Dana Mentink - Secret Refuge

John shook his head. “I decided to investigate first. I’ll do that right now.” He stepped away a few paces and dialed his phone.

Reggie stalked away to examine the rooftop.

Silence stretched between her and Mick until she grew uneasy. “I’m, um, sorry I hit you,” Keeley said, pointing to the gash on Mick’s face. “Seems like I’m either running over you or clobbering you with something.”

“No problem.” He smiled, and the action lit up the satin depths of his eyes, a transformation she never would have thought possible. It swept away the flicker of what she hadn’t recognized before. Under the anger, he had been afraid, but not for himself. For her. Why? Maybe because he hadn’t been fearful enough about Tucker, about what he was capable of doing to her sister. The ache spiraled afresh, pounding a trail through her nerves. If he’d only been more worried about what Tucker might do before he got the tracking device removed. “I’ve got some Band-Aids in the car, but I think they might have rubber duckies on them.”

“I’ll pass, but thank you.” The lightness left. “I’m going to check something out. Stay here.”

The irritation rose again. Stay here. Do this. Go here. He was very free with the directions for a guy that she didn’t invite into her life and never would. I call the shots in my life, Mick. Get that straight . Mick went to the far side of the building and climbed down the fire escape. She hugged herself, watching Reggie prowl the rooftop, scowling. John appeared to be finishing up his phone call.

Dead leaves skittered across the roof. The faraway distressed call of the birds still drifted on the wind. Her heart returned, as it always did, to June. Junie, precious child. What was she doing right now? Playing with clay? Using her chubby fingers to create wild paintings of scenes in bold stripes of red and yellow? Had she noticed Mr. Moo Moo was missing an eye? She allowed herself for one moment to imagine what her life would be like if Junie was suddenly snatched away, gone without so much as a goodbye embrace, like LeeAnn had been. Bile rose in her throat, pulse edging upward with the horror and shaking her courage. Who could she trust to get her out of the mess? No one. You’re going to have to do it yourself, so stop letting everyone order you around.

She found herself following Mick’s path down the fire escape.

John called something out to her, but she didn’t stop. All her energy was spent in keeping her sanity; she had nothing left over to handle John’s immense sadness or the animosity between him, Reggie and Mick. The ladder rungs bit into her palms, but she welcomed the movement, pain and all. One flight down and she realized there was an open window, halfway ajar, through which Mick must have squeezed.

She fit through the opening easily, emerging on a dusty floor in a large open area crowded with broken office chairs and more wooden pallets. The far corner had one small office with a dust-smeared window. Mick was on one knee near a long-abandoned file cabinet, examining something.

He looked up at her approach.

“I know, I didn’t stay as ordered, but honestly I can’t. First, bossing people around is not polite, and second, inactivity is just not in my physiology. You can ask all my teachers from over the years.”

His mouth quirked. “Let me guess. PE was your favorite class?”

“Yes.”

“Mine, too.”

Enough of the pleasantries. She peered closer. “What did you find?”

He pointed to a sleeping bag. “Tucker’s been crashing here. Couple of empty food cans, eaten recently. This is what puzzles me.” With a discarded piece of wire he found on the floor, Mick pulled a piece of crumpled paper loose. It was a diagram of some sort. Keeley looked closer.

“Is that the rooftop?”

“Yes.” Mick frowned. “Why would Tucker be so interested in the rooftop of an abandoned newspaper office?”

Keeley’s stomach tightened. “And a building not more than one mile from where the police recovered his car with my sister’s body in the trunk. What does it mean?”

“I don’t know. Yet.”

Something about the last word worried her. Mick would keep digging, which means he would stick in her life like a thorn. Just find out the truth and he’ll be gone . She poked a toe at a pile of empty snack-cake wrappers, muscles tensing. “Mick...”

He stood. “Uh-huh?”

She stared at the wrappers, sticky with icing. “My sister never could understand how Tucker had no sweet tooth whatsoever. She always told me it was unnatural.”

They locked eyes.

With the wire, he teased a receipt out of a discarded plastic grocery bag. “Purchased last night at a Pick and Pack a couple of miles from here.” He squinted at the time stamp. “Just after eleven.”

Cold trickled down her spine. “I have a feeling Tucker has someone helping him.”

“Gonna keep looking,” he said.

He pushed open the door of the office. She was about to follow him inside when out of the corner of her eye she caught the blur of movement, followed by the crash of the stairwell door being flung open behind her.

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