Green Tea (5 page)

I grabbed some pork chops out of the fridge. I got those really thick ones, boneless, on sale the other day. I’ll just butterfly them. Not exactly the same as a regular chop, but it will work.

I turned on the electric skillet, which was now sitting on a thick wooden cutting board that I’d laid across my kitchen sink. Normally I put it over the stove and cook there since I can use the overhead fan if something starts to smoke, but this particular recipe is more likely to splatter and I can clean that up more easily in the sink area. I put a silicone pad, one of the ones made to protect the bottom of your oven from drips, under the skillet on top of the wood. Starting the house on fire would create even more of a mess than browning a piece of pork.

Normally I have the TV on for background noise, but the lightening’s hitting so hard and fast that chances are good I’m gonna loose power a few times before the night is over. I’m always worried about my TV blowing up, so when big storms hit I unplug that puppy. I’ve got a Zap Cap on the electric meter outside because it’s supposed to be a really good surge protector and I’ve got everything plugged into surge protection inside, but a couple of years ago I was at my parent’s house, when lightening hit the house down the street. By the time everything was said and done, there was one hurt fireman, several traumatized neighbors, including me, and half of the house gone. The house was rebuilt better than new, and they now have a second story on it, but they lost things they can’t replace. Now I’m a little paranoid.

I slapped my pork into the electric skillet, love that sizzle noise, was a little over generous with the garlic, added some white pepper, some ginger, and let them brown. Once the first side was done, I repeated the process on the second side, and then added veggie broth to the meat, turned the electric skillet down, and covered it.

That done, I grabbed some potatoes to peel.

Having a conversation with myself is pretty normal, if Teagan isn’t around, who else really wants to listen to me? “Great Cara, you covered the stupid sink, where are you going to peel potatoes?”

“That’s a good question.”

I looked up and saw Jerkface. Right there. In my living room.

It is not an exaggeration to say that I almost had a heart attack.

I considered fainting, but couldn’t decide what he would do while I lay helpless on the ground. Helpless is bad. I decided not to faint. Not yet.

I couldn’t think of a single intelligent thing to do or say, so I just stood there, peeler in hand, skillet bubbling away, Jerkface drenched like a drowned rat, standing in my living room, dripping on my carpet.

“Aren’t you going to say something Cara?”

“I kind of figured that you were in charge. I figured if you wanted me to talk you would ask me a question.”

“Smart woman.”

“I hope so.”

We stood there for a while. Lightening hit right outside my window. Scared the ever-loving bejeezus out of me. I jumped.

“Scared Cara?”

“I think anybody in their right mind would be a little nervous. You’re in my apartment. You were not invited. I don’t know why you’re here or what you want. Being a little jumpy is probably the only reasonable thing to be.”

“I’ve tried to talk to you Cara but you just won’t listen.”

“I’m listening now.”

“Yeah. You’re listening now that you’ve ruined everything.”

Okay, I admit it, he pushed a button, and unfortunately, at those times in life when a normal person would be quiet, I get loud. I can’t help it. It’s a blurtation issue.

I may have been loud, “I ruined everything? Excuse me? I didn’t do anything at all. If you weren’t following me around and lying to me and everyone else, your life wouldn’t be what it is. You did this to you. All I did was a favor for the family priest. I didn’t start this. I still don’t know what the hell
this
even is.”

“You’re a smart woman, Cara. That’s what everybody says.”

“Obviously you aren’t talking about my family, so just who is ‘everybody’?”

“You just can’t shut up. You always have to be a smartass. I’m trying to help you.”

“Yeah, you want to explain that to me, cause you’re dripping on my carpet, uninvited, unannounced, and unwanted. I don’t see that as particularly helpful.”

“I told you to get out of the way.”

“You told me that you were working on an undercover operation for the police. If that were the case, what the hell happened in the parking lot? The police didn’t seem to be involved in your actions, or was that all an act just to make the bad guys think you were doing something you weren’t?”

“You don’t know anything.”

“I agree. So why don’t you tell me?”

“You really want me to do that? You really want to know what’s going on Cara?”

“What I really want is for you to turn around and leave. I’ll sop up all the water on my carpet, you stay away, and I’ll forget this ever happened.”

“Too late.”

“It’s never too late. Life is cause and effect. Everything you do changes the outcome of everything to date. You can choose to make the outcome of this situation different by the decisions you make right now.”

“Good theory, but haven’t you ever heard of momentum? This whole thing started a while ago. Now it’s rolling down hill. I swear to God I thought it was all gonna be okay, but then everything went to shit, and still, I thought I could turn it around, just like you said, but then I couldn’t find it. I looked everywhere.”

“Find it?” He kept talking as if I weren’t even there.

“Then I heard your brother laughing about you at work. He said you could find a germ at a hundred paces, blindfolded, and I figured if there was anything to find, even something tiny, you would find it.”

I didn’t comment, but if I live through this, I’m gonna smack the crap out of my brother.

“You still don’t know, do you, Cara?”

“Know what?”

“Cara, where’s all the shit you found at Louis’s condo?”

“I really didn’t find all that much, but what I found, is in the hands of a lawyer. I still don’t know what the significance of anything I saw has, or could have, or whatever.”

“Nobody is stupid enough to hand something over to a lawyer without even looking at it.”

“I am. You just have no idea about the power of plausible deniability do you? I’ve had it pounded in my head all my life. Maybe it was ‘the troubles’, but I learned how to keep my mind and mouth shut long ago.”

“What troubles?”

“The war between the north and south. Ireland. You’re kidding. You’ve never heard of it? Doesn’t matter.”

“You have your own troubles now.”

“You know what Joe? I still don’t even know what this is all about. All I know is that Steven, or somebody claiming to be Steven, Louis’s brother, asked me to clean out his condo so that it could be sold. Was that you?”

“I still can’t believe you fell for it. You know what Cara? Your family is just stupid! Anything that comes out of the mouth of a priest, you go for it. Good little Catholics. Naive doesn’t begin to cover it. Probably comes from going to Catholic school. Never learned how the real world works.”

“Well, maybe I am stupid, but I’m not hiding from the cops and breaking in to people’s homes to solve my problems, can you say the same?”

As I talked to him, I could see that as he got more angry, he moved back and forth a bit, if I could make him mad enough, maybe he’d move and wouldn’t be exactly between me and the door. If I could get him to move far enough, maybe I could get the hell out.

Good news, I could tell the door wasn’t locked, because the little bar thingy on the lock was horizontal and perpendicular is locked.

Bad news, he’s a cop, probably has a gun, although I hadn’t seen it yet, and definitely knows more about beating people up than I do.

Good news, I’m tall, long legs and I can move really fast when my life is in danger.

Bad news, it’s himself who’s putting my life in danger, and he’s between me and freedom, and I can try to talk myself into believing that he isn’t paying attention, or that I can manipulate him, but if he’s crazed enough to let me manipulate him, then he’s crazed enough to do something really stupid all over me. That could end badly.

My wee little brain was going to get whiplash with the back and forth, while he stood there and dripped and smoldered.

“Who’s the lawyer Cara?”

“What?”

“The lawyer, who is he, and what did you give him?”

“I gave him the journals.” No reason to let Jerkface know that Steph is the lawyer we’re talking about, he would just see her as one more vulnerable female, and drag me to see her, and then we’d both be found with our legs all akimbo.

“What else?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, what else did you give him? We read the journals. We read them together. There was nothing there. There has to be something else.”

“Fine, you know what, I did find something else. It was a key.”

“A key to what?”

“A key to the toilet paper holders in the bathroom at the condo complex.”

“Shit.”

“And in the toilet paper holders, we found 8 memory cards. Do you have any idea how much data can be held on 8 memory cards? Enough to put you and everybody else in jail. So, if you want to add to that, go ahead.”

“Me? Everybody else? You still don’t get it do you Cara? I’m the one that has been trying to help. To help you and her, you stupid…” Lightening crashed outside, so I didn’t have to hear exactly what he said, but the message was pretty clear.

I couldn’t shut myself up, not the first time I’ve had that problem, “Yeah, my knights in shining armor often run my ass over in front of my parent’s house and break into my apartment and hold me hostage.”

“I’m not holding you hostage.”

“Then I can go?”

“No!”

“Then you’re holding me hostage.”

“No, you’re in protective custody.”

“Does your boss know about that? From what I saw in the parking lot, I don’t think he knows about your plan. Are you telling me that you’re saving me from the chief of police? Some kind of corruption that goes all the way to the top?”

“I told you to stay out of it. I begged you to stay out of it. But you just wouldn’t listen. You know what this is going to cost me? Everything. You know what this is going to cost my family? More than that. You couldn’t just stay out of it.”

“What’s going on Joe? You just told me that nothing on those memory cards can hurt you,
then
you tell me that this is going to ruin you and your whole family. That doesn’t make sense to me. Maybe you need someone to help you think all this through. Maybe I can help.”

When he didn’t say no, I went with the assumptive close and kept on talking. “If this isn’t about police corruption, what is it about?”

“It doesn’t matter anymore. You’ve ruined everything. It could have all ended. We finally could have been free, but you just had to get in the middle of it.”

“I didn’t just happen to come into the middle of it, I was invited, remember? You’re the one that contacted Billy, and had Billy contact me, aren’t you? I honestly thought I was starting a new business. I honestly thought I was doing a good thing for a good person.”