Images 32

Chapter 32

I’m not sure if it was the thing with Troy or just some defensive woman instinct running through me but even as I rocked Njinda my body was humming with this. He’s not going to touch her; he’s not going to hurt her. Njinda’s family…no one’s going to hurt my family.

It’s not too long before the guys showed up there was a mix of gravel and tires skidding to a halt on pavement. Then Holly’s letting Tim and Davey inside. Tim’s holding Holly and Davey takes Njinda out of my arms and she bursts out bawling and he hugs her and picks her up right off her feet and sets her on the edge of one of the booth tables and he holds her a bit more and he’s whispering to her in the quiet Davey way and she’s nodding then wrapping her arms around his neck and he leans in and kisses her then they touch foreheads looking into her eyes.

I swear he’s in her heart and mind because they’re doing that and they’re both calming down. Like they’re falling into each other.

Me once I’m freed to move I’m all nervous energy and making coffee and I slipped to the back room and grabbed a couple of bottles. Yeah sometimes alcohol doesn’t help but sometimes a good stiff one settles the nerves. Nin…No, not until the police show, the last thing we need is some guy brushing this off because he smelled booze on her breath.

I pace, even checked the windows a few times. Kendal’s doing the same and she’s as nervous if not more than I am.

There’s a bit of relief, no a lot of relief when I see Taylor coming back with Nin’s Mom in out truck and Billy flanking right along the truck on his motorcycle. Billy has a gym bag with him that looks kind of suspicious. I hold the door for them and Billy quick kisses Kendal the takes a fast line to the walk in.

Right, I’m not even going to ask.

Not when this murderer got past all our rules to try and not be the bastard he was over in Somalia.

Our boys don’t use the rules.

Tim goes out and brings some suitcases in and we lock the doors again and wait. It doesn’t take too long before the police show and we let them in. Honestly I think we got lucky with the cops that came, one was a semi regular and the other a young guy.

Either way they got a good look at how scared Njinda was and they took this seriously. Well the older cop did and the young guy was still sort of stunned about the stuff that had gone on over there with Nin and her family and I heard him asking the older cop a couple of times. “How the hell does a monster like that get over here?” The older cop was smart enough to just say. “There’s a way in and out of everywhere Scott, it’s our job to get these guys when they do pop up.”

Yeah a debating stuff like this is never good. All you here nowadays is how terrorists get in here or get into there but it’s not that simple, you don’t hear the press going on about how the refugee that get out of the hell holes they’ve been in get out.

No I don’t think the press has a political agenda unless it’s like something like Fox or Al Franken. I do think that they do push out more bad than good and seem to celebrate when bad things happen far more than anything good.

I would raise money for a news channel that has the mission statement of “Don’t give up.”

But it’s sort of our own fault. It’s the consume it all I don’t care ADHD we seem to have now.

The News is like a stripper, we want to see the nasty stuff, the juicy bits but see it again? We’ve already seen her boobs get us another terrible thing.

Sorry, stuff like this just gets to me now. I don’t know if it’s getting to be myself for real or if it’s the hormones but Jaime, Jaime never really had an opinion on anything. I wasn’t stupid but if it just didn’t fit my self profile t never computed.

Once I was out though I’ve been a lot more well informed since I became Jenna, I only really lived online and with my online friends for the longest time and just never got that whole human contact thing, I was still in PTSD from my attack and from the other attacks by Troy and Ingrid on my life and who I was. But I was still growing and becoming the me that I guess I am now even then.

God I’m all over the place.

I get like that scattered, and nervous and thinking way too much like this when shit like this happens, and….and….

“Hey, relax…breathe Jen.”

Taylor comes up from behind me and he wraps those arms of his around my body and he hugs me and holds me from behind and we stand spoon. The thing where he’s pressed right into me and it’s not because he’s hard or horny but because he loves me and wants to be close to me.

He actually does this with me at least a few times a day. Getting ready in the morning we’ll do this or close to it in the bathroom in front of the mirror or waiting for the coffee to brew. Or right in that lunch rush lull when you don’t have to wait on anyone because they’re all stuffing their faces.

Or now, as he holds me and shifts back and forth from foot to foot rocking me, holding me together while sweetly getting me to breathe. Ladies, my husband rocks.

I close my eyes and drift a few minutes and its majik, the way it just went from one forty to like thirty five in my brain.

I open my eyes and turn around and kiss him deeply a few times and then we move over to sit with the rest of the family and just wait.

Waiting really sucks.

It took three hours for the RCMP to show but there were four cars and one with federal government stickers in the windows. Actually I’m glad that it took so long because it gave Dad time to show up and everything.

Which was a good thing because the Mounties were good and they were pretty thorough but the government jackasses were from the department of immigration and they asked questions and showed pictures of people Nin or her mother had never seen before and it all sounded like they were trying to link Nin and her mom to like terrorist or gangs or something.

It took a lot for me not to say stuff.

Dad had said plenty and one of the government types wasn’t happy with them having their own council and I couldn’t follow all the legalese. But I served out food and coffee and fought the temptation to spill the stuff all over these assholes and stuff.

I did hear a different non-legal version when I passed the men’s room and Dad and one of the assholes were inside.

“Your client didn’t need council.”

“That’s funny because it certainly seemed like you’re looking to force her to admit to something that she’s not a part of.”

“You can’t be sure of that, how well do you know her.”

“Not too well but my daughter does.”

“Daughter…yes well lets not go there.”

“Excuse me?”

“No never mind. Now look here we’ll find out if she’s dirty, a lot of these so called refugee aren’t they have crap for documents coming out of that third world fucking monkey-land and we have no way of knowing if she’s who she said she is or not. Just back the hell off and let me do my job.”

There’s a thud of someone hitting a wall inside hard…

“You’re…you’re choking me…”

Then I hear my Daddy and I’m so calling him Daddy for this.

“Listen here you racist little bureau-toad, you think you’re the shit because you’ve got a little paper slip saying you can inspect this and that and bully people? I’ve lived in the states for a good long time you little shit and you know one of the good things about the changes since nine-eleven? I’ve had case after case against shits like you and homeland security and other pissants like you that all you really are is a fucking hemroid.”

There’s another thump.

And another thump.

The town cops…the older guy went “Repeat that?” and “Checked” his radio pulling the kid out on the patio.

The other government guy looked at the RCMP guys and there was a subtle shift with Taylor, Tim, Davey, and Billy and there was a bit of tension there, the Mounties are tough lads but at the same time…

I missed the rest of what Dad said but the guy came out looking scared of my Daddy in that the bully being afraid of a real man kind of way. Everyone sat back down and the other government guy says.

“Alright just what the hell’s going on here?”

Daddy looks at him. Then at the little weasel who turns paler and paler under Daddy’s stare then get’s up. “Excuse me I’m not feeling well.” He leaves beating a hasty retreat to the government car and starts to throw up outside of it.

Daddy blandly turns to the other guy. “Nothing, something he ate must not have agreed with him. Maybe the food here was a little too ethnic for him.”

There’s a staring contest guy measuring guy thing going on with that form of testosterone-telepathy that female brains can’t pick up and something happened because the other guy said. “Okay then we’ll just have to continue on without Mr. Dobson.”

It was like there was a switch thrown or something and the guy was civil and he was thorough and calm and actually nice about the whole thing. He did take a break and went outside for a smoke and talked to the weasel that stayed out in the car. He came back and I couldn’t, just couldn’t help myself.

“Is your friend going to be alright sir?” innocent blink, blink, blink.

“Oh he’ll likely be fine I think he came down with something like hoof and mouth or something but I don’t imagine that he’ll be returning with me about this case miss.”

“That’s Mrs. But I’m glad he’s alright.” I move off and I hear Nin saying.

“This ess, good I do not like that man, he scared me.”

Daddy smiles and rubs her hand. “It’s okay, the stuff he was asking before won’t really count so much on this Njinda he common mistake right Mr. Jacobs?”

Yeah, he pissed off my Daddy.

“Uhm yes quite right Mr. Powers, I think he’ll be looking for something in another department.”

“Just not veteran’s affairs.” Daddy says.

“Excuse me?”

“I served.” He nods his head to Nin and her Mother and looked at the Jacobs fellow. “Over there.”

“Peacekeeping?”

“Yeah.”

I thought there was a mood shift before but the guy and the Mounties all sort of shifted somehow. It’s like the rules of how things got perceived changed. I don’t really get why but I do, it’s some respect thing that’s pretty big.

They finish up with a few questions and things about where they’ll be staying and stuff like that and that they’ll be in touch as soon as they have any information on the case and their safety.

The RCMP and he leave and there’s sort of a sigh with the tension going out of the room and I’m getting a great big slice of my lemon meringue pie and Kendal’s chewing her thumbnail beside me.

“That’d never happen home, the cops and the Feds they wouldn’t take that what happened …just now, are they just letting it slide or are they going to deport me or something and I’ll be in trouble when I get back to the states?”

I hug her. “No honey, you’ll be fine. There was just this little so and so that thought his job made him a bigger man than he was…I don’t get all of it honey but we’re good, you’re safe….Billy, tell her she’s okay.”

I take the pie over to Daddy and I set it in front of him with a tall cold glass of milk then I hug him.

“I’m so proud to be your daughter Daddy.”

He hugs me back with this smile there that makes up for all the stress and bullshit we had today/this afternoon. I break the hug to have Nin hug him, and then her mother hugging him calling him a “Sweet, Sweet Man.” Over and over and Holly hugs him and tweaks his nose. “You’re a good guy dammit and now you’re making me cry. I’m so telling Angie what you did.”

I’m on that verge of happy tears and going over to Taylor and slip into his arms and snuggle into his chest and his scent and his strength and I notice Kendal’s looking out the window looking confused and Billy is passing a roll of cash to the town cops who are giving him a DVD.

We’re just watching when he comes in and Kisses Kendal and passes her the disk. “It’s the security video for the store; can you go and copy this to so I can get it back?”

Kendal looks at us and at him then at the disk then at Njinda and her mom. She straightens up like she found this something in her. She kisses him bolder than she ever had before in public. “Yeah, no problem…no one hurts our family right?”

She slips upstairs and Taylor hugs me tighter.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a look like he was so in love before on Billy’s face before.

Yeah Kendal, yeah…family is everything.

I tilt my head up and kiss my husband.