She Belongs to Me (35 page)

He refused. “Are you sure it’s not more?”

“Such as…?” She felt her blood begin to boil.

“Well, I know how you feel about your mother and how she treated you—”

She cut him off sharply. “I am nothing like my mother!” she fumed. “My grandmother raised me, and she had four children and tons of grandchildren and great-grandchildren too. Don’t ever compare me to my mother!” She turned away, knowing she had tears in her eyes. She always cried when she was angry.

He turned her around then reached for her face but pulled his hand back as she jerked away. “Jaynee, I know you are nothing like your mother. I wasn’t implying—” He paused, sighing. “I just wondered if you thought children would come between us, as you think you did with your parents. I know you would never hurt a child.” Despite her rejection to his touch, he wrapped his arms around her, refusing to let her go. “I’m sorry. It’s just that I am twenty-eight and don’t want to wait until I’m over thirty to start a family, but I understand. I won’t pressure you.”

She relaxed in his embrace. “I’m sorry too, Jordan. I just think
it’s
best. Besides, you being a cop
isn’t
the best occupation when deciding to raise children, either.”

She couldn’t see his face, but she felt his body tense. He was ready to end the fight, and she had broached another sore spot. “I won’t be an officer forever. Actually, I was waiting to tell you this as a surprise, but I have it through good authority they are going to offer me a detective’s position. It’s not the division I wanted, but at least my foot is in the door.

Jaynee wasn’t positive this was good news, but she knew it was what Jordan wanted. At least he wouldn’t be on the streets every day.

She did her best to sound enthusiastic. “That’s good, Jordan. When? What division?”

“Auto-theft.”
His tone lacked the excitement she expected from his announcement. “I wanted rape or homicide, but I’ll take it. Probably right after we return.”

At least it didn’t sound too dangerous. She wasn’t certain what an auto-theft detective would do, but at least he wasn’t working the streets in one of the worst neighborhoods in Charlotte.

She turned in his arms and looked at him. “Are you not happy?”

“It’ll be okay. It’s just not what I envisioned when I joined the force. It’s a lot of insurance fraud more than anything—teenagers steeling joyrides,
junkies losing their vehicles in awry drug deals
. And then, every so often, they make a big bust on a chop-shop.” His eyes thrilled as he discussed the possibility. “Hard to imagine, but over six hundred vehicles are reported stolen every year in Charlotte. It’s a big division. It’s where John works, and he put in the recommendation.”

“It sounds exciting,” she added, hoping they were finished arguing.

Jordan pulled her closer, noticeably feeling similar emotions. Here they were under the stars with no appointments, no work in the morning, no reason to get out of bed if they didn’t want.

He kissed her gently and then with more fervor. “It’s not as exciting as you. Let’s go back to the room.” He stood up and held his hand out for her. She took it gratefully, and then he pulled her against his side, effectively ending any further argument.

Jordan did achieve the detective’s position and no surprise to her he was an excellent investigator.

His hours virtually remained the same, except the few times when he was on call. Fortunately, his Captain didn’t have a personal life and tended to appropriate all the overtime. But several times, when they detained a suspect and couldn’t obtain a confession, they’d call Jordan.

He was a natural; even criminals liked him. He had an ability of making everyone feel comfortable. “They don’t confess because they are pressured
;
they confess because they want to,” Jordan explained to Jaynee after one very exciting situation.

Uniformed officers apprehended suspects who supposedly raped a cocktail waitress. The detectives in the rape division couldn’t seem to elicit a confession from the perpetrators and were standing in the hall frustrated. They knew the guys committed the crime, several witness had seen them walk out after her, but it
would make it incredibly easier if they could obtain a written statement. Jordan’s Captain, having overheard the detective’s frustration, indifferently suggested sending Jordan in to speak with them, even though Jordan wasn’t in rape.

The detectives allowed him, and it wasn’t ten minutes and Jordan had one guy confessing to everything and consequently his friend felt compelled to do the same after hearing about his friend’s admission of guilt.

Jordan never talked about police work, but that day, he’d called Jaynee all excited and continued the conversation when he came home. He loved being a detective, and she thought he would never quit.

Again, over the next few years, it was the only other cause for discord among them. Several times when they went to dinner with another couple, typically cops, she would hear stories. She would attempt to remain calm, not wanting to upset Jordan and start an argument.
Luckily,
they were
usually
only old stories about how some woman offered her body in exchange for a ticket.

They’d been married for almost five years, so she was getting used to the stories about fights, but she still hated to hear them. She tried to prepare herself for more of the same this evening, as t
hey
walked in to
m
e
et several of Jordan’s coworkers for dinner.

John
was the only detective she knew;
he was there with his newest girl—who Jaynee tried to strike up a conversation—but it was no use, the girl was dumber than a box of rocks. Patrick, she recognized the other man’s name, worked with Jordan in auto-theft. His wife
seemed nice, but uninterested in socializing. Two other detectives,
Powe
and Williams, worked in Homicide according to Jordan. The men weren’t married and neither chose to bring a date.

Jaynee listened to the office politics and the he-said she-said monologues, finding
herself
bored with the melodrama. The men were worse gossipers than the women she worked with in restaurants.

Powe
raised his hand to break into an exchange she couldn’t hear between John and Patrick, as if cued by their conversation. “So…we heard we almost had a new case on our hands, and here we thought our jobs were dangerous.”

Jordan winced in his seat.

“Man! Can you believe that,” Patrick retorted in response to the homicide detective’s comment. “Li should have been locked away years ago; instead, he’s sporting an AK47 and taking potshots—”

“Excuse me,” Jordan interrupted Patrick, patting his pockets as he stood up in front of his chair. “I just realized I think I left my credit card in my jacket. Jaynee, do you have your purse?”

He knew she didn’t. She always left it inside the vehicle when they were together. “Uh, no,” she answered suspiciously. “It’s in the truck.”

Jordan reached for her hand
,
pulling her up at once beside him. “Let’s go get it.”

Jaynee sat back down. “That’s okay, Jordan. You go, I’ll wait here.”

Patrick rested his hand on Jordan’s arm. “Hey, hold on a minute, man. You’re the hero in this one. If it weren’t for you, we might all be dead.”

Jaynee eyed Jordan contemptuously. “I’m interested, Jordan. I haven’t heard this story.”

Jordan sat back down in defeat, his jaw clinched. Evidently, this wasn’t a story he wanted to share.

“So,” Patrick began again, his face animated. “We’ve arrested Li several times for auto-theft, but the judge always releases him…since it isn’t a ‘violent crime’.” He made quotes in the air, sneering at the judge’s words. “So to make a long story short…Jordan and I were eating lunch when John calls. They just made an arrest on a string of
armed
carjackings
, and this
perp
starts singing, giving them the head of their gang, who just so happens to be Li. Who,
as
I said, we
’d
arrested repeatedly, but now we had him on a multiple, armed offense and an informant.

“John instructed us to meet him at the suspect’s mom’s house; we were just supposed to bring him in for questioning. When we got there, his mom answered the door and said loudly ‘he not here, go away!’” Patrick imitated a bad impression of an Asian accent. “So, we knew right away Li was there.

“John escorted the mother downstairs, and I called for Li to come out. Li shouted from behind a door right off the front room. ‘Is my mom still here?’ and this is where it gets exciting. I don’t know how Jordan knew, but he told him ‘yeah, she’s right here.’ Li must not have believed him, because the next thing I knew Jordan pulled me to the floor whispering frantically, ‘He just
racked a gun! Go now! Stay down!’ I hadn’t heard anything.
And then, BAM!”

Jaynee jumped when he clapped his hands in front of him.

Patrick made eye contact with her. “Sure en
ough, the rounds commenced. And
y’all know the story from there…four hundred eighty-six rounds later, SWAT and a whole hell of a lot of paperwork.”

Jaynee said nothing the entire dinner, and no surprise, Jordan did have a credit card with him. He requested their check as soon as he finished eating, apologizing to his coworkers that he needed to get up in the morning.

Jordan slid his arm around Jaynee as they left the table and directed her out of the restaurant, but she wriggled herself free as soon as they passed through the exit. She waited as he opened her door but refused assistance. It was difficult getting into his truck even with the running boards, but she could manage.

She waited until he climbed up in the truck and then let him have it. “You were shot at? With an AK…whatever it was.” Jordan nodded, apparently embarrassed by his friend’s blunder. “And you didn’t tell me? You never tell me anything.” Traitor tears formed in her eyes when all she wanted to do was be angry.

He rolled his eyes, sighing deeply, an attempt at downplaying the severity of the incident. “You don’t want to hear it, Jaynee.”

“Yes, I
do
.”

“No, you don’t, trust me.”

She glared at him. “Was that the only time?”

“No,” he admitted. He may have kept his police work from her, but he never lied when she asked a direct question.

She exhaled loudly, attempting to control her temper.
“How many times, Jordan?
How many times has someone attempted to take your life that you
’ve
failed to mention?”

He licked his lips then looked out the window, evidently deciding whether to tell her the truth. “Three times with a gun,” he said in a solemn voice. “But that was when I was on the road. Those situations don’t occur now.”

“But it did!” The tears ran free now. “When you discovered that ring of motorcycle thefts and located the warehouse where they were taking them apart...that I had to hear about on the news. What if they had been ready when you busted in the door? What if they had machine guns, too?”

“It’s not like television. Li was a freak incident, and I’m fine obviously.” His tone abruptly turned sour.

She knew when she had pushed him too far, but she didn’t care. “I want to know, Jordan. I hate not knowing what is bothering you. When you’re melancholy when you come home sometimes and I wonder if I did something wrong. I need to know.”

He shook his head and huffed. “You don’t know what you’re asking.”

“Yes, I do. I hate not knowing. I hate this!” she fumed.

Jordan turned to her then, his eyes bore into hers. “You don’t want to know that I had to hold a two-year-old in my arms trying to do CPR after he fell in a pool and drowned because his mother was busy in her room having sex with some random man. Or, when I got into a fight at the scene of an accident where a motorcyclist was so drunk that he fought over his dead friend and actually threw his brains at me. Is that what you want to know? Is that what you want me to come home and discuss?” He hit the steering wheel in frustration.

Jaynee couldn’t speak;
she’d never seen him lose it and hit something.

“I warned you, you didn’t want to know,” he seethed.

She lowered her voice, hoping to calm him down, but she didn’t want to drop the argument this time. “You’re wrong, Jordan, I do want to know. I just don’t want you to have to contend with it either.” Then she decided to say something she swore she never would, but before she could even rethink them, she allowed them to burst out of her mouth. “I want you to quit, Jordan. We don’t need the money, your business does fine, and I can’t endure this anymore.”

The look in his eyes was surprise at first and then she watched as his face transformed to something else—indignation. “Fine!” he hissed. “I’ll resign when you get pregnant! How’s that for a compromise?”

She heard this before but never quite in this context. He
’d
always said he’d quit and said he didn’t want to be a cop when they had children, but he
had
never used it as an ultimatum against her before this moment.
So
now
what should she do? If she still refused to get pregnant, did that mean she didn’t care about Jordan? If she did get pregnant, only because he wanted her to, then how would she feel toward him? Would she always resent him, feeling as if he
’d
forced her into something she didn’t want right now? It wasn’t that she didn’t want children; she just wanted to be finished with school. And she had said it so often; she felt as if she had to stick to her decision. She had less than a year to go. Really, she should be finished by fall and would be able to graduate in the spring. She had taken so many classes, even through the summer to finish at her five-year mark.