100 Proof Stud (The Darcy Walker Series) (24 page)

Workaholic, I didn’t know, but I might be the biggest dolt ever created. “Two things are on my mind, Tito. Number one, I want to know if you received the two Visa cards and the social security card I mailed you. Visa cards were for Lindsee Maroni and Kelley Lowder. Social security card was for an infant boy named Lucas Carlton.” I then reiterated their stories, down to the last detail, and swore on a stack of Bibles I wasn’t the thief.

Crickets chirping for a beat.

“That package was from you?” he finally asked with disbelief.

“No, they were from the Tooth Fairy. Of course, they were from me.”

“Where’d you get them, Jester? When I wrote my article, all three of those families called to share their stories. I never printed particulars, and I never printed names.”

“Well, I didn’t steal them if that’s what you’re insinuating. I’m simply showing you how far my reach goes in case you ever have the need to doubt me or sever ties.”

More crickets. “Jester, you scare me.”

That might be the biggest compliment anyone had ever given me. “Thanks,” I dumbly giggled.

Tito chuckled…I think. “You said you had another reason to call?”

Right. “Number two, I have a lead on The Ghost,” I lied. “But I need to catch up with him one last time. What location did your source last see him?”

Please, say it’s within driving distance
, I prayed. Then I looked to the ceiling hoping my many lies didn’t keep me from Heaven’s Gates permanently. But how could you remain lie-free when you pumped people for information? Creativity was a necessity.

“Big Moby’s Cheeseburger Shack,” he rattled off.

After some small talk, we disconnected.

A spoonful of peanut butter later (my cure for hiccups), Dylan sauntered through the door to a silent house. Claudia and Ana Rosalina went shopping and took Marjorie and Choncho along. Suddenly, I felt the need for allies because Dylan didn’t seem as lovey-dovey as last night. In fact, he looked like he’d opened a can of whoopass.

I choked on my tongue and coughed it back up.

The whoopass thing actually sounded intriguing.

Murphy thundered down the stairs, and by the look on his face, more bodies must’ve been pulled from the rubble, or he was mad about something else…
I gulped
.

When I glanced at Dylan, he lowered his voice, “Powwow, sweetheart.”

Oh, God, no. Powwows were worse than walkie-talkies. Powwows included Murphy or worse yet, Murphy and Red…or God forbid, Grandpa Winston. Powwows were my family’s equivalent of a come-to-Jesus meeting—underscoring the death and eternal damnation if you didn’t see the error of your ways.

Now we knew why Dylan remained silent on entry. One of them was the mastermind here, and Dylan was stuck between tag teaming with my father or cluing me in.

I put my hands on my hips, wanting to kiss him and spit on him at the same time. He gave me a look that meant everything…and nothing. The usual. “What in the heck did you do, Dylan?” I said in a rare moment of anger. “Call and whine to Murphy about what big, bad Darcy was doing?”

He never admitted, denied, or even acknowledged the statement. He carefully removed his jacket, standing stoically in a white golf shirt, faded-out jeans, and Adidas sneakers. Opening the hall closet, he even more carefully hung up his coat. Once he closed the door, he lowly and slowly repeated again, “Powwow.”

Like he was afraid I wouldn’t understand the term.

Believe me, I got it. “I’m not in the mood for Native American culture,” I mumbled, sort of giggled. The joke fell flat. When no one laughed, I decided to act dumb and blonde. “What’s wrong?”

When Murphy made it to the last stair, the house suddenly took on the tenor of a den of angry rattlesnakes. He grabbed me by the elbow and shoved me into the kitchen. We tripped overtop one another, his jeans swiping my sweats, until he stopped on a dime by the kitchen table. “I understand you didn’t ask to be thrown into detention,” he grunted, “but did you have plans to make the best of it while you were there? In Darcy’s world, poll the dang crowd for whatever stink you’re currently stirring?”

It’s not like I got up one day and said,
Hey, how about I get myself thrown into detention.
The idea presented itself with Nico Drake, and once there I decided to execute. That made me a mover and shaker. He should be proud.

“I didn’t
plan
anything, Murphy.”

“Bible it, kid,” he demanded. Once again, Murphy was doing the talking.

I looked at Dylan and let out an imaginary eek. Before we fell asleep (and talked about our relationship afterward), Dylan had asked the same thing over and over. I’d successfully held him at bay. I got the distinct feeling my free pass was used up.

“Umm,” I stammered. “We don’t need to bring God into this, Murphy. He’s probably busy handing out angel wings.”

Murphy snorted to himself about going to church more. “That’s what I thought,” he grumbled. “You might be dumb in all the other areas of your life, but thank God you know you can’t swear on the Good Book and lie. Your life, under current management, isn’t working. That means I need to manage you. You’re in the ditch, kid. Either look up and find your salvation or continue down into the pit of Hell.”

God help me, Hell might be a possibility. I glanced at Dylan. He leaned up against the countertop, idly fingering the clasp on the black TAG Heuer hugging his right wrist. He was nervous; no, I take that back. He was p-i-s-s-e-d off.

“Answer the question, Darcy,” he demanded, “or I’m not picking you up for school ever again.”

I was reeling, my head swirling in a sickening circle. “That’s Beemer blackmail,” I gasped.

Dylan remained stone-faced. “Try me,” he warned. “And by the way, when did you start editing our conversations?”

Oh, about five minutes ago…

Murphy hissed, “I need an explanation. Did this Nico Drake really attack you because you defended some girl’s honor? Is that all, or is there something else?”

I ignored Dylan because I suddenly couldn’t look him in the face. “Some situations are beyond explanations, Murphy.”

Murphy’s attitude went arctic, immediately talking in terms of electronics because he thought I needed a rewiring. “Shut up, kid,” he huffed. “Your motherboard is so screwed up. This has to be another one of your lowlife, cockamamie, screwball routines that’s going to wind up with someone getting hurt. You’re always rubbing shoulders with some shyster, Darcy, and God only knows who you hooked up with on The Island of Misfit Toys.”

One look at Dylan showed him stifling a chuckle. Good, maybe I could salvage the evening despite the bad vibe that’d invaded the room. “Answer your father,” he murmured. “He’s just…
we’re
just,” he amended softly, “worried.”

When I didn’t answer, Murphy literally took my arm and twisted it high behind my back. “Man up,” he barked.

“I can’t,” I stupidly laughed. “I have ovaries.”

There was a moment here where they both debated laughing, but they didn’t give into it.

“For the sake of clarity,” Murphy growled, “I’m going to dumb this down as much as my intelligence will
allow
and your
lack of
will understand. Are you doing something that would’ve landed you in detention even if you wouldn’t have been attacked?”

“I don’t understand what you’re saying,” I giggled.

Murphy threw both arms up in the air, like defeat faced him with a six-shooter, and he had no choice but to surrender. “Oh, Good God,” he fumed. “You add a whole new dimension to the term dysfunction.”

“I like to think I’m resourceful.”

Murphy’s grumble sounded like a PO’d bear. “You’re being resourceful. Well, let me tell you what
I’m
going to be.” He turned to Dylan with a frown. “I’m
out,
son, because this conversation didn’t take. I’ll say a prayer for you upstairs, but right now I need to take two Tylenols and crawl into bed. I’m being deposed tomorrow. On the Lord’s Day, dang it, about a claim we denied because some idiot didn’t understand what I told him. I don’t understand why God continually puts stupid people in my life, and then I have to un-stupid their mistakes.”

“Stupid is a bad word,” I giggled.

He gave me his standard answer. “Stupid is a frame of mind, kid. It has nothing to do with intelligence.”

He shot a sarcastic wave over his shoulder and disappeared upstairs.

Once out of earshot, Dylan yanked me to the couch so hard my elbow throbbed like a heartbeat. His eyes knit together in frustration. “Cough it up, Darcy, before I beat it out of you.”
Impressive threat—one I don’t mind having thrown at me actually
, I laughed to myself. Those words were ultimately a fabrication. Besides, Dylan did that hocus-pocus stuff with his voice where I wound up doing what he said anyway.

I enjoyed the way he looked at me, even when angry. I fell headlong into his eyes, scorched in the amber gaze that’d kept me up almost every night for months. I shook my head so violently to clear it I probably lost IQ points. “What’s wrong, D? You act like something else is bothering you.”

Dylan was molten-hot and unnaturally strong. But he had a weight upon his shoulders, making him move so slowly, it’s like he’d wrestled with a lion…
and lost
. “I’m frigging exhausted. Dad sleepwalked out to the lake last night thinking he was crossing The Delaware fricking River. At two o’clock, I had to talk a grown man down from attacking the Redcoats in his underwear with a pool stick. Do you know what it’s like to stare into the half-mast eyes of someone who’s incoherent, unstable, and devoid of rational thought?”

Every day when I look in the mirror.

“I’m sorry,” I smiled innocently. “Would you like a massage?”

He frowned when I batted my lashes twice. “Maybe later,” he said. “Right now, we’re talking about you, Darcy.”

I picked up the remote. “Since you want to be formal…
Dylan
,” I emphasized snidely, “it’s sort of a long story.”

“Shorten it.”

I took a major gamble here, but I blurted out, “As you know, I didn’t ask to be assaulted by Nico Drake. That being said, I’ve been working on finding who painted Coach’s car. To gather information, I stole a file from his office and did some profiling. The guys who caught my interest have juvie records and do the occasional neighborhood graffiti, normally pulling time in detention. So when the situation presented itself, I introduced myself Saturday morning. To me, this is business. I did not ask to be there; I did not ask to have my favorite bra ripped. But I’d be a fool to let the situation pass me by without getting something that benefitted me. In one conversation, I’d swear Slapstick Wilson and Damon Whitehead had nothing to do with spray painting Coach’s car. Now I just need everyone to leave me alone so I can figure out what to do next.”

I omitted The Ghost.

I was stupid but not suicidal.

“Please say this is a lie,” he muttered.

“It’s truth. Pinky swear.”

When he didn’t respond, I soldiered on with the bombast account and overdramatics, offering a slew of excuses why it’d been a godsend to be banished to detention. It was a contained environment, chances of random violence were slim (sorta), I could observe while I performed worthwhile community service, and so on. He still said nada. In fact, he swallowed three times and took the remote from my hands.

“D?” I said.

He scrolled through the channel guide with his left hand, holding the other palm to my face in a back-off motion. “I’m processing.”

I actually felt pretty darn good. Confession’s good for the soul. I crawled onto his lap, snuggling my nose into the curve under his chin. “Would it help if I said
I loved you
?”

Dang, he smelled good.

You heard it here first, folks. I literally jumped on top of him, touching anything I could get my greedy little hands on. The hair, the face, the chest—anything that said pregame activity, if you know what I mean. Dylan tensed as if it’d hurt. Here he’d led me to believe he wanted a relationship, and now that I’d offered a hookup—let’s just say he wasn’t so gung-ho about getting up close and personal. Mortified, I pulled a complete-180 and pushed away, wondering where I could hide. I blamed this behavior on the three cookies I’d eaten beforehand—they weakened my brain. And if they hadn’t weakened my brain, then that just proved Dylan was one step closer to stealing my soul.

Hello, migraine. Good night, libido.

“Are you going to drop this?” I asked, rubbing my temples.

“No,” he murmured, and then he tenderly kissed the top of my head, his voice going rough. “Soon,” he whispered almost to himself. “Soon.”

Vinnie’s pink Volkswagen Bug sounded like a dying pigeon.

“What’s wrong with the Bug?”

“She’s sick.”

There you have it, friends—the extent of Vinnie’s mechanical abilities. The calendar said Sunday morning. Vinnie and I had decimated, and I mean
decimated
, Finn Lively’s list. We cruised along Mack County Road, ending our surveillance for the day before I headed into work and Vinnie back to Ohio State.

Vinnie’s job was primarily to get me “into” places. It was my job to find out the needed information once inside. When we started our unorthodox relationship last year, I discovered he had many aliases (once again, not my place to cast judgment). The two I’d encountered then were a maintenance worker named Guido Galucci and an attorney called Carlo Corleone (yeah, The Godfather; so much for creativity). Carlo helped me gain access to my friend Oscar Small when he’d been unjustly detained in the Valley Juvenile Detention Center for the murder of a mobster named Alfonso Juarez. In both those situations, Vinnie played the part and dressed appropriately, getting me out of a heated situation in an Evidence Room (as Guido) and into Oscar’s presence as Carlo Corleone.