“You crying?” I ask, meaning to tease, then wish I could reach out and pull my words back. I might be crying too, if my knee looked as jacked up as his.
“Fuck you,” he growls as I stand and offer him my hand to pull him up on his good leg. Propping him up with an arm around his back, I help him hop-hobble to my pickup and get inside.
Before I get in, I go back to Faye's truck. There is a laundry basket on the seat, but otherwise it’s spotless. The basket must be the things she didn’t want to leave behind when she ran. I grab it and empty out the glove box before locking the doors and pocketing the key that was left in the ignition.
I can’t stop my smile when I notice the USMC keychain beside the Ford key. The lack of a house key makes me think that she must have left it behind, not intending to return.
Fuck!
Blake must have scared the crap out of her. I’m regretting having him keep his eyes on her, since we knew where she lived and worked. I should have just went and found her at either place, and saved her the fright and Blake the injury. Which reminds me that right now I need to get Blake to a hospital, and then figure out where on God's green earth Faye is hiding now.
Fortunately for Blake, we really aren’t that far from Coeur d’Alene and a hospital. He is pale and sweating by the time we roll up outside the emergency room and I help him inside to wait. I check him in and tell the triage nurse a story about how we had been playing baseball and I threw the bat behind me, accidentally hitting Blake. It’s quiet enough and we don’t have much of a wait before he is wheeled back to talk to the doctor and get an x-ray. They let me tag along, and when the nurse cuts the leg off his jeans to check the injury, I wince at the huge black bruise running down his shin.
After a brief exam and the application of an ice pack, an orderly takes him to radiology. He’s back soon and feeling better from the ice and a shot of Toradol. The doctor reviews the x-ray and says he is pretty lucky. Nothing is broken, but he will be on crutches for a couple of weeks while the swelling comes down. He is also ordered to stay off his feet for the next several days. So now we are back on the road to Spokane. I don’t like that I have to delay finding Faye, but I have to take care of Blake first. My hasty decision is what put him in this situation.
The plan is to set Blake up at my place with painkillers and an ice pack. He’s pretty self-sufficient. Once I have him settled, I will be heading back to Idaho to find Faye. Not realizing that it’s me looking for her, I’m sure she has found a place where she feels she can safely hide. The good news is there are only so many places she can do that: motels that take cash, and shelters. I’m hoping for a motel, because a women’s shelter won’t let me anywhere near her.
Chapter Seven
Travis
With Blake settled on my couch with an ice pack, the TV remote, and my dog Max by his side, I’m free to resume my search for Faye. My first stop is her apartment, where it’s easy enough for me to pick the lock and let myself inside the studio over the auto shop. The space shimmers with bright colors and energy. It is so different from the photo Blake sent me of a thin, careworn Faye.
Inhaling deeply, I draw my first breath of air scented by her presence in years. Lemon and brown sugar, just like how her letters used to smell. She must like the combination. Something about it vaguely reminds me of her mom and I wonder if that is why she likes it. There are no clues as to where she might have run.
The diner where she has been working is my next stop. I’m still having trouble believing that we have been in the same city and I had no idea. I wonder how long she has been here. Her apartment looked like she was well settled, so it’s been a while. I can’t help but feel shitty about that. How in the world can I be the owner of an investigations firm when I couldn’t find one specific person in the same damn city?
The diner Blake directed me to is a shitty little dump outside of the city. Just one look tells me everything I need to know about it, and a bubble of anger builds in me knowing Faye was working here. I speak to a pregnant waitress named Ana. She seems a little older than Faye, and it’s pretty clear to me that she is hiding from someone. What is it about this place? Her hair is a dark muddy brown that is in stark contrast to her pale brows and porcelain complexion. After I assure her that I have known Faye since she was a child and that I mean her no harm, she borrows my phone to do an internet search on K&S Security. Only then is she comfortable telling me everything she knows about Faye. Or rather, Francesca Andrews, as she is now known. She doesn’t know much.
Most of what Ana is able to tell me I have already figured out myself. She has been working at the diner for about three years. Apparently it’s a good place to work if you are hiding from someone. The manager pays cash and the tips are usually good. It’s the parking lot business that seems to draw the truckers. Ana hurries to assure me that, unlike a lot of the waitresses here, she and Francesca/Faye never cross the highway to strip and they never, ever turn tricks in the parking lot. They just work any shift available and they work together as often as possible. Safety in numbers, she says.
I have to admit, witnessing the women working the parking lot when I arrived had alarmed me. Blake had warned me, but seeing it with my own eyes and absorbing that this is the place my sweet Faye has spent a lot of her time… well, it’s just not acceptable to me. She won’t be coming back.
Faye will never work another day in this cesspool. Not if I have anything to say about it. I’ve already decided that once I get her home I will have to find something new for Ana as well. I can’t leave someone who has been a friend to Faye in circumstances I wouldn’t want her in.
“Just find her and keep her safe. She sounded scared when I talked to her earlier.” Ana says as I turn to leav
e. That fear was my fault and I turn to go. On impulse I turn back to hand her a business card with my personal number on it and a hundred-dollar bill.
“Thanks for your time,” I say. “My job is keeping people safe, so if you ever need anything don’t hesitate to call.”
My simple words are loaded with honesty and she smiles for the first time. I can’t help but notice that beneath the exhaustion and fear she is a very pretty woman. I will make sure she and her little one have better opportunities in this city. It’s the least I can do.
I’m sure Faye will like that.
It’s getting late enough that traffic on the highway isn’t heavy, and I roar down it in silence. My mind is whirling with thoughts about where to begin my search once I get back to Coeur d’Alene. The ringing of my phone rips me from my contemplation. It’s Blake checking in. He says he is feeling better, the pain meds and ice are doing their job, and he wants to assist. He had one of our employees bring over his laptop, so he’s already hacked into the systems of every hotel in the city, checking to see if Faye is a registered guest at any of them. Armed with her full alias, he promises to run it again and be in touch as soon as he has info for me.
Thirty minutes later he calls back. Neither Faye or Francesca is registered at any of the hotels or any of the women’s shelters. At least not the ones with computerized records. How he found all that in only half an hour, while on pain meds, is a mystery to me. It’s why we are such a good team: where Blake excels at hacking and navigating the web for information, I’m better at surveillance, negotiations, and a good old-fashioned smash and grab. I’m grateful for the intel though, because it narrows my list to less than a handful of shitty motels and two shelters that don’t have computers keeping track of those in residence.
I’m really hoping that once I find her I can convince her that I’m me and that she doesn’t have to run anymore. If I can’t... I will happily smash down a door or two to get to her. Nothing is going to come between us anymore. I have had enough of that to last the rest of my life. She is stuck with me from this day forward.
Blake’s SUV has GPS tracking, so I go to it first, hoping to find her somewhere nearby, but I find it in the parking lot of a strip mall right near a bus line. She is long gone, and none of the motels on my list are in the vicinity. What worries me is that she left her baseball bat in the car, which means that wherever she is, she only has whatever mace is left in the canister she sprayed at Blake. It’s a good thing that she either doesn’t know how to use it, or is actually that intent on using it properly. She ended up mostly missing him when she sprayed it, and just made his eyes burn and water a little. He was almost recovered from the minor exposure when I got to him, and my harassing him about the teary eyes just pissed him off about the whole situation.
I figure that the motels will be the best place to start, not to mention way less trouble since I won’t have to contend with staff trying rightly to protect victims. I head to the first dive on Blake’s short list. Getting the desk clerk to talk doesn’t take much, just handing the stringy-haired desk clerk a couple fifty dollar bills and turning down the offer of a mostly toothless blowjob. She tells me that no one matching Faye’s description has checked in today. I’m actually happy that she isn’t in this place, and thank the clerk for her time before getting back on the road to the next one.
The next place is slightly worse than the first, and I’m in and out fast. The young man working the desk takes the money I offer and sends me on my way to the last motel Blake suggested I try. This is the one that I am hoping she isn’t at, even if it means I have to try bribing someone at the women’s shelters. This place is a by-the-hour motel that caters to hookers, drug dealers, and addicts looking for a semi-safe place to buy, sell, and partake of their goods.
I park in front of the dismal motel and sit for a few long minutes, watching the activity in the parking lot. There is a small crowd of guys lingering near a door across from the dimly lit lobby near a dirty vending machine. They look over at my truck and a couple of them laugh before turning their backs on the parking lot and gesturing toward the door to the room they are standing near. Icy cold grips my gut as I open the door and step onto the pavement.