Gathering Dark Candice Fox (e reader TXT) 📖

“A shipping container full of guns,” Jessica corrected.

“One of my many hobbies is importing and trading rare antiques and domestic fineries,” Ada explained to me, shrugging innocently. “A simple shipping manifest mix-up has left Sanchez here with the unfortunate misapprehension that I’m some kind of international arms dealer.”

“‘Terrorist’ might be another word,” Jessica said.

“How dramatic.” Ada rolled her eyes.

“I guess that’s Dayly’s mom.” Jessica jutted her chin at Sneak, who was staring out at the pool.

“Millions and millions,” Sneak said.

“She’s not handling things very well right now,” I said.

“I can’t help you women.” Jessica put her hands up. “I’m in enough shit right now as it is.”

“Your cinematic debut not sitting well with the captain?” Ada asked.

Jessica’s neck flushed with red. “Where did you see it?”

“YouTube.”

“Wonderful.”

“What are you guys talking about?” I asked.

“Nothing.” Jessica scratched her neck. “Blair, if you’ve been the victim of a home invasion, you should go directly to the police. Your apartment is a crime scene. They’ll send a team out.”

“I’ve told you why we can’t do that,” I said, covering my nose and mouth. I was infuriatingly weepy. For fifteen minutes after I’d bolted from my apartment, leaving my attacker inside, I’d hidden in an alleyway crying and hyperventilating in turn, trying and failing to shake myself out of it. When I had gone back to my apartment after a few hours waiting in the dark, I had found the door open, the place empty, and Hugh Jackman’s container on its side in the kitchen, lid off, the creature long gone. The sight of it had thrown me into more tears. I drew a deep breath now and clenched my fists. “Look. When I left here yesterday, you hadn’t said no to me. You said you didn’t know what you’d do. I hope that’s because you wouldn’t turn away from the case of a missing girl just because it was brought to you by someone like me.”

Jessica gave a tired sigh, and I saw my opening.

“Ada and Sneak and I are ex-cons,” I said. “We’re bad people. But we’re trying to do something good here. Dayly needs us.”

The clang of the locking mechanism on the pool fence outside drew all of our attention. We looked out the unbroken kitchen windows and watched Sneak stripping off slowly at the water’s edge. She had more tattoos than I’d imagined, prancing pixies and butterflies around her hips, a set of paw prints on her white, round butt. She walked into the water and pushed off as if she was about to do laps in a public pool, heading for the deep end, her chin above water. She was still muttering to herself. Jessica bumped my shoulder with hers.

“I want to talk to you alone,” she said.

I followed her out onto the deck, past the pool, toward the back garden gate. I could see Sasha’s house through the foliage, and gripped the gate that surely gave my son access to Jessica for their little visits. So close to the world I desired, yet impossibly separated from it, the way I had been when there were bars and walls between Jamie and me instead of leaves and lattice. Jessica lit a cigarette and exhaled hard.

“You didn’t tell me Ada Maverick was involved in this,” she said.

“I left that part out,” I confirmed.

“Let me make something absolutely clear,” Jessica said. “You need to expend every effort you can from the moment you leave here today detaching Ada from yourself and this case.”

“What? Why? She’s been very helpful to us.”

“She can smell money,” Jessica said. “That’s why she’s here.”

“She gave us five thousand dollars to help our cause,” I scoffed. Ada was standing on the pool deck, out of earshot, smoking and watching Sneak cutting laps across the smooth surface of the water like a cat watching a fish in a tank.

“That cash was an investment,” Jessica said. “Trust me. I know that woman. She doesn’t do things out of the goodness of her heart. If she’s helping you it’s because she thinks it’ll be worth it to her in the long run. You can see where she’s coming from, can’t you? If Dayly’s got herself mixed up with gangs and drugs, that’s money. If there are corrupt cops somehow involved in this, that’s money. If she’s been kidnapped by someone for ransom, that’s money.”

“You’ve got it wrong,” I said. “She’s helping us because she owes me. I saved a member of her family. A baby. She couldn’t get even with me in prison and she doesn’t like the idea of people knowing that.”

Jessica laughed humorlessly.

“Yes, okay, she’s a violent lunatic,” I pressed. “But she knows when she needs to pay her dues.”

“It’s your funeral.” Jessica shrugged.

“Are you going to help us or not?” I asked.

Jessica looked at me. Really searched my eyes. I stood there, not knowing why, not knowing what she could possibly see in me but a killer who had returned to her world only to wreak more havoc, to bring yet more darkness than I had last time. I didn’t want her looking at me, trying to decide if I was worth helping. It was Dayly she needed to think about. Sneak, sitting on the edge of the pool, was staring at the wispy marine layer slowly creeping over the neighborhood toward the base of the mountains. Jessica threw her cigarette into the lush garden and folded her arms, seeming to have made a decision.

“Who was this guy who attacked you?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “It was pitch darkness. For all I know it was Tasik. He already set a parole officer onto me.”

“That’s a big leap. The guy did what any sane police officer would do—order a check on a parolee who’s acting strange—and then suddenly he’s trying to rape you in your apartment?”

“I don’t know if rape was the goal.”

“Might it be someone connected to Sneak? Or Ada? You invite these types into your life, you’re going to get—”

“You didn’t answer my question,” I said.