They settled on the couch. Jessica took a notepad out from her book bag and readied her pen.
“Before we begin, Jessica… Do I have your word on anonymity?”
“Even if it means my editorial never sees the light of day.”
“Well, I certainly hope it does…” Malik’s father tapped his finger against his notebook. “So get ready. Here’s what I know.”
For the next half hour, Jessica took extensive notes on what was looking more and more like a silent partnership between Pantheon and Daedalus Incorporated. The rumors were true: months earlier, Daedalus had met with the dean and head of student housing to discuss the financial standings of their more elite students.
A recent study had shown that as tuition for private universities had increased over the past decade, off-campus housing had boomed. The trend hadn’t escaped Pantheon’s attention. Not only were they seeking to increase the availability of student-friendly housing, but a new measure was going to be passed allowing sophomores to join upperclassmen in seeking off-campus alternatives.
A tentative oral agreement had been reached. If Daedalus could pack the renovated apartments with Pantheon students, then the university would step in after two years and purchase the property themselves – at a bargain no other buyers would be offered.
“It’s like laundering property,” Malik’s father explained. “Relationships between the university and the town have always been love-hate. A marriage of dependence. Pantheon wants to extend its reach without rocking the boat. With this deal, Daedalus is assured a decent flip, while the university gets to keep its hands clean.”
Jessica circled a few names, and shook her head. “My, my. Quite a little shell game they got going on.”
“Well, all above board. But that don’t make it right.” He sighed. “I’m supposed to represent the most noble pursuit. The quest for knowledge. To improve the minds of our children, and instead… I don’t know, somewhere along the line, we all became business men and accountants. PR monkeys. Real estate agents.”
Jessica offered him a warm smile. “Thank you so much for helping me.”
“Least I could do…” He turned his orange Crocs inward, face turned askance. “I’m sorry you had to leave so early last time you were here. Offering you a drink and a plate of barbeque…”
“Oh.” Jessica tried to shrug it off. “It’s really not –”
“The hell it’s not. After everything that happened with Glen Roberts. And then Clarence Davenport, the trust we put in both those men… Clarence was like an uncle to Malik. I guess Patty saw you as an intruder, and I just followed her lead.” He reached over, gave her forearm a squeeze. “And I am sorry, Jessica Kincaid.”
“Well…” Jessica tossed the notepad on the table. “I guess if I didn’t accept your apology, that would just make me every bit as bad as you thought –”
“I’m worried about Malik,” he interrupted, as though they had only just sat down to talk. Troubled face, teeth biting down on his lower lip. “I’m worried about him. I’m worried about Patty.”
Malik had been her ulterior motive since setting up their meeting. But she never thought the opportunity would simply fall into her lap. An unexpected gift, double-stamped fragile. This was big game hunting, and Jessica telegraphed her concern with as little movement as possible. “What’s going on?”
“I don’t know…” Malik’s father stood up and walked into the kitchen. “I know I shouldn’t even be talking to you about this. But I feel as though maybe you’ve got some insight. I’ve dissed you before, and I’m not about to make the same mistake twice.”
He returned with a fresh beer, took a seat.
Took a nip for courage and cleared his throat. “Oh-eight was a mighty bad year for us, as you know. Patty’s car accident, her clinics getting shut down. I know Malik must have told you how trying the recovery was. The physical therapy, and all that.”
“Yeah… Malik told me about it.”
“Took a real toll on him. We put him on antidepressants. Didn’t seem to work. And the side effects were bizarre. He began sleepwalking. Talking in his sleep. Eyes all crazy, like he was reenacting his nightmares. Strange thing… At first, there was this silver lining to it all. Malik and Patty were closer than I had ever seen them. But then…” Malik’s father flashed an uncertain grin. “We off the record now?”
“Of course.”
“Patty got addicted to pain killers.”
Jessica put a hand over her chest. In doing so, she could sense the shallow display of distress as she began to piece things together, one step ahead of Mr. Phillip Council.
“And when the pharmacist finally cut her off… Malik did something I am particularly ashamed of.”
Jessica decided to take a risk. “He stole some morphine from his internship at the Center for Human Genetics.” When Malik’s father shot her a surprised look, she gave him a sheepish look. “Guess I shouldn’t be telling you this, but… I was basically Malik’s confessional booth.”
With the circle of trust tightening, the elder Council nodded. “Just glad he found someone to talk to.”
“Yeah.”
“When Patty saw what he’d done… it was a wakeup call. For all of us. She went into rehab, got cleaned up. Malik went to therapy. It was right about then that the school year was starting, and I admit… I wasn’t exactly there for either of them. A house like this don’t come without a lot of hard work.”
Jessica graced his arm with her own empathetic touch.
“Yeah, it’s no excuse… Thing is… between Malik’s therapy, you coming into his life… then the whole scandal with Glen Roberts, his acceptance into Wesleyan... Somewhere in the middle of all that, things began to…” He searched for the words in another sip of beer… “Things got complicated. Malik and Patty’s bond became so strong that I became a kind of bench warmer. And after Clarence Davenport was found in his home, it only became worse… They became like their own secret club. Won’t share their secrets, won’t give me the password to get in… and it’s been getting worse. This whole summer’s been one long nightmare.”
“I’ve been getting the same feeling,” Jessica agreed. “Like they’re locked into some kind of contract neither can get out of. Maybe don’t want to get out of.”
Jessica had no idea whether that was the case. It turned out to be exactly what Malik’s father wanted to hear, and he pointed at her with an emphatic finger. “That’s what I’m talking about… And now, they’re off at the beach house, I’m here tending to the lawn like some kind of domestic servant… Jessica, do you have any idea what’s happening to my son?”
A pretty good one. “I think Malik has some deep-seated psychological problems. I think his mother loves him very much. And I think by the time they get back from the beach, things are going to be better.”
“You really think so?”
“There’s nothing I can tell you that you don’t already know. Maybe you just needed someone to talk to.”
Malik’s father gave it some serious thought.
Before he could get too comfortable with the idea, Jessica stood and stretched. “Tell you what. If you’d let me, I’d like to go up to Malik’s room. I’ll leave him a note; hope you’re feeling better, that kind of thing. I’ll tell him we should meet up for coffee or something like that. We’ll talk, I’ll get a read on him. And I’ll let you know if I catch any bad feelings… How about it?”
“Well…” he smiled, polished off his beer. “Wouldn’t do me any good if Patty found out you were here, so… just make it discrete.”
“No lipstick on the mirror, I promise.”
“I’ve got to go move the sprinkler.” Malik’s father rose and ambled towards the back yard. “You just go ahead and holler at me when you’re done.”
He had hardly stepped out onto the deck, when Jessica tore up the stairs.
Well aware that trust came with a certain constraint on time.
***
If there truly was such a t
hing as past lives, Jessica would’ve pegged Malik as a crow. Black and devious would have only covered the obvious characteristics of his power animal. It was his proclivity for petty theft that truly defined the comparison. And like his avian counterpart, Malik had a nest for all his little prizes.
Racing against the clock, Jessica tossed her book bag on the floor and hunched down at Malik’s desk. The inert monitor kept watch over her every move as she pulled on the topmost drawer. The one that was always halfway open due to warping, as Malik had always alleged.
Jessica no longer cared if that really was the case.
She released the drawer from its home and set it down on the floor.
She reached into the gaping socket, expecting to feel the clutter of tiny little keepsakes. Hoping to find something along the lines of a notebook. The elusive journal he had confessed to on several occasions. Her search came up empty, save for a splinter caught beneath her thumbnail.
Returning the drawer to its rightful place, Jessica stood and scanned the room. Malik’s mother wasn’t big on the whole Fourth Amendment. Prone to conducting random searches. If she’d found his special hiding spot, was there finally anyplace in his room he could have considered safe?
Jessica jiggled the desktop mouse.
The hard drive clicked twice, awoke with an low, annoyed whine.
The monitor joined in, lighting up to show the blue, Windows lock screen. Chess piece icon welcoming Malik, requesting his password.
“Shit.” Jessica glanced back to the open door, saw nothing but the hallway wall. Got down on her knees and ran her hands over the keyboard. Held a little impromptu séance. Fingers twitching, ready to get a move on.
She typed in Angry Jonny.
No good. Beneath the password slot, the computer provided a gentle hint: favorite movie.
“Yeah, right. ‘Cause Malik’s just that stupid.” Just in case, she typed in Bulworth.
Another negative.
She glanced at a framed picture on Malik’s desk. Taken on the night of their first date. Malik had a dab of ice cream on his chin. That thing on Jessica’s face looked to be an actual smile.
And what movie had the two of them blown their money on that evening?
It couldn’t hurt to try: Tropic Thunder.
Nothing.
Jessica was about to abandon her efforts, when she remembered that they had been too young to buy tickets to the R rated extravaganza. They had gone PG-13, then snuck into Tropic Thunder.
“If this works…” Jessica typed in Mummy3.
Bingo. The screen lit up with a benign chime.
Yet another picture of Jessica, unflattering close-up the day after a botched camping trip.
Downstairs, she heard the door to the backyard slide open.
“Tick tock…” Jessica clicked on the start menu. Clicked on the search bar and typed in the word Journal. No folders, no documents. Malik was no idiot. “Code word, code word.” She did a search for Memoirs. Epic. Deep Thought. No matching results.
Then she remembered the Angry Jonny letters.
Did a search for paint files.
A short list popped up, instincts double clicking on a file labeled EyesOnly.
The paint file engulfed the entire monitor.
Glaring white background covered in messy black letters.
Jessica didn’t need a scrapbook to tell her where she’d seen those words before.
THIS STORY BELONGS TO JESSICA. LET HER BACK IN, MR. HOLDER. OR INNOCENT PEOPLE WILL DIE – ANGRY JONNY.
The first Angry Jonny letter sent to the Observer. The one that nobody knew about except for her, Al Holder and the detectives.
And now, apparently, Malik as well.
“Jessica, you all right up there?”
From the sound of it, Malik’s father was stationed at the bottom of the stairs.
No time for cocktails. Jessica grabbed a flash drive off Malik’s desk, stuck it into one of the computer ports. She moved the mouse to the top left corner of the window and dropped the file menu. Wherever the document was hidden, the pathway was too long to fit in the provided space.
She heard Malik’s father call out again, joined by footsteps, slowly ascending the stairs.
She went back to start Menu, repeated her search for paint files. EyesOnly, there it was again. She right clicked and raced down to open file location. The window opened up instantly, displaying all the contents of a folder simply entitled AJ. Palms slick with sweat, opened the flash drive.
Greeted unceremoniously with a window asking for her password.
The clock had run out.
She dragged the contents onto the flash drive icon, praying uselessly that it would take.
Surprised to find that it was actually working.
She watched helplessly as the transfer took place… seconds remaining.
Done.
She hop scotched across the screen, closing every window.
Opened the start menu and locked the computer.
Tore the flash drive from its port and shoved it into her book bag.
Leaped up with a full one-eighty just as Malik’s father appeared in the doorway.
“Everything alright, Jessica?”
With a pleasant smile, Jessica reached down and hoisted the book bag over her shoulder. “Right as rain.”
He glanced around the room. “Where’s the note?”
“Like I said, no lipstick on the mirror. Wrote him a little something on his computer. Left it on the desktop for him. That way Mrs. Council won’t know I was sniffing around your boy.”
“Good thinking. I’m surprised he gave you his password.”
“It’s all about trust,” Jessica said, walking past him and out into the hallway.
“Lord knows I could use more of that around here.”
You have no idea, Jessica thought.
She charmed her way down the stairs and out the front door. Left Malik’s father with continued assurances that his son was going to be just fine. Strolled out to her car and opened the door. Glancing across the street, she saw Detective Randal leaving the Castle residence, cellphone glued to his ear. He caught sight of her and threw her a neighborly wave.
“Always the good cop,” Jessica muttered.
Hands shaking, she started the car.
Took a look at the address Al Holder had looked up for her.
She rolled down the windows and headed north.
Recharging her batteries for her next stop.
Chapter 54: Anita Montero.
It was somewhere around six when Jessica pulled up to Anita Montero’s house.
Happily nestled on the corner of Flocks and Tandy Street.
Single-level, wood siding. Dark windows looking out onto a strip of dying lawn that wrapped its way around the side of the house and out toward the backyard.
She didn’t need to check the address twice.
There in the driveway was Jessica’s prized dragon.
The legendary Pontiac G6.
She made her way across the street. The sun had taken unusual mercy on the neighborhood as evening approached. Light breeze bending the blades of neighboring lawns, their houses pressed close to the ground. Roofs staring up at clear blue skies. Smoke from a nearby cookout drifting through the air, mingling with the pleased laughter of those who had bet against the weather and won. A world briefly turned perfect under the approving cry of a distant train whistle.
The news of this lovely day seemed to stop short of the front porch.
Jessica felt the wood creak beneath her feet. All along the porch, planks rose in warped waves, powder blue paint splintering. Porch swing hanging precariously from a pair of rusted chains. Flat, green cushions projecting the damp stench of mildew.
Taking one last look at the Pontiac, Jessica pressed the doorbell.
Sensed it wasn’t working.
She opened the pollen-encrusted screen door. Rapped on the entrance, embedded window
s rattling with every knock. Jessica refrained from the urge to press against them, get a little preview of what lay in store.
From inside came the sound of approaching footsteps.
Jessica had replayed the fantasy a thousand times. Now that the time had come, she couldn’t recall what any of those daydreams had involved. Though she was fairly certain none of them had involved the woman that answered the door.
At five-two Anita Montero looked to weigh in at an alarming eighty-five pounds. A long, white t-shirt hung over jeans that that had once hugged a fuller figure. Her skin was stretched taught, the faded color of candle wax. Cheekbones struggling to escape. Black bandana covering a naked scalp. Her eyes remained the only constant, the bridge between past and present. Large, brown and beautiful; woven with the pain and pleasure of a visitor at her doorstep.
“Hi.”
Jessica’s first instinct was to run way, appearances be damned.
Anita smiled weakly. “It’s the chemo. Don’t let it bother you.”
Jessica coughed, fidgeting in her heels. “Sorry, I didn’t know.”
“How can I help you?”
“Sorry again. I’m Jessica Kincaid.” There was no doubt this woman had no idea who she was. But there was the Pontiac resting in her driveway, and Jessica inched along with her plan. “I work for Al Holder, over at the Verona Observer.”
“Bringing them in kind of young, isn’t he?”
“I’m an intern, actually. Observing the Observer contest.”
“Well, congratulations, Jessica. Come on in, please.”
Easier than expected. This woman was either far too trusting, or the cancer had left her with nothing to fear from anything or anyone. Whichever it was, Jessica was forced to brutally slay all guilty thoughts as she stepped over the threshold, scanning the living room for clues.
“Sorry about the looks of this place.” Anita motioned listlessly at the dormant furniture, cut off from daylight by downcast shutters. “I do most of my entertaining over near the kitchen.”
“You live here alone?” Jessica asked, following Anita down a dark hallway.
“Yeah. For a while now.”
“I really hope I’m not intruding.”
“Please, I’m forty-seven years old…” They came out into a small, square room coupled with a cramped kitchen no larger than a walk-in closet. “I don’t know what that has to do with anything. Guess it’s just my way of reminding myself. Have a seat, can I get you anything? Rum and coke?”