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I’ve sat there too many times to count. In that room, on that bench, or in rooms and on benches similar enough for the difference not to matter. I want nothing to do with them now.
I opt for the rolling chair of the desk across from Piper’s.
“Andrea will hate you sitting at her desk,” Piper says without looking up.
“Thankfully, we’re here in the middle of the night, so Andrea isn’t here to care.”
Piper smashes her lips into a hard line, but doesn’t respond. The silence continues for the next hour as she reads through files, organizes them into three piles I don’t know the significance of, and drops a few into the recycle bin. I watch her the whole time.
Finally, as I’m finishing the last of my coffee, she shoves a file in her purse and turns to face me.
“I have an on-site visit. You can wait here or head back to the house. I’ll meet you there when I get off later.”
I grab the keys to my motorcycle and stand up. “No need. I’ll come with you.”
“Timofey, please,” she sighs. “Whatever point you’re trying to make, you’ve made it. You have the upper hand. I’ll do what you want. I’ll play the role you want. Just let me do my job.”
“I’m so glad you’ve seen reason.”
She frowns. “Does that mean you’ll let me finish out the day on my own?”
I snap my fingers in anaw shucksmotion. “Damn. Maybe you haven’t seen reason, after all.”
She levels me with a glare and stomps towards the door. I follow after her at a slow stroll. I have the keys. She isn’t going anywhere without me.
Besides, the view from back here is pleasant. Piper is in a knee-length wool dress today. It’s modest enough when she’s standing up, but when she mounts my bike and straddles my hips, there is nothing modest about the long stretch of thigh wrapped around my body.
It suits me more than it ought to.
* * *
This part of the city is a shithole. As we near the address Piper gave me, we veer around potholes and roadkill. Trash clogs the gutters and more houses look abandoned than not.
Piper presses herself against my back, her mouth close to my ear. “This is going to be a tough case. I know you’re here to punish me or annoy me—maybe both—but I don’t want to make things worse for these kids.”
I didn’t process until now that she would be dealing directly with the children involved. It doesn’t change anything for me. Because my motives here are not purely malicious like she might think.
“This is research. It’s been almost two decades since I had any contact with a CPS agent.”
I swallow down the resentment boiling inside of me at memories I do my best to never touch. Maybe things have changed since I was a kid.
I hope they have.
I pull the motorcycle along the curb of a rundown duplex. The small square of lawn in front is dried and brown. Aluminum foil is pressed into the upstairs windows to block the sun. Where a garden might have been along the front facade, there’s instead a graveyard of faded plastic toys.
Suddenly, I’m back in the trailer my mother moved us to after Dad died. I see the dark-haired CPS man with the mustache blocking all the light from the front door, his shadow stretched long over our empty living room.
He haunted our house like a demon. Every time he showed up, a little more of my mother disappeared.
“Are you coming inside?” Piper asks from the sidewalk.
I blink back to reality. I didn’t even feel her get off the bike.
I see the blinds in the front window move. A little head pokes out for just a second to watch us in the street. Then it disappears.
I prop the kickstand up and sit down on the leather seat. “I’ll stay here for now.”
“But you said—” Piper shakes her head and backs away. “You know what? Never mind. I’m not going to look this gift horse in the mouth. I’ll be back soon.”
