Free Love Is the Drug by K. E. Saxon Page B

rubbed herself against both of their ankles. “Oh, Lord. There went our lunch.” Her shoulders slumped as she looked around. “What a mess!”
    “Look,” Jason said, “I’ll help you clean it up, but first I need to finish jotting down the last couple of notes I have for my dad—the pen?”
    “Oh, yeah,” she said, still looking a bit stunned and disheartened as she gazed at the vermicelli that hung from the side of the island, over the edge of the countertop, and snaked, like the Rio Grande River across the linoleum floor.
    “In the roll-top desk, right?” he asked. “I’ll get it. Why don’t you just sit down for a minute and relax, okay?”
    “Okay.”
    When she continued to stand there staring at the wreckage, he shook his head and walked into the living room.
    Julie had placed a few family photographs on the mantle, which he hadn’t seen before, so he took a minute or two to look them over. One was of a couple on their wedding day—clearly from sometime in the late-seventies or early-eighties, from the look of the clothes and hair. Must be Julie’s parents.
    The groom had hair the color of Julie’s, the bride, a paler brown color. But the face—the face was all Julie. Julie had clearly gotten her features from her mother.
    Which was a good thing. Because the guy had a pretty big honker going on. And he was wearing those large red glasses like some of those early MTV bands had worn.
    Cute picture.
    He set it back on top of the mantle and studied the one next to it. Actually, the small brown-wood frame held two school photographs: one of Julie when she was probably six or seven, and the other of Connie, made about the same time, he figured, since she looked to be about ten or eleven. She was so bright-eyed and innocent in the photograph. Nothing like the sexed-up, peroxided boy toy she’d turned into, that was for sure.
    Connie must’ve been an amalgam of both parents—and maybe some other distant relatives, too—because he didn’t see as strong a resemblance between her and either one of her parents as he did between Julie and her mother.
    After another second trying to wrap his brain around the disconnect between the kind-of awkward looking dark-haired little girl in the photo and the party-girl bleached-blonde celebrity he’d met five years ago, he strode over to the desk that sat in the far corner next to the picture window.
    He opened a few drawers, but none of them had pens in them. In fact, there wasn’t much of anything in them. Then he pulled open the top. Not much here, either. Just the manila envelope from the auction, a couple of pens lying loose on top of the desk, and something from Harmony Canyon Drug & Alcohol Treatment Center.
    He’d already grabbed a pen and turned back toward the kitchen before the name registered. His heart tripped into a rapid beat as he whirled back around and reached for the envelope. It had an April postmark. Not very long ago. Damn.
    Was Julie a recovering druggie, just like her sister? Shit! He shouldn’t have talked her into drinking those beers the other night. But how was he to know? She should have told him.
    He made a decision then and, after glancing toward the empty doorway to the kitchen, he slid the pages from the envelope and unfolded them. He felt a little guilty, but protecting his and his dad’s interests was paramount.
    His brows came together. It was a handwritten letter. Strange. He figured it’d be a bill when he saw Julie’s name and address typed on the front of the envelope. He flipped to the last page and looked at the signature line. Connie. Thank God. It was just a letter from her sister.
    Had she given Julie any indication that she was going to commit suicide? Maybe Connie hadn’t planned that far ahead.
    Poor Julie. For the first time, it really hit him how much she’d had to go through. And all on her own; just like his dad had been saying. He started to fold the letter back up, but then his eye caught on a particularly