88. Thea
Chapter 88
Thea
I ’m not sure what remote site Alexz is dialing in from, but I’m in a secret room in the back of a bar on Cannery Row, in Monterey. Delta Team who lives in my building is here as well.
We wait as Alexz scribbles his signature on a stack of papers before handing them off to an assistant I haven’t seen before. What number are we up to? Eleven? Twelve? He finishes up and looks into the camera. “Delta Team, I understand you have an update.”
The guy in charge, Stanford, says “We found the woman in the picture you sent us sir, and you were right. It appears she’s the catalyst for Ms. LaReaux’s first move. The woman’s mother worked in the cafeteria at the high school where Moira was a student.”
Alexz nods, and asks, “Where is this woman now?”
“She died about eighteen months ago, sir. The police report says it was a hit-and-run accident.” Stanford straightens, and glances at me before saying, “There’s something else, sir.”
“Let’s hear it.”
Stanford holds up a grainy old photo. “Miss LaReaux, do you recognize him?”
“Sure. That’s Billy. He was the first boyfriend I remember mom bringing around. He had squeaky shoes.”
“He’s the second cousin of Joe Winthrop.”
Glancing around the room, I ask, “Am I supposed to know that name?”
Alexz says, “Winthrop is a lower legacy family. The head of the family line is always a city councilman.”
“So that’s two people with ties to Canyon Falls?” My brows furrow as I take in Alexz on the screen. “I don’t understand why mom stayed in Nevada, instead of leaving the state and starting over somewhere else.”
Stanford’s smiling, showing off his slightly crooked front tooth when he says, “I think Delta Team deserves a raise, boss.”
“Do you?” Alexz chuckles.
“Yup, because my man Asher may have found something that can answer Miss LaReaux’s question.”
I lean forward and say, “Any time there, buddy.”
“Your mother was a cocktail server in Vegas, right?”
“Yeah. Off and on for years. Whenever I was in foster care, that’s where she’d go to earn money fast. Then she’d come back to whatever city I was staying in, and show the courts she was stable enough to take care of me. My placements in foster care got longer and longer. I guess it was getting harder to make good tips.”
“I think there’s another reason your mother preferred Vegas.”
“What? Like a man? That’s not raise worthy news, Stan. Vegas casinos and showrooms are where she met a lot of the guys she dated.”
He says, “Miss LaReaux, I have reason to believe your mother was traveling from Vegas to LA.”
Is he serious? “What led you to this belief?” I ask, “Do you actually have any proof of her riding a bus or a train to Los Angeles, or any transportation system at all? And could you please explain to me why she’d go back to the very state she went through so much trouble to escape from?”
He looks unbothered by my suggestion that he’s an idiot. Alexz leans closer to the camera. “All good questions, Thea, but let’s work through this theory. Hailee realizes that people with ties to Canyon Falls were infiltrating her life, and is desperate to protect you.”
I add, “According to you, she pretends she’s drinking. Acting out. The people watching think she’s spiraling out of control, and so do the courts, when she drives drunk with me in the car. She’s arrested. Goes to treatment. I’m released into her custody and we move to Vegas.”
Stanford says, “Which is when she begins working as a server. She’s coming into contact with tourists from Los Angeles, and decides to sneak to Canyon Falls to keep an eye on things.”
I ask, “How does she get in and out of town without being seen?”
“That’s easy. By using the Santa Monica hiking trails.”
This is where it all falls apart. Shaking my head, I say, “That’s impossible. Those trails are gone. I was trying to map them out when I first got to town, and never found any.”
Alexz stares at me through the screen. His look just as potent as if he were here in the room, as he says, “Those trails were originally used by league members to sneak in and out of town on challenges. There were a lot of structures built over them as the landscape of the town changed. A few may still be accessible through hidden access points.”
“But how would mom know where the access points were? Women couldn’t join The League.”
“You’re right. They couldn’t, but they’ve always been assigned as companions and under the right circumstances, prospects are known to be… chatty.”
He’s right about that. I grimace, thinking about what mom might have done to get a prospect talking. “Any idea who her companion might have been?” I ask, swiveling back and forth in my chair. Whoever it is, I hate him already, because I know what he really planned was for him and his buddies to marry Moira, even though she wasn’t old enough.
“From what I’ve gathered, it was Evan Bishop.”
“Bishop?” I bang my knee against the table, turning back to the screen. “As in Wade Bishop’s father? The land developer?” I remember Wade bragging about that the night we met.
I turn this new information over in my head. Malcolm Cox, Felix Lazarro, and Evan Bishop. Malcolm would know the access points, but so would Evan, since his family was the one building all over town.
Can I imagine mom hiking into town on a secret mission? Hell yeah I can. We’ve hiked. It’s because of her I even have an interest in nature and exploring. What I can’t imagine is her sneaking into town after she went through so much trouble to escape.
Stanford says, “It’s safe to assume there may have been other people watching you through the years, but why didn’t they drag you and Hailee back to town?”
“Lack of opportunity?” I flick my eyes around the room, then back to Alexz on the screen. “Mom never stayed in one place for too long, and I think it might be kinda hard to kidnap someone from foster care. Plus, I stayed in trouble so much, I had a lot of court appearances and attention on me. They tend to issue warrants and manhunts for fugitives.”
I mull over the possibilities a little while longer, then ask, “If this theory is true, and I’m not saying it is, then explain to me why mom would go to Canyon Falls and not check in on Moira, who she adored? And who sent those people after us to begin with? The League was quite clear that they did not know where she was, which is why they ostracized Joshua. They thought he had something to do with mom’s disappearance, but they never tried to prove it.”
Alexz addresses Delta Team. “Those are very good questions. If Hailee made it to Canyon Falls, and it wasn’t to see her family, what was she doing there?”
One of the team members says, “Well, I can tell you sir, if I’m sneaking into some place, it’s to steal something.”
I nod my agreement. That’s pretty much the number one reason to sneak into a place you don’t belong. But mom couldn’t have been stealing anything of value. We didn’t have shit.
I think about what I know about my mother and what I’ve learned since moving to Canyon Falls. Mom was very protective of Moira and wanted to protect her from being forced into the life of a legacy wife. Mom didn’t want to be controlled either, and the plan was for all of us to be together.
What happened to make her change the plan? Why would I need to be a year older, and why did the fake birth certificate show her giving birth to a boy? Okay, that last part is easy enough. If she had a boy who died in childbirth, they wouldn’t be looking for her with a daughter.
Pretending to be a year older got me into school sooner, and being in foster care that last time forced the courts to end her parental rights. It’s that loophole that allowed me to be declared independent from Joshua’s control. I’m basically my own head of family. Did she know it would come to that?
I blurt out, “Mom’s got an uncle on her mother’s side that works in the archives.”
“Does she?” Alexz asks.
“You mean you didn’t know?” I smirk at him, kinda proud that I have information he doesn’t.
“No, I didn’t. From what I understand, Hailee’s mother left her in Joshua’s care. He’s the only relative I paid any attention to because that’s the person in power in The League.”
“Right.” Waving my hand, I say, “Women are invisible. They don’t exist. It’s all head of the bloodline men. All the time, and their decisions are final.”
Moira said Joshua was leaning towards changing the name on the marriage contracts, but mom was working on convincing him to keep it as it was. It was until after Moira got pregnant that she came up with this elaborate scheme to run away.
My stomach turns as I come up with a new theory. A more plausible theory to this whole thing. The League may have done a surface level inquiry into mom’s disappearance, and then let it go, but someone else continued to look for her. One person has been adamant about his hate for me, for us, from the moment I stepped foot in Canyon Falls. One person who decided to wed and breed me.
My eyes snap to Alexz’s. He has that calculating glint in his eyes again. He gives me a slight nod, letting me know we’re thinking the same thing. What if mom stole Malcolm’s Impossible Challenge item from Evan Bishop, and that’s the reason he has it out for me? If that’s it, then figuring out what happened to that item might be the key to ending him.
I’ve been getting a lot of murderous looks since the last presentation meeting in The Tomb, and a few surprisingly friendly ones. Getting that last challenge alert sent me into a bit of a panic attack. It had two different challenges and three locations. I thought it was a joke when I saw Palm Springs was one of them. I wasn’t planning to go, but Wolfe’s reminder that I wouldn’t be alone helped calm my nerves.
The first assignments were typical league challenges. Retrieve something from someone or some place and take it to the Palm Springs delivery location. I thought it was stupid to select the harbor club where a second year prospect’s bachelor party was happening as the drop off location for our challenge items, but it worked out pretty good for me in the long run.
As I was leaving my drop off location, I received a final alert which instructed me to present the league with an item of my choosing that showed I deserved to keep my spot in the ranks. I watched as the collection of challenge items were carried down the pier and onto the yacht. I’m pretty sure there are supposed to be protocols in place to keep those things protected but, the courier must’ve been trying to multitask.
He was smart enough to lock them in a safe, and the party gave me a chance to snoop around the boat unnoticed. The fight kicked off as I was leaving. It was like an episode of drunk frat boys gone wild. Easily the most entertaining shit I’ve seen in a while.
Finn’s beanie was easy to pick out in the middle of the madness and Finn being Finn, things got bloody. He dropped his blades as soon as the pier became a disco ball of red and blue. I swiped his knives up and made a hasty retreat with the other hysterically screaming girls. I planned to keep them for myself, but I think presenting them to the high council made more of a statement.
They’ve labeled me disloyal, but out of everyone on that party boat, I’m the one who protected their precious Trium member.
Finn
Good Morning, my sexy little thief
I roll my eyes at his greeting.
You were right. I haven’t shown the proper level of appreciation for all you’ve done for me. I should have told you days ago that I’m still sporting a woody from that special reveal.
Not my problem.
Oh, but it is. And you need to fix it.
Rub one out. All fixed.
My thoughts exactly. I’m at the dorm. Dick ready.
I’m not coming to the dorm to jack you off, Finn
Then come here so I can get you off.
Pass.
I have a thank you gift.
He sends a picture of a beautiful set of throwing stars. He’s not playing fair. The jerk knows the way to my heart is through sharp objects.
This better not be a scam and all you have is the picture.
Not a scam, Pet. These pretties are all packaged in a bow waiting for you to take them to their new home.
Fine. I’ll come by after my last class