Asking For Trouble (24 page)

The kids all whooped and whistled, and
Jazzie smiled, but held up her hand. "I want each of you to make me
that promise...starting with you Sam, and moving down the line,"
she told them, and listened as each one made their promise, then
gave them a nod.

"Okay then, we're done for today, be sure to
practice at least thirty minutes a day, I want us to sound
brilliant when we play this song next week," she said and they all
started talking at once. She laughed, then turned and put her
violin and bow in the case, and wiped her hands on the towel in
there to remove the rosin that had dusted off on her hands.

Her gaze fell on the sole violin, which was
left unused, and was leaning against the bottom of the podium. She
frowned and realized that Lucy never made it to class. She wondered
why Beau hadn't brought her back, and she scanned the gym, but only
saw one of the FBI agents leaning against the wall by the door.

"Does anyone live near Lucy Simpson?" Jazzie
asked the class. She would have one of them bring the instrument to
her house.

Mrs. Jackson cleared her throat then said
loudly, "Um, Miss Ramos...just hang on to the violin, I need to
speak with you please."

Jazzie nodded then picked up her violin, and
the spare, then made her way to the stage steps and walked down to
the gym floor. When she reached Mrs. Jackson, her eyes were filled
with worry.

"Your friend, Beau, went to pick up Lucy and
said she wasn't sick...she'd been abused and had whelps on her legs
and a bruise on her face. The house was a mess and the kids hadn't
eaten...the parents hadn't been home since last night."

She gasped then said, "Oh, my god, is Lucy
okay?" Sickness and fear knotted in Jazzie's stomach.

"Beau said he's going to take her to the
doctor or hospital to find out, after he takes them to the
breakfast buffet down the road and gets them breakfast. She
couldn't sit down, so that's why she didn't stay for the
lesson...that and she was hungry."

"Good, Lord, people are just cruel animals
these days...how could they do that?" Jazzie spat angrily and set
down the violins. "I'd like to go over there and give them a piece
of my mind!"

"I think Beau is taking care of that...he
said he's calling her social worker, and social services.
Unfortunately, that means she'll probably be shipped to another
foster home, and another school, and might fail this year. The
little boy in the foster home with her, I don't know much about,
since he's in elementary school."

"I bet my mama would take them in," Jazzie
said impulsively. Jazzie would try to do it herself, but she was
going to be on the road a lot with the band, and that wouldn't be a
good environment for Lucy. "Maybe we could get special permission
from the school for her to finish out the year, and someone in my
family could bring her to school in the morning. My dad's shop
isn't too far from here."

"That's a lot to take on, Jazzie..." Mrs.
Jackson warned her.

"My mama is the best mother in the world.
She loves kids, and they love her...she would be good for them,"
Jazzie said with conviction.

"That may be, but you'd better talk to your
mother first. There's a process that has to be followed to become a
foster parent, and it's a lot of trouble, and takes quite a while.
Considering the situation though, the social worker might allow
them to stay there, while they find another foster home for them,
or until your parents can be approved."

"I'm going to call her right now!" Jazzie
said with excitement, then remembered she didn't have her cell
phone, the FBI still had it. She was going to have to talk to them
and get it back, because she needed it.

"You probably should talk to Beau first and
see what they talked about, and where things stand," Mrs. Jackson
suggested.

"Good idea...I hate to ask this, but can I
borrow your cell phone to call him? I don't have mine with me."

Jazzie wasn't about to tell her the FBI had
it...that would just open another can of worms with Gert, and she
might even cancel her classes, because her being here could put the
children in danger. That thought had only crossed her mind when
she'd glanced to the back of the gym and saw the stoic agent
guarding the door a few minutes ago.

"Sure you can," Gert said and pulled out her
phone then handed it to Jazzie.

Jazzie took the phone, then looked at it and
groaned. She didn't have Beau's phone number memorized...it was
saved in her phone, which she didn't have. Instead of calling Beau,
Jazzie called her mother.

Her mom answered the phone breathlessly, her
tone anxious, "Yes, who is this?"

"Mama, it's Jasmine...is everything
okay?"

"No, bebe, everything is not okay. I got a
call a few minutes ago from someone, and they said they have your
brother..." her mother told her with a waver in her voice.

"What?!? Which brother?" Jazzie shouted
frantically.

"Carlos--they have Carlos, and said that if
Frankie didn't refuse to testify, and give them the papers he had,
they were going to kill him." Fear shot through Jasmine and the
blood drained from her head. She wobbled on her feet, then sank to
her knees clutching the phone.

"Did they threaten you or papa, or anyone
else?" she asked softly with tears burning behind her eyes.

"No, they just said they'd kill Carlos, if
Frankie didn't cooperate."

"Did you tell the FBI agents with you about
the call?" Jazzie asked her.

"No, they said if I told anyone, he was
dead...I didn't know what to do. I called your papa and he's on his
way here."

Oh, god, Jazzie thought, she needed Beau,
because she didn't know what to do either. He would know what to
do. She had no way of contacting him, though...unless, maybe Jess
could contact Sabrina. Sabrina was his sister and surely had his
phone number.

Quickly, she dialed Jess's cell phone and
her best friend answered. She heard Angel cooing in the background
and wanted to smile, but couldn't manage it. "Jess, this is
Jazzie--I need your help! I need Beau's phone number, do you have
it? Or can you get it for me?"

"Sure, Jazz...I think I have it in my phone,
one sec," Jess told her and it sounded like she pulled the phone
away from her ear and was scrolling through it. "Here it is..." she
said then spouted off the numbers and Jazzie tried to remember it
in her scrambled brain. "Is everything okay, Jazz?" Jess asked her
with concern.

Her best friend was enjoying the most
downtime she'd had in forever, so there was no way she was going to
ruin that by filling her in on the drama that had become her life.
"Everything is fine...how's Angel?"

"An angel of course..." Jess told her then
cooed to her daughter.

"Of course," Jazzie agreed with a forced
chuckle. "Look, I'll call you back later, thanks for the phone
number," she said then hung up the phone and dialed the number Jess
had given her. With every ring of the phone in her ear, Jazzie's
heart got tighter in her chest. Answer...please answer, she prayed,
but after the fifth ring, Beau's deep whiskey-smooth voice asked
her to leave a message.

"Beau, this is Jazzie...something has
happened and I need to talk to you right away," she said anxiously.
"It's Carlos...I'm about to leave the gym with the agents to go
back to the house, please meet me there." Jazzie hung up the phone
then pushed back up to her feet and handed it back to Gert. "Thanks
very much," she told her, and could see the questions in her eyes,
questions she was not going to answer.

"Is everything alright Jasmine? Is there
something I can help you with?" Gert asked her and put a hand on
her shoulder.

"No, something happened to my brother, and I
just need to go make sure he's okay. Thanks for letting me use the
phone, I'll see you next week," Jazzie assured her then picked up
her violin cases, then almost ran across the gym to where the agent
was standing. "Can you take me back to the house now?"

The burly dark-suited man nodded then took
her arm and led her outside of the gym. He stopped at the door and
looked around, then pushed the door open wider and escorted her
down the sidewalk to their car. She wasn't going to tell these guys
what was going on either, because of what her mother told her. The
only hope that she had of helping her brother was Beau, and she
could only pray that he'd be at the safe house when she got
there.

When she was seated in the back of the car
and they pulled out of the parking lot, she asked, "Can I borrow
your phone, please?" She was going to try to call Beau again, maybe
he'd just been somewhere he couldn't answer.

"No, it's against the rules," the driver
told her and looked at her in the rearview mirror.

Well, that was that...unless Beau got her
message and met her at the safe house, she was screwed. She'd bet
that guy even read the rule book in the bathroom, he probably had
it memorized, and God forbid he should ever step out of the box the
feds put him in. Hell, there was probably even a rule about when
and how often he could go to the bathroom. She folded her arms
under her breasts and leaned against the back of the seat trying to
corral the fear, anxiety and tension dueling it out inside of
her.

Jazzie was determined to get to a telephone,
to get in touch with Beau, and if these guys weren't gonna let her
use theirs, she'd just escape and go to a pay phone, if Beau wasn't
at the house. When they turned onto the street where the house was
located, Jazzie leaned forward and looked out of the windshield, to
try and see if Beau's truck was at the curb in front of the house,
and it wasn't. She swallowed back the bubble of disappointment that
lodged in her chest and sat back again.

The car edged along the street and the
agents scanned the street and houses, then when they got to the
driveway of the house, instead of pulling in, they gunned the
engine and shot off down the street swiftly, throwing Jazzie
against the back of the seat. The agent in the passenger seat,
pulled out his phone and glanced in the side view mirror. He dialed
a number then said flatly, "Yeah, the house is dirty, we're moving
and have a tail...red Ferrari."

The driver looked up in the rearview and
frowned, then accelerated more. Jazzie twisted and glanced out the
back window and saw Carlos's red Ferrari behind them, but he wasn't
driving it. "That's my brother's car!" she shouted.

"Yeah, but that's not him behind the wheel.
Something's happened, and we need to get you out of here fast," the
agent in the passenger seat said, and Jazzie was surprised he'd
managed to string a whole sentence together, let alone voice it.
That was the most the man had said to her, since she'd been dropped
off at the safe house.

The driver said in a reprimanding tone,
"
That
is why we didn't want you to have visitors at the
house. Someone probably tailed your brother there."

Guilt washed over Jazzie and bile rolled
around in her stomach. Carlos being taken hostage was all her
fault. She should never have called him and asked him to come and
get her, or bring her violin. Jazzie hadn't been taking the threat
seriously enough, but she was now...she just hoped it wasn't too
late. Jazzie groaned and pulled the seatbelt across her lap and
snapped it, after the agent driving turned a corner on two wheels
and almost threw her across the back seat.

"Keep your head down below the seat, Miss
Ramos," the agent in the passenger seat told her, then pulled out
his gun and turned around in his seat. Jazzie slid down in the seat
and felt a little car sick from the rocking and rolling and turning
the car was doing, as they tried to get away from whoever was
chasing them.

"Please give me your cell phone," Jazzie
begged tearfully, then told him, "I just want to call Beau Bowman,
the Texas Ranger who was at the house earlier."

The agent looked down at her for a moment,
then huffed out a breath and reached into the breast pocket of his
suit and threw her his phone. She grabbed it like a lifeline and
dialed Beau's number again. This time he answered on the first
ring.

"Beau!" Jazzie wailed and put her hand on
the seat when the car swerved again.

"What's going on?" he asked her
anxiously.

"They have Carlos, and someone is chasing us
in his car! The agents think they followed him to the safe house
earlier."

"Oh, god, Jazzie..." Beau groaned then said,
"Where are you?"

"I can't look over the seat, so I have no
idea...we're running from them."

"Stay safe, baby...I'm going to see if I can
call in and get ya'll some backup. Let me talk to the agent," he
said and she heard his voice tremble.

Jazzie handed the phone to the guy between
the seat, and said, "He wants to talk to you."

"Yeah?" he said impatiently, then his
eyebrows drew together and he told Beau where they were. "We don't
have any agents in the area, so that would be appreciated," he told
Beau, then disconnected.

He looked over at his partner and said,
"He's going to get some Rangers to try and intercept. We'll never
outrun that car, and it doesn't look like we're gonna lose him
either." The driver nodded and looked up in the rearview again,
then the car swerved right and Jazzie grabbed the door handle and
hung on.