Jamie Hill Triple Threat (7 page)

“Suit yourself.” Jack stacked up the game cards and said, “Draw to see who goes first.”

“The youngest player always goes first,”
Devon
announced.

Jack looked at him like he was crazy.

“Says so in the rules.”
Crystal
blew smoke toward Jack for emphasis. She ground out her cigarette and closed the window, joining them in the front room.

“Bull hockey.” Jack shook his head. “Draw to see who goes first. Highest number wins.”

Mark grinned and drew a card, then
Devon
shrugged and chose next. Jack drew the highest numbered card and got to go first.

“Now who’s cheating?”
Crystal
looked over his shoulder and kicked his leg with her toe.

“Perfectly fair,” Jack told her, and the game proceeded. Crystal got that ‘normal family’ feeling in the pit of her stomach again, and tried to bat it down by moving back to the window and lighting up another smoke.

In the men’s version of the famous Parker Brothers’ board game, nobody cut anybody any slack. Those who were sent back
went back
with a snotty, “Sorry!”
Crystal
tried to kibitz but Jack would have none of it. They finally had to call the game on account of time, and declare Mark the unofficial winner.

“I guess the winner gets to decide if he bathes first or second,”
Crystal
told him as the boys picked up the game.

“Second,” Mark decided, “and I want to shower, not take a bath.”

“Ooh, I want to shower too!”
Devon
called out.

“Manly men.” Jack stood up and looked at
Crystal
. “So where do they shower, here or there?”

She wrinkled her nose. “My bathroom is definitely cleaner. I think here. Would you mind getting
Devon
started while I run next door for their p.j.’s?”

“You bet.” He headed into the bathroom. “Come on, Dev. Let’s see how much of a mess we can make.”

She stuck her head through the bathroom door. “Oh, I forgot to tell you. He can’t wash his own hair.” She smiled at Jack sheepishly.

He gave her a sarcastic grin. “Oh, thanks a lot.”

She could tell he was up to the task, so she hurried to Dave’s place and brought back
clean clothes for the boys.

Jack called out to her, “Hey Crys? Could you shoot us a couple more towels, please? We had a little problem.”

She stood in the doorway and stared at her flooded bathroom floor. Jack wrapped a towel around
Devon
and looked up at her apologetically. “I was just kidding about making a mess, but we had a little shower curtain issue here. Seems no one told him it needed to be on the
inside
of the tub. Sorry.”

Her heart ached sweetly as she watched Jack rub a towel through
Devon
’s hair. He was such a big man, kneeling awkwardly in her small bathroom, and taking such gentle care of the little boy. There was something very tender about the moment, and
Crystal
bit her lip anxiously.

“Crys? Towels?” Jack interrupted her thoughts. “I’m really sorry. I’ll do better with the second one.”

She reached under the sink quickly and tossed a couple big towels out on the floor. “It’s not a problem. No big deal.” She spread them out and they absorbed the water in no time. “Okay,” she wrapped the towel around
Devon
one last time. “Let’s get you dressed and your brother in here.” She pointed to the cabinet and told Jack “There’s another towel for Mark in there. He
can
wash his own hair, but doesn’t always rinse it very well.”

“Got ya.” He smiled at her, and was pulling Mark’s t-shirt off as
Crystal
was pulling
Devon
’s p.j.’s on. Mark was shyer about dressing in front of
Crystal
, so she let Jack handle things. When she returned to the bathroom, it was neatly straightened, with wet towels lined up across the shower rod to dry.

“Sorry about the number of towels.” Jack leaned in over her shoulder. “I’ll catch the Laundromat bill next time.”

“I’ll make you come with me.” She looked back at him and smiled. “That’s the worst part, the sitting around and waiting. I hate that.”

He shrugged. “There’s always poker. Maybe you can teach me some tricks.”

“Never know.” She shrugged back and scooted around him to get to the boys. “You shouldn’t be hungry for a snack tonight. I think we ate all day long.”

They both nodded in agreement. “Let’s head next door, then.” They followed her into their own apartment, where she helped them brush their teeth and hugged them as they got into bed. “Have happy dreams,” she advised.

They smiled at her.

Jack watched from the doorway, and appeared surprised when
Devon
scampered out of bed and ran to him for a hug. “Good night, Jack.” He hugged the man’s waist tightly.

When he was free, Jack leaned over and gave
Devon
a hug back. “Good night, tiger. Sleep well.”
Devon
ran back to his bed.

Jack smiled at Mark. “Good night, buddy.”

“Good night. Will you be here in the morning?”

Jack raised his eyebrows at
Crystal
, and then told the boys, “No, but I’ll see you after school sometime. It’s a promise.”

“Good. ‘Night,” Mark repeated, and rolled over.

Crystal
pulled their door mostly shut as she always did, and turned on the night light. She stretched and rubbed her eyes. “Would you mind staying with them for a minute while I run next door and take my contacts out? My eyes are burning for some reason.”

“Oh, sure, go ahead,” Jack said, looking surprised again.

She grinned and went back to her place to pop her lenses out. The fact that he didn’t realize she even wore contacts reminded
Crystal
how little they knew about each other. It didn’t seem to matter on some level. She liked what she did know, and definitely liked what she saw. He seemed to feel the same way. She put on her black plastic horn-rimmed glasses, and returned to Dave’s place.

Jack had taken a seat on the sofa, where he sat with paperwork on his lap. “Nice glasses.” His voice almost stammered. He was apparently as nervous as she was.

She chuckled and peeked in on the boys before taking the chair next to the sofa. She tossed a key to Jack. “Dave’s extra apartment key. So, you found something out?”

He pocketed the key. “Well, not specifically, no. I don’t know where the hell he is. But I found out some stuff about him and Laura.”

“That’s a start.” She listened as he read off some papers.

“David Martin Erickson, age thirty-two, born in Winfield Kansas to Mary and Martin Erickson…” He hesitated and looked at
Crystal
“Both now deceased.”

She made a face and he went on. “Is this our boy?” He handed her a mug shot of Dave facing forward and sideways.

“That’s him. This is old. His hair is longer and curlier now. And he’s wearing a tiny little beard—just a spot, really—below his bottom lip.”

Jack nodded. “He’s got quite a rap sheet. Drugs, petty theft, even an arrest for domestic abuse. Charges were filed by Laura Devon Erickson, deceased at age twenty-eight from an intentional or accidental drug overdose.”

Crystal
repeated “
Intentional or accidental
drug overdose? What the hell does that mean?”

“It means that they couldn’t tell if she intended to off herself or not, but don’t suspect she had any help.”

Crystal
looked in the direction of the boys’ room, and muttered, “Why would she intend to kill herself? Seems to me she had an awful lot to live for.”

Jack nodded, tapping his papers on the arm of the sofa. “It might have had something to do with her husband. If she filed an abuse report on him once, he probably knocked her around for a long time beforehand.”

Crystal
looked him in the eye. “Some son-of-a-bitch knocks me around once, I'd file a report that same night. There is no ‘long time beforehand’ bullshit.”

“Unfortunately, not every woman is so strong. And unfortunately Laura Devon didn’t have family to fall back on. Her father was M.I.A. from the time she was a little kid, and her mother died when she was a teenager.”

Crystal
inhaled and looked toward the boys’ room again. “No grandparents.”

“Nope,” Jack repeated.

“Aunts, uncles…any family at all?” She wasn’t sure if she wanted the answer to be
yes
or
no
.

“I’m sorry, Crys. Nobody I could dig up.”

“Jesus.” She reached in her pocket and pulled out a cigarette. She lit it absently and blew smoke toward the ceiling. She finally looked at him. “He’s probably coming back, right Jack?”

He looked at her evenly and shrugged. “I can’t say, sugar. But I also can’t discount the fact that the last day you saw him, Manny Hooper turned up dead on your doorstep.”

Her eyes grew wide. “Do you still think there’s a connection?”

“Hell yeah, I think there’s a connection. You told me Manny kept an eye on the building, knew all about people’s comings and goings. I think someone wanted to shut him up.”

“Oh God! Oh God, oh God…”
Crystal
hugged her knees to her chest and puffed furiously on her smoke.

Jack leaned forward and put a hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry, honey.”

She looked at him, fear piercing her gut. “What am I going to do if he never comes home? What the hell am I going to do?”

He said softly, “I took the liberty of calling an associate of mine. She works with Social Services. I picked her brain—confidentially of course—about how a situation like this would be handled.”

“What did she say?”
Crystal
snuffed out the cigarette in an ash tray and wiped her hands across her face.

“Well, the first thing that would happen is that the boys would be taken into protective custody. They'd be placed with a licensed foster family, if one was available, or in a group home, if not.”

“A foster family? A group home?”
Crystal
practically shrieked. “They have a home.
Here
, with me!”

He looked soberly at her, and she caught his meaning. She was barely making ends meet. Oh hell, she was
not
making ends meet and they both knew it. “What do you
want
to happen, Crys? Do you want to see them placed with a nice family?”

“Or stuck in an orphanage…”

“They’re called ‘group homes’ these days.”

“And maybe split up? I’ve seen enough TV to know that no one is going to promise me that they’ll always be kept together. They might get split up.”

Jack nodded. “They might.” He reached out to her, but
Crystal
stood up to pace. She lit another cigarette and walked around the room, stopping to crack the window and inhale the cool night air.

“Nights are getting colder,” she finally commented.

“Yes, they are.” Jack nodded and stood. He stepped behind her. “Let me guess. The boys don’t have winter clothes.

She dropped her cigarette on Dave’s carpet and stomped it out angrily. She reached out for Jack and he pulled her securely into his arms.
Crystal
buried her face in his chest and sobbed. “How could he do this to me? How could he do this to them?”

Jack smoothed her hair and answered quietly, “Maybe he didn’t have a choice, honey. I think tomorrow after I’ve turned this place inside out, I’m going to start checking morgues for John Does.”

Crystal
pulled back and looked up at him. “Oh God. Do you think…”

“Shhh.” He pulled her to him and held her tightly. “I’m not sure what to think. But we’ll get to the bottom of this, one way or another.”

He rubbed her back gently until she pulled away again.

She looked up into his eyes and saw her fear and uncertainty echoed there. She also saw another emotion she couldn’t quite place. If only he could reassure her that everything was going to be okay. There was no way she could deal with this alone. Unsure exactly what to say, she reached up on her tiptoes, slipped her arms around his neck and crushed her mouth against his.

Chapter Four

Jack felt tears on
Crystal
’s cheeks as he ran his hands over her face and down to her shoulders. He pushed her back gently. “Crys, as much as I want this, we can’t. I have a job to do, and I can’t get personally—”

“Shhh.” She put a finger to his lips. “I know. I just need to pretend for one minute that there’s no one but you and me in the world. Kiss me and help me pretend for one minute.”