Chapter Thirty-Four-Jaden

Pins and needles dance along my spine when Johnny walks into the garage on Monday. I'm the worst at lying and hiding my feelings, but I try my best.

Johnny knocks his knuckles against my desk, as he always does, and smiles. "Hey Girlie. How was your weekend?"

I bite my bottom lip. "Good. Good. How about you? What did you do this weekend?" I pry, but he doesn't bite.

He shrugs. "Watched some football and hung out."

Yeah, at his secret restaurant.

I smile, but it doesn't reach my eyes.

"Where is Cade?" he asks, buttoning his uniform.

"In the back," I say, turning on the computer. "He's all better, finally got his cast off."

Johnny nods, still working his buttons. Pursing my lips, I continue to scroll over appointments, and say, "I wish they would have found the thugs that did that to him. Scumbags."

Johnny finishes his shirt, and gives me a smile. "Yeah, he didn't deserve that."

I watch him walk toward the back, not giving me a second thought, which is bittersweet. I don't want him to know I work at his restaurant, but I also want to get a bigger reaction out of him. He seems like a completely different person here than when I was introduced to him.

I hear him exchange words with Cade, and then the music is up. I have no way of hearing anything that goes on in the back unless I try to eavesdrop, and I'm not comfortable with it.

The minutes tick by slowly until Dan walks out of the back. "It's lunch, buttercup. You want me to pick you something up?"

I shake my head. "No, I brought our lunch."

Dan grins. "Making food for Cade, already? Someone is trying to get a ring out of him."

I cringe at the thought. Not being married to Cade, but being married at eighteen, because it sounds like a mistake waiting to happen.

"Nope, not doing that," I say.

Dan winks. "Sure."

He leaves, and I find myself walking toward the back. The music is blasting. Johnny is talking to a customer in the bay, and Cade is under the hood of my car in the corner. It takes some guts, but I dash into Dan's office and shut the door.

It's small with two filing cabinets, his desk and a half-dead plant in the corner. The filing cabinets have the key on the top, so I unlock them and begin rummaging through the files. He has to have a file on his employees.

I dig until I see Johnny's name and pull it up. It consists of one page with his name, address and contact information. Nothing else. It strikes me as odd, but I memorize the address as if I'm Dory on Finding Nemo.

The office door slams, and I drop the file, and shut the door. Dan is standing in the doorjamb, with a grease stained sack in one hand and a soft drink in the other. He looks at me knowingly.

"Where are the staples?" I rattle off. "I couldn't find any up front."

He stares blankly at me, but points toward the corner of his desk.

I grab a carton of them and high-tail it out of there. I feel Dan's eyes on me the rest of the day, even though he's not around. Cade finds me hunkered over the desk, counting down the drawer, at the end of the day.

He slides his knuckle down my spine and I jerk, spewing change all over the place. He tilts his head. "Jumpy today, are we?"

"Yeah, yeah," I say, tucking my hair and bending down to gather my change. He bends down with me, and covers my hand with his.

"What's the matter?"

"110 Ridgeview Boulevard!" I whisper shout.

"What?" he asks.

I lean toward his ear and whisper, "That's Johnny's address. I found it in the filing cabinet. Dan caught me."

Cade looks over his shoulder and scratches the scruff on his cheek. "Did you play it off?"

I stand up and put the change back into the drawer. "Yeah, but I don't know if he bought it. I'm super nervous."

"I can tell, you tossed change everywhere. Just calm down, he can't prove anything. Finish up here so we can go home."

I finish the drawer and find Cade sitting in his truck. I climb in and watch the front windows of the garage. Dan's truck is still there, which I find odd, because he normally goes home early. "Why is he still here? I don't like it."

Cade reaches over and runs his palm over my thigh. "Calm down, Jaden. You're being paranoid."

"I don't think I am, Cade. Dan knows something—"

"I got that feeling when I spoke with him at his house. Something isn't right with it."

I begin to tap my foot against the floorboard. "Aren't you going to go?"

Cade looks over at me. "Go where?"

"To 110 Ridgeview. I need to see where he lives."

Cade gives me the side eye. "If it'll make you stop panicking, sure," he says, turning his truck around. "Let's go spy on Johnny."

I'm on the edge of my seat when he pulls into a small neighborhood and stops in front of a vacant lot. "You've got to be kidding me," I say. "It's a fake address?"

"Looks like it."

"Maybe we could go down to the restaurant, like a stake out."

Cade turns to look at me. "Jaden, I think you need a break. You have class in the morning; we can't have a stake out all night."

"Since when did you become my dad? I can stay up late if I want to."

He lifts a brow. "You'll be passed out by ten thirty."

He's right, but I don't agree. I cross my arms and stare at him. "You're not curious as to why he has his own restaurant, and Dan has no information on him?"

Cade swipes his palm down his face. "Of course I am curious, Jaden, but I'm not going to drag you around the town in order to figure it out." He turns around in someone's driveway and starts home. "You're already risking your safety working at that bar, now you're wanting to go stalk him? I mean, come off it."

I stare down at the semicolon on my hand, thinking about where I've come from over the last two years. I feel freer than I ever have, and to have my own brother send out naked pictures of me, and have this guy pimping out drug addicts in the town, it's strange to think I feel normal during this.

"Please?" I ask.

Cade burst out laughing. "Seriously? You're gonna give me that face?"

I shrug. "I need to know. I was a blubbering mess today at work. Let's just go by the restaurant or Dan's and see if anything sticks out."

He sighs. "Okay, but if we're caught I'm blaming it all on you."

"I'll take the blame. Now drive."

Cade drives us across town to the restaurant and parks across the street. "There is a vender, go get us some popcorn," I say, poking my elbow into him.

He chuckles and stops his truck. "Funny. Now what do you expect to happen?"

I cup my eyes in pretend binoculars and wait. Seconds tick by, and Cade's palm slides against my thigh. "You're cruising for a bruising," I mumble. "This is my training for a FBI agent."

"Right, excuse me. I wouldn't want to distract you from that."

It's a Monday night, so I don't expect to see many people bar hoping, but who asked me, right? We wait for a few minutes, while Cade drums his fingers along the steering wheel. After thirty minutes, I sigh. "Okay, you're right this is stupid—,"

Cade looks over with a smug look that screams I told you so but he stops. I follow his gaze toward a dark SUV that pulls toward the back alley of the bar and parks. It can't fit into the alley, but the driver pulls up enough that it's partially hid.

I feel Cade's fingers grasp my thigh. "Didn't they tell you to stay away from the back alley?"

I nod.

Two women get out of the back of the SUV, a man holds them captive with their arms behind their backs, and guides them toward the backdoor. I feel myself open the truck door without thinking. Cade's finges grasp at me, but miss by one second, as I barrel across the street.

I don't hear Cade but I don't stop to listen. I bend down behind a trash barrel and listen as someone opens the rusted backdoor. "Delivery," he jokes. "Is boss here?"

"Nah, won't be here until tonight," someone says.

It sounds like the female bartender, but I can't be for sure. "Take 'em before someone sees."

I fumble backward, and Cade catches me, pulling me to safety in a small alcove in the corner of the building. I bury my face into his chest, listening to the SUV drive over the loose gravel in the parking lot.

So many things race through my mind. Is this a sex trafficking ring? Or a prostitution ring? I can't fathom another thought when I feel Cade grab my shoulders and force me to look at him.

"What the hell was that, Jaden? They could have caught you?"

I open my mouth to speak but nothing comes out. He tugs me toward his truck across the street and slams my door. I can basically see the smoke coming from his ears. When he gets in, he drives us several miles before he lets out a hushed sigh.

"What was that? I—I don't even know what to say to you. You could have been snatched. They could have killed you, or sold you, whatever it is they are doing."

My bottom lip trembles. "I'm sorry. I don't know what I was thinking. I'm just so tired of everyone getting away with everything."

Cade shakes his head. "It's not our job to punish people, Jaden. They'll get caught—,"

"We could tell on them—,"

"No!" he yells. I see the fear on his face for the first time. "I'm not going to lose you because of this. Just drop it. It'll all come to light."

I wipe a stray tear from my cheek quickly. My phone buzzes in my pocket, and I dig it out. A text from the bar comes across my screen.

"Who is it?" Cade asks.

"It's the bar manager. He just let me go. He said he didn't need my help anymore."

"Good," Cade says.

I shove my phone into my pocket and think about it. "When you went to talk to Dan, did you tell him about me at the bar?"

Cade thinks about it. "Yeah, I did."

"I don't think Johnny is the only person that deals with the bar, Cade. I think Dan knows about everything. Did he know your mom was an addict?"

Cade looks ahead. "Yeah, but Dan wouldn’t—,"

"How do you know?" I ask. "How do you know anything about Dan outside of the garage."

Cade grinds his teeth together. "I don't."

I stay quiet on the way home, because there is nothing else to say. We both know Dan and Johnny both have dealings with this, and now Dan knows we're onto them. I bite my bottom lip and try to keep myself composed, but Cade let's go for me.

He slams his fists against the steering wheel. "I'm going to kill them both. I'm going to prove it, and kill 'em both."