Framed: A Jarek Grayson Private Detective Novel (Grayson Investigative Services Book 2) Read online

  I sat there and chewed on that. My father had put up with her for forty years. She hadn’t changed in all the years I knew her, so maybe there was something to being who you were supposed to be. That led me back to the talk of pushing boundaries.

  “Johanna?” I asked.

  “Yeah?”

  “My therapist and I talked about boundaries and how pushing them—”

  “Oh hell no, I told you…”

  She pointed back towards me.

  “No, no, I think you misunderstand. She was talking about how much I’ve changed in the year since my father died. How many self-imposed boundaries that I’ve broken through. I didn’t notice the change until she brought it up.”

  “Oh…” Johanna said softly, so quiet I almost missed her words because of the loud song on the radio. Pharrell Williams’ “Happy” was playing for the fourth time today.

  “There are some things about myself I do want to change, but—”

  “This is Johanna,” Jo said, hitting the blue-tooth headpiece and holding up a hand to shush me.

  “Sure thing, Skye,” Johanna said. “I think we’ll even get Jarek to help out. Uh-huh…Ok. Bubye.”

  “What was that?” I asked Jo.

  “That was Skye calling. She was asking for help to move some stuff. She wants to get her computer gear out of her apartment before her brother and sister-in-law mess her stuff up.”

  I looked at the back of the Suburban and nodded. There were two rows of seats that could be folded down, excluding the seat I was in, and it’d have plenty of cargo room for her clothing and personal items. If her personal computer gear was as extensive as I thought, we might need to get her setup its own space.

  “That sounds like fun,” I told her dryly.

  “You wanted to push boundaries, so now you get to see how a…what did you call her…a script kiddy who watches too much Japanese cartoon porn? You get to see how she lives.”

  “I do believe that’s the phrasing that’s been used a time or three,” I admitted, “but it’s rather distracting to walk into the IT department to see animated tentacle porn on the plasma while she plays old techno and does her work like nothing else is going on.”

  “You’re just jealous that she needs to have all that noise and distraction to work,” Jo told me. “Some people quiet their brains differently.”

  That got me thinking, and I nodded after a time. “Ok, let’s go break some boundaries.”

  3

  I could hear the shouting and cursing from inside the cramped elevator door. Jo and I were close, but the elevator was so small, even two people riding together had to stand close and invade each other’s personal space. Skye lived on the fourth and top floor of an apartment building, and the closer we walked down the hallway toward the apartment, the louder the shouts and screams came, until Jo pointed to the door the racket was coming from.

  “I can’t,” I told her, already feeling nervous.

  “I’ll go first. It’ll get quiet, trust me,” she said, banging on the door so loudly it sounded like she was crushing the wooden door to bits.

  The screaming went silent immediately, and the door was thrown open by a middle-aged woman with stringy red hair, a dusky gray complexion, and an eye twitch that had me backing up slowly.

  “What the fuck you want?” she spat.

  “Excuse me, bitch?” Jo said, stepping forward. “Who the fuck are you? Skye?” she called, looking over the woman’s shoulder.

  “Oh, you’re her work friends. Come in,” she said, holding the door open.

  “Jo, Jarek?” Skye called, rushing out the doorway and pulling it closed behind her, almost slamming it on the woman’s hand.

  “We were close by,” Johanna admitted.

  “Oh sorry. Uh…this might not be the best time. My brother, Dustin, and his wife, Daniella, are sort of having a bit of a—”

  The door was pulled open over the shrill cursing of the stringy-haired Daniella, and a man stepped out. I could see the family resemblance immediately. The two siblings could almost be identical twins, except that Dustin was almost as tall as Johanna, whereas his sister was barely five feet tall. The other thing I noticed was the hollowed look in his eyes, the dark rings around them, and the infected needle marks running up both arms, scarred from years of drug abuse.

  “I told you—” Skye started.

  “Thank you,” the man said, putting his hand out towards me, “for taking my little sister in.”

  I stared at the hand and backed up, shaking my head.

  “He doesn’t shake hands,” both Skye and Jo chorused and looked at each other. “Jinx,” they said together and then broke up laughing.

  I stood there staring at him, noticing the dilation of his pupils and the unkempt appearance. I could smell something acrid from the moment the doorway had opened, and I was afraid it was either meth, or something even fouler that had been cooked and then shot up or smoked in there.

  “Well, shit. I did forget that. She told me about you and your…peculiarities,” he said.

  Pretty good vocabulary for a junkie. I wonder what else I was going to learn by standing here in silence.

  “What have you got?” Johanna asked.

  “Two duffel bags, two rackmount servers, and the rest is already packed in my car.”

  “You taking the racks?” I asked her, breaking my silence.

  “No, I don’t have a rack system, I just stacked them on top of a dresser with some bricks spacing them out so they wouldn’t overheat each other.”

  An old school, home-built setup. Sadly, I never had to go down and dirty like she did; my parents always got me what I’d wanted. If what I wanted wasn’t available, I figured out a way to have it done or built. Hardware wasn’t my specialty like it was Skye’s, but you could get a lot accomplished with an allowance that could dwarf a small country’s GDP.

  “Ok, give me something to carry,” I told them.

  Jo looked at me oddly when the door to the apartment was opened, and I remained outside. She walked closer and whispered to me.

  “What is it?”

  “I don’t want to go in there. I think they were smoking meth,” I admitted.

  “Smells more like heroin,” Jo said. “But if you want to wait here, I’ll bring stuff out for you and we can carry it to the SUV together.”

  I nodded gratefully. Within moments, I was handed a large Dell rackmount server. I stood there while Jo came back out with one of her own. Skye came out next, a duffel bag over each shoulder almost making her stoop down under the weight. As soon as she yelled goodbye and closed the door, the argument started back up. I walked quickly towards the elevator and was the first one in when it finally opened.

  The server was getting heavy, so I wedged myself into the back corner and used the handguard to rest the end of the computer, giving my shoulders time to relax. Jo saw what I was doing and did the same. Skye, on the other hand, came into the cramped space gracefully, her duffel bags pushing Jo off balance and into me. I reached out and caught her before she fell. Her weight was off balance from the almost fifty-pound computer, and for a moment I thought I was going to lose the grip on the one I was holding up myself.

  Luckily she gained her balance. Skye let out an “oopsie, sorry,” before the door closed and we began our descent.

  “What was the fighting about?” Jo asked her.

  “My brother’s got some problems, but my sister-in-law is a royal…uh…” Skye looked at me as the door dinged. “She’s something else entirely.”

  “Is she always pleasant like that?” I asked, starting to sweat from the cramped quarters as much as holding half the weight of the server.

  “Come on,” Jo said, leaving me to walk out of the elevator last.

  * * *

  The office had been closed for hours now, so we grabbed a dolly from the utility room that Annette or whoever used when Xerox dropped off copy paper or office supplies. Instead of going around to the public side and using the elevato
rs there, I had us cut through the GIS offices to use the private elevator that Jo and I had access to. That made me remember that I’d have to get the kid a keycard for the elevator as well, or she could just ride down with Joanna. It’d taken us two trips to unload her car and what was left in the Suburban.

  “Do you two want to stick around for dinner? I’m thinking of doing Chinese takeout?”

  “Sure,” Jo said and then she nudged me.

  “Sure,” I said. “Moo shu pork or sweet and sour chicken with brown rice for me,” I told her.

  Skye smiled amidst the piles of belongings and pulled out her phone to make the order. I grabbed a couple of the duffel bags and carried them towards the larger of the bedrooms and laid them out against the far wall near the sliding glass door to the balcony. I figured if I could move half of what I knew to be her clothing, we’d have room around her dining room table and chairs.

  The apartment wasn’t the most exclusive nor the best furnished. It was at most utilitarian with a sturdy cloth couch, TV stand, and thirty-two-inch flat-screen TV in the small living room. The dining area was just off the kitchen, which was a galley style with plain white cabinets that gave it a clean look. The floor was all ceramic in the kitchen with a light brown berber in the rest of the house.

  Jo saw what I was doing and began lugging bags as well. I had just finished my second trip and was picking up a server to go into the spare bedroom when Skye got done with the order and hung up.

  “It’ll be ready in ten minutes. Do you want to ride with me, boss?” Skye asked.

  I shot a worried look at Jo, who was smiling and nodding at me.

  “I don’t know, I might be a complete mess. If Jo drove I think that—”

  “Jarek, stop,” Jo said. “Remember your therapist today? Boundaries? Try something new. I’ll ride along, but you can sit shotgun.”

  I thought about that, thought about someone else driving. It made me cold all over. I hurried and put the server on the small day bed in the spare bedroom and headed back. Jo was carrying the second server and bumped me with her hip, almost tripping me up.

  “Excuse me,” she said, grinning. “But you never answered the lady.”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Driving…it’s the one thing that really, really—”

  “It’s ok, you don’t have to come if you aren’t comfortable,” Skye said, her eyes looking down and the smile leaving her face.

  Since Skye perpetually wears a smile, and we’d gotten close, I knew something was wrong.

  “No, no. I’ll come. I’d love to,” I lied.

  That’s how I found myself buckling up in the front seat of Skye’s Acura as the girls chatted excitedly.

  4

  That night, I did not in fact die, but I did come close once to having an anxiety attack when we parked and Skye bounded inside to get the food. Jo had put a reassuring hand on my shoulder and I focused on my breathing. I even survived the trip home. So one good trip. I wouldn’t be as terrified of riding with her again if the occasion should ever come up. Dinner was good, and I was happy to find my food came in a Styrofoam container.

  Then we did something that I’d never done before in my life. Jo went and changed and Skye hooked up her equipment, and we “binge watched” Orange is the New Black. I tried to pay attention to the shows and in general make it a learning experience for myself about culture and being around the ladies.

  “Is this what it’s like to have family?” I asked myself softly.

  The ladies had fallen asleep, and I’d taken the comforter off the bed and laid it across the two slumbering forms on the couch, their feet almost touching as each commanded an end. I’d ended up between them for a while, but I couldn’t get comfortable. On one side of me was the woman I’d promised I’d never have a relationship with, and on the other was Jo, the woman I’d somewhat had a relationship of sorts with, and I was starting to realize I had some feelings there, although I didn’t know what they were exactly.

  I picked up the food mess, rinsed the fork I used because chopsticks take more dexterity than I am capable of. Then, I slipped quietly out of the room and headed back to my apartment.

  A quick shower, and it wasn’t long before I was feeling the need to lie down.

  * * *

  It was Wednesday morning, and I was back in the gym, working on my routine. I had CNN turned up loud as I struggled to keep an eye on the financials and the opening of the stock market. It wasn’t something I understood much, but it was something I did want to learn. Having an accountant and an investment banker with a host of advisors was nice, but I did want to understand the advice I was being given.

  Four…I pushed the barbells up in a butterfly over my head, breathing out.

  I could feel the muscles in my chest burning. I’d recently increased the weight. I really hated how I’d been manhandled my entire life. I wasn’t a big guy by any means at five foot six and a half inches, but I made up for it as much as I could by trying to be fit, and hopefully learning how to defend myself better. I knew that was now Johanna’s job, but I took every chance I got to train, to lift, and to push myself just a little bit more.

  Five…last one. I’d been doing a lower amount of reps with a higher weight today. I dropped the weights and sat up, taking a long pull from the bottle of water and grabbing the remote control to turn on the local news. It was time for the elliptical or the treadmill. I considered how my body was feeling, the little signals it was telling me. I’d only started training my core and upper body this week in the heavier weight in order to build muscle. My legs were not quite as tortured as the rest of me.

  “Treadmill,” I told myself, knowing I was going to set it on an incline or a series of inclines.

  I plugged my headphones into the treadmill because I couldn’t hear the TV over the pounding of my feet. Immediately the anchor’s voice filled my ears, and I winced as I turned the volume down to an acceptable level and got going. I’d left an open invite for Skye and Johanna to work out with me whenever they wanted with the agreement that they’d buzz me ahead of time. I was almost thirty minutes into the run when movement caught my eye. I looked over my shoulder briefly to see Skye and Johanna throwing a medicine ball back and forth on the gym mats.

  I tried not to stare, but both of them were wearing stretchy outfits and sports bras. Skye’s pale skin was artfully decorated with dark tattoos that did in fact cover the majority of her body. She was a contrast to Johanna’s sun-kissed complexion she still had from her time overseas. I suspected she also utilized the tanning booth when I wasn’t paying attention. Deciding on not letting them throw me off my game, I turned the channel to catch the end of a live interview.

  “….The hacktivists known as Anonymous have released the names of purported KKK members, many of whom are in positions of power such as Senator…”

  This was something to think about. Now that Skye was in my building, I needed to have another conversation with her about her former team. I knew she liked to talk to them and had probably worked with them or made them some scripts, but with the headlines they were pulling in lately, I couldn’t have anything traced back to the building or the business. It was one thing for a select few to know what I did and how I did it, it was another to bring down national attention.

  Skye was almost as good as me, and if anybody found out we were working together, then it would definitely be bad news, especially if they thought we were both hacktivists. I finished my jog and was mulling that over as I headed towards the shower stalls, almost forgetting to pull my earbuds off. The cleaners had left a larger than normal pile of clean towels, so they must have gotten my note from a couple of days ago. I smiled, knowing the ladies would appreciate it if they decided—

  Something solid smacked me in the back, and I stumbled more in surprise than pain or being off balance. I turned to see one of the red yoga balls Jo had insisted I buy so she could teach me more about balance. A feminine snicker alerted me, and I ducked as a second one bounc
ed off the concrete block walls of the shower wall barriers. I knew there were only two of the balls, so I turned to see both Skye and Johanna laughing. Skye’s eyes were wide open, and she was pointing at Jo.

  “Excuse me, you seem to have lost your balls,” I told her dryly.

  Skye snickered and Jo laughed.

  “I was asking you a question. When you didn’t answer, I decided dodgeball would be more fun!” Jo said, the smile transforming her face into that of a woman in her early twenties.

  “I’m sorry, I was listening to that report about the Anonymous hack and going over the details in my mind. I surly didn’t mean to ignore you, you know that I would never do that, the both of you—”

  “Thank you for covering me up last night, and putting away the food,” Skye said. “It was just so stressful at my old place, and thank you for…you know.”

  I knew something—I knew she was wearing almost nothing, and I needed to turn and go back to the shower. Cold shower.

  “Jarek,” Jo said. “Wait.”

  “Walk with me,” I told her and headed back to the shower over her grumbles asking me to stop.

  I remembered that I didn’t want to make Skye uncomfortable, so I got into the shower stall before undressing. I then removed my clothes and hung them up before turning on the water. I wasn’t surprised to see Johanna’s arms and chin resting on top of the blocks as the water pressure rinsed away the sweat and grime of the workout. The hot water and steam immediately relaxed my taxed muscles.

  “I was asking you if you minded that I brought the kid along? I know you left it an open invite, but I didn’t know if you were just doing that to be polite…”

  “No, I don’t mind. She’s like a kid sister, although I wasn’t expecting her to be quite that…comfortable here.”

  Jo looked me over, a funny expression on her face, and then snorted.

  “I really wanted to just thank you for what you did last night.”