In a rush, she drove to her house, sounding her horn numerous times, even leaning out of the window to give someone the finger and yell at them. And to be fair, the guy did deserve it, cutting her off and nearly pushing her off the road. But it was a far cry from the calm and sympathetic ear I found when she served me at the bar, the pleasant woman who spoke tenderly to me—albeit about my concocted predicament—but then everyone has their breaking point. And on the journey home, Tanya had reached hers.
I called Casey once we were five minutes away from the house, letting her know that Tanya wasn’t too far away and to get out of the property before she was discovered there. She responded quickly, and assured me she was on her way out.
As we approached the house, I saw no sign of Casey. That was good and although it was what I expected, it was still a relief. I had the utmost faith in Casey’s ability to get out of there stealthily, but this aspect of the operation was outside of my power, and whenever something was outside my direct control, I felt a degree of concern. It wasn’t a worry, as such, more a healthy investment in the success or otherwise of events.
The semi-detached house was just one block from the corner of the main road, and the road’s high level of incessant noise was sure to affect anyone’s sleep pattern. It would have driven me nuts.
Sleep is such an important factor in well-being. From anger management to weight-loss to decision-making, quality sleep is the great regulator. The ultimate reset button. I once lived close to a busy main road, much like Tanya’s house, and I had never been in so many fights in my life. Not just verbal fights but physical altercations. Not that a fist fight was a rarity for me, but when I got into a fight on the way to work, had a fight on the job and then another on the way home, I knew things had gotten out of hand.
Tanya’s house was clapboard, and the noise was sure to travel through the thin walls. A lot of trucks used West Fullerton Avenue, especially early in the morning. Maybe she was used to it by now and had become desensitized, but there was nothing I liked less than a consistent lack of sleep caused by excessive noise in the night. There was a good reason why sleep deprivation was considered a form of torture and was effective at breaking a person’s will to live.
I drove past the house once, before turning and parking across the other side of the road, under a large oak tree. The street was busy, cars coming and going to the nearby apartment complexes, and people walking to the shops close by.
On the street in front of their home, I saw a car arrive, and out stepped Kyle. Tanya came out the front door to meet him as if she had been watching at the window for his arrival, and it was immediately clear she was not there to simply welcome him home. Tanya and Kyle instantly broke out into an argument. And a heated argument at that. She was throwing her hands in the air and he was trying his best to pacify her. Something had rubbed Tanya the wrong way.
Something was not going well for them.
The question was: what?
I opened my window a crack and strained to hear what the argument was about. They were loud enough for me to hear their voices, but other than the odd word here and there, I couldn’t make it out over the other droning background noises in the street. Every time I nearly could hear something a vehicle would rush by and I’d lose it again, leaving me with nothing of practical value to work with.
After five minutes the argument faded out, they both embraced in a hug and walked inside together.
If Millie was inside, I was sure she would be safe. There was no way I could see Tanya harming her child for any reason whatsoever. She might’ve had an angry streak, a short fuse that flared up every so often when things became too much but she didn’t seem the sort of psychopath that could harm their own child.
But then, that wasn’t what Chase was paying me for. He wasn’t paying me to assess the safety or otherwise of his daughter, or the mental state and capacity of his former wife.
He was paying me to find Millie, and bring her back before he had to make the drop of a cool million dollars.
Even if Tanya was trying to blackmail Chase, did I see her as the criminal? She was trying to provide a life for Millie, and money could certainly help there, I understood that well enough.
Was I concerned
