shaped desk stood in our way.

Catching his reflection in the door’s glass, he said, “I should have left the hat at home.”

“Just smile a lot. Your dimples trump the hat. Now stop teasing and go.”

He turned to face me. “You sure you can carry her and crutch at the same time?”

“I have excellent crutching skills,” I assured as I kept Ava pressed close to my chest. I used a cocked hip to keep her in place. It helped that I had only brought one crutch—and that Ava wasn’t all that heavy. “Now go on.” I shooed him.

“Bossy,” he whispered with a smile and strode off.

“Sean, wait!”

He slowly turned.

I crutched over and kissed him soundly. “Thanks for coming with me.” He hated hospitals. Utterly despised them.

“For you, Ms. Valentine, anything.” In a flash he was out of sight, leaving me grinning like a love-struck fool at my reflection as I propped open the door with my foot. “He’s a keeper,” I whispered to Ava.

She blinked at me.

I took that as an agreement.

A second later, I heard him asking something about visiting hours. As quietly as I could, I zipped through the open door of Aiden’s room, nearly running smack dab into the back of a nurse who was checking his blood pressure. In my quest to not knock her over, I skidded to a comedic stop and dropped my crutch, raising a clatter so loud it could rival Santa’s Christmas Eve rooftop landing.

In hindsight, during the planning stages of sneaking Ava in unseen, I should have first ensured the room was empty of hospital personnel.

Damn that hindsight.

The nurse spun around at the commotion, looking ready to do battle.

“I, uh—Hi,” I said. “Sorry. Didn’t see you there. Dropped, uh, my crutch.”

“Obviously.” She eyed Ava.

Ava’s curious gaze zeroed in on one of the machines that beeped intermittently before she shifted her head and spotted her father. Her hands opened and closed as she offered her version of a wave. “Hihihi!”

With a wide smile, Aiden looked…good. Sitting up in bed, he didn’t look to be in much pain. It took only a second to see why as the nurse moved aside. Orlinda Batista sat in her wheelchair on the other side of Aiden’s bed.

She grinned. “Fancy meeting you here.”

Although they looked completely opposite, Orlinda reminded me a bit of my mother. Same down-to-earth, nature-loving way about them. Her brown hair curled in soft waves around her face, and her intelligent blue eyes sized me up.

I said, “You’re the best. Truly. Look at him. No one would ever guess he was almost blown up yesterday.”

“I know.” She winked and smiled, her full cheeks plumping.

Smiling, I asked, “Where’s Em?” I’d expected to see her glued to Aiden’s side.

“She’s at school, taking an exam for her night class,” Aiden said.

“You talked her into going?” I asked. “How?”

“It was pretty easy once Orlinda showed up and fixed me up. She promised to stay with me, and told Em she’d be less stressed if she just went and got it over with. She’ll be back soon.”

I was glad she went. Em was Type A, and missing class had to be hard enough on her without missing an exam. I also knew she had been skeptical of Orlinda—her science mind has trouble wrapping her head around the paranormal—and I wondered if this visit had changed her opinion.

Sean came strolling through the door, his hat in his hand. He spotted my crutch on the floor, bent to retrieve it, and said, “You sure know how to make an entrance.”