“He’s downstairs,” he tells me.
“Good,” I reply as I follow. The house is pretty empty. There’s an old dirty couch in the living room only accompanied by a tiny old TV, card table and a mini fridge. I follow the man to a door revealing a basement. I follow him down the stairs, the air immediately becoming cooler and stale. When we arrive at the bottom there’s another man, this one skinny in a big set of coveralls and a cap on his head. Then I see him. A man tied up in chair with a black cloth over his head.
“We didn’t touch him. He’s perfectly intact just like you wanted,” the big one says.
“What’s the blood on his knee from?” he asks wryly.
“Moving damage,” the little guy chuckles. He stops laughing at the look Cal shoots him. He grabs one of the folding chairs, putting it directly in front of the man tied up. Cal removes the black hood from the restrained man’s face, revealing a terrified man with tape over his mouth. He steps back, arms folded across his chest. He kneels down so he’s at eye level with the man. The man has hooded dark brown eyes and thick bushy eyebrows with sallow skin, and a small scar on his left cheek.
“So, this is the guy?” he asks dryly.
“That’s him,” the skinny one says.
“Clay Rice,” the big one chimes in.
“Now, I’m going to take this off. If you scream we’re going to have a problem. So you’re not going to scream. Right??” Cal says tightly. The man nods frantically.
Cal snatches the tape off the man’s face. And he lets out a small yelp.
“What’s your name?” he asks.
“Clayton Reece,” he stutters, not looking at anyone in the room.
“How old are you Clayton?”
“Thirty. Th-thirty nine, sir,” he says as tears pour out of his eyes.
“Do you have any kids Clay?”
“Yes sir. A seven year old girl. She’s my world, sir.”
“Have you ever been to jail, Clay?”
“Yes sir. For a few car robberies when I was younger. Nothing since. I’m straight sir. I-I don’t know what I’m doing here,” he starts to say in a panic.
“Calm down, Clay. If you start rambling, that’s just going to irritate me and I’m already pretty irritated. Do you have a tattoo on you back?”
“Yes sir,”
“Of what?”
“Of an e-eagle sir,” he says, starting to cry. Cal lets out a deep sigh.
“Do you have his wallet?” Cal asks. The smaller guy tosses it to him.
“Okay Clay. I’m going to put this tape back on your mouth and this hood back on your head, but don’t worry. These geniuses are going to take you back home and you’re going to forget this ever happened, okay. I’m going to take this just in case,” he says, showing the man his ID.
“Wait, what?” the big one exclaims.
“And for your trouble,” Cal says, pulling out a stack of hundred dollar bills and stuffing it in the man’s shirt, then he puts the tape back on the man’s mouth.
“What are you doing? That’s our money” the skinny guy says.
“This isn’t him,” Cal says calmly.
“What do you mean this isn’t the guy? He fits the description."
“This isn’t the fucking guy!” Cal yells.
“I told you his name was Clay RICE. I told you he has a tattoo of a motorcycle on his back. I told you that he’s about 6’4" and this guy can’t be over 5’11" you fucking idiots!” Cal roars and they both look confused and quiet.
“We thought he was lying or changed his name,” the big guy says defensively.
“No fucking excuses! Drop this guy back off tonight in his neighborhood, with the money. Then how about you find the right Clay?!” he shouts, heading up the stairs of the basement.
“Alive!” he adds, before leaving and slamming the door.
“Chris!” It’s my mom. Holy shit! What was that?
She runs down the porch stairs and hugs me like I’m five years old again.
“It’s okay mom,” I assure her as she dotes on me like a toddler.
“I was so worried about you. I didn’t know when I’d see you again,” she says with tears in her eyes.
“I’m not going anywhere mom,” I tell her with as much confidence as I can, but to be honest I don’t know when it’ll happen and I’m starting to see things maybe I don’t want to know about.
“Are you okay honey?” she says gripping my face and looking into my eyes.
“Yeah. Just. All of this, you know,” I say as calmly as I can. She nods.
“I-I’m sorry about how things have gone with Jenna,” she says, and I give her a weak smile.
“Me too,” I say as I take her hand and we walk into the house.
“Are you hungry? I haven’t cooked anything since you left,” she chuckles.
“I’m sure dad was thrilled about that,” I joke, trying to ease the tension.
“Honey, your dad couldn’t eat a bite either. We were so worried after that phone call with Cal,” she sighs.
“What phone call?”
“Oh. I thought Lauren might have told you,” she says looking away nervously.
“Ugh. I didn’t. I kind of asked her to not talk to me about what happened when he was here,” I admit, feeling like an idiot now. She looks at me sympathetically.
“It wasn’t a big deal. Just—well Cal being Cal,” my mom sighs with a shrug.
“I’m actually going to skip dinner mom. I just need to get some sleep,” I say, kissing her on the forehead.
“Honey, things are all going to work out just fine. I know it,” she says before I leave the kitchen. I give her as much of a smile as I can muster. If only I could believe that. But now, not only do I have to worry about what happens when Cal comes back, but what the hell he’s done when I wasn’t here.
Chapter 9
Lauren
It’s going to be a new wonderful, fantastic day. Well, even if it’s not, it can’t get any worse than yesterday. The sky would literally have to fall to beat that disaster. I think back over the last year, when it was just me and Caylen, how simple things were then. Except I was lonely, frustrated and I had a broken heart. The sad thing is not much has changed. Well, now I’m beyond frustrated, confused, and I’m afraid to break someone’s heart. I’m afraid that I’m not good enough for one of them, that I’m not strong enough for the other, yet I can’t let either of them go. Great, right? At least I got to see Caylen. When I hold her in my arms, her little smile makes all of this seem worth it. Even being called a slut who used my own child to keep the man who nearly has me on the brink of a psychotic break down, is worth her smile.
It took everything in me to not go after Jenna yesterday but I knew she was drunk, and deep down I can’t blame her for being angry. I try to remind myself that my life wasn’t the only one disrupted, hers was too. It’s just hard to feel sorry for someone who is such a bitch, and how could she call me a whore when I’m the one married to—well them I guess.