Some Day Somebody (9 page)

***

At the end of the work day, Carrie glanced up as Sam paused before her desk. She smiled, semi-self-consciously, and turned her attention back to retrieving her car keys from her bottomless pit of a purse. It was the day before Thanksgiving and the long holiday weekend. She felt surprisingly distressed that she wouldn’t see Sam until Tuesday of next week.

Sam twirled his keys around his finger as he leaned against her desk. “You got big plans for the long weekend?”

“Just a get together with my family,” she said, lifting her gaze to meet his.  “You
know,
my mom and what’s left of her
litter
of eight kids.”

“What’s left?” he asked, skipping over the litter comment.

“I lost a brother to bone cancer a few years back.  But two of his kids will be there.
How about you?”

He gave her a non-committal shrug.  “My kids and I are supposed to spend it at my sister’s place this year. My folks will both be there, too.”  He leaned over on her desk, tapping his key on the surface.  “Hope you don’t have any run-ins with your ex over the weekend.”

“I shouldn’t,” she said, snapping her purse shut.

“You need to turn him in to the Sheriff’s department for making those phone calls, you know.”

His acidic tone made her drop her purse on her desk as she faced him once more.  “I told you I don’t know that it’s him making the phone calls.”

“Come on, Carrie. Of course it’s him!” he said.

”Really?
It must be nice to be so sure about things,” she said. “Exactly when did you find the proof?”

“I don’t need any proof.  I know it’s him, and you need to do something about it,” he told her.

“That’s what I need, huh?” she said, her tone sweet as honey, luring him like a fly to tacky tape.  “Maybe I need a big, strong man to take care of me over the holidays, too.”  She saw him puff up with prideful hope.

He pulled out his wallet and handed her his business card.  “My home number’s on there if you decide that’s true.”

CHAPTER 5

2:00 A.M
. Monday morning

The smile broke over his face as she answered the phone, her voice grumpy with sleepiness.

“Don’t you ever get tired of this?” she groaned.

Not hardly.

“Who’s there?”

I’m here.

“Okay, asshole. You’ve had your little fun for the night.”

He frowned as he heard the distinct
click
when she disconnected.  Three sentences from her sleepy lips wouldn’t do it tonight.  He hit redial, was rewarded a moment later when she answered, her voice a mixture of disbelief and anger. Her answer made him smile.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” she croaked.

Afraid not, sweetness.

“I tell you what. Just for tonight, let’s pretend you’re not a selfish jerk and let me get some sleep, okay.”

Or not.

“I’m hanging up now.”

I’ll call back.
 And he did—over and over again.  At least a dozen times—just to hear the sound of her voice grow increasingly more fearful, though she tried not to show it. He knew from talk around town that her mother was in a Lafayette hospital with a severe case of bronchitis.  No way would she take the phone off the hook, good daughter that she was. He used it against her.

The last time she answered nearly did him in. She answered, unafraid, pissed off enough to taunt him.

“Why don’t you say something, you chicken-shit, son of a bitch? What, did you get tired of drowning kittens and killing baby birds?”He smiled.
Small stuff.
Microscopic.

“You don’t scare me, you know!”

That’s not what the tremor in your voice is telling me.

“I’m taking the phone off the hook, now.”

“Carrie,” he whispered. Her gasp was the only thing that let him know she’d heard him. He smiled, imagining the look of shock on her face, and laughed after she slammed the phone down, breaking the connection. He hit redial, ready to raise the stakes, and tell her he was coming for her. Not tonight, but she wouldn’t know that. It was all part of the game to raise the terror factor. When he called back, he got a busy signal.

“No, no, no...Not now!” His voice—a prolonged, deep growl—resonated throughout the deserted back alley of the local bar.

He hit redial.
Busy signal.
Again...again...and again.
 

A low snarl accompanied the loud
crack
as cell phone hit the twelve inch thick brick wall.

***

After spending five days trying not to think of Sam over the Thanksgiving holidays, Carrie was surprisingly glad to see him waiting for them at his carpool pick up spot.  Instead of sitting in the front, he opened the back door, forcing her to slide to the middle as he climbed in next to her.  She tried to concentrate on her latest library book, a thriller by a cop turned crime writer.  Unfortunately, having Sam near enough to brush his arm against hers, to smell his cologne, sense his need to be near her...all kept her from concentrating as she read and re-read the same page for the sixth time. By the time they pulled up to the office, she was ready to scream.

As Dan vacated the seat to her left, Carrie slid across the bench seat toward the door. Before she could slip out she felt a gentle tug at her wrist, and turned to see Sam still remaining at his end of the bench seat.

“Please stay,” he murmured, his eyes pleading with her.

She kept her silence as one by one their co-workers entered the building through the back door.  When the door closed she turned to him, pulling her hand back.

“You were right, and I’m sorry!” he blurted out before she had a chance to say anything.  “I’m worried about you, but that doesn’t give me the right to tell you how to handle your problems. It’s your life and you’re a smart, self-reliant woman, fully capable of making your own decisions.”

“It’s not Dave.”

“If you believe that, then I trust your judgment.”

“No...
really
...it’s not Dave,” she said, her voice firmer.  “I know because I got the Sheriff’s department to trace the call yesterday morning.”

His face paled visibly.  “What happened?”

She rubbed at her tired eyes. “He wouldn’t stop. He kept calling, and calling. I didn’t want to take the phone off the hook because of mom being in the hospital. But finally, I had to.”

“So, they know who it is now?”

She shook her head. “It traced to one of those prepaid cell phones and whoever bought it paid in cash.  They know the call was made from around the Abbeville area, though.  Dave was at his mom’s last night.”

“You’re positive about that?”

“Yep, I called Ruby’s myself to make sure.”

“So, if it’s not Dave, then who the hell is it?”

“I don’t know, Sam. And that’s what really scares me. As long as there was a possibility it could be Dave, I could dismiss it.  But now...”

“Now you’re as worried as I am?”

She cocked her head and squinted up at him. 
“Maybe not that much.”

“Well, hell. It’s time
somebody
worried about you, Carrie,” he said, reaching out to touch her hand.

“Somebody,” she whispered, looking down at the seat, where his hand rested on hers.

“What was that?” he asked, leaning closer.

“Nothing,” she mumbled, pulling her hand back as she stepped out of the truck.

Sam hurried around to meet her at the door.  “You never said.  Am I forgiven?”

“You are, but don’t let it happen again.”

He shook his head. “It won’t. I got a lot of thinking done over the past five days.  I’m determined to change, Carrie.  Whether it’s for you, or just for
myself
, I’m trying to be a better man.”

She scraped her lower lip with her teeth and nodded, afraid to say anything more.

***

At seven-thirty the next morning, Carrie walked into the office and intercepted Sam’s look of worry.

“I know,” she muttered. “I’m late, and I look like crap.”

“I wouldn’t say that,” he countered. “Craig said you called saying you’d be too late to make the carpool. Anything you want to talk about?” 

She opened her compact and groaned at her reflection. “I threw on a little war paint during the drive over here, but Max Factor is a poor substitution for sleep.” She snapped the compact closed and dropped it in her purse before turning back toward Sam. The smile he gave her made her stomach flip in nervous anticipation. Jesus, what was it about the man that made her feel like a gawky, inexperienced teenager?

She forced her thoughts away from her cuter-all-the-time co-worker and back to the source of her exhaustion. “That caller whispered my name.” She stopped Sam from asking the obvious question. “I couldn’t tell who it was.”  She shivered as a frisson of dread caught her.  “At least the dogs didn’t go nuts afterwards. I think I’d have had a stroke.”

Carrie made her way to the snack machine for a breakfast bar, then the kitchen, where the aroma of freshly brewed coffee called to her.

Sam followed her and leaned his long form against the door jamb. “Anything else you can remember about the call?”

Carrie prepared her coffee and propped herself against the cabinet. “It’s always creepy, but this time it felt creepier.  Damn, this would be so much easier if it was Dave, but he’s obviously moved on.”

“Can I say one more time what a fool your ex was?”

She grinned up at him, marveling at how one line from him could totally lift her spirits. “I appreciate that, Sam.  You know, when I think back on the person I used to be before I met him, and remember how I was when I was with him, I can’t figure out when the old me disappeared. I don’t believe my children have ever met her.”

“Maybe it’s time to introduce them.”

She took another sip of coffee and nodded. “I will, as soon as I find her again.” They both turned toward the door as J.C. walked into the kitchen, fairly growling.

“What’s going on in here?”

“Sam’s letting me vent,” Carrie told him.

J.C. raised one eyebrow. “Is your ex still dropping by unannounced?”