Peeling the wrapper off my fudgy brownie, I eat it in a couple bites, savoring the crunch of the sprinkles and decadent frosting. The cafeteria workers may not have a handle on fried chicken, but their brownies are delightful. Savoring the last bite, I wash it down with my carton of milk. Examine Rock’s mop of hair. “You sure you don’t want to add some laurels to your hair? With a flower crown, you might actually look friendly. It would offset your oafish personality.”

  Rock huffs in a way that could be construed as a laugh. “What makes you think I want to look friendly?” Lifting his entire piece of fried chicken on his plastic fork, he tears a piece off with sharp, white teeth. With a snap, the flimsy tines break and the soggy meat flops into his lap.

  I’m still laughing, handing Rock napkins from the holder when Destin takes the seat across from us, eyes coasting between me and the dude who is swiping furiously at his navy uniform pants.

  My best friend’s eyebrows rise as if to ask, what is Rock doing here? I shrug because hell if I know. “Table tax,” I say, swiping Rock’s brownie square of deliciousness off his tray.

  “Give that back, Valencia.” Rock crowds my chair, but I don’t yield.

  “It looks like it’s been tampered with. I’d hate for you to be poisoned by the nice cafeteria ladies trying to save their students from a bad seed like you.” Grinning, I widen my jaw for a big bite.

  Destin watches with a horrified expression.

  “You’re the bad see--I swear if you eat that…” Rock groans when I lick the corner of frosting and exaggerate rolling my eyes closed in ambrosial pleasure.

  “Look at that. Not poisoned after all. Too bad, guess I’ll take the bullet and eat it anyway.”

  Rock snipes the brownie out of my hand and eats it in one huge chomp. Chewing with his mouth open, he grins. “You’re right. This is delicious.”

  Destin gapes. “Did he just?”

  I’m both repulsed and oddly flattered that Rock devoured something I licked. Those brownies are that good. Contrarily, are they though? If he licked my brownie, would I still consume it? My brain stutters.

  Wait a second. Are we… flirting? No. No, that cannot be what’s happening here. He wouldn’t do that to Janice. He just didn’t let a little thing like germs come between him and a gooey, chocolate treat. Which, understandable.

  Rock double-taps a palm on the table. “Eat something she licked. Yeah I did. She keeps forgetting I live with a passel of cousins who don’t believe in sharing. In my house, it’s everyone for himself.” He reaches across me and swipes another napkin.

  “Cousins. Okay.” Destin scoots his own tray closer to himself, opting to eat his brownie before anything happens to it.

  “I can’t believe you did that,” I say to Rock, who has moved on to eating today’s vegetable offering: soggy broccoli. As kids, we used to share popsicles all the time, but that was years ago.

  “You got cooties or something?”

  “No, but I may be rabid. Here, let me try your water.”

  “Guys? Janice looks pretty mad.” Destin’s eyes are wide “Who is pretty mad?” Portia asks, dropping her tray and taking a chair.

  “Janice saw these two flirting over a brownie.” Destin thumbs between Rock and me. Portia’s eyebrows twitch.

  “We were not flirting.”

  Rock takes a swig of his water. “She coming over here?”

  “Yup,” Destin answers.

  The loud tapping of shoes over the vinyl floor breaks into my awareness. I twirl an imaginary streamer with one hand.

  Rock cuts me a look. Unfolding from the chair, he picks up his tray and heads toward the exit. Janice changes course to intercept him. The drone of gossip and laughter makes it impossible to hear anything she’s saying, but it’s obvious she’s furious. She hisses something at Rock, sharp-nailed finger aimed at his chest.

  Rock doesn’t flinch, but she doesn’t go in for the stab, either. Rock doesn’t look over his shoulder as he leaves. Janice clenches her fists, watching him go.

  I flick my eyes to the table where their group is watching avidly.

  “I heard they broke up last night,” Portia says.

  My stomach dips when Janice speaks from behind me. “It was mutual.”

  Janice appears calm and cool, but there’s a storm brewing behind her eyes. Seeing her at our lunch spot makes me regret our fight. I wouldn’t call our conversation at the Herald a peace treaty, but maybe treaty-adjacent. Then I had to go and shoot my mouth off yesterday. Maybe if I hadn’t, she wouldn’t be hovering over our table.

  Her gaze swivels to Destin, her eyes sharp. She’s here to cause trouble.

  I try to head her off. “Chief, I was going to message you.”

  Janice seems slightly mollified by the nickname, until she processes my obvious diversion tactic. “Oh? And what were you going to send me? More platitudes about how it’s all going to work out despite the fact that you haven’t done the one thing I suggested?”

  My hackles rise. “That’s a dead-end line of questioning, and you know it.”

  “I don’t think so,” she retorts, unfolding crossed arms to lean hard on the table, right next to Destin. Her sharp look pins him. “You were dating Gracia when she died, weren’t you?”

  Destin gulps. “Yeah, but that’s hardly newsworthy.”

  “Did you know that when a woman disappears, or is murdered, eight times of ten its the dad, step-dad, husband, or boyfriend?” Janice’s steely calm makes my hands clench into fists on the table.

  “I told you this wasn’t relevant,” I spit at the same time Destin says, “It is?”

  She ignores me. “It is. I’ve seen Mr. Cuoco. He looks heartbroken. And Gracia wasn’t married, obviously. That leaves you.”

  Destin’s gaze falls to his half-eaten lunch.

  I push out of my seat, a beat too slow.

  Janice moves in for the kill. This is payback for my getting in her face. “I can’t help but wonder if there’s a reason our friend Valencia has been hesitant to ask you about Gracia. Maybe because she knows something she doesn’t want to get out. So tell me, Destin, did you kill your girlfriend when you found out she was cheating on you?”

  Every movement at our table shrieks to a halt. Portia, Destin, Janice, and I are frozen in a horror show of our own making. This train wreck is my fault, and I won’t stand by while she attacks my best friend.

  Destin folds in on himself, eyes glazing over.

  “That was totally unnecessary,” I say, low, putting a hand on his hunched shoulder.

  It hasn’t escaped my notice that pretty much everyone in the caf is watching the fireworks.

  Janice lifts her chin, eyes hard as flint. “Was it? Or was it the push you needed? You can thank me for breaking the ice later.” She sashays from the cafeteria. The spectators stare at me, but when none of us makes a move, they go back to eating. A gossiping.

  Destin’s mouth opens and closes a couple of times before he finally grinds out, “Is that what everyone thinks? That I killed her for cheating on me?” Underneath the crack in his voice, there’s a current that is completely throwing me.

  “Nobody thinks that.”

  Destin’s hand is bloodless around his fork. “Maybe they should.”

  “Wait, you knew she was cheating?”

  He murmurs, “I’m an optimist, not a fool.”

  “Okay… But what do you mean, maybe they should?”

  Destin shrinks further and his head droops.

  I pull out the chair next to him and sink into it. “Des, I don’t know why you’re saying this, but you’re freaking me out.”

  “I found a cigarette butt in her car once. I don’t smoke.”

  Portia makes a surprised squeak.

  “Okay. . . Maybe Gracia smoked.” I don’t know why I’m trying to convince him she wasn’t stepping out on him when I know with certainty she was.

  “Gracia didn’t smoke.”

  “Maybe she did, and you just didn’t know.” I never saw her smoking, either.

  Tension crawls along the line of my shoulders, its nails piercing my skin. My dad smoked. Not often. But sometimes, when he was extra stressed about work, or after he and mom had had what they call “differences of opinion,” I’d find him out behind the garage, lit cig between his lips, a pinprick of flame in the shadows.

  Destin is quiet for way, way too long. “I was there that night, Val. Gracia was acting weird, so I followed her.”

  Time tunnels, stretching out until my heart is skipping to keep up. I try and utterly fail to keep my calm. “You said she was working on a story. She would clam up when she was investigating, and she only told you about it later once she was done with whatever article she was writing. That wasn’t unusual.”

  Sighing, his eyes cling to mine. They’re crystal blue, cold as ice. “I followed her. Saw her meeting your dad at the casino. She hugged him, Val, and didn’t let go. The worst part is, I didn’t do anything. I was so, so confused, I left. I went to Portia’s, and we watched movies all night. By the time I woke up, Gracia was dead.”

  My mouth opens, but my tongue won’t work. All the nerves that normally send signals from my brain to my lips have been severed. All I can do is gawk at Destin, horrified at the truth coming out of his mouth.

  His brutal head-shake makes my insides ache. Even though I had no concept of how deeply it would cut, this is exactly the conversation I was trying to avoid. I scramble for something to say, and come up empty.

  Destin clenches his teeth. Pinching the bridge of his nose, he stands. Refuses to look at me as he mumbles something about his locker and flees the cafeteria.

  One Off

  Before Mom left tonight, keys clutched in hand, her eyes lingered on Dad’s office door.

  Truth is, I’ve been lurking around that door a lot in the last few days. Talking to Destin was a dead end that left him torn and bleeding. We’ve tiptoed around each other since. I don’t think he’s mad at me for dredging it up. More like we’re both a little sore and need some breathing room to let the bruises fade.

  I haven’t been able to uncover anything else about the car thefts happening in town that connects them to Agani Auto, which means I need to look through Dad’s files again. I missed something the first time, even though I could have sworn I looked at every page.

  My gaze zeroes in on the back wall where the safe is hidden. I have so many questions about the concealed metal box it’s hard to focus on anything else. When did he put it in, and why? What is he concealing in there?

  I contemplate calling Portia to have her talk me out of trying to crack Dad’s safe, but she’s got play practice tonight and won’t answer her phone. The only sound I hear is the ticking grandfather clock. Time is passing, running out on an invisible counter.

  Despite knowing that my father would never use a combination that was easy to guess--which meant all birthdays, anniversaries, and addresses were out--I try them anyway. Nothing doing. I try his badge number, driver license number, license plate numbers, VIN numbers. Jersey numbers for his favorite baseball players.

  Before that, I had to empty the filing cabinet so I could move it. Stacks of files are scattered over the floor. A sheaf of papers spills across the carpet next to an open pizza box. Not having to share meant I ordered my favorite toppings--extra cheese and garlic. I stink to high heaven, but who cares? For the next ten hours, the house is mine.

  Mwahahaha.

  Seriously. What would Dad use for a combination? Splayed out on the floor, I move my arms and legs to make a carpet angel, focused on the drag of the low pile against my clothes. My dad always told me to use random numbers, so his combination could be literally anything. There are a billion different combinations, and I do not have the time to try each one of them. Pushing up onto my elbows, I stare at the frustratingly tight-lipped lockbox.

  I’d have to be astronomically lucky to get even one number correctly. If I was even a single digit off…

  Abruptly, I sit up, my eyes locked on the safe. One off. One. Off. Rubbing my hands on a crumpled napkin so they’re not greasy, I scuttle to the wall-mounted safe. First, I try Dad and Mom’s anniversary, only one digit off. Then the other direction. Still locked. So I try birthdays. Both Dad’s and Mom’s yield nothing.

  But when I get to mine… I use the number one greater than each for my birth month, date, and year. The lock clicks, drowned by my surprised gasp. I figured it out. My hands shake as the door swings open.

  The inside is a letdown. There’s an old handgun that belonged to my great-grandpa, a thin stack of files, and an unopened burner phone. Careful not to touch the handgun, I reach for the files, cursing when my finger leaves a greasy smudge on the front flap of one. Oops. If Dad ever sees that, I’m busted.

  Not thinking about that right now.

  It takes me less than thirty seconds to run to the bathroom, scrub my hands free of pizza grease, and bolt back into the office. Reverently, I lift the secret files out of the lockbox and set them on Dad’s desk. Lowering into his chair, which swivels some when it takes my weight, I scoot close. Something in these files was worth hiding. From everyone. Some bit of information in this stack of papers was so private Dad didn’t even keep it at the department. There are myriad reasons he would do that, and not a single one is good.

  Trepidation makes my hand hesitate, hovering over the top file. Once I open this, once I read whatever Dad was concealing, there’s no erasing it from my brain. For good or ill, I might be seconds away from discovering what lead my dad to leave Hacienda after that night without so much as a whispered goodbye.

  The information in these files might be my salvation. Or it might destroy me. I swallow, not daring to follow that train of thought.

  Do I really want to read Dad’s secret files?

  Yes, I can. No matter what happened that night, no matter what his reason for leaving, I have to know. Even if ripping off the bandage reveals an insidious infection under my dad’s healthy moral facade.

  Opening the top one, there’s a sheet of paper on which Dad made some notes about a possible drug dealer working out of the resort. News to me, but not relevant.

  The next page is a photo of Gracia taken at night, so it’s dark and grainy. But it’s her, standing in front of the resort and casino. Biting her lip, hands twisted in front of her.

  I flip over the image, looking for a date, and my eyes bug out.

  On the back, written in my dad’s hand, is a date: one week before Gracia was murdered.

  Special friends.

  Could Dad have been using it as a euphemism for sources? Pieces click together in my head. The photo. My friend’s name on Dad’s list. Gracia was working with my dad. An informant.

  My throat works as it begins to make sense.

  In the course of her research on the resort, Gracia must have seen something fishy. She took it to my dad, who convinced her to keep looking. He wiped her tears. My dad would have convinced her to tell him everything. His sheriff’s instincts must have seen an opportunity and taken it.

  Destin needs to know about this. The colossal weight of guilt he’s been carrying will disappear.

  But there is dissonance in this new version of that night I’m constructing. My dad would never have put someone inexperienced, someone like Gracia, in danger unless there was no other way. What could she have seen or heard that would be useful to him?

  I need to do some snooping at the resort. Maybe if I retrace Gracia’s steps I’ll find out what she saw or heard that ended her life.

  Protocols Suck

  Hot, bubbling water swirls, making me so drowsy I could lay my head back and fall asleep. Soaking in a hot tub is my new favorite thing. “We should do this more often.”

  “I’ve been trying to get you to come with me all summer,” Portia retorts, opening one eye to peer at me from the opposite side of the hot tub.

  “I thought it would be crawling with creepy middle-aged guys.”

  Turquoise water ripples over her shoulders as she sinks lower. “I mean, it happens, but most weeknights are pretty good. Gramps is on security, so he keeps an eye out for me.”

  I yawn, sinking farther into the soothing liquid. “I forgot he worked here on top of volunteering at the department.”

  “Weeknights, the security booth is all his.”

  “Hmm.” After I told Destin my theory that Gracia was working as an informant for my dad, it narrowed the gap between us, but didn’t close it. There’s still hesitance that I don’t know how to dispel. It’s not as bad with Portia, and I won’t risk making it worse by pumping her for information.

  In addition to needing some girl time, I agreed to come tonight so I could sniff around. Not that I told Portia my reasons.

  “Hey, Val?” My friend’s unease makes me push myself up so I can see her better.

  “Why do you sound like you have something to say, and you’re not sure I’m going to like it?”

  She taps the tip of her upturned nose with a finger.

  Water splashes as I anchor an elbow on the spa’s rim. “Shoot.”

  Blowing out a breath, Portia skims her hands along the choppy surface of the water. “I was with him, the night Gracia died. We were hanging out, and Destin kept texting her, but she wasn’t answering. I pushed until he admitted he thought she might be cheating. He got pretty upset, talking about it, and wouldn’t calm down. He said he was going to her place to talk to her. I convinced him to come to the casino with me instead. You know how he is about a good smoothie.”

  I do know how Destin is about that. Guy would live on fruit if it was healthy, and since Portia’s dad manages the casino, she gets all the free smoothies she wants from the drink hut in the food court. I hold my breath, hoping Portia will fill in some details. I don’t know if Destin and I would survive another round of questions.

  Never in the time we’ve been friends has our connection felt so tenuous as it does now, and I hate it.

 

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