True Colors (5 page)
“You again,” the teenager said. His voice rasped as though he’d smoked since coming out of the womb.
“Yep, me again,” Logan said with a nod. “Brought you something.” He held up a McDonald’s bag that held four double cheeseburgers and the three Krispy Kreme doughnuts that he and Alex hadn’t devoured.
The boy snorted and blew twin streams of smoke out his nostrils. “You do know that crap will kill me, right?”
Logan shrugged as he balanced the bag on the kid’s knee. “So will starving.”
Justin pressed his lips together as he eyed the bag. Promises of tasty goodness floated out of the bag, somehow overpowering the offensive alley odors. He looked ravenous, his dark-rimmed blue eyes intense with hunger, his cheeks pale. Already thin to begin with, he’d lost weight since Logan had met him the first time a few weeks ago, his cheeks beginning to get that hollowed-out look. Logan hoped that sickly pale appearance didn’t have anything to do with drug use.
Logan waited him out, hands in his pockets as he nonchalantly studied the ugly green stucco that belonged to a Mexican restaurant. The Green Iguana. Good, inexpensive margaritas. Salsa exactly the way he liked it: strip-the-skin-off-the-roof-of-your-mouth hot.
The rattle of the paper bag drew his attention down, and he watched Justin plunge a hand inside and pull out the first paper-wrapped cheeseburger. “Is it a double?” he asked as he unwrapped it like a precious birthday gift.
“You bet.”
Justin sank his teeth in and rolled his eyes with ecstasy.
As Justin ate, Logan leaned against the stucco across from him, this one a mustard yellow. It belonged to a bar that Logan suspected turned into a strip club after hours. One of these nights, he planned to stop in and flash his badge. That should be enough to scatter the ne’er-do-wells into the night, at least for a while.
“So,” he said, hands still pocketed. “What’re you up to today?”
Justin grunted as he swallowed a huge mouthful, already ripping into a second sandwich. “What do you think?”
“I’m guessing a bunch of feeling sorry for yourself.”
Justin nodded and chewed. “Sounds good to me.”
“I don’t suppose you took my advice and went to see Dr. Paige?”
“Waste of time.” Burger muffled his words. Some color had returned to his cheeks, so the food was already doing some good.
“She works with kids like you all the time,” Logan said. “She might have some insight.”
“I don’t need insight from a bleeding-heart social worker to know I’m screwed up.”
“You’re not the only one, you know.”
“Yeah? What would you know? You look pretty well fed to me. What’re you hanging out with me for anyway? You think you’re going to get some?”
“I’ll pass, but thanks for the offer.”
Justin scowled as he plunged his hand into the bag for the third time. His eyes widened, though, when he pulled out a doughnut. “What the hell?” he breathed.
“It’s a doughnut.”
“I can see that, dumbass. I just haven’t had one of these in a long time.”
“A doughnut?”
“No, a Krispy Kreme. Jesus.”
Logan smiled. “Yeah, I praise the Lord when I eat them, too.”
Justin closed his eyes as he took the first bite and chewed. His expression said he’d tasted something beyond decadent. “It’s fresh,” he said softly, eyes still closed.
Logan felt a tug at his heart at how much this kid missed the finer things in life. He cleared his throat. “I’ve been there.”
“To Krispy Kreme?” Justin asked. “It smells like heaven. Mom used to take me there after school sometimes. When I was a kid and got good grades.”
Logan didn’t point out that he was still a kid. “I meant I’ve been where you are now. Living on the streets.”
Justin peered into the bag and grinned when he spotted two more doughnuts. “Hot damn.” As he tore into the second one, he said, “It could be worse. This could be freaking Chicago or New York. I don’t get cold at night. Much. And there’s this cop who brings me food on his lunch hour.”
“I can get you some help. Get you a place to sleep.”
“You’re talking about a foster home, right? I’m not going into the system. The system is screwed.”
Logan couldn’t argue with that. A front-row seat could provide a hint of the problems, but a starring role during a long-term run made the flaws glaring. “I can help with that. Make sure you get a decent place.”
Justin studied him as he chewed. “What’s in it for you? I already told you I don’t do guys.”
“Not yet you don’t. And that might not be around the next corner, but it probably will be around the one after that.”
“No freaking way. I don’t do that shit. It’s
disgusting
.” He spat out the last word a bit too vehemently.
disgusting
.” He spat out the last word a bit too vehemently.
Logan squatted, bracing his forearms on his knees, so that he was eye to eye with the teenager. “I’ve been here, Justin. I know what I’m talking about. There comes a point where you don’t feel you have a choice.”
Justin’s eyes rounded. “You—”
“And then there’s gangs. They make it sound like family, but it’s not. Your family doesn’t kill you if you decide to leave the fold.”
Justin finished off the last doughnut with a thoughtful look on his face. “You’re trying to scare me straight?”
Logan chuckled and shook his head. “You’re too smart for the streets, Justin. You’re too smart to flush your life down the toilet because your parents don’t know shit about how to deal with you. Instead of being bitter and pissed off, you can do something about it. You can prove that you’re better than this.”
“Hey, my mother obviously doesn’t give a crap about me, ’cause here I am. So what am I supposed to do? Where am I supposed to go? I have
nothing
.”
nothing
.”
“Yeah, it sucks. But you know what? You’re in charge now. You’re the one who decides what happens next. I’m just trying to give you some decent advice. This is the first step, sleeping in an alley and depending on the kindness of a stranger to keep you fed. You can spend the rest of your life wallowing and making bad decisions until you finally die young. Or you can get off your ass, brush yourself off and do something about it. Don’t do what I did, kid. Don’t roll over and play dead.”
Justin looked him up and down with narrowed eyes. “You look like you turned out okay, cop.”
“Took me a while. I’m offering you a shortcut.”
Justin glanced away, working his jaw as though either biting back angry words or suppressing tears.
Logan rose and his knees popped. Withdrawing a prepaid cell phone from his pocket, he tossed it to the boy. “I programmed my number into speed dial number two,” he said. “When you decide you’re going to do something constructive, give me a call.”
He turned and walked away without looking back, hoping like hell that he’d made an impression. Maybe it’d take a few, or even a dozen, more visits. He just hoped he could turn the kid around before he had no choice but to do his duty and haul him into the system.
CHAPTER SEVEN
A
lex shifted in the passenger seat of Charlie’s new Escape hybrid, wondering if she should tell her sister to slow the hell down. But Charlie seemed hell-bent on going wherever they were going. “Where are you taking me again?”
lex shifted in the passenger seat of Charlie’s new Escape hybrid, wondering if she should tell her sister to slow the hell down. But Charlie seemed hell-bent on going wherever they were going. “Where are you taking me again?”
“To see someone who can help.”
“You seem to know what’s going on. Why don’t you just explain it to me?”
“This is different.
Yours
is different.”
Yours
is different.”
Alex rubbed at the center of her forehead. That made no sense, but her brain felt too foggy to sort it out.
“Headache?” Charlie asked.
“A little.”
“Are you seeing flashes of light?”
Alex squinted sideways. “No. Why?”
Charlie kept her eyes on the road, but the coiled tension in her shoulders unfurled a little. “Good. That’s good.”
Alex decided to try another tack. “What makes you think I had . . . what did you call it? An empathic flash?”
Charlie braked for a stoplight. “You said something in the hospital after you were shot. You were out of it, but it was something you couldn’t possibly have known unless you’d gotten an empathic hit off me.”
“I don’t remember this.”
Charlie went on as if Alex hadn’t spoken. “I was sitting with you, holding your hand, and when you woke up, you were agitated. You said something about a body under the stairs.”
“I
really
don’t remember this.” And didn’t want to. A body under the stairs? Holy crap.
really
don’t remember this.” And didn’t want to. A body under the stairs? Holy crap.
“You couldn’t have known what I saw, Alex. Unless you saw it through my eyes.”
“This is nuts. It’s . . . it’s . . .” She trailed off, at a loss.
“What happened when you touched my hand earlier?” Charlie asked.
“You know what? Let’s just go back to your house so I can get my car. I don’t want—”
“Think about it. What did you see?”
Alex shook her head and stared out the passenger-side window. She didn’t want to relive those moments. The pain and fear had felt all too real, all too powerful. She shied away from the memory as surely as she shied away from the idea of a root canal without a painkiller.
“Whatever it was,” Charlie said softly, “it happened to me.”
Alex turned her head to look at her sister. “What?”
“You had an empathic flash on something that happened to me.”
Alex’s nausea returned in full force. “You should pull over.”
Charlie didn’t hesitate to swing the car onto the shoulder of the beach-access road.
Alex stumbled out the door and made it a couple of yards away from the car before doubling over. Nothing came up this time, her heaving stomach hollow and raw, almost painfully empty. Oh, God, this can’t be real. Don’t let it be real.
Her knees buckled, and she braced her hands in soft green grass and tried to catch her breath. A dream, a nightmare. That’s all this is. Time to wake up now.
Please
.
.
Charlie appeared at her side and placed her hand on Alex’s back, soothing in gentle circles. She handed Alex a fresh bottle of cool water, the cap already removed, and waited while she took a shaky drink. Several minutes passed before Alex thought she could speak coherently.
“He did that to you,” she whispered. “That man who tried to kill you. He kidnapped you and . . . tied you up.”
Nodding, Charlie stroked her palm over Alex’s hair in a calming gesture. “But I’m okay now.”
“I didn’t know it was so . . .” She couldn’t find an adequate word. “Horrible” wasn’t horrible enough.
“You’d been shot, Alex. You needed to focus on your own recovery.”
Alex closed her eyes and took several deep breaths to fight the churning of her stomach. Perspiration beaded on her upper lip, and she swiped the back of her hand over it. The world hadn’t made much sense to her before, but now . . .
“We should get back into the car,” Charlie said. “It’s cool there. You’ll feel better.”
Alex didn’t say anything as Charlie guided her back to the SUV, but she was thinking she’d never feel better again. How had Charlie survived such terror? And how the hell had Alex tapped into it?
Once they were back in the car, Charlie flipped the air-conditioning on high and pulled back into traffic, calm as you please.
“How?” Alex asked. She figured she didn’t have to elaborate at this point.
“I don’t know. It probably has something to do with when you were shot. You weren’t empathic before that.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I was, and I could tell you weren’t like me.”
“Have you always been . . .” She couldn’t bring herself to say the word. Didn’t want to acknowledge that it even existed. As if that would make a difference in how screwed up everything was.
“Some,” Charlie said. “But it didn’t become what it is now until after . . .”
“After?”
“Remember the woman I saw get killed when she was hit by that car? She was our cousin. And also empathic.”
Alex put a palm to her forehead and pressed against the growing throb there. “I thought we didn’t have any cousins.”
“Surprise.”
Alex didn’t respond to her sister’s attempt to lighten the mood. “So if that woman was our cousin, why are you just now telling me?”
Charlie sighed softly. “I didn’t tell you when I found out because she was murdered and someone was coming after me. I didn’t want to make you a target. And we haven’t had much alone time since then to discuss . . . things.”
Alex narrowed her eyes against afternoon sunlight that had turned blinding and wished she had sunglasses. “Things about Mom, you mean. Mom and her slew of secrets.”
Charlie nodded. “Yeah.”
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