Chapter 18

What starts with a P and ends with -orn?

-Popcorn

(You’re such a perv.)

Steel

“So, will we be like…stepbrother and stepsister?”

I snorted as, Sean on one side, Conleigh on the other, sat glaring at each other.

“Conleigh,” I tried to contain my laugh.

“You refused to let my mother work on your ambulance with you.” Conleigh narrowed her eyes at Sean.

Sean didn’t even blink.

“I refused to let your mother work with me because she can’t lift a cot,” he said, explaining why he’d denied Winnie a job.

I hadn’t known that happened, and Winnie wasn’t sore about it. Conleigh, apparently, was.

“You’re a shithead,” Conleigh retorted. “My mother doesn’t need to lift the cot. That’s what the EMT is there for if she needs help.”

“Company protocol says she needs to be able to lift the cot. I don’t make the rules, I just follow them,” Sean shot back.

Conleigh lifted her lip in a silent snarl. “That’s bullshit, and you know it. Ninety-nine percent of the time there’s a volunteer firefighter or paid firefighter on the scene. I’m not stupid. You can’t tell me that she’ll only ever be alone lifting that cot. If, say, the EMT couldn’t do it, there’s always a family member there you could possibly ask for help. Or, hell, even a bystander of whatever scene you’re on. It’d be a cold day in hell before there was no one there that could help. And my mom’s getting stronger every day. She’d been PRN—part time as needed—since she moved here ten years ago. Then she had her accident, and you declared her unfit for duty. That extra two hundred dollars a month paid for my baby brother’s clothes.”

Sean’s jaw firmed.

I’d bet my balls he hadn’t known anything about Winnie when he denied her working there.

“He hadn’t had a new pair of pants in a while until your father bought him some for his birthday last week.” Conleigh rubbed salt into the wound.

And it was a wound.

I knew for a fact that Sean hadn’t wanted to cut Winnie. He literally hated when someone couldn’t pass, but he was right. There were rules set in place for everyone’s safety, not just the patient’s.

But, Conleigh was correct, too.

Ninety-nine percent of the time, a medic wasn’t alone on scene. There was always a volunteer firefighter, paid firefighter, and sometimes even a cop on scene along with other random people—such as family or friends of the patient.

It was possible that she never would’ve been alone.

Sean, however, being an administrator, couldn’t pass people because he wanted to pass them. There were rules. There always would be, and it sucked, but it was what it was.

“Okay, who wants pizza?”

Winnie’s ‘pizza’ was homemade.

And, twenty minutes later, I found out that homemade pizza was better than ordering it.

“Holy shit, Winnie,” I moaned as I took another bite of food. “This is amazing.”

Winnie smiled.

“My parents used to own an Italian restaurant before my mom died. Dad got too sick to run it by himself…then I got pregnant right when I would’ve been able to help. He was so embarrassed by me that he refused to let me be anywhere near his restaurant—his pride and joy.”

I don’t think she’d meant to add that last part because she winced and looked at Conleigh.

Conleigh didn’t look worried, though.

Thankfully.

The girl had a short trigger and lost it at the drop of a hat. Luckily this wasn’t one of those times.

It was news to me, however, that Winnie still had a living parent.

I hadn’t known anything about them, and Winnie rarely, if ever, spoke about them.

“Did you know that when a male honey bee mates with a female honey bee, the male ejaculates and then his penis explodes? Sometimes a queen can mate with up to fourteen other male honey bees. And she leaves a trail of broken wieners in her wake.”

The table was silent until Sean said, “Interesting.”

“Why would you want to mate when your penis exploded?” Cody asked the table in general.

Naomi started to snicker.

Winnie only shook her head.

“That’s the million-dollar question, son,” I told Cody. “And one we’ll probably never know the answer to. Kind of like the praying mantis and the female ripping the head off when she’s finished.”

Cody blinked at me with wide eyes. “What?”

“Uhhh,” I hesitated.

Was I not supposed to tell him stuff like this?

“When male and female praying mantis’ mate, the female praying mantis rips the head off of the male’s body when she’s through,” Winnie said without missing a beat. “Now, do you want pizza?”

Cody nodded. “Did you know that Americans consume over three billion pizzas a year?”

I just shook my head and stuffed another bite of pizza into my mouth.

Having my family all together like this was making my heart fucking happy.

“Dad,” Sean said, interrupting my inner thoughts. “Did you ever think to share that you were the only freakin’ person in the department that didn’t have a ballistic vest?”

I blinked, then turned knowing eyes toward Winnie’s direction. Winnie, who was avidly eating her pizza and looking anywhere but at me.

“I didn’t think it was important,” I answered.

“You just got my kid a freakin’ jungle gym for her birthday that cost over a grand. That could’ve easily gone to your vest,” he said, sounding annoyed.

“Yeah,” I agreed, blowing a breath out in defeat. “But she wanted it.”

“She also wants to have her fuckin’ grandfather around when she graduates, or goes to prom, or gets goddamned married.”

I sighed. “Sean, I’m not allowed to buy my own things for the department. It’s company policy. Everything that I have has to come out of my allowance for uniforms, and seven hundred dollar vests aren’t in my allowance.”

The new bylaw was some bullshit rule that the city had come up with regarding new police procedures, and how police officers needed to be held to a higher standard or some bullshit.

I thought it was a fuckin’ joke, but again, as the police chief, I couldn’t very well buck all their policies, or they’d find a way to get rid of me—and my men needed me. They needed someone to look out for their best interests, something that hadn’t been happening lately. Especially in this day and age where a police officer was no longer looked upon with respect but with derision.

My guys weren’t bad. None of them, not even that stupid dumbass Matt.

Was he annoying? Yes. But he was good at what he did…well, you know, when he actually did his job and wasn’t cheating on his wife.

“Well, we’re going to fix that.”

I grinned.

“I’m already working on it, son.”

Just as I was about to have to explain how to my son, my phone rang.

Work.

“Hello?”

“Chief?”

I winced. “Yeah?”

It was Matt. Why the hell was he calling me on my day off?

“There’s an incident at work. It has to do with Conleigh.”

I looked over at where Conleigh was working on her third piece of pizza.

“What’s going on?”

“I just think you better get down here.”

I said I’d be there in ten minutes and then shoved my phone back in my pocket.

“I gotta go,” I said. “Sean,” I ruffled his hair, causing him to curse. “Naomi. I’ll see y’all soon.”

Before I left, I ruffled Cody’s hair, just like I’d done to Sean, and received much the same reaction.

After passing Winnie and giving her a kiss, I left out the door chuckling.

I wasn’t chuckling ten minutes later when I arrived at the station.

“What the fuck?” I asked.

Matt had his arms crossed over his chest, staring at the building and the cruisers that weren’t currently being used by on-duty personnel.

“Who did this?” I asked.

“They’re pulling the camera feed right now.”

“You think she did this?” I asked.

“Her name is on the cruiser, Steel,” Matt said. “And it’s all over the school, too.”

It was late. Well after ten in the evening. The nightshift was usually smaller, which meant that more than two-thirds of our cruisers were at the station.

Goddammit.

There went the money I was going to use on the remaining ballistic vests.

Mother. Fucker.

“She didn’t do it,” I said. “She’s been with me all night.”

Matt turned his gaze toward me. “Taking over my family?”

I laughed and then turned to fully face him. “I’m not taking over anything. I’m picking up the pieces. It’s not my fault that you broke them.”

“Cody is my son,” he growled.

My brows rose. “You could’ve fooled me. What, you’ve only had him one week since I’ve been around, and, from what I’ve heard, you didn’t have much to do with him that week. Conleigh told me that the majority of the time he was at your parents’.” I paused. “You’re lucky I didn’t share that information with Winnie, or she would’ve been pissed.”

Matt snorted. “Whatever.”

I didn’t reply to that.

“Yo,” Tough said as he came up to us. “Kids. Multiples. But they’re all wearing ski masks. No way to identify any of them except by the color of a few of the ones with long hair. Brown, red, and one with pink streaks in it.”

“Conleigh has brown hair.”

“Conleigh’s name is on the cruisers, but she’s not very popular at school thanks to you. I wouldn’t put it past these teenagers to come here and do this because she has a job here,” I said to Matt, then turned toward Tough. “Get what you can. Call that mobile cleaning crew we use when we have accidents, tell them we need our cruisers and station cleaned. Get the fire department to hook them up with the water situation. I want this cleaned up by morning. This will not get out.”

“They’ll want overtime,” Tough offered.

I shrugged. “Then give it to them.”

And, hours later, after reviewing the tape myself, I was sure that I could identify at least two of them.

One of them was wearing a pair of sneakers that I remembered seeing at a certain fight a few weeks ago. None other than Matt’s new stepson, and the girl with the red hair that was his girlfriend.

I’d start with that in the morning, then go from there.

***

 

“Steel?”

I woke up instantly.

I’d been asleep an hour at most, but the moment Winnie said my name, I was wide awake.

After raising my son, then staying in this house with the woman I was falling fast and hard for and her kids—who I also cared about—I never slept deep.

“Yeah?”

It was still dark.

Really, really dark.

In fact, the only light that we had in the entire room came from the computer that Winnie had in her lap.

“I was thinking about something that I needed for Cody’s Halloween costume, so I got on Conleigh’s laptop because it was the first thing I saw. When I opened it, I saw this message on Facebook—the first thing that popped up when I opened the computer—and saw this.”

I blinked the sleep from my eyes, and cleared my throat.

“What is ‘this?’”

She turned the laptop around and showed me, causing my stomach to lurch.

“Who is that?” It was a picture of some guy’s dick. “Some guy is sending her dick pics?”

She scrolled down more. “Keep looking.”

The chat feed went on for what felt like hours. The beginning came about fifteen minutes later, and I finally realized that this all had started about two weeks prior.

“Andy. Did he send any other pictures other than his dick?” I asked.

Winnie shook her head. “No, nothing. His profile is bare, too. Just says his name is Andy Anderson.”

The name Andy Anderson made my radar ping, and I was just about to come to an epiphany when Winnie interrupted my thoughts.

“How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days,” Winnie suddenly blurted.

“What?”

“Andie Anderson is the heroine off of How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days,” she repeated. “That’s where I know that name from. It’s one of my favorite movies. That’s her. This guy spells his name differently, though.”

My eyes flicked to the screen, and I slowly started to read over what was being said on the screen.

Andy: Hello. You’re gorgeous.

Conleigh: Hi. Thanks.

Andy: You remind me of someone I used to know.

Conleigh: If you are from around here, it was probably my mother. We look exactly alike.

Andy: Haha, I don’t know your mom. I’m only nineteen.

Conleigh: She works at the ER in town. Your profile says you’re from Mooresville so you might’ve seen her there.

Andy: Maybe, I was in there last month for a cut that almost needed stitches.

My radar pinged again, but I continued reading, hoping it would come to me.

Andy: I’m okay. Just a minor cut. Didn’t even need stitches.

Conleigh: I’m glad. Your profile picture is cute. I want a dog. When did you graduate from Mooresville?

Andy: Last year. Mid-year. I’m in college now. I’m going for my engineering degree. They make us attend bible classes here.

Conleigh: I’d fail. I haven’t been to church since my grandmother took me when I was young.

Andy: You can always go with me. I could use all the help I can get.

Conleigh: Anytime. You never said you were on the football team!

Apparently, I was missing part of this conversation.

“Did you check to see if they were messaging on their timelines?”

“No,” Winnie shook her head, the harsh white light off the computer screen lighting her face. “I haven’t had a chance yet.”

Normally, I wouldn’t be so upset about this. But Conleigh was only sixteen, and this guy was nineteen and in college. Three year’s age difference wouldn’t be so bad if she was older, but she was so young, so the age difference here wasn’t just a big deal, it was a huge deal.

Huge!

I read the entire length of the conversation between Conleigh and this boy, Andy, as it went from just talking about their daily lives to whether Conleigh had ever had an orgasm or not. The last entry was from last night at 11:59 PM.

Andy: Can’t wait to see you again. Tomorrow. LY.

“LY,” Winnie said. “Does LY think what I think it means?”

I felt sick to my stomach. “Love you, would be my best guess.”

“So was this meeting for tonight or tomorrow night since it was almost twelve in the morning when he sent that last text?”

I got out of the bed and reached for my jeans that I’d discarded when I got into it.

“Only one way to find out,” I admitted.

She scrambled up beside me and snatched the underwear that she’d left discarded next to the bed.

Then she followed me closely as we made our way through the house and down the length of the hallway toward Conleigh’s room.

I moved to the side and gestured for Winnie to go in. “In case she wakes up.”

Winnie snorted. “Her brother likes to come in her room at night. I highly doubt that she’s going to do that.”

Me, either, but it was always safer to be cautious.

I’d learned that after twenty plus years of being on a police force, and eight years of being in the Army.

Winnie pushed open the door and gasped.

“She’s not here.”

I followed her and felt my stomach drop.

“I’ll put a BOLO on her,” I muttered, taking one last long glance around the room before marching down the hall toward the bedroom and my phone.

“Did you know that there are thirty-two ways to fold a piece of paper and make it look like a dolphin?”

For the first time ever, I didn’t stop to acknowledge Cody.

***

Two hours later, I sat on the arm of the couch and waited for Conleigh to finish sneaking her way in through the kitchen window.

Winnie was in the kitchen chair but scooted up against the wall of the kitchen right underneath the light switch. Her fingers were hovering over the switch, and she was glaring at Conleigh.

At least, that was what I assumed she was doing.

I wasn’t glaring.

I was scared.

I was scared for Conleigh. I was worried that she was in over her head, and I was disappointed.

Disappointed that she’d done this when she knew it’d freak her mother out.

And, if I was being honest, I was hurt.

I was hurt that she was doing this when I’d gone out of my way to make sure she was safe. To make sure that she wasn’t in trouble and had a job.

It was like she was spitting on my generosity.

Conleigh’s flip-flops hit the floor, and Winnie finally hit the lights.

Conleigh gasped and turned, seeing first her mother, and then me farther beyond.

“Mom…”

“You’re grounded.”

Conleigh opened her mouth and said, “That’s not fair!”

“You have a lot to learn.” Winnie stood up, her feet a little sluggish, showing her growing tiredness. “And one of those lessons is this: you’re grounded until I see fit to unground you. That means school, home, and work, if you have it, and then you come straight home. I’ll be revising your admin capability on the alarm, and from what I heard when I signed up, I can give you a password input that’ll tell me when you leave and when you arrive. So that means no more sneaking out in the middle of the night.”

Conleigh looked flabbergasted.

I stayed where I was, not wanting to get into the middle of it.

I loved these two girls in front of me, but Winnie was her mother. I was just the boyfriend of her mother, not anything to Conleigh yet.

At least, I thought.

Then Winnie pointed at me.

“He had officers out looking for you. He used police resources. He WENT OUT HIMSELF. He was gone all night long, and I woke him up an hour into him sleeping to show him the crap I found on your computer—a computer that you will no longer have, by the way. He read it all right alongside me, and then immediately got into his car and started looking for you once we realized you were gone. He’s more than gone out of his way to help you, and you’ve repaid his generosity by doing this?”

Conleigh looked at me like her favorite thing in the world had been stolen away from her, right out of her hands.

And I couldn’t figure out if it was because Winnie had taken her computer away or had grounded her.

Then Conleigh surprised me.

“I’m sorry,” she said, tears in her eyes. “I never meant to scare you.”

I felt like the wind was knocked out of me.

“You should be. Because you just made one of the biggest mistakes of your life. Do you even know who this man is that you’ve snuck out to see?”

“His name is Andy.”

“Andy Anderson doesn’t exist,” I said, breaking the silence. “I searched for him through the police database. No one named Andy Anderson, or anyone with the last name Anderson, graduated from the high school last year under that name. Or any other year, in fact. This man you’re dating isn’t who he says he is.”

“You’re…you’re kidding.” She swallowed

I shook my head.

“You could’ve been raped,” Winnie said. “You could’ve been raped, then killed, and I never would’ve known you were gone until tomorrow morning when I tried to wake you up for school.”

Conleigh’s tears slipped free. “But Mom, I’m okay.”

“Sure, right now,” Winnie said, swiping away her own angry tears. “But who’s to say that wouldn’t have been a different story tomorrow? What if we hadn’t found out today? This could’ve gone really badly, Conleigh. I can’t even begin to count the ways.”

“You don’t know Andy.”

“No,” I agreed. “You’re right. We don’t, and that’s the problem here. This boy, whoever he is, isn’t who he says he is. Right now, we don’t know what he looks like. His real name, or whether he’s even nineteen like he says he is. Is he even from here?”

Conleigh looked torn.

“I…”

“Tell us,” I urged. “This needs to be figured out. We need to know who this kid is, and we need to know more than what we’ve been able to pick up from searching his fake Facebook account.”

“He’s not nineteen. We never discussed how old he actually is, but nineteen isn’t possible. He’s, uhhh, maybe twenty-three or four.”

“What kind of car does he drive?” I asked. “Did he tell you to call him by any other name? What does he look like? What color is his hair? Does he have any distinguishing tattoos? Do you know where he lives?”

She swallowed, then shook her head. “He’s maybe five ten or eleven. He has dark black hair, brown eyes, and a small scar on his cheek. No tattoos that I’ve seen, either.”

I looked over at Winnie.

Winnie looked ready to strangle Conleigh.

“Anything else?” I asked gently.

“N-no.” She shook her head. “I’ve only seen him for about twenty minutes twice now. We’ve met down the block. He’s always in a rental car. He said his is in the shop.”

I nodded. “That’s more than what I had an hour ago…time for you to head to your room.”

Conleigh looked ready to argue, but her mother’s snapped, “NOW!” made her hop to without a backward glance.

I looked over at Winnie. “Come here.”

She shook her head.

I got up and went to her. Then wrapped her in my arms. “It’ll be okay, baby.”

“It will?” she asked. “Because from where I’m standing, I’m raising a criminal and a stupid child who could’ve gotten herself killed today.”

“She’s not stupid, baby,” I soothed, rubbing my hand down her back and calming her shaking body. “She’s a normal teenager who thinks, like we all thought, that she’s smarter than we are. We all did stupid shit when we were kids.”

She dropped her head to my chest.

“I hope you’re right.”