High Risk by G.K. Parks (books for 10th graders TXT) 📕

swallowed as the facts sunk in, but he was determined for this to not be real. I couldn’t fault him for that, but it made our job more difficult. And watching him was heartbreaking enough, even more so than finding the body. At least then, Gardner was just another victim. Now he was a person with people who cared about him. “He wanted to go see them for his little sister’s birthday. She’s turning twenty-one at the end of next month.”

“Tell us about Johnny,” Fennel said. “When did you meet? What does he do? Where does he hang out? Who are his friends?”

“We met freshman year. We shared a dorm and have been best friends ever since. Johnny used to work as a bartender, but then the manager asked him if he could work as a bouncer instead. So that’s what Johnny did. He liked it okay, but it didn’t pay much. Eventually, he found a job at Moonlight Security. I guess that was two years ago. Most of it was just stupid night watchman shit. He worked in an office building for a while. But these last six months, he’s been reassigned like five times. He hates it. He’s been looking for something else, but he hasn’t found anything yet.” Golden jerked his head to the side, as if the glitch in his brain had resulted in a physical manifestation. “Needless to say, ever since they screwed with his hours and schedule, he hasn’t had much time to hang out with friends. We tend to stay around here. The last time he had a day off, he ran some errands.”

“What kind of errands?” Fennel asked.

“Just basic stuff. Getting his oil changed, grocery shopping, that kind of thing.”

“Does he have a girlfriend?” I asked.

Golden shook his head. “Mary did a real number on him. He’s sworn off dating for the time being. One of these days, he’ll come around. I keep telling him that. But in the meantime, he still makes a hell of a wingman, if I can ever convince him to grab a beer. Ever since he worked in a bar, he doesn’t exactly enjoy going to them. It’s probably why I hate corndogs and hotdogs and tater tots.” He cringed.

“Mary?” Fennel flipped his notepad to a new page.

“Yeah, Mary Winsor. They broke up ten months ago. The heartless bitch. They’d been together for six years, since college. I don’t know what her deal was, other than the fact she’s psycho.” He rolled his eyes.

“Has Johnny seen her since? Has she contacted him at all?” Fennel asked.

“No. He tried calling her a couple of times after she broke up with him, but she wouldn’t give him the time of day. She said she had to find herself and she couldn’t do that with him.” He shook his head. “I heard from a friend of a friend that she went to some ashram or temple or something, but then I noticed photos online of Mary in California with some other guy. From the way she was hanging all over him, I don’t think he’s a monk.”

“Did Johnny know about this?” Fennel asked.

“I don’t know. Maybe. But she’s ancient history. He just hasn’t gotten over the heartbreak yet. I told him the best way is to get some. That’ll put everything back in perspective. But I think he was happy with it just being us. No nagging girlfriends or wives. We got it made. This is the good life.” Suddenly, his cheeks turned red and his eyes filled with tears. “God.” He held his fist to his mouth and bit his knuckle. “What am I supposed to do now? He’s my best friend. And now you’re telling me he’s dead.”

While I attempted to comfort Richard Golden, my partner searched Jonathan Gardner’s bedroom and the rest of the apartment. But we didn’t find anything that would explain why someone shot him in the face. When Fennel finished the search, he called for an officer to keep an eye on Mr. Golden. Neither of us wanted to leave the distraught man alone.

Seven

“Are you going to cry?” Brad asked.

“No, that wouldn’t be professional.” I sniffed and looked out the window.

“Are you sure? Because if you do, I will too. And then it’ll just be our little secret. No one has to know.” He took one hand off the steering wheel and gave mine a squeeze. “That was brutal.”

“At least he alibied out. It would have been worse if we had to drag him in as a person of interest.”

“True.” Brad pulled into a parking space near the Moonlight Security office building. Half a block away was a coffee shop. “I could use some caffeine. How about you?”

“Coffee, chocolate, answers. At this point, it makes no difference to me.”

“Come on. It’s my treat. And if you want to go crazy and splurge on something insanely unhealthy, I won’t tell Emma.”

I thought about my best friend. I felt the same way about her that Richard Golden felt about Jonathan Gardner. There was a time in my life when it was just the two of us against the world. But then I became a cop. And my world got a lot bigger. And then I met Brad, and now most days, it was just him and me, fighting the good fight. Or trying to. Even if today felt like an epic loss.

“Don’t you think it’s weird none of the neighbors mentioned Jonathan Gardner had a roommate?” he asked.

“We didn’t ask.”

“He has an alibi. And I don’t think anyone could fake that level of grief.” Brad stared up at the menu, but his mind was elsewhere. “But it’s just weird.”

“Maybe it has to do with Gardner’s lease agreement.”

“That could be,” he agreed. The woman in front of us moved out of the way, so Brad and I stepped up