Page 75 of You Can Make Me
I stood and we hugged. A shudder ran through Walter, indicating that he was spooked by the thought of leaving. If me being here made him feel safer, I’d stay and have his back as he’d had mine countless times.
“What time you leaving? I’ll get up with you and you can give me a tour of the security you’ve set up.”
“Deal. Early, though. Five?”
I checked my phone and saw it was already close to midnight. “You better get some sleep. Can’t have you nodding off on thatdrive.” It was a hundred miles to the Kern County Sheriff’s Office from Laurel Canyon, and with traffic, later in the day it could take hours.
“When have I ever needed more than five hours of sleep?”
“Sorry, I forget you youngsters have an abundance of energy.”
He pounded on my back. “You kidding? I can’t go longer without having to piss.”
“I’ll make breakfast,” Dane said with a shy smile. “I haven’t had anyone to cook for in a while.”
Walter looked wounded and grabbed his chest.
Dane rolled his eyes. “You don’t count. You’re happy with anything.”
“I’m happy with you.” Walter scooped Dane up and carried him toward their bedroom. Dane called out a good night and laughed heartily at Walter’s ridiculousness.
“Don’t even think about picking me up. Den, I’m worried. Are you sure you don’t need to see the doctor at the very least?”
I held out a hand for Cooper and he took it, worry creasing his brow. He wobbled the slightest bit on his feet as he reached for his cane.
“I’m fine, baby. That board though…I won’t be doing that again. I’ll monitor things and if I feel even a twinge, I’ll call, okay? I’m not going to mess up my second chance with you.”
What I didn’t say was that a current had been running under my skin since letting go of the board. It was similar to the adrenaline I felt when working on a serious case. The feeling that something was about to happen. Something not good. Something that, during my law enforcement career, would inevitably mean hours of paperwork…or worse.
Cooper fussed over me the whole way back to the bedroom until I suggested a better use of his skills. I knew it was serious when he rolled his eyes at me and turned out the light. He curledup in my arms and let out a long breath, but I could tell he wasn’t sleeping.
“Everything’s going to be okay, I promise. Get some sleep, baby.”
“I don’t know that you can keep that promise,” Cooper whispered.
I didn’t respond. How could I?
Eighteen
Cooper
I slept through Denny waking up to tour the security system with Walter, and I pretended to sleep when he came back so he’d curl up and hold me once more. I loved the feel of him pressed against my back and didn’t want to move, but my mind wouldn’t stop cycling through the information gleaned the previous night.
The carnival was real.
Dane wastheDane Donovan, and not thesonof the missing folk singer.
Dane and the big man who had been at the house the day of my attack had both worked at the carnival.
Denny and Dane had used the same Ouija board I’d seen that day months ago, and he’d discovered that I’d actually gone to the carnival once upon a time. Almost.
Using the Ouija board had caused Denny to have chest pains, which triggered my biggest fear, now that he was back in my life.I couldnotlose this man, not for the carnival, not for all the truth in the world.
I had so many questions, but the words of the old women echoed in my consciousness.
You seek answers meant for others
Maybe that was the bottom line. My whole life’s purpose had been to seek the truth, to understand why people did what they did, why things happened the way they did. But that perpetual search for the truth had worn me down and put me in a precarious scenario that I almost didn’t survive. A child who touches a hot stove learns real quick not to do it again…or spends the rest of their life worrying their parents and getting themselves into quandary after quandary.
