Page 62 of Chasing Liberty

“Freedom, there’s a fine line between love and hate. You act like he has the cooties and yet I saw you two together a few days ago. Was that a ki—”

“No!?” Freedom about came out of her seat.

Liberty raised a brow. “You two looked like you wanted to rip each other’s clothes off.”

“I don’t like him.”

“Honey, you chase after Jinx like he’s Mr. Wonderful and he doesn’t look at you like Keller does.”

“You’re wrong. Keller likes Lanah.”

“Wait, I thought Carter and Lanah were an item.” Liberty couldn’t keep up.

“Maybe for a bit, but Lanah hangs out with Keller a lot since he’s back in town.

“That doesn’t mean anything, Freedom.”

“It does when he cheated on me with her when we were eighteen,” she blurted in one breath.

Liberty paused. Then said with a gentle smile, “Honey, are you that completely blind? I don’t know what happened in the past, but he’s crazy over you.”

“Then he shouldn’t have given Lanah the time of day.”

“Said in the saddest, most jealous voice ever,” Liberty teased.

Her cell phone rang, and she saw that Lee Rhimes, the private investigator, was calling. She had completely forgotten about hiring him. “I have to take this.”

“Sure, but hurry. I have a hankering for karaoke.”

Once Liberty stepped onto the porch and closed the door behind her, she clicked “talk”. “Hi, Lee!”

“Liberty, I’ve been trying to contact you for days.” The stern ex-military man seemed a bit frantic.

“I’ve been a bit preoccupied.” She’d leave out the details. She’d turned off her phone and enjoyed some much needed disconnect from the outside world. “Do you have information?”

“Reggie Barnes is actually Ronald Cooper. He grew up in Philadelphia. He’s very much still alive and the only other living relative I could connect him to is an eighty-year -ld aunt in California. It appears the man of interest has a list of minor traffic violations, some brushes with the law but no real jail time to speak of.”

“What about the woman?”

“Penelope Sands. Also born in Philadelphia. Now she’s a real peach. Turns out she has been in and out of trouble all her life, mostly for con jobs. She served a few years behind bars for drug trafficking and was released on good behavior. The two met each other while while they spent some time in the Behavioral Institute of Philadelphia. I managed to reach a nurse who was more than willing to talk. He said Ronald and Penelope struck up quite a relationship during their stint at the hospital.Together they liked to wreak havoc on the other patients and the staff.”

Liberty wrapped her head around what Lee was telling her. “Do you know where they are now?”

“Hold onto your seat. Ronald is sitting in jail awaiting trial. He was arrested for beating up a homeless man. From what I can gather, Ronald was staying in a shelter and somehow struck up a conversation with the victim, who is an ex-marine, who didn’t like the fact that Ronald was lying about serving in the military. During a physical altercation, Ronald used a metal rod to beat the victim who’s now in a coma.”

Liberty dropped down into one of the rockers. “So he’s dangerous?”

“It would appear so.”

“Where’’s Lacey? Or rather Penelope.”

Lee’s exhale rattled the other end of the line. “Gone. I can’t find any trace of her. I figure she took off the second she saw what Ronald had done and didn’t want any trouble herself.”

“Thank you, Lee.”

“No problem, Liberty. Remember, these people are good at what they do. They’d conned a lot of people along their way. Take care and call if you need anything.”

Liberty clicked off and dropped her face into her palms. How had she missed all the red flags?

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