Maybe I’d call and find out how too. Dax could avoid me at school, but he wouldn’t be able to avoid me if I showed up on his doorstep.
It had taken a couple of phone calls but I’d finally been able to talk a police officer into telling me the address Dax had given them. I now stood on the porch at his house wiping my palms, which were starting to sweat, on my jeans.
The door opened with a squeak, and a woman not much older than thirty answered. Her hair was multicolored and she wore an oversize T-shirt and jeans. “Can I help you?”
“Hi. Is Dax here?”
“Is he in some sort of trouble?”
“No, I just want to talk to him.”
Her eyes traveled the length of me. “He doesn’t live here anymore.”
My mouth opened, then shut again. “What? Where does he live?”
“Who are you?”
I shifted on my feet and put on a smile even though I didn’t have the best feelings for this woman. “A friend. I have some of his things.”
One thing really, his sweatshirt, and it was just a convenient excuse to see him.
“What things? They’re probably mine. He took a lot of my things.”
“They’re not yours. Do you have his address?” I was getting more irritated by the second.
“CPS didn’t tell me. I just know he was going to some group home.”
I closed my eyes and took a calming breath. So he had been sent to a group home over this. Over helping me. “I think you know where that home is, but maybe I should call CPS and let them know about the extra income you grow in your basement.” Did I just say that?
“Are you threatening me, girl?”
Fear snaked up my spine. I’d never done anything like this before, and I was sure it showed on my face, but I was getting desperate. “Yes.”
She mumbled something to herself and slammed the door in my face.
I let out a frustrated growl, then kicked her door. I just needed to walk away and forget about this. Dax got himself into this mess by deviating from the plan. He would be fine. He’d be eighteen soon, and then he could walk away from everyone like he’d always wanted.
I needed to get to the hospital. That’s where my dad had agreed I could go. That’s where I should’ve been. I turned and had just descended the two cracking cement steps toward my car when the door creaked open. The woman threw a crumpled piece of paper at me and immediately shut it again. She locked it as well.
I stared at the paper sitting on the porch next to the doormat shaped like a flower and a tipped-over green plastic watering can. I picked it up, smoothed it flat, and smiled at the address written there. I probably shouldn’t have been so happy about blackmailing information out of someone, but considering the victim, I didn’t feel quite so bad. I’d found him. And he never needed to know how.
CHAPTER 22
The group home caregiver was a tall black man with a pleasant smile, unlike Dax’s last foster parent. He also looked like he’d actually gotten ready that morning versus rolled out of bed. He had the early stages of a beard along his jaw, but his head was as smooth as could be.
“You’re here to see Dax?”
“Yes.”
He looked at his watch. “He’ll have to go over his schedule with you. Now is homework. He has free time after four.”
Dax would hate that, I was sure, his life scheduled to the minute. I checked my phone. It was 3:45. “Do I have to wait or can he get done a little early today since I didn’t know?”
“Just this once. Let me get him.”
“Thanks.” I clutched his sweatshirt in my hand. A moth clung to the wood around the door frame and I watched as it moved its wings without flying.
Dax came to the door, his hair disheveled, wearing a wrinkled tee and some athletic shorts. His feet were bare, and around his wrist was the black bracelet I had tied there.
My tight chest loosened. I wanted to push up the sleeve of my sweater and show him I was still wearing mine, too. I didn’t. I held out his sweatshirt. “Thought I’d return that.”
He took it and I had the strangest urge to grab it back, hold on to it, keep it.
“And my socks?” he asked.
“Oh. Right. I forgot about those. I’ll bring them next time.”
“It’s okay. You can keep them.”
“Did you happen to grab my shoes?” When he looked confused I added, “They were black ankle boot wedges.”
He laughed. “Because that clears things up.”
“You can’t picture them perfectly now?”
“No, I didn’t get them. They’re probably still at the library.”
Right. Still at the library.
Dax stood in the open doorway, as though ready to shut the door without a second thought. I searched my brain for another reason to keep him from doing that.
“So a group home, huh?” was the idiotic solution my brain came up with.
He looked at the door. “Dreams do come true.”
“You were supposed to leave.”
“What?”
“When people came, you were supposed to hide and then leave. It’s what we talked about.”