Hidden in the Blood: A Novel of the Terribly Acronymed Detective Club (Book 5)

Chapter Fifty-Six: Al, Friday

He wished Sunny would come back inside and be a third set of eyes. He felt like two sets of eyes on two objects were spreading surveillance too thin. Not that he worried about the women; they could hold their own against the younger men. The goal was well defended. He focused on their drinks instead.

After a few minutes had gone by with him staring until he thought he was going to go cross-eyed, with neither the women nor the men feeling his stare and looking his way, his phone buzzed in his pocket. He had to answer it because it could be Logan or Emma. Logan was supervising his sister, Naomi and Tosh, but this night was going to go later than other nights when he was responsible for them, and the boy was resentful that he couldn't go out with his friends. It took Joe promising to teach him how to drive tomorrow, now that Logan had his learner's license, to make him agree; as Al predicted, Logan didn't want to go to Kelowna with them, seeing a wine festival where he wasn't allowed to drink as the height of unfairness. Joe had assured Al and Rachel he'd keep an eye on the boy and take him out for something he wanted to do after they did some driving. As irritated as Al was that Logan seemed to like Joe more than his adoptive father, he did appreciate that their adopted children felt the safe embrace of the wider family of the LSDC. As awkward as it might have been living under the same roof as the man who'd slept with his wife and whose wife had slept with him, he had a feeling he'd miss the family dynamic that had developed while they were living there when the time came for them to move out.

He checked his screen and saw that it wasn't either of the kids, who probably would have called Rachel first, he realized later. To his surprise, it was Mom. 

Immediately on the alert at this late call, feeling his heart hammering in his chest, he answered. "Mom? Are you okay?"

"Al?" Mom's voice was barely audible over the competing noises of people talking and country music. He must have stuck out like a sore thumb in this bar. He didn't like beer or country music, so what the hell was he doing here? Especially if his mom was in trouble?

"Mom? Can you talk a little louder? I can barely hear you."

"Where are you?" she asked a little louder, but he still pressed the phone harder against his ear and put a hand over his other ear to hear her better.

"At a bar with the friends," he said, not needing to clarify who his friends were.

"A bar?" she asked in disbelief. "Aren't you going away in the morning? You need your rest."

"I think we'll be going home soon. We have Logan babysitting and we don't want to put too much responsibility on him."

"I didn't even know you liked bars."

"I don't. We're helping Joanie with something." He knew mentioning Joanie's name would shut down any further questioning from his mother, who now considered the woman the daughter she never had. "Is everything okay, Mom? Aren't you normally in bed by now?"

"Well, normally I would be, but I'm afraid I've had to take Samson to the animal hospital. I'm there right now."

"What?!" he squawked, leaping from his stool, drawing eyes from other patrons at the bar. He looked around wildly, only barely registering that Rachel had noticed him and was looking at him in concern, ignoring the man who was attempting to chat her up while Lauren and Tej were exchanging polite but stiff conversation with the other two guys, who either didn't notice their body language that was telling them this far and no further, or were hoping to change their minds.

"I don't want you to be too alarmed," she said, but even her voice seemed shaky, like she was barely holding it together. "But I thought you should know because he's your cat."

He looked toward the entrance of the bar, wondering how badly he would balls up this operation if he made a run for the parking lot. No, he couldn't leave Rachel behind. Still, his cat needed him! "What happened?" he asked plaintively, voice cracking, fearing he was going to cry in the middle of a bar filled with testosterone.