HOMESTAY 007

Sullivan turned on the faucet. The cold water dripped from the tap and stung her skin when it landed. The thought of having to dig deeper into the case that turned her marriage to a mess made her upset and the fact that she would stop at nothing to unveil its mysteries piqued her pulse. She washed the sweat off her skin and rubbed her body all over again with soap and as she did, every detail was sinking in; details that her ex-husband might get disappointed in her if she failed nipped her in the bud.

Dwayne had been her prince charming but she let work consume her, she let it get in the way and it suffocated him. It pushed him to the wall and he could not take it and they grew apart. And suddenly, one morning he slapped her with a divorce.

Even after a year of divorce, she hadn't been able to move on and now, he was in her face begging her to help him with that one thing he used to push her away. Now that she thought about it, he was a complete bastard.

Why did he come to me? She asked herself. She touched her chest and it was pounding. Stop it Sullivan! Stop being a prick. He is over you, his baby brother is just missing. He wants you to help him find Jessie not that he wants you back in his life and even if he wanted you back in his life, you don't deserve it because all you care about is your job. She scolded herself.

But it was not true, she deserved him. She loved him and was to Sullivan to admit it. Now that she thought of it she wasn't less of a bastard than he was.

She wished she hadn't just put her signature on the divorce but had held him back. But it was for the best.

After a long thought under the stinging pain of dripping water, she turned off the faucet, cleaned herself, got dressed into a clean robe and strode to her bedroom. Kinner was in the other room so, she had little privacy. She had barely lay to sleep when there was a light knock on the door. She grumbled a silent curse before she stood to her feet "God so help me Shawn, if you are here to talk about what Dwayne told you, I will punch you in the face..." She muffled as she pulled the door open and to her utmost shock, she gazed at the man at the entrance. She stood there for like almost a minute, her lips agape before she finally decided to shut them and be formal about it even though she was stupidly standing there dressed in a bathrobe.

"Dwayne." She croaked "w...w...what are you doing here?"

"I don't know" his voice was husky and he reeked of alcohol. The Dwayne she knew doesn't drink, she would have called him prudish but he wasn't a complete prissy prince. "I shouldn't be here at all but I can't help it"

"Are you drunk?" She raised a brow

"No. I am in my right mind"

"You reek"

"I do." He sniffed "can I come in?" His glare darkened. He was gazing at her deeply as he stumbled into her apartment.

Still trying to process the whole thing, she closed the door and latched it from behind. "What are you doing here?" She repeated in a whisper and turned to him. Shawn was in the other room; he had teased her about what a jerk she was for denying she still felt something for Dwayne and she had told him, maybe not directly, that she and Dwayne, no way on earth would they get back together. And there she was breaking that promise. How would she come up with an excuse if Shawn showed up? How would she explain Dwayne standing in the middle of her room drunk and her in a bathrobe with nothing underneath?

She heaved a deep sigh and looked at Dwayne who seemed a mess but was putting a great deal of effort to hide it. What happened to that prissy prince she got married to? Was it Jessie that affected him so much or was he missing her?

Trying not to get ideas into her head, she spoke quickly "Shawn had told you everything you needed to hear. We are still working on Jessie's case. We have a strong lead, I'm sure we'll find him" but he wasn't saying anything neither was he moving. He just stood still, staring at her, his glare piercing its way into the depth of her bone marrows.

She ran a hand through her hair. She shouldn't fall for this, she shouldn't fall for him.

"You can't just show up in someone's apartment in the middle of the night for no reason" but he was still mute. He took solid steps towards her, his hands in the depth of his pocket, his look was stern but before she could figure out what his next move was, he brought out a sharp razor from his pocket and like a flash of lightening, pain stung her in the chest.

******************************************

"Mariah, Mariah!" A hand touched her shoulder "are you okay?"

Honestly, she wasn't. Her eyes fluttered, trying to wake up from whatever nightmare that was. She touched her head, her face and her chest to be sure she was awake and not in another realm then the environment began to sink in.

She was buried in a stack of files and had fallen asleep on the stiff wooden bench in the one room she and Shawn had rented. Her vision finally settled on the nervous-stricken fellow in front of her and when it all settled, she sighed in a guttural voice.

"Nightmare" she said as she sat upright.

"You scared shit out of me" Shawn shook his head, sitting backwards. "Are you okay?" He queried

"I am fine Kinner" she looked around and judging from the littered room, she knew he had been busy working, trying to track down Donna and her husband Peter "what did you find?" She blinked but he didn't respond. His eyes was all over her like she had been shot and he was looking for an exit wound.

"I am fine Shawn. What-did-you-find-?" She stood to her feet and crossed the room to the wall of pictures and links, connecting possible people in the investigation"

"You need to slow down Mariah"

"That's the last thing I need. We need to search the Briggs house. I think we are missing something"

"Calm..."

"Stop Shawn!" She trembled. She didn't want him to know anything was wrong but even at that, she failed "for the love of God, the last thing I need now is that..." She touched her head, exasperated. But Shawn wasn't her partner to just work on cases together, he felt responsible for anything that happened to her under his watch. Ignoring her, he raised a hand to her forehead and quickly, he withdrew it.

"God! Mariah, you are having a fever" his voice was firm. "You need to go to the hospital"

"You want to know what I need, I need you to butt off. I need you to focus on finding Jessie and not me!"

"I can't focus on anything Mariah when you are a mess. Look at yourself!"

"Shawn..."

"You need to calm down..."

"Shawn..."

"It has just been..."

"Shawn!" She snapped "Shawn, I am fine" then, her voice drained calmly. She knew how worried he could get when it came to her but it wasn't about her, it was about Jessie - it was always about that brat. And when she said she was fine, she meant it. "I can handle this" he went silent too "what do you have?"

"Donna and Peter now live in Dallas with their son. They relocated from Denver three days before Jessie got missing... Leaving their son"

"Steve"

"Why would they do that?"

"Well, that's not all. Steve is a ghost. I ran the picture in all database and found nothing"

"But you found Donna and Peter"

"Yup"

"So, it's either Steve does not exist or this picture isn't Steve's"

"Bingo!" Kinner ripostes and walked briskly to his PC. "So, I did what every other CIA tech guy would do in such case, I ran the photo on the CIA database using Dave's password and look what I found" he turned the screen towards Sullivan who was now close. She ran her eyes through, pulling a stool to sit.

"Joshua Divalski?" She raised a brow "Steve Craig... Joshua Divalski" she sighed "why didn't we think about this before Shawn?" She said without intending a response. There could have been a possibility that Steve who is now Joshua didn't use his real name. Almost all kids don't use their real name on social media. She scrolled through the information Kinner had gathered. Now looking at the concrete picture of Steve who now turned Joshua, he looked pretty young like Dwayne had described probably about twenty, twenty one.

She stood upright and retrieved the non-disclosure agreement Jannie had claimed she received the day after she spoke with the Craigs and scanned through it.

"Why didn't Jannie get this the same day she spoke with Donna and Peter?"

"I guess there is only one way to find out" Shawn eyed her

"Donna and Peter" she croaked.

__________________________________________________________________________________