Chapter Two…

Jack Reese steered his car into the driveway of a house about two lots away from the top of the winding road that led to Charlie Crews' house. He could not yet bring himself to believe - or accept - that his daughter lived there too, although it was painfully obvious. But then Jack was master at ignoring the obvious. He could shut out the sunlight at noon - if he chose to.

He looked up the hill as Dani artfully wove the car through remaining switchbacks to the mansion at the pinnacle of the hill. Jack pulled a pair of binos from the detritus that littered his front seat, lowered his window and examined them from afar. His daughter parked the car out front , in the broad circular drive, and as soon as Crews unbelted the little girl, she was off like a shot for the front door. Barely reaching the handle, she still managed to action the unlocked door.

Who leaves their door unlocked in LA? Jack thought. "Crews is an idiot"he mumbled to himself. What kind of cop doesn't even bother to protect his house? What does that say about the safety of his family? Slowly, subconsciously the image and idea that Crews and his daughter were in fact family began to seep into his brain, like blood through a bandage.

The door opened a crack exposing the nose of a very energetic black and white Border collie who frantically charged the little girl, knocking her to seated position on the pavement and began circling her, in a herding behavior, licking her ears, face and neck. "Daddy help! Ripley is trying to eat me" she giggled, holding her arms over her head, making the dog try even harder to nudge his way in.

Dani stood apart from them on the other side of car, still scanning as if she could feel him watching. That was his kid - good cop, good instincts, still sharp as a razor, Jack thought proudly. As he watched, Crews reached down and plucked his daughter from the ground and she promptly began wiping her face against his shirt and sleeves. "Hey, no dog slobber on the threads, kiddo" he laughed.

Kiddo – a phrase from the past – a term from their collective pasts. Popular in the sixties, it was more in vogue these days to use "bud" or "dude" but Crews lost a good portion of his life in prison, more than a decade - where his life was on "pause" while the world played on. It made him forever behind the learning curve and Jack doubted the man would ever truly recover or catch up with the times, despite his wealth and all the things he could buy with it. You can't buy back time, Jack thought, this lesson he knew well.

Who would Charlie Crews have been - had he not been sent to prison for killing the Seybolt family? Jack wondered as sat still watching the quiet house on the hilltop. Probably some run of the mill patrol officer looking for his twenty and his pension. Still married to that pretty blonde wife of his, with a couple teenage kids and a mortgage. He'd probably never have met Dani, who was a tough little twelve year old, tomboy, when the Bank of Los Angeles robbery went down and all their lives changed forever.

Crews was already a young patrolman back then, twenty or twenty one years old, making him eight or nine years Dani's senior. Had it not been for that damned robbery and the ensuing sequence of events, his daughter would likely have never known Charlie Crews. She shouldn't be here, his Dani and she shouldn't have been partnered with Crews – at work or at home, Jack thought angrily.

The little family had long since gone into their giant house and disappeared from view, while Jack was lost in thought and remembering his questionable past. The effect of which was to destroy everything he fought so hard to build. Deep down, in a way, Jack Reese knew all this was his fault. They were living out a narrative of events set in motion years prior and could he have reached through time to see how things would end, he would have made decidedly different choices.

Drawn by an impulse to look into what his daughter's life had become, he waited until twilight and nudged the car closer in the darkening sky with no lights on. He didn't even hit the brakes lighting up his taillights, but instead took the car out of gear and rolled to a natural stop on a piece of flat road affording him a view of the back yard. Years of surveillance technique training was not lost on Jack Reese, slowly he forced the car into park and again took up his binos.

Crews really should invest in fence Jack thought, you can see right into the house from here, but he didn't need to, as it was a nice night and they were on the stone porch and around the pool. There weren't many lights, but the low blue, green, glow from the pool lit their faces and left the rest in shadow.

Crews was in swim trunks with his arms around Dani, who stood watching their daughter swim, while the dog barked frantically, pacing madly back and forth. Simultaneously, both Crews and Dani spoke the dog's name sharply "Ripley" and then smiled at the synchronicity of the their action. The dog for his part looked at them expectantly, ceased barking for about ten seconds and then happily began chasing and barking more quietly again. Crews rested his chin on Dani's head. Jack could tell Dani had been swimming with her daughter because her hair was swept back from her face and still wet. Dani shivered and Crews reached for and wrapped her in a monstrous towel.

Crews near foot height advantage and the size of the towel had the additive effect of dwarfing Dani making her appear childlike. And for a moment in Jack's mind, Dani was a small child again, in their own backyard, her lips and fingers blue, refusing to come out of the water, insisting she was "fine" - warm enough, when he could clearly see her teeth chatter.

Dani smiled and bent forward, retrieving and then tossing a ball into the pool. The dog fidgeted and then leapt into the water, eliciting a squeal of delight from the little girl. Strange Jack thought, he knew the dog's name, but not the girl's and then as if on cue, Dani spoke to her daughter.

"Okay, Sam time to get out." She spoke in even tones to her daughter. "You need to warm up and settle down before bed". Jack could hear the "but moms" before they started, but Dani held firm and Crews went poolside to fish the little girl out of the pool. The dog came to Dani's feet, dropped the ball and shook profusely, showering her with the spray. "Ripley" she protested before taking a towel to the dog; who thought the entire episode was a game. The dog grabbed an end of the towel and began tugging.

"Crews - a little help" she said to her partner? Lover? Husband? Jack was unsure which applied – thinking maybe all were accurate. Crews draped his daughter over his shoulder in a fireman's carry and then deposited her on a chaise lounge before attempting to help Dani with the unruly dog.

The little girl, Sam, Jack's grand daughter he thought that'll take some getting used to - leaned sleepily back in the chair and watched in amazement as the dog got the better of both her parents, who ultimately let him have the towel. Sam's eyes were drifting closed, by the time her parents noticed, because Crews was putting his hands in obscene places on his daughter, places Jack couldn't watch.

Dani melted into Charlie Crews embrace, winding her arms around the tall man's back and Jack could make out the sharp contrast in their skin tone. Dani always had her mother's coloring; the rich tanned skin of the Arab peoples, with her mother's luminous dark eyes and rich dark flowing hair. Since she as a child, Dani had been a carbon copy of his wife. Jack missed his wife, he missed his home and the life he had before it had all gone so horribly wrong and he left.

His intentions were to spare his family the embarrassment of his arrest, which Crews seemed so intent on.

Would Crews still want his revenge, now that they shared so much? Jack wondered. In his mind, he was still deciding, but in his heart Jack Reese had already decided to find out the answer to that very question.