Deep Fried Trouble (Eugeena Patterson Mysteries) (12 page)

I’ve done some crazy things in my life. Banging on Amos Jones’ door and inviting myself into a man’s house? That was a first for me.

Amos opened the door, still dressed in his suit pants, with a white tank t-shirt. He’d manage to stay rather fit except for some thic
kness around the waist. Not bad looking for an older guy. “Eugeena.”

“Hey, I need your help. Well, aren’t you g
oing to invite me in?”

Amos shook his head. “Come on in woman.”

Standing inside his foyer, I noticed Amos’ walls still had a woman’s touch to them. He probably hadn’t changed anything from the way his wife had decorated.

“Now what’s this about, Eugeena?”
             

“I need to find Chris.”

Amos squinted at the paper. “Chris?”

“Tyric’s daddy. I believe he has something to do with Leesa disa
ppearing.”

“Well, we should leave this to the police.”

“I
want
to find him.”

“That’s
not
a good idea.”

             
“I have his son.”

“I understand you want to do something, but you are talking a little bit crazy. We told Detective Wilkes everything. The law can locate the man faster than we can.”

I huffed. “Aren’t you the law?”

“I’m retired
, woman.”

“
So? You’ve managed to stick your nose into the investigation of Mary’s death.”

“Wait a minute now. She’s a neighbor. I couldn’t just sit around and not do anything.”

“Exactly.  Which is why you can’t expect me sit by and do nothing while my daughter is missing.”

Amos shook his head. “What’s your plan, wo
man?”

“We need to get back to Leesa’s apartment and get in this time. I know my daughter, she probably left some clue that no one else would unde
rstand but me.”

“I will go with you. We will look around.  But if we find something, we tell the police, unde
rstand?”

I smiled. “Gotcha.”

He pulled his shirt from the back of the chair. “I can’t believe I’m doing this. I would never let a civilian get me to do something like this. Let’s try not to get into any trouble.”

Did he say not get into any trouble? Looks like I was in knee-deep and would dive in even further to find my daughter. I knew she was alive.

By the time we arrived in Columbia, the sun had gone down and the moon sat full in the sky.  As we rode, I can’t say my nerves i
mproved any, but I had more appreciation for Amos than I did earlier.

“You still miss her.”

“Everyday.”  His voice was hoarse.

“I miss Ralph. Kind of funny, it seemed like we didn’t or at least he didn’t like me much som
etimes. After the first heart attack, he softened up a bit.” I laughed. “Actually a lot.”

Amos peered at me in the darkness, with one hand on the steering wheel. “I’ve had death at my door a few times. It makes you think about what really ma
tters.”

“You right about that.”

“Eugeena, why do you think the police are trying to place Leesa at Mary’s house? Would she have had a reason to be there?”

“Maybe. I found this letter Mary had written her a few weeks ago. Mary finally decided to clean out her daughter’s things and she found the stolen ring.”

“Ring?”

“Oh you don’t know the story, do you?”

“Nope.”

“At one time Mary and I, our families were tight. Our daughters hung out together, really best friends. Mary and I worked at Sugar Creek Middle School. Ralph and her husband Clarence often fished toget
her.”

“What happened? I rarely saw you two talk.”

“I know. To this day I don’t know what happened. I know Mary came over one day like usual and said Leesa took a family heirloom that was really special to her.”

“The ring?”

“You guessed it.” I rubbed my forehead. The event still felt silly to me. “Anyway, I am known to lose my temper sometimes.”

“Really, I hadn’t noticed.”

I laughed at Amos’ attempt to be sarcastic. I could see his white teeth. He was a beautiful man.

“To make a long story short, I blew up, she got mad, she told some people about what ha
ppened, I talked to some people, our daughters got mad with each other, we didn’t talk for months and then...”

Amos prodded me. “Then what?”

“The accident. Jennifer had been attending a camp for honor students at Duke University and her father was bringing her home. They were hit by a drunk driver. Jimmy died instantly and Jennifer hung on for a few weeks.”

“My God.”

“Leesa really was affected by her best friend’s death. She became a handful. There were so many times I wanted to go by and talk to Mary. Life just took over.”

Soon we’d pulled up in front of the apartment. There were no lights in the windows.

“Well, we’re here.” Amos opened his door. “Let’s see if the woman you talked to saw anything else.”

The television blared from the door, but I reached over and pressed the doorbell. I hoped Mrs. Hattie’s hearing was still good. I had a fee
ling with the voices from the television talking to us outside the woman might not come to the door.

“Who’s there?”

I was wrong. This woman must be like another Louise. Always alert and being nosy. “Mrs. Hattie, it’s Leesa’s mother.”

Locks clinked and clanked on the inside of the door. Finally, Hattie peeked between the crack in the door.  She opened the door wider. “Oh, you’re back.”  I saw her take in Amos on my side. “Brought your husband this time.”

If I could turn red I would’ve. “No, this is a ...” Well, what was Amos? It felt silly calling him a neighbor. “... a family friend.” My family barely knew Amos, but that was his title for now.

“Oh, well you know I thought I heard someone up there a few hours ago.”

“You did?” Leesa could be up there right now.

“Yeah, I even banged on the ceiling. A whole lot of bumping and thumping. I could barely hear my television.”

Apparently a
Law and Order
fan too, I could hear the distinct melody playing from inside. Me and the whole apartment complex. Either she’d turned it up to avoid hearing the noise upstairs or she really couldn’t hear. I was itching to get upstairs. If the noise caused Hattie to turn up her television, something was awry.

“Did you see Leesa or uh ... Chris?”

“I haven’t seen anybody since you came by the other day. I’ve been real under the weather. Some kind of stomach virus, I think.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Hattie.” There was no need to subject Amos and myself to TMI or too much info
rmation. Hattie lived alone and could keep us here all night. I had to find my daughter.

I huffed my way up the stairs to my chagrin. It had been several days since I exercised and I hoped Amos wouldn’t notice my struggle with the stairs. By the time we got to the top, he didn’t look much better than I did. I guess being retired, he’d lost some of his physical fitness.

I rang the door bell, waited a few minutes and then tried banging.

“Hold on, Eugeena. Give her a chance to get to the door if she’s in there.”

Yeah, if she’s in there. “Leesa.” I called out. “Open the door.”

I felt the hair on my arms rise. While I could still hear Hattie’s television from below, now muffled, it was very silent behind my daughter’s apar
tment door.

I placed my hand on the knob.

Click.

I turned toward Amos, who looked back at me.

He placed his arm out in front of me. “Stand back.”

I expected him to pull out a piece, but he didn’t, he pushed me b
ehind him and slowly turned the knob. The door swung open, showing darkness. I could see the outlines of the couch Leesa inherited when Ralph thought it was okay for us to upgrade our living room furniture.              Amos stepped inside. “You stay here.”

Yeah right. I moved in close behind Amos, ste
pping on the heel of his shoe. He spun around, ready to say something, but I put my index finger to my mouth. Now was not the time to scold me or hold a mother back from going inside her child’s dark apartment.

I remembered where the light switch was on the wall. Bright light i
lluminated the small living room and dinette area on the side. The ceiling fan part of the light started whirring slowly and then picked up speed. The air lifted some papers that were lying on the coffee table. I walked over and peered down at the papers. Some textbooks sat on the table as well. It looked like Leesa had been studying for a class. A brief spurt of joy passed through me since I’d only been nagging her for years to take some courses at the community college.

“She’s not here, Amos. Let’s go. I don’t know what we are going to do now.”

“Well, we can still try to find this Chris fellow. Maybe she has an address written down somewhere.”

“That’s true. She keeps a desk in her bedroom.” I headed down the narrow dark hallway, stepping on some plush toy that talked back to me. I reached down to stop the high-pitched yakking. The toy appeared to be Elmo, one of Kisha’s favorites. How come Leesa didn’t pack him? Had Kisha grown tired of this toy already? The more I thought about it, I realized Leesa didn’t make plans to stay long.

I switched the lamp on in the room, illuminating an unmade bed. Not uncharacteristic of Leesa. Her room though more adult like, still resembled the messiness of her childhood bedroom back at Sugar Creek. I walked over to the desk, which used to be in her room when she lived at home.

I searched through the desk drawer and found what appeared to be a journal of some sort. Now I definitely wasn’t one to snoop into my chi
ldren’s stuff, but at a time like this, I had to flip through the pages.

“Did you find something?

I jumped and screeched.

Amos appeared sheepish. “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.”

Holding one hand over my chest, I held up the notebook. “I found this journal. I guess I’m a little nervous to be flipping through it.”

Amos moved closer to me. “No time to worry about being a snoop now.”

He was right. I flipped pages. They weren’t dated in any consistency as most journals go. An entry from late last year grabbed my attention.

I’m pregnant. I’ve been in denial, but I know the feeling. I wanted to ask Mama what to do, but she might really be disappointed with me this time. I knew better. I haven’t even introduced Chris to Mama yet. I’m not sure she will like him or not. I’m not even sure I want to keep this baby.

I sucked in my teeth. I had no idea what turmoil Leesa went through to have Tyric. I continued to another page, dated two months ago.

Mama keeps calling me. I try to hurry her off the phone. She would never admit it, but I know that has to hurt her feelings. I keep thinking why am I keeping this pregnancy a secret. She’s going to find out. That’s if I live long enough. Chris is crazy. He hit Kisha today and I just lurched at him. He knocked me back. I would’ve hit the floor if I hadn’t caught the counter. I told him I’m pregnant. Are you crazy?

My heart did flip-flops. I looked up at Amos, who was studying me. “We definitely need to find this Chris. He seems to be a scary man.” I peered back down to go to the next entry, but that’s when a click came from up front. Amos and I eyed each other.

“Leesa.”

“Wait, Eugeena.”

I was already gone, halfway towards the living room, ready to take my child in my arms and take her back home with me. I would not let any harm come to her.

The door opened.

I stopped, my heart pounding in my chest.

It wasn’t Leesa.

A man stepped through the door. His presence threw me off as I took in his attire.  He was at least six foot three or four, ebony black skin and underneath his blue uniform, he certainly wasn’t slim. Muscular, kind of built like a football player. Really the man was huge.

I felt Amos’ presence behind me and for the tenth time in a week I was glad to have him with me, al
though between Amos and me we still might not be able to take the man down. I mean, was he really a cop? I mustered up some confidence to ask, “Excuse me officer, why are you here? Do you have some identification on you?”

The man took off his hat displaying a head bare around the sides, with only a low tuft of hair going down the middle. He must have been a M
arine or a part of the military at one time. “Ma’am, I can ask you the same question since I had a report of a break-in?”

“Break-in. Oh no.” I whirled to Amos and then back. “No wait, you’re mistaken. This is my daughter’s apartment. She’s missing. You know this a
lready. They should have alerts all over where you work.”

“Yes, they have circulated some information about a young wo
man.”

“Well, do you have anything new? Like who is this Chris guy?”

The man’s eyes narrowed. Amos moved up beside me.

It took a moment before the cop answered. A
lmost like he wanted to arrest me or hit me. But for what?

“I’m Chris. Chris Black.”

They have a cliché saying. You could have heard a pin drop. In the silence that followed Chris Black revealing himself, I didn’t know whether to drop to the floor or drop kick him.

I finally found my voice. “You are my daug
hter’s boyfriend.” A cop. The one meant to protect. My daughter seemed to be on the run because of him. “Where is she?” Amos reached for my arm, but I didn’t care.

As I lurched forward, Chris stepped back and held up his hands. “Ma’am, I don’t want to have to haul you in for assaulting an officer. You might want to calm down.”

“And you might want to tell me where my daughter is Officer Chris Black.” I ain’t one to go toe to toe with the law, but I’d managed to stand less than seven inches from Chris, who I might add, stood a foot taller than me.

“Mrs. Patterson, I don’t know Leesa’s where
abouts.”

“That is the wrong answer. What are you really doing here then? N
obody called in a break-in did they?”

“Mrs. Hattie reported hearing noise upstairs. I was in the vicinity when the call came in on the radio.”

I caught myself. My hands were balled in a fist. Lord, me and you going to have to have a talk.  Just when I think I have my temper down, I get a curve ball thrown at me. I stepped back. “You might be right about that. I still like to know what kind of person you must be that my daughter never introduced you to me.”

“Maybe you two didn’t have the best relatio
nship.”

Oh no he didn’t?
  My hands flexed into fists again. “Maybe you weren’t the man she thought Mama would like.”

“Okay, that’s enough. Eugeena, and ahem, Officer Black.” Amos placed his hand in front of me coaxing me backward.  “Time is crucial and we need to try to locate Leesa. I think we are all aware there are some children involved here.”

My grandchildren. Amos was right. We needed to find Leesa.

Amos continued, “Can you tell us the last time you saw her?”

“Two months ago.”

“What?” Amos strained to hold me back. “You trying to tell me, my daughter had your child and you have not been by to see her or your son?”

Chris bit his lip. “It’s not because I didn’t want to. She wouldn’t let me.”

I looked at what appeared to be some wetness formed around Chris’ eyes. There is no way I’m going to fall for that. Eugeena Patte
rson knew when she was being manipulated. What Mr. Black didn’t know is Hattie already told me he’d been by harassing my daughter.

He’d better not have laid a hand on her. If he did, it would take a whole lot of Jesus in me not to lay Chris Black out. For good.