Jo sat down on her couch perplexed and that’s when she saw the message from her parents in the pop up banner on her computer. Her stomach clenched realizing that Wes had seen the message. He thought she had taken a job in Chicago. She knew she needed to explain everything to him, even if that meant explaining why she hadn’t accepted the job.
Chapter 27
Wes
Wes was reeling from Jo’s betrayal. He shut his phone off and instructed his doorman to tell anyone that asked to see him that he was out of town. He used Sunday to catch up on chores and he came to a major decision. There was no way he could stay in town, knowing Jo was nearby, even if it wasn’t for much longer, and maintain distance from her. He was hurt that she’d taken the job in Chicago without even discussing it with him. So Sunday night Wes called the client that had asked for him to accompany his family to Europe. Wes explained that his schedule had cleared and he would be the one going with them. The client was delighted.
On Monday morning Jace and Andy knew immediately something was wrong. When Wes called a meeting they were floored when he told them he was leaving for Europe in the morning.
“Is Jo okay with you going?” Andy asked hesitantly.
“Jo and I are through.”
“What?” Jace couldn’t believe it.
“She took a job in Chicago.”
Andy and Jace looked at each other and before they could say anything else Wes spoke again.
“I can’t stay here right now and I don’t want to talk about it either.”
Jace and Andy didn’t argue with him. Jace was really angry at Jo and he felt bad for Wes, he was hurting. Andy felt sorry for his friend also, but he thought there might be something more to the story. It didn’t sound like Jo. Andy knew she may not have expressed her feelings to Wes yet, but he knew she was in love with him. He couldn’t believe that she would leave him.
Wes left that afternoon for Europe. He swapped out his phone for one from the business ones that would work overseas and one that didn’t have Jo’s number on it and one she didn’t have the number for. Wes wanted to give his job his undivided attention and hopefully the distance would help him heal.
Jo tried to call Wes that evening and once again was bounced to voicemail. She even went to his condo on Sunday, but the doorman told her he was out of town. It was becoming crystal clear that Wes couldn’t handle her lifestyle and had washed his hands of her. Jo spent the rest of Sunday getting ready for her night at Cardboard Corner.
When evening set in Jo parked a few blocks away from the homeless corner and took out her oversized bag that contained items a homeless person might carry. She had two blue tarps that she had knocked holes into with a rock to make it appear worn and she had some wooden clothes pins, old twine, a ratty blanket and some other odds and ends.
She packed a few extra items as well like; a bag of diapers for Annie, and some dog biscuits for Charlie, one of the older occupant's dog. Jo walked into camp around 8:00pm and Trip helped her rig up her tarp against the fence. Jo snuck the diapers into their small shelter, and when Annie saw them she knew it was Jo who had put them there, but she remained quiet. Annie had good people sense for a seventeen year old and she had a feeling Jo wasn’t what she was claiming to be, but Jo was nice and Annie liked talking to her. Jo never tried to get personal information from her and she loved holding little Trip, which gave Annie a break.
That night undetected by her plastic tarp Jo watched and took pictures with her iPhone, of a truck pulling into the construction yard. The head supervisor came out from the trailer and signed for the shipment of lumber. A small crew of men unloaded the wood and then she watched them leave. The supervisor recorded the shipment and then he left. The only person left at the site was a night watchman.
Jo fell asleep wrapped in her thin wool blanket and awoke to another truck pulling into the yard. She looked at her iPhone noting that it was 2:00am. Jo watched as the night watchman unlocked the main gate motioning the new truck in. She took pictures again, but she knew it was too dark and they wouldn't be clear.
Four men stepped out of the truck and Jo watched as they unloaded wood from the truck and then loaded up the wood that had been delivered earlier.
Holy Smokes Jo thought this was it. This was the evidence she’d been waiting for. Her head whirled with all the new information she had just gathered and what to do next. When the truck was getting ready to leave she heard the one man tell the watchman they’d be back on Thursday night.
Jo knew she had some serious investigating to do before Thursday night. She could break this wide open if she played her cards right.
Jo stayed on at Cardboard Corner continuing her charade. Some of the occupants started to accept her and although many of them really were down on their luck persons she did find there were a few of them that were unbalanced. During the day Jo would leave the corner, but she always returned at night. She had to keep up the pretense because her new objective, for Thursday night, required her to be at Cardboard Corner and record what she hoped would be another material swi
tch out on Thursday night.
During the weekdays Jo focused on gathering more evidence, but she was becoming increasingly depressed when thought about how badly she had misjudged Wes. She couldn’t believe he was so callous to just walk away from her. Her heart ached from missing him, but she refused to call or text him anymore. He had walked away from her. Jo wished she could tell him everything she had discovered. He would be crazed that she was spending her nights in Cardboard Corner, but she also thought he might be just the tiniest bit proud of her too.
Jo had taken a few minutes to call Auggie and although she didn’t tell him about her and Wes being broken up, she did tell him that she thought the investigation she was working on was going to be over soon. He was excited for her. He was the one person that she had confided in about lying to her parents about the job in Chicago because she hadn't wanted to leave Wes. Auggie understood why she had told her parents the lie, he knew them and they would have insisted that she go on the interview, but he did tell her she should have told Wes.
On Thursday night Jo left her townhouse hoping she could wrap up her stint at cardboard corner that night. She had downloaded the pictures from Sunday night onto her computer and her iPhone, and as she had thought, the pictures of the switch out couldn’t really be seen because it was too dark and she had been too far away. For tonight’s delivery Jo had rented a night vision video/camera that had internet capabilities. She programmed the high tech camera to send what she recorded and any pictures she took to her home computer and to her iPhone.
Jo’s plan was to sneak into the site behind the second truck, video the switch, and sneak back out. The reason she needed to get inside the site was because she needed to take a picture of the original invoice from the first delivery. Jo had noticed that after the supervisor had signed the invoice, he then placed it on a clipboard, and he then hung the clipboard right inside the trailer door.
Jo decided when the second truck was being unloaded she would slip over to the trailer and take a picture of the invoice, while the guard and men were busy. She’d then remain hidden and video as much as she could. Her only worry was sneaking back off of the site. Jo decided if worse came to worse she’d scale the fence in the back when the guard took his normal nap in the trailer around 4:00 am.
Jo videoed the first shipment being delivered around 8:00 pm that evening. This time the delivery was steel beams that had to be off loaded with a small crane. Like before, a few men under the direction of the supervisor unloaded the materials. The supervisor signed the invoice, handed it back to the driver, and then placed his copy on the clipboard placing it right inside the trailer door. Jo figured there must be a hook for the clipboard because the supervisor never even had to go inside the trailer to hang the board, he simply reached in and when his hand reappeared it was empty.
When the truck left Jo reviewed her footage pleased with what she’d captured. She pressed the button that relayed the pictures to her computer and iPhone. She then lay back down on her blanket, ate a granola bar and went over what she’d be doing next. She realized it would be risky. If Wes had been on board with everything she could have confided in him and then she would have felt safer that someone else knew where she was and what she was attempting. He could have even been her back up.