Locke 2 (Blackwater Boys #4)

Eleven

Kali

I expected something to happen the next morning. My pulse was through the roof as I felt the familiar paranoia beneath my skin. I wasn’t sure why I was surprised and…disappointed when nothing happened.

I felt…different. Like, I was Kali again. The same Kali that had to put change in her shoe so she didn’t get mugged by the homeless. Why did that very thought make me long for the past? Was I delusional? Had going to the bank and watching my old bank card get eaten and spat out by the ATM triggered some kind of desire to be the “old me”?

That was stupid.

There was nothing remotely nostalgic about the way I used to live and be. I was still surviving on very little, but the town was cute as a button. The kind of town that got all Christmassy and shit in December. It was kind of too cute, wasn’t it? Designed for cute, gentle townsfolk, and didn’t people think I was all innocent and shit?

Blackwater was a shithole, and I was only thinking about it because I was low-key thinking about a suited man that was definitely not thinking about me.

That was a lot of “thinking” in one sentence.

Anyway, I was paranoid and a little anxious.

I took Dahlia out like normal, watching her carefully as she took her time to pee. It bothered me that she was taking a lot longer to move around. There was no spring in her step like yesterday. I dropped down, stroking her face, asking her if she was alright. She looked up at me with her baby brown eyes, the love shining out of them.

“I love you,” I told her. “You get me out of bed, you know that?”

She dropped down on her back for belly rubs. I chuckled, but the sound died as I looked around the yard, a feeling of dread suddenly forming in my stomach.

What if it was a mistake? What if he didn’t come? What if nothing could be done even if he did?

I mulled that over, feeling bereft.

Hal waited for me when I eventually got ready. I walked to school, my conversation with him quiet.

“Still down about that boy?” he asked after we grabbed a cup of coffee.

“Just tired,” I answered, peering down at my worn boots. “And, yeah, I’m sad. Any word on him?”

“No, they already buried it and said it was likely the mother just took off. There’s a lot pointing in that direction. The police said there was nothing to suspect foul play, but they’d keep trying to check in on her until they get a response. I don’t think that’ll happen.”

I pursed my lips, swallowing down an old Kali retort. “So, everyone’s supposed to just forget about them?”

“The aunt is still trying.”

She hadn’t gotten back to me, but why would she? I was just the teacher’s assistant. I wouldn’t help her get any closer to finding her nephew.

I could feel Hal’s eyes on me linger. “This has really gotten to you.”

That observation made me look up at him, meeting his curious blue eyes. “It hasn’t gotten to you?”

He shot me a sympathetic smile. “It does, but…I think I’m sort of used to it.”

I frowned. “Used to disappearing boys?”

He let out a dry chuckle. “More like unresolved stories. You get a lot of those as a journalist. You hardly find peace of mind when you’re digging into a story. Even if it’s a solved one, something about it sticks and fucks you up. Someone always loses somebody, you know? And they carry these scars. They think no one notices, but…” Now his gaze gentled. “I’ve seen it so many times, I see it in people.”

He could see it in me, he meant. I looked away quickly, determined to keep my guard up, to pretend it wasn’t me he was referring to.

I was fine.

I really was.

But the little girl that stood beside me, holding my hand, staring up at me with big hopeful, brown eyes said otherwise.

We parted ways not long afterwards. I walked to the school, waiting for that weird feeling to tickle the back of my neck. To make me turn around and study the streets for a black car.

The feeling never came.