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Again, not normal. Not normal at all.
The little girl was in the back seat, sitting timidly in the car seat, watching a movie that was on the flip down entertainment system in Tyson’s Mercedes.
“You can’t handle the truth,” he admitted. “And, honestly, there’s nothing in the world you could give me that would make me tell you. I’m keeping two people safe here.”
I narrowed my eyes.
“Two? And safe from who?” I asked.
Tyson’s chin went up as he refused to answer.
“Tara?” I asked.
He didn’t twitch.
“Andy?” I pushed.
He stiffened slightly.
“Daddy?” I barked.
He began walking in the direction of his car door.
“I’m never going to confirm or deny it,” he said softly. “You may be curious.” He opened the door. “But your curiosity isn’t worth their lives.”
With that, he got in and didn’t look back.
Which only made me more curious.
My eyes went to the mental facility where someone—someone very important to Tyson—sat inside.
And I had a feeling I knew who it was.
Now, I only had to figure out how to get in there to confirm my suspicions.Chapter 3Monday must be a man. It comes too quickly.
-Coffee Cup
Liner
My big break came in the form of the PI.
He sent me a message telling me that visiting hours for the facility were Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays for thirty minutes at a time.
However, if I didn’t want to do it at normal times, I could volunteer.
Since he was still looking into who it was exactly that Tyson was visiting, I could either wait or go in there blind.
I was going in there blind.
I was also going in there when I had zero time to spare.
The line of storms was barreling down on us and would be here in less than four days. That meant I had three days or so to find out what I wanted to find out or I’d likely be busy for at least the next week.
And knowing that, it would kill me knowing that I didn’t have answers—I was an answer person. I had to have them and understand a problem, or it would literally drive me insane.
That was the problem with having an enormously high, immeasurable IQ. My brain literally never stopped working. I had to challenge it, or things would go bad—meaning I would get myself into trouble.
I looked over at my dog, who I’d taught to do everything from bark on command, to play dead or get me a beer.
“You ready to go, Monster?” I asked my Standard Poodle mix who was actually named Monster.
He was a freakishly large dog for his particular combination of breeds and weighed in at a hundred and twenty pounds. He resembled more of a Great Dane’s build, and likely had some of the larger breeds in his lineage. But, since he was a rescue, I didn’t really know what all was in him except for the Poodle part thanks to the curly hair that I had to get trimmed once a month or it’d be fuckin’ awful.
Monster, who was intelligent like me, got up and started for the door, making sure to pick his leash up on the way.
He looked at me over his shoulder and I caught the leash and clipped it on him before I opened the door to the house.
I grinned as I remembered telling him to go shit on Tara’s lawn and him actually doing it. The resulting chaos that had ensued from that one command had been enough to cause me to grin about it even a year and a half later.
My phone beeped, and my grin widened slightly at seeing my new ID.
“Look at that, Monster,” I said to my dog. “You’re a certified rehab K-9.”
The badge that the PI had taken a picture of made us both look all official and shit.
I pressed my hand to the leather vest that I was wearing and wondered if I should just leave it here, but then decided that I’d just stow it in my saddlebags for the couple of hours that I’d be there.
Heart pounding and excitement thrumming through my veins, I tucked Monster’s leash into his collar and told him to get seated.
“Load up,” I ordered.
He did, heading for the trailer that I pulled with my bike when he was making the rounds with me.
I didn’t own a truck.
I didn’t need one.
If I did need one, I just borrowed a company one and went on about my business.
Meaning that when I wanted to go anywhere and Monster needed to go, too, he sat in the specially designed trailer that was made just for him.
It had a seat and everything.
He even had dog glasses to protect his eyes.
Heading for my bike, I backed it up to the trailer and hooked everything up. Once I slipped Monster’s eye protection on, we motored out and headed for the drop off location to pick up Monster’s therapy dog vest, and my new badge.
