G-Men: The Series (67 page)

^{chapter 28}

I got everything situated with the university on Friday. I was taking a temporary emergency leave due to family illness. This meant that I wouldn’t be dropped from my program of study, unless it extended into or beyond the following semester. I was able to work out transferring two of my classes to online status, which made me feel better.

Back at the apartment, I packed up most of my clothes and personal items. I was carefully putting Robespierre on top of the clothing I’d packed in the last suitcase when Taz wandered in.

“A childhood friend?” he asked, nodding toward the well-worn stuffed poodle.

“Sort of,” I replied, smiling nostalgically. “It was a gift my father brought back for me when he traveled to France on business. It’s funny, I just found him again when I was home at Christmas. Mom had packed him up when she moved from Indy. Before I left for college, he was a constant in my bed at home.”

“It looks like he’s seen better days,” Taz said, grinning. “Is that how I’m going to look one of these days?”

I looked up at him and saw his eyes sparkling mischievously.

“Very funny,” I replied, looking back at Robespierre with the tattered purple sash tied around his neck. “Maybe I can spruce him up a bit,” I said, getting an idea from the purple satin ribbon I still had set aside from when I opened the box containing the roses.

I went to the kitchen and grabbed the purple ribbon and a pair of scissors and returned to my room. Taz was busy packing his duffel bag with the clothing he’d brought for his stay.

I measured the silk ribbon from the box, and cut it to the appropriate length. I sat on my bed, and put Robespierre on my lap as my fingers worked to untie the tattered sash that was knotted around the neck.

I finally used the scissors to cut it off and unwound the rest of it. That’s when I noticed how the stuffed poodle’s head now flopped to the front. That was strange. I turned him over to check the back and saw that the seam had been ripped. There was a gap of a couple of inches. I could see the stuffing.

“Oh, he’s torn,” I remarked, sticking my finger in the opening and wiggling it. “Poor little pooch.”

Taz looked over and shook his head. “Well, we don’t have time for you to sew him up right now. We need to get going, baby girl.”

The index finger I’d been wiggling inside of the stuffed toy came in contact with something. Taz glanced over and saw my furrowed brow.

“What is it, babe?”

“There’s something in here,” I said, poking my middle finger in to help grasp what turned out to be a small plastic bag with a sealed top. It was one of those tiny bags like extra buttons are put in when you buy a coat, in case you lose one.

There was no button in this small, plastic bag. There was a key.

“Drop it,” Taz said immediately.

I let it fall to the bed, looking at him in confusion.

“We need to preserve any prints that might be on that bag, besides yours now,” he explained. “Do you have tweezers?”

Silly man. Did he think I’d been born with these perfectly arched eyebrows? What female didn’t have tweezers? I pulled tweezers from the make-up bag on my bed.

“Can you get me a baggie or something, Lindsey?”

I went to the kitchen and came back with one. Taz used the tweezers to lift the small bag with the key and dropped it into the larger plastic bag, sealing it up.

“I’ll take this to our lab when we get back to D.C. and run the key and the plastic bag for prints.”

“That’s kind of an odd looking key, isn’t it?”

“It looks like a key to either a post office box or safety deposit box. Do you know whether your father had either?”

I shook my head. “Mom might know.”

What were the chances that I would have come across that key to begin with? Maybe I wasn’t supposed to find it. I shivered. I finished tying the new purple ribbons around Robespierre. It did make his head less floppy, being supported with a new sash.

“Sweetie,” Taz said, watching me. “I’m going to need to take your little poodle there, too.”

“Why?” I said, looking at him in confusion. “There’s nothing else in there but stuffing.”

“I just need to have the lab check and make sure.”

“So, the gist of it is that the one thing I have left that my father gave me is going to be ripped to shreds?”

“I’ll see that he is sewn back up…good as new,” he said.

“There,” I said, tossing the stuffed dog over to him. I went back to my packing in silence. Why did everything have to be put under a microscope these days?

Taz followed me on the two-hour trek to Falls Church. He brought my suitcases and boxes into the house. I told him where my room was and he lugged everything upstairs for me.

The house was quiet for now. I knew that would change this evening, once Mom, Slate and Bryce got home.

I checked the fridge to see if Slate had been bothering to shop while Mom had been gone. I was pleasantly surprised to see that he had everything well stocked. The house had been kept neat and clean as well.

I’d just sat down on the sofa in the family room when my phone sounded. It was Kyzer. Taz hadn’t come back downstairs yet.

“Hey, Kyzer,” I greeted.

“Hey, Lindsey,” he said. “I just wondered if you were home sick or something. I didn’t see you at school today.”

“I was going to call you this evening,” I replied. “Everything has kind of been chaotic. I’m at home in Falls Church. My stepfather called earlier in the week and said I was needed at home. There’s been a bit of a family emergency. I had to withdraw from my classes to come home and help out.”

“Oh,” he said, sounding genuinely concerned, “it’s nothing serious, I hope.”

I appreciated the fact that he wasn’t trying to be nosy about it. I didn’t totally agree with Taz on his assessment of Kyzer.

“Well, it’s not life-threatening or anything. I’m helping my mother out until she starts feeling better. Mostly, I’ll be looking after my baby brother and helping out around the house.”

“I hope everything works out okay. Is there anything I can do?”

“Well actually, I’m taking two of my classes online now. They happen to be the same ones that you and I were taking together. I’m not worried about the English Composition, but you know how much I hate Physics. It’s like second nature to you. So, since I won’t have easy access to a professor, would you mind terribly if I call you when I get in a bind? You’re pretty great at explaining theory.”

“That’s no problem whatsoever. We can be online study buddies if you want.”

I felt relieved. I knew Kyzer was a whiz at any type of science class. I’d initially been concerned about transitioning that class to online status.”

“Great. Thank you.”

I gave Kyzer my e-mail address. He said he would e-mail the notes he’d taken in today’s class on a Word document for me to review.

“Hang in there, Lindsey,” he said. “Lean on me whenever you feel the need, okay?”

Taz was coming into the room and, with the way he felt about Kyzer, I felt it best to wrap up the conversation.

“Thanks again,” I said. “I better get going. I have a lot to do.”

“Okay. Check your e-mails when you get a chance. I’ll have the notes waiting for you.”

Taz was giving me a look that plainly asked “Who was that?”

“That was Kyzer,” I answered his unspoken question. “He was just checking to see if I was sick or something, since I wasn’t in class.”

“Humph,” he muttered, “At least you won’t have to be exposed to that Poindexter anymore,” he replied.

I decided it was best not to let Taz know we were going to be online study buddies. He had a major issue with Kyzer that I was convinced was more territorial than anything else.

“We have a few hours until Slate and your mom get here. Do you want to go out and eat?” he asked.

“Sounds good to me,” I replied.

Taz took me to his favorite Mexican restaurant. It was called ‘El Papagyos.’

Mexican food was not my favorite cuisine, but the food and atmosphere there definitely moved it up a couple of notches. It might have been the company I was with. We enjoyed dinner, just talking about normal things for a change.

Taz had grown up in Marin County in northern California. His parents still lived in Sausalito, the town where he was raised until he enlisted in the Army after completing his B.S. in Military Science at U.C. Berkeley.

After graduation, he immediately enlisted in the Army and made E-4 right after boot camp. He then began jump school and graduated as a Green Beret within six months. That’s when he met Slate.

“So, what about your family?” I asked.

He shrugged.

“They’re like a lot of other families, I suppose: hard-working, honest, driven, flawed, opinionated, proud, judgmental, and conflicted.”

“Wow,” I said, sipping a glass of Sangria. “That’s a lot of adjectives, most of them not exactly flattering.”

“Oh, yeah?” he replied, looking directly at me. “How would you describe your family, Lindsey?”

“Now or before?”

“The family that raised you?”

“I guess, at the time, I considered them loving, caring, dedicated, comforting, secure, and nurturing.”

“And now?” he asked, cocking that lovely eyebrow.

“Clearly fractured and dysfunctional. But you’re the Psych major here, so I’m betting you already knew that.”

“No family’s perfect. I’m glad that your mother’s with Slate now. Even though Slate’s not blood to you, he does care and will always do what’s best for your mother and brother, and he’ll do his best to be there for you. He understands you’re grown up. I’ll bet he even understands that you still love your father, and that your love for a parent doesn’t just magically disappear.”

“Why do I get the feeling that somehow there’s a cryptic message underneath what you’re saying to me right now?”

He shifted in his seat, his hands folded underneath his chin.

“I saw the way you were this afternoon with the stuffed dog your father gave you. I noticed how you wanted to fix it so it looked as good as new again. Is that what you think is possible with the relationship between you and your father, if he comes back into your life?”

I mulled over his words in my head. “Is that really the question you’re asking me?”

“I’m not following?”

“I think the question that you just asked me is not really the question that’s burning in your mind. I think what you
really
want to know is, if somehow, my father should make contact with me, be it in person, or by phone, or by freaking carrier pigeon, what I will do? Am I right?”

“It’s a legitimate question.”

“Then why’d you dance around it? Why didn’t you phrase it the way it should’ve been asked? I don’t want you playing Psych 101 with me. I don’t want you asking me things in order to interpret it to mean something else or speculate my behavior that way. If we can’t be upfront and honest, then what the hell are we doing hanging with each other?”

“Fair enough,” he replied, “I get it.”

“Okay, then. Here’s your answer. If my father somehow approached me and asked me to help him hide, or contacted me to meet him somewhere, I would refuse. I’d tell him that I loved him. I’d also tell him to turn himself into the authorities and let it play out in our judicial system. I’d advise him that in no uncertain terms would I assume the role of aiding and abetting his flight from prosecution. I’d also ask that he never contact me again if he didn’t plan on following my advice.”

Taz reached over and picked up my hand, gently lifting it to his lips. He kissed it softly, his green eyes gazing at me.

“What if during all of this, you were made aware of where he was staying, or where he was heading? Would you assist the authorities in seeking him out?”

“Do you mean like saying I’d meet him and then double-crossing him so that he could be apprehended?”

“Yes, exactly.”

“Absolutely not.”

^{chapter 29}

Taz and I had driven home in silence from the restaurant. I suspected he was not happy with the answer I’d given him on his final question.

I had to be honest, though. I knew what my father had done was wrong. I also believed that people who break the law need to be held accountable. I had to draw the line, though, at playing ‘bounty hunter’ with my own father.