Jex Malone (12 page)

Instinctively, I pull the drawer all the way out and carefully wedge my hand in the back. My stuff is always getting stuck back there and I'm forever taking the drawers out to find what's missing. It's almost second nature to do a search mission at least a few times a week. Nat and Deva are looking at me with curious, wild expressions on their faces.

“What are you doing?” Nat mouths to me in a silent scold.

I shake my head. My fingers are reaching toward the back of the cabinet and
eureka
! I feel something: the thin, paper edges of an envelope.

Carefully and quietly, I pull the first drawer from the stand and then the second to make a little bit of space. The drawers are warped and only come out a bit, but enough for me to get a grip on the envelope with my now aching, dirty fingers. Slowly, I pull it out of the back of the nightstand where it has been hiding—or should I say
was hidden
?

The envelope appears as if it's been in a time capsule because it's relatively unwrinkled. Written on the cover in big, bold letters are the words:
PRIVATE
.
Property of Patty Matthews
.

I look at Nat, whose eyes are now as wide as mine were at that window. Without saying a word and before I can do anything, she grabs the envelope and shoves it under her second sweatshirt and tucks it into the waistband of her shorts. Pulling her shirt down, she yanks me away from the nightstand as she pushes the drawers back in.

Putting two fingers to her lips to silence us, she grabs Deva's hand and mine and almost shoves us back up the stairs.

Again, there are four of us.

Me.

Nat.

Deva.

And Patty.

“How do you hide a gun in a bikini?”

—Kelly Garrett,
Charlie's Angels

Once we hit the top of the stairs I can see the white hot anger on Cooper's face. His expression seems to say, “I didn't know John Malone had a daughter. And now she has really overstayed her welcome after virtually breaking into my house.”

I can't help but wonder in the last thirteen years since his sister disappeared if he talks about it with his mother. Do they ever say, “Remember when Patty was here … ?” or, “Remember that thing Patty would do? Patty always said … ”?

It has to be out of control. A family member just disappearing … well, I guess that's something we actually have in common, although my dad technically has always had an actual mailing address.

Does he miss her?

Still?

When we emerge from the stairs with the envelope safely hidden, I feel a sudden case of the guilts hit me hard, but I mask it with a casual “what's up” kind of face. Cooper is sitting at the kitchen table with Cissy, who is busy wringing her hands while he stares with a frown in the general vicinity of the basement, waiting for us to emerge.

“Oh gosh, thanks for the drinks, but we gotta run,” Deva says hurriedly as she grabs Cissy by the hand and physically rips her out of her chair. “Lots to do today. Very busy! Gotta go.”

What the …

My top is still soaked in that sticky red juice and my face is still the color of Hawaiian Punch, too. With my flaming red hair, there's a whole lot of red going on here. I'm sure my blue eyes look a bit frazzled and scared.

I smile weakly at Cooper and give him a small wave on my way out. For some reason, I see something visibly change when it comes to his mood.

“You have a nice smile,” Cooper abruptly says to me. “Unlike your father. He just frowns a lot.”

“So true, Cooper—and thanks for the drink,” I stammer and then stifle a laugh when I look down at my shirt. “Okay, so maybe next time I'll just have water. Much safer.”

I smile again.
Wait. Did he just say I had a nice smile?
My heart is pounding loudly.

“Okay. Water. Was that a joke?” Cooper asks, his eyes crinkling just a bit as he attempts an actual smile.

Then his frown returns.

Maybe he thinks this was all just a dare. Maybe they dared me to survive the freak house where the girl went missing.

“Why is it that all of a sudden I'm so popular with you girls?” Cooper shouts to us as we cross his yard. I stop for a moment and glance back at him as he states the not-so-obvious.

“Must be a full moon rising,” Cooper mutters to the universe. “Freaks are always popular during full moons.”

There is absolutely no time to do a rewind of all things Cooper. For starters, the weather is about to go off the charts. I spy the lightning rip across the desert sky in our neighborhood as all four of us race out of Cooper's yard. Maybe it's the smile comment, but I'm not even paying attention when I practically fly across the lush green grass of the house next door.

“Get the hell off my property!” a raspy voice barks at me, followed by a wet, throaty cough.

I look down at my feet to see why they are not moving, only to notice they are unfortunately smack in the middle of an island of white and purple fat petunias that are somehow beautifully surviving the summer heat.

“Girly, you take one more step, and I'll get my shotgun!” he bellows at me.

I blink hard and see that Nat, Cissy, and Deva are already across the street, each motioning me hard with their hands in constant fluttering motions to keep going and get the heck out of there.

When I blink again, I see a man who must be close to seventy, but he's far from frail. He's actually tall, maybe six foot two or three, and burly, like maybe he used to work on a ranch or something. He is wearing a long-sleeve drab gray shirt—Who puts on long sleeves in the summer in Las Vegas?—and frayed gray pants hitched up high, almost to his armpits.

His hands are hidden by huge gardening gloves, and his face is partially obscured by a tattered, old canvas hat that looks like something an old man would wear fishing on a lake. A lake somewhere normal, somewhere with water, that is.

From the corner of my eye, I can see that he has the largest pair of gardening shears I've ever seen in my life.

He could literally cut me in half with them.

I want to move, but I can't take my eyes off the shears. They extend out into a point so sharp I swear I see a glint coming off them, or worse, maybe they are attracting lightning like a lightning rod.

The old man is walking toward me purposefully, but not quickly. He's looking me square in the eye, like he's giving me a chance to get away.

Cannot. Make. Feet. Move.

As he gets closer, I can see his features more clearly. He has craggy, wrinkled skin, big sickly looking fleshy bags under each eye, and thin, cracked lips that are pursed together tightly. His eyes are so pale blue they're almost the color of ice. Every muscle in his face is tense with anger and intensity.

He abruptly stops his charge at me. And he stands there, shaking with anger. I don't think I've ever seen anyone so angry in my entire life, and certainly not with me.

I'm not going to be foolish and provoke him. Instead, I will my feet to move. Swiftly and gingerly, I step out of the flowerbed without busting a bloom. In a single bound, I am on my way out of the yard and hightailing it back to my friends who are anxiously waiting across the street. Cissy is swaying so hard in a nervous dance that I think she might fall over.

I nearly fall into their arms when I get there.

“What is his damage?” I ask them in a shaking voice.

“Oh you have no idea how bad Mr. Foster is,” Deva answers, her voice getting huffier by the moment as she swerves around the corner. The golf cart actually tips a bit to the right because it's not meant to go at NASCAR speeds.

“Oh great,” says Nat. “Here we go. We're about to enter a zone I like to call Def-Con Deva. Others would call it a rant. Just don't tip the cart, please.”

“Every time I drive my golf cart past his stupid house and he's in his yard, he actually says, ‘Nasty spoiled little rich girl,' and I am sure he thinks I can't hear him, but I totally can,” Deva rants.

“I actually know people who have a big beagle, the sweetest thing ever, and he has threatened to kill the dog if they come anywhere near his yard,” Nat says.

“We call him Old Man Foster. The Old Fool. Scrooge,” she says.

“As for his stupid house … are you kidding? There isn't a single kid around with enough nerve to do anything to Old Man Foster's house,” Deva adds, dismissing my thought with a wave of her hand. “At least not anymore, now that his wife dropped dead—but that's another story.”

“Did he kill her?” I ask, which of course seems a perfectly normal question to ask having seen him wield a deadly garden tool and knowing that people seem to turn up dead in this neighborhood.

“Nah, she just died of old age or some disease, which was sad. Mrs. Foster was actually very nice. She was one of those ladies always making cookies for everyone in the neighborhood,” Cissy says.

“Now, he's alone, but don't feel sorry for him,” Deva snaps, and her abrupt tone startles me. “He probably had something to do with her death.”

“What do you mean?” I ask, her harsh tone surprising me. “I thought you said she was old and sick.”

“She wasn't
that
old,” Deva responds. “Plus, it just seems all too convenient—one day she's fine and then the police start asking a few questions and the next thing you know, she's dead.”

“Asking questions?” I interrupt. “Why were the police asking him questions before his wife died?”

“Because he's a suspect,” Nat almost whispers.

I shrug my shoulders because I really don't want to hear about some old lady and another death. I am technically on vacation.

“Forget about his wife. He's a suspect in the disappearance of Patty Matthews.” Cissy fills in the blank. “The neighborhood nut is always a suspect, and few are nuttier. Plus, he hates kids and loathes teenagers.”

“Now, he mostly keeps to himself,” she continues. “I think he's hiding some secrets. Dangerous secrets.”

Deva finishes it.

“For a long time after Patty was first gone, all the kids in the neighborhood would go stare at his house and Patty's house,” she says. “I know it's weird, but it was a big draw around here. Everyone wanted to take a look.”

“It's what he said to the kids that's … upsetting,” Cissy interjects.

“He would just glare at us and sometimes mutter, ‘Maybe it should have been you, little brat,'” she says with a shiver.

“I'm going to go out on a limb here and say they're hiding something.”

—Catherine Willows,
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation

I have no idea if teenagers can technically have heart attacks. But I'm sure of one thing: I might be having one.

Even in the safe confines of Dad's little abode, my chest is pounding and my breath is still ragged. I do what we were taught in health class and actually take my pulse.

Bump. Bump. Bump.

Good news. Still alive.

Nat pulls up her sweatshirt and pulls down the front waistband of her shorts while pulling out the envelope with Patty's scrawling signature across the top. A wide smile spreads across her face.

“Didn't figure on any take-home gifts, did you Ciss?” she asks as a look of horror spreads across Cissy's suddenly pale face.

“What is that? Where'd you get it?” Cissy shouts, truly freaking out.

“Oh, it's just a little something we found in the basement,” Deva says dismissively. “I'm sure it's nothing, but we took it anyway.”

“I don't know, looks like something to me,” Nat counters as she flips the sealed envelope in her hands. “It seems to me anything Patty Matthews might have touched has some kind value.”

“How could you take it, it's not yours!” Cissy—now in full-blown freak-out—shouts way louder than she should. “That. Is. Stealing!”

“It is not stealing,” I jump in. “It's not stealing if it belongs to someone who hasn't been seen in thirteen years. I'm sure there's some sort of statute of limitations on possessions or something that covers us on that. Nat? Jump in here.”

“Well if you're asking for my legal opinion,” Nat says, straightening her shoulders and now sitting upright with a large grin on her face, “then I'd say it's probably in a very gray area of the law. And even more importantly, we are losing our focus. We actually have a piece of evidence here that's never been seen before! Can you even believe it? One day into our case and we hit pay dirt.

“This is so exciting!” Nat cries, opening the envelope slowly in the now silent room.

A purple spiral Mead notebook falls out, and Nat gingerly flips through the pages. There it is, in black and white, words in Patty's handwriting spilling God only knows what. “It looks like a diary,” Cissy whispers.

Cautiously, I open it to the first page and there is tiny, loopy cursive writing. I flip ahead and find that the entire notebook is filled with Patty's writing. It's her journal. Her diary.

My jaw almost hits the floor while Nat begins to do a happy dance around the room. Cissy smiles nervously while Deva examines her nails.

“I guess we really are doing this,” Cissy whispers. “But we can't read it until tomorrow.” Three nods agree with her. Even if it's killing us to wait.

We are adjourned … and alive.