“No, not really. Just…they keep wanting to plow up this story about my sister and my father, and I’m just done with it.”
Rhodes looked up and down the hall, as if wanting to make sure no one was within hearing distance. “I wonder if they’re looking to see if it emotionally affected you…maybe seeing if you’re capable of working after such a personal and traumatic event.”
“Doubtful.”
“I don’t know. It would make sense as to why I was just given an assignment without you as a partner. I know we haven’t been made official partners yet, but the case looks like it would be right up your alley.”
“What? When did you get the assignment?”
“Half hour ago. I’m about to set up travel arrangements right now. The reason I was given was that Johnson wasn’t sure you were up for the task. He thought you might need some time to recuperate.”
Chloe grinned, but only because it was easier to do that than to bite back her scream of anger. “I’m perfectly fine. Apparently, his idea if recuperating is listening in on wiretaps and helping out the research department.”
“You poor thing,” Rhodes said. “If you want, I could push to get you added.”
“I appreciate it,” she said, “but I think I’ll make the request.”
Rhodes nodded, but it was clear that she was uncomfortable with the way it was all going down. “Don’t push, though. I wouldn’t want you getting into trouble or anything.”
“I won’t.”
She was about to turn around and head right back to Johnson’s office, but then a thought occurred to her. It wasn’t like Rhodes to show this type of concern. The phrase I wouldn’t want you getting into trouble or anything was not like her at all.
“Rhodes…have you heard anything? About me or my sister?”
“Nothing anyone else hasn’t already heard. It sort of got around that you went down to Texas and had some sort of confrontation with your father. Most people around here think it was heroic of you. I think Johnson probably does, too…he just has his superiors breathing down his neck.”
Chloe wasn’t quite sure why, but she didn’t believe her. She felt that she was getting to know Rhodes pretty well, and there was something about the way she had answered the question that did not sit right with Chloe. Still, if she wanted to get on this case and try to carry on with her life as usual, she was going to have to let it sit for now.
She walked back down the hallway to Johnson’s office and happened to run into him in the hallway while he was on his way to somewhere else.
“So, I spoke with Rhodes,” she said. “Why was I not given the chance to work this new case with her?”
“Not that I have to answer to you, but I didn’t know that you would be ready to head back out, given everything you had been through.”
“I appreciate that, sir. But if nothing else, I think it might actually help me.”
He smirked at her and she could not tell if it was one of disgust or good nature. “Would it help to get you over this subordinate attitude you’ve got going on?”
“I can’t promise it,” she said. She meant it as a joke, hoping it might sway him.
“She’s due to leave within a few hours. Can you just drop things that quickly and go?”
“Yes, sir.”
Johnson considered this for a moment and then sighed. “The case does seem to fall right into your wheelhouse.” He then gave a defeated little shrug and said, “Okay. Speak with Rhodes and have her forward you all of the case details. You’re officially on the case, but I need you to be responsible. If you get out there and find that you aren’t ready for it just yet, I need you to be honest about it.”
“Of course. And thank you, sir.”
She wheeled back around, heading for Rhodes’s office before he could change his mind.
CHAPTER THREE
Danielle had been handling the aftermath of Millseed, Texas, about as well as she might have expected. Because Danielle had always preferred solitude and stewing in it to actually trying to be proactive, she had spent the five days since coming back home sitting in her apartment. The only thing she had done in terms of going out and trying to better herself was seeing the doctor in regards to her injuries. She had suffered a mild concussion and a slightly sprained ankle from the confrontation with her father and nothing more.
Still, she felt sore all over. She had read something somewhere about how the body keeps score—how even when there is no psychical trauma, your muscles and nerve endings recall the tension of a given time or place and can cause it to resurface.
Apparently, her body was doing exactly that.
She was also having to deal with the fact that she held no regrets. She was glad the bastard was dead—glad even that she had helped get him to such a state. When she looked back to the backbreaking work of digging the grave and then shoving him in, she was filled with relief and pride rather than any sort of sadness.
These were all things she would never tell Chloe. She was well aware that Chloe had always thought she was a little deranged. It was hard to read Chloe on the matter, though. Sometimes it was broached as an almost passive sort of comic relief, while other times she felt that Chloe almost looked down on her because of it.
Honestly, Danielle just wanted to get back to her life—back to work, back to pretending like her father didn’t exist. She still felt that it had been unfair of him to resurface after she had spent so much of her life pretending he didn’t exist in the first place.
Now, on day five after everything had taken place in Millseed, Danielle was sitting on her couch, trying to decide what to watch on Netflix. She knew she needed a shower, knew she needed to call into work to see when they would let her start picking up shifts again. But she knew once she did that, her life would begin again. And as cliché as it seemed, she knew that now that her father was dead, there would be a new chapter to her life beginning when she did decide to get her ass off the couch.
As if reading her thoughts about needing to get into action, her cell phone rang on her coffee table. She reached out for it and was surprised to see it was Chloe. They’d only spoken once since returning from Texas. It was unlike Chloe to distance herself after something so monumental, but Danielle assumed she had her reasons. The lies they had constructed were so intricate and numerous that she likely figured it was best not to talk very much for a while.
So then why is she calling now?
Curious, she answered the call. “Hey, sis.”
“Hey, Danielle. How are you feeling?”
“Rested up and mostly fine, I think. You?”
“Same. I haven’t been sleeping particularly well, though. I feel the need to just start life back up again, you know?”
“I do, actually,” Danielle said. “The sleep thing…you having nightmares?”
“No. It’s just anxiety, I think. Look, D…there’s something a little strange going on at work and I wanted to give you a heads-up. I was questioned again this morning about what happened. It wasn’t just my director this time, though. He brought in some other people from higher up—the sort of people that only get involved when there could be potential trouble brewing.”