Chapter 15
15
ECHO
As I jot down the article’s details in the notebook I keep for my social psychology class, I hear someone speak behind me.
“Excuse me?”
I ignore the voice, certain the person isn’t addressing me. It’s quiet in Full of Beans this afternoon, so it’s easy for me to pick up on pieces of other people’s conversations. I reach for my skinny caramel mocha and my lips curve down when I realize the mug is empty. I’m on a tight budget, so I’d better not have another.
“Excuse me,” the voice repeats, and this time, there’s a tap on my shoulder.
I jolt, my heart racing as I spin to face them. “Don’t do that,” I squeak. “You scared me.”
The young blonde toys with a charm on the bracelet around her wrist, her expression anxious. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. Are you okay?”
“I’ll be fine.” I take a slow breath to get my pulse under control. “Can I help you?”
“Um.” Her eyes flick away and then back to me. “Are you Echo?”
“Yes.” Something about the way she asks makes me suspicious. I study her more closely. Flawless golden complexion, eyes the color of a summer sky, and a build not unlike my own, although she’s a little taller. She’s familiar, but I can’t put my finger on where from.
“I thought so.” She rests her hand on the back of the seat beside me. “Can I join you?”
She doesn’t wait for an answer. I can’t help feeling as if I’m supposed to know who she is.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t recognize you,” I tell her apologetically. “Have we met?”
She angles her chair toward me and sets an espresso cup on the table. “I’m Soraya Kinsey. Tyler’s sister.”
A sudden coldness permeates me. I should have realized. Her coloring is so similar to his, except that her eyes are bright where his are cool, and she has more of a tan—presumably from spending time outside. He likely spends all of his spare hours indoors at the rink.
“I didn’t realize,” I say.
I’ve seen Soraya Kinsey in the past, but she was a freshman when I was a senior, so we rarely crossed paths. And because Tyler wanted to keep me away from his friends and family, we never said more than a hello to each other in the school corridors.
“Can we talk?” she asks, her fingers finding their way back to her charm bracelet again, in what must be a nervous habit.
I quickly catalog what I know about her, and what can easily be seen. She must only be in her first year of college, making her eighteen or nineteen. Her body language says she’s anxious, and nothing about it is aggressive, but I still worry she intends on harassing me the way so many others did before I left Charlesville.
“Why?” I ask. “Tyler and I aren’t friends, and if you’re here to rehash the past, then I’m not interested.”
Soraya’s hand stills, and she stiffens. “The past? Are you talking about the charges against Eric Weston?”
I stack my hands one on top of the other, hoping she won’t notice that they’re trembling. My insides are turbulent, and suddenly, I’m glad I only had one mug of coffee. It’s less to throw up.
I make an effort to relax my tight jaw. “I haven’t heard that name said out loud in a long time.”
She claps her hand to her mouth, her eyes horrified. “I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have—”
“It’s fine,” I assure her. I need to be able to get through life without being triggered anytime someone mentions the name ‘Eric’.
“No, it’s not.” She presses her lips together, her eyes shining with emotions I can’t pinpoint. “I should have been more careful.”
“It is what it is.”
She nods and blows out a breath. “For what it’s worth, I believe that the jury was right to convict him. He did what you said, and I would never try to make life harder for you because you were brave enough to stand up and expect a monster to face the consequences of his actions.”
I stare at her with my lips parted as tears fill my eyes. With effort, I force myself to swallow a lump of emotion.
Very few people ever believed me, or at least were willing to say so to my face, and I’m unprepared for the wave of emotion that crashes over me. My throat tightens and I raise a hand to my chest, feeling the pounding of my heart beneath the skin.
“You believe me?” I whisper.
“Yes.” Her tone is fierce, and she reaches for my hand but then stops. “Tyler does, too.”
I reel back, her words striking me like a slap to my face. “He certainly didn’t give that impression at the time.”
Maybe he believes me now. Based on his actions over the past few days, I’d even venture to guess that he does. But if he believed me back then, why wouldn’t he have called off his friends, or even just taken a minute to ask if I was all right?
I wasn’t.
It took a long time for me to be anywhere near all right.
Soraya twists her hands together. “He was in a difficult place.”
I scoff. “I’m pretty sure I was in a worse place.”
She nods, her eyes flitting around like a wary bird as she considers her next words carefully. “I can’t imagine what you were going through. It’s most girls’ worst nightmare, and for you to be so alone… It must have been awful.”
“It was,” I confirm.
She stops twisting her hands and wraps one of them around the small espresso cup instead. “There’s nothing that can justify my brother’s behavior, but I swear he did believe you.” She pauses. “Did you ever ask where your mom got the money to hire such a good attorney?”
Whatever I’d thought she might say, it wasn’t that. I frown, wondering what she’s getting at, but as I think about it, I realize it’s a good question. I was too overwhelmed at the time to wonder how Mom managed to hire a top criminal law attorney to act as her advisor during the trial.
“Are you implying the money came from your family?” I ask, refusing to beat around the bush.
Another thought occurs to me, and my frown deepens. I got lucky with the prosecutor, too. The district attorney personally handled my case, and he’d been a staunch source of support from day one.
I hadn’t questioned it at the time, but he had plenty of underlings who could have done the job. After all, I was the daughter of a working-class single mother. Nobody special.
“Or did they pull strings?”
Mr. Kinsey loves doing that, but why would he help me?
Soraya shrugs and tosses back the espresso. “No comment.”
I pick up my pen because I need something to occupy my hands or else I might grab her and demand answers. Does she have any idea how frustrating it is for her to drop sly little questions like that and then not follow them up with something tangible?
“What are you doing here?” I ask because the longer we spend together, the more this feels like a set-up. Once again, Tyler and his family are trying to pull strings, but I’m not some puppet for them to manipulate.
Soraya places the espresso cup back on the table and pushes it away from herself. “I go to school at Newbury. I’m studying sociology, but I’m pre-law. I intend to specialize in domestic violence cases.”
A hint of darkness passes through her eyes, reminding me that no matter how wealthy and privileged the Kinseys are, all isn’t well in their world. Or at least, it wasn’t in the past. It wasn’t uncommon for me to find bruises on Tyler, and he explained most of them away as hockey injuries, but I never forgot what I saw in his driveway that day.
“That’s an admirable goal,” I reply, treading just as cautiously as she has been with me. “I’m surprised your father allowed you to attend a second-rate college like this one. Surely, he wanted you to go to Harvard or Yale.”
And, surely, he’d insist on a different area of specialization. One that wouldn’t make anyone wonder why she’d chosen it.
Soraya laughs, and for the first time since she sat down, her face lights up. “Dad is dead.”
“Dead?” I stare at her, uncomprehending. Mr. Kinsey couldn’t be much older than fifty. Surely, I must have misheard.
But she nods. “Completely and totally. He had a heart attack six months ago.”
“I’m sorry for your loss.” I don’t know what else to say. I didn’t like Mr. Kinsey, but he was still her father.
“Don’t be,” she replies. “The world is a better place without him.”
My eyebrows fly up. “You don’t miss him?”
She purses her lips. “I miss the father I could have had, but not who he actually was.” She cocks her head, appraising me. “I’m not sure if you know this, but he was abusive.”
“I suspected as much,” I admit.
“He controlled all of us,” she goes on. “Our choices. Who our friends were. Who we dated. What classes we took. And on and on and on. Even if he’d never raised a hand to us, he’d still have been a horrible man.”
I glance away to hide my surprise at her sharing all of this so candidly.
“He didn’t even have the decency to die without hurting us.” Her tone is full of venom. “Tyler was with him when it happened. He couldn’t save him, and it messed with his head.”
I shut down the voice in my mind urging me to find Tyler and hug him. This happened months ago, and even if it had been more recent, he isn’t mine to comfort. He never really was.
“That must have been difficult,” I say, for lack of anything better to offer.
“Yeah.” Her nostrils flare, and I can’t help but wonder how deep her anger at her dead father goes. “As soon as he was buried, Tyler started planning to transfer to Newbury, and I wanted to be near him, so I enrolled here, too.”
A faint ringing begins in my ears and builds gradually until it’s a piercing drone that can’t be ignored. I shake my head, but it doesn’t dispel the noise.
“What?” My lips form the word, but I don’t hear myself say it.
It feels like the world is tipping upside down, throwing everything I thought I knew off balance.
“But why would he do that?” I ask, hoping she can’t make out what I’m saying.
She gives me a knowing look. “Because of you.” She rests her hands on the table and leans toward me. “Despite his dumbass behavior in the past—which you should make him grovel for, by the way—you’ve been the only girl for him since you started tutoring him in high school.”
“That can’t be right.” I shove back my chair and get shakily to my feet.
Soraya bolts upright, as if to give chase.
“I’m not running away,” I tell her. “Just…give me a moment.”
I go to the counter and request a glass of water. I drink it quickly and wait while the barista refills it, then I carry the glass back to the table. I sit and close my eyes. It takes a few meditative breaths before the drone in my ears fades to a whine.
“You can’t be serious,” I say, opening my eyes and blinking as they adjust to the light. “Maybe Tyler has woven a good story, but I saw him with Whitney at prom, and then again the following week.”
“He wasn’t—”
“Besides, girls always throw themselves at college athletes,” I interrupt, unwilling to listen to her defend the man who shattered my heart. “I refuse to believe that he’s never been with any of them.”
Soraya sighs. “All I can say is that, as far as I know, he’s never touched anyone else since you were together.”
That can’t be right.
The wheels of my mind turn, trying to make sense of the information Soraya has unloaded on me.
Is there a chance—even if it’s a slight one—that Tyler is telling the truth?
Or has he put Soraya up to this, knowing that I’m more likely to hear her out than I am to listen to whatever useless excuses he’s come up with over the past three years?
Even if a portion of what Soraya has told me is the truth, I can’t forget that Tyler hurt me. He broke my trust and utterly humiliated me. Then, when my world crashed down, he didn’t stand by me.
Soraya stands and twists a lone silver charm between her fingers. “It was nice to meet you. I hope you’ll give Tyler a chance. He’s an idiot, but he’s made himself sick over what he did to you—and what happened after. He really does care for you.”
I can’t force myself to nod, so I just meet her eyes. She reaches into the pocket of her designer jeans and withdraws a folded piece of notepaper, then holds it out to me. I take it with some trepidation.
“My phone number,” she explains, confirming that this was a set-up from the beginning. Why else would she have her number ready to hand over? “Don’t be a stranger.”
She leaves.
I watch her go, then turn toward my laptop screen, which has gone black while I was distracted. I massage my jaw with one of my thumbs. There’s no way I’m going to be able to focus on my essay now. There’s no point even bothering.
I pack up my laptop, put my notebook in the laptop bag, and carry it outside, where I walk toward my dorm. Thankfully, I don’t run into anyone I know because I’m not in a good headspace to talk. Even more luckily, Martina isn’t in our room.
I ditch my laptop bag on the desk and flop onto the bed. I pull my phone out of my pocket and call Mom. She answers on the fourth ring, which is progress. For a while there, she’d always picked up after one ring, which made me wonder if she was living with her phone fused to her palm just in case I needed her.
“Hey, Mom,” I say.
“It’s so good to finally hear from you,” she exclaims, making it sound as though it’s been weeks rather than two days.
“It’s nice to talk to you, too.” I know better than to call attention to her clinginess when she’s making progress, even if it is slow. At least she hasn’t moved to Newbury to be with me all the time. She wanted to, at first.
“What have you been doing today?” she asks, the sound of rushing water in the background, as if she’s running a tap. Washing the dishes, maybe? Or she could be at work.
“Just finding references for an essay,” I tell her. “Otherwise, things have been quiet.”
“I’m glad to hear you’re taking some down time.”
I hesitate for a beat too long, uncertain of how to broach a subject that will upset her.
“What is it?” she asks, noticing immediately.
I jump into the deep end. “Mom, after I was…you know…where did the money for our attorney come from?”
There’s an intake of breath. “Why do you ask?”
“Please.” I can’t bear to explain everything right now. “I need to know.”
“Actually, the attorney approached me,” she says. “He said that an anonymous benefactor believed in your case and had arranged to pay his fees so he could ensure everything was being done properly.”
The bottom dropped out of my stomach.
An anonymous benefactor.
Could it have been one of the Kinseys?
Could it have been Tyler?
But where would he have gotten his hands on the money? His father was generous with them but liked to know where every cent was going.
“Do you have any idea who?” I ask, needing to know the truth even as I fear the answer.
“What’s this about?” Mom sounds disturbed.
“Please.”
“Okay, honey. No, I don’t know. I never did. To be honest, I never questioned it much. I was just so grateful.”
I bite the inside of my cheek. “So, there were no clues?”
I’m not sure I can handle not knowing.
She pauses for long enough that I realize she’s thought of something.
“What?” I prompt.
“The attorney passed along a message. It was strange, and that’s why I remember. He said that the benefactor wanted to get justice for a shooting star.”
I drop the phone, the room spinning around me.
It’s true.It must be.
Somehow, Tyler paid for my attorney.
He didn’t totally abandon me. And if I was wrong about that, then what else might I be wrong about?