The One who got Away

“Tell me about it,” she smiled. “But he’s a great dad, all things considered.”

“Is that why you stayed back in Kent?”

Jenni hesitated, then shrugged. “I’m not sure,” she said, frowning. “Partly, yeah, but I don’t hate it here, either. It used to be a great place to live for a while.”

“Used to be?”

“The college campus brought a lot with it,” she replied. “Good business, but also late-night parties, drunk drivers and of course, our all-time favorite, drugs.”

The DEA agent inside me suddenly woke up. “Drugs?” I asked.

Jenni looked at me, and for a second I had a feeling that she was about to tell me something she wasn’t supposed to. It looked like she was conflicted over what to say and what not to.

“The usual,” she shrugged. “Weed, a couple of synthetic garbage, you know?”

I did, and I also had a feeling there was a lot more to it than that. It was in the way she said it, how she looked away while trying to act like there was nothing serious to it. I made a mental note to ask Samuel about that later. The last time I had checked, Kent wasn’t exactly the place most people would associate with drugs.

I was about to ask her more, when a knock on the window startled me. Samuel waved for me to come out and help him with the chains, and as I stepped out of the truck, I glanced back at Jenni. She was looking out the window again.

Pete was standing next to my father, the hood of Jenni’s car up as he hunched forward to check the damage. “Right, it’s the alternator,” Pete said. “Don’t have the parts now, but should get ‘em in a couple of days.”

Pete stood up and stretched, then gave me a wide smile. “Welcome back, Alex.”

I shook his hand. “Thanks, Pete.”

“You tell Jenni she can come pick this up on Monday,” Pete continued. “Till then, she betta find herself another way to go about her day.”

“Thanks, Pete,” Samuel said, clapping the man on the shoulder. “We’ll manage, just do what you can.”

I unhooked the chains, then helped Pete push the car into the garage. “Now don’t you be a stranger, kiddo,” he said. “You gotta pass by here more often.”

I walked out of the garage with the promise that I would. Kelly was standing in the middle of the driveway, waiting for me.

“Grandfather’s invited your new friend to dinner,” she said with a smile.

I gave her a wary look. “Does that bother you?”

Kelly shook her head quickly. “Nope, I like her.”

“You don’t know her.”

Kelly frowned and tapped her index finger on her chin. “Let’s just say I have a feeling about her,” she said. “What’s the world I’m looking for? Intuition? I think that’s what you keep throwing at me, right?”

“One day that lip of yours is going to get you into a lot of trouble,” I smiled, resting my arm around her shoulders as we walked back to the truck. Samuel was talking to Jenni, and she looked over at us as we approached.

“Your father’s trying to charm his way into my heart,” Jenni said.

“Yeah, be careful about that,” I replied. “A real heartbreaker, that one.”

“So, a man can’t ask a beautiful woman to join him and his family for dinner?” Samuel asked, looking at the both of us with an amused smile on his face.

“Well, we could use the company,” I chimed in. “Normally, the three of us can’t really stand each other, so you’d be like a buffer.”

Jenni laughed. “Only if it’s okay with Kelly,” she said.

Nice. She knows how to play this right.

“Are you kidding?” Kelly rolled her eyes. “Please come. Save me from these two geezers.”