Chapter 22
Twenty-Two
On Monday morning, Valencia is definitely on edge. I know it’s because she’s anxious about going to work and leaving me home
alone, but I’m not sure why. She knows the alarm app will tell her every door and window I open—she doesn’t know Easton showed
me how to bypass it. Maybe she’s worried about me snooping?
Which, yes, Miles and I are absolutely going to do that as soon as the house is clear.
“What do you think you’ll do today?” she asks, sipping her coffee as I eat a leftover bagel from Saturday.
“I was thinking about walking to the library,” I say. “I looked it up; it’s only a half mile away.” I have no intention of
going to the library today, but I want to test her reaction to me having some autonomy. It might come in useful when I do want to get out of here.
She sets the coffee mug down a little too hard but tries to play it off. For a moment it seems like she isn’t going to say
anything, but then she looks at me. “I’d like you to stay in the house.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m asking you to?” She says it tentatively, like she’s trying to be nice, but also hinting that she’s doing more
than asking.
“I’ll have my phone on me. I’m not going to disappear.”
Finally she snaps, and her voice goes full-on scoldy mom mode. “Well, disappearing isn’t the worst thing that can happen to a person, Nate, and a phone won’t protect you from that.”
I flinch, and to her credit, Valencia looks embarrassed. But not enough to apologize or elaborate any further.
Easton enters the kitchen, dressed for the day. “Christ, Mom, cut the cord already.” He goes over to the fridge and takes
out a jar of peanut butter.
“I don’t need it from you, too,” she says. She sounds exasperated and turns her attention back to me. “Stay home. Please.
I’ll drive you to the library on our way home from your appointment with Dr. Zapata tomorrow. And I promise I will loosen
the reins at some point. I’m just not ready to do it right now.”
“Fine,” I say under my breath. I want to understand why she’s acting like this. Sure, she’s anxious that the son she just
got back might be taken from her again. But it feels possessive, not overprotective. I can’t help but wonder what she knows
about the real Nate’s disappearance. Or maybe what she’s suppressing. Easton gives me a pitying look as he scoops a spoonful
of peanut butter.
“I hope you’re eating something else,” Valencia says. “And other people may want peanut butter, so I’d appreciate if you didn’t
eat it directly from the jar.”
He shrugs. “Habit. I’m the only one who usually eats it. Nate, if you want peanut butter, you’ll have to deal with my cooties.”
He turns back to Valencia. “Which, by the way, are the same cooties.” He dips his empty spoon back into the Jif jar defiantly.
Marcus enters with his own empty coffee mug.
He’s dressed in a brown tweed suit, blue shirt, and navy-and-gold tie.
He kisses Valencia on the cheek, then puts the mug in the kitchen sink.
Valencia reminds him of the leftovers in the fridge and he grabs a Tupperware and asks Easton if he’s ready to go.
He’s going to the office with Marcus because he needs to have someone monitor him while he’s taking one of his finals online.
Easton’s professor said he’d allow him to take the final remotely as long as he had a proctor who wasn’t a family member,
so one of Marcus’s assistants is going to sit in a room and barely watch him take a test. Or at least sign a paper saying
they did that.
“Did you remember to set the timer on the garden spigot?” Valencia asks Marcus.
He closes his eyes and shakes his head. “I forgot. I’ll do it tonight when I get home.”
“Can you do it now? It’s supposed to get up to ninety today and I don’t want all the hydrangeas to burn or get droopy.”
He laughs. “You’re the one who bought the overcomplicated timer. I can’t figure the thing out in five minutes, and if we don’t
leave now, I’m going to be late for a meeting. The flowers will be fine for a few hours. I’m calling a car for Easton when he finishes his final, so when you get home, can you water the plants?” He
turns to Easton.
“I was going to have you send me to JT’s.”
But before Valencia or Marcus can ask him to come here first, I speak up. “I can water them.” It’s actually perfect, because
I can open the back door to let Miles in and Valencia will get the notification on her phone that the alarm is off. “I’m stuck
here all day. Let me at least do something boring like watering the flowers.”
“Thank you, Nate,” Marcus says pointedly while looking at Valencia. “See, darling? You don’t even need the timer.”
“You know what, that’s a great point. Maybe I’ll show you how to fertilize them, too, before I leave.”
“Wonderful,” Marcus says. “Now that that’s out of the way, Easton, grab your stuff. We gotta go.”
Marcus gives me a polite goodbye and they head for the garage door. I stand to put my plate in the kitchen sink.
“I’ll show you where the Miracid is for the hydrangeas. You add a scoop—”
“NATE!”
Marcus’s voice booms from the garage, startling me. Even Valencia flinches, spilling her coffee on the counter.
She reaches out and grabs my hand, as if by instinct.
“Get out here! NOW!”
Valencia lets go quickly and rushes to the garage. Easton is standing inside the mudroom, shaking his head and smirking.
“Probably should have left it the original color,” he murmurs as he looks at me.
Valencia gasps and I step around her to see the carnage in the garage. The motor finishes pulling up the garage door, letting
the morning sun illuminate the crime scene.
The front of Marcus’s black Mercedes is stained green.
No. It’s Juniper Fog.
Whatever was left in the paint can I put away yesterday is splattered across the hood and drips down to a massive wet puddle in front of it.
The paint can is on its side at the puddle’s edge.
The lid sits glued to the windshield with a layer of dried spatter.
There’s a half-moon-shaped dent in the hood where the edge of the can must have hit.
I shake my head. “How did this happen?”
Behind me Easton snorts. “Seriously?”
I glare at him over my shoulder. “I put it on the ground!”
“Then how the fuck did it get all over the hood of my car?” Marcus yells. A vein pulses at his temple and his face has gone
red.
“Marcus.” Valencia’s voice is a warning.
“What?! Half of it’s probably dried, I don’t have time to go to the car wash, and it won’t come off without detailing anyway.”
He walks over to the driver’s side door, opens it, and reaches in to pull a lever. The hood pops and, carefully, he steps
around the paint to reach under the hood and unlatch it. His hands come away green-gray as he lifts it up. And yes, the paint
has seeped around the edges and into the engine compartment. It only goes down the sides, not touching anything important,
but it’s definitely there. Some of it pools around a raised edge, which is most likely there to keep water from getting into
anything vital.
Marcus glares at me, shaking his head. He slams the hood again and some of the tacky, still-wet paint splatters onto his pants.
He curses again, and Valencia tells him to calm down.
I step around her and point a shaky hand to the ground. “I swear I put it right there.”
“You sure?” Easton asks. “Dad did tell you to put it with the paint stuff.”
“Yes, I’m sure.” I point to the wire rack behind Marcus. “Look, there wasn’t enough room for the paint, so I put it on the ground.” The paint rollers aren’t where I put them. I open my mouth to say so but Marcus interrupts me.
“You’re right,” he says. He points to the dent on the front of the car. “There wasn’t enough room, which is why it fell off
and landed here.”
Someone must have moved it. Easton or Valencia. Or, shit, maybe Marcus himself did it and now he’s embarrassed it fell over
and he’s looking to pass the buck. Someone clearly moved the paint rollers to put the can on the shelf but didn’t realize
it would tip over.
I shake my head. “No! I swear I put it on the ground.”
Valencia puts a gentle hand on my shoulder. “Honey, it’s okay if you put it on the shelf. No one is mad.”
“The fuck we aren’t!” Marcus yells, gesturing to his car. “I’m mad! Look at this mess.” There’s that short temper I’ve been hearing about.
“Yes, and you need to clean yourself up if you’re going to get to work on time,” Valencia says, stepping in front of me like
a protective mama bear. But I’m still shaking. Marcus is acting like my own father now, and it makes my heart race with a
familiar fear. My dad never hit me, but the threat was always there. Like when he’d get too mad and throw the kitchen chair
into the living room or kick some nearby inanimate object, then wince in pain.
Marcus clenches his fists and shakes his head. Then he reaches into his pocket with a hand that doesn’t have paint on it and
tosses his keys. I duck, thinking he’s throwing them at my face, but they go wide around me and Easton catches them.
“Easton, back the car out of the garage for me. Nate, you made the mess; get the hose and clean off whatever isn’t dry.”
“I didn’t make the me—”
“I don’t care! Do it!” Marcus storms past us and into the house, cursing under his breath and looking down at the paint on his ugly suit.
Easton gets in the car and backs it out while Valencia puts an arm around me.
“I swear I put it on the ground,” I say. I don’t know why I care so damn much, but I need her to believe me.
She nods. “It’s okay. It’s just a car. And he’s been itching to buy a new one anyway; he’s waiting for bonus season.” She
gently rubs my arms. “Go hose off what you can. He’ll take out all his anger on some scathing motion he’s gotta write and
cool off by the time he gets home.”
Valencia is the only one who has treated me like Nate from the start, and even she isn’t saying she believes me. She keeps
saying it’s okay and no one is mad but never I believe you. She never even offered up another theory like Marcus said a murder suspect needs. She just decided not to defend me altogether.
I swallow hard and try to ignore the tears blurring my vision as I walk out to the driveway. Easton watches me as I unravel
the hose attached to the spigot on the side of the garage. I peel off the paint can lid and turn on the hose. Most of the
paint starts to come off pretty easily, but the dried areas are stubborn, and no matter which setting on the hose nozzle I
use, it isn’t enough to wash it off.
“So what did he do?” Easton asks.
“What do you mean?”
“To piss you off. Obviously he said something yesterday. When I was helping you move the furniture back, the energy was . . .
odd. Now you plaster his car in paint—”
“I didn’t do this.”
His hands go up. “Sure. Fine. But he thinks you did, which means he thinks you had a reason to.”
So Marcus set me up? He said the only way to get away with murder is an alternative theory, but there’s no evidence for one
here. He told me, in front of Easton, to take the paint downstairs to the garage. Specifically to put it with the other paint
supplies. I put it on the floor, and it somehow ends up on the car, which is impossible.
Marcus returns wearing a new suit. Without saying anything to me, he gets in the car. Easton gives me an anxious look and
climbs into the passenger seat after him. The door is barely shut before Marcus shifts into reverse and backs out.
I spray down the driveway, washing the paint water into the grass so it doesn’t stain the asphalt—another thing for Marcus
to freak out about when he gets back from work—and then put away the hose.
Valencia comes back out with her work bag and glances over at the paint on the garage floor.
“Can you do your best to clean all that up, too?” she asks. She tells me where some cleaning supplies are, and I nod.
“I swear I put it on the floor, not the shelf.” Again, I don’t know why I care so much that she believes me. But the look
on her face—the one that says she feels sorry for me—tells me she doesn’t believe me at all.
She reminds me to set the alarm when I go inside, then I clean up the garage floor.
While I mop, I keep replaying what Easton said.
The energy in the room was weird after I asked Marcus about how to get away with murder.
If Marcus had something to do with Nate’s disappearance—he told me himself the best way to avoid a murder charge is for the police to not have a body—then he knows I’m onto him.