Chapter 43
Forty-Three
I’m showered and dressed by the time Valencia gets down to the kitchen the following morning.
“Oh, good, you ready to go?” she asks, putting her empty coffee mug in the sink.
Easton isn’t far behind her, and he watches me suspiciously over her shoulder as I say yes. I’m absolutely ready to get out
of this house and away from him.
“Where are you going?” he asks.
“Gramma Sharon’s.”
“Why do you want to hang out with her all day?” Easton asks. He tries to keep his tone teasing, brotherly, but underneath
I know he’s digging for information.
So I use the teasing brotherly tone right back at him. “Better than hanging around here doing nothing.” I turn my attention
back to Valencia. “And I feel bad for her being by herself all day.”
“Well, you have fun with that,” Easton says, heading toward the kitchen doorway. “I’m going out for a run.” Once the front
door opens and closes, I tell Valencia I have to grab something upstairs.
“Okay, but be quick, I have to get on the road,” she calls after me. Marcus is coming down the left-side stairs while I’m
heading up the right. I say good morning to him and he mumbles it back.
When I get to my room, I take out the duffel bag in the closet and set it on top of the dresser. I take out the clothes and put them in the drawers. What Miles and I are planning today feels final. Whatever happens, by the end of the day, the Beaumonts are going to know the truth.
But it probably won’t come from me. If anything, it’s going to come from Agent Grant or the police. They’ll know I’m not the
real Nate. And they’ll know Easton is the one who killed him.
But I want Marcus and Valencia to know at least one true thing from me.
When I get down to the kitchen, duffel bag in hand, I walk over to the pantry and take out the food I had been hoarding for
my escape. I put it all back, one thing at a time. I can feel Marcus’s and Valencia’s eyes on me, but neither of them speaks.
When the food is back, I turn to them and hold up the empty duffel bag.
“I wanted you to know I don’t need this anymore.”
Valencia is the one who asks, “Why?”
“Because I don’t need to run.” Wait, that’s not true. And I said I wanted to tell them something true. So I change it. “I
mean, I don’t want to run. This place feels more like a home than . . . anywhere else I can remember. And I love you.” Hell, even Marcus, now
that I know Easton alone is responsible for Nate’s death.
Valencia walks around the island with tears in her eyes and pulls me into a hug.
I know it’s weird to have all these conflicting feelings, but I don’t care anymore.
Valencia and Marcus aren’t bad parents; not like mine.
Which was probably how I was so blind to Easton’s psychotic nature.
I trusted him instead of his parents. But raising a bad person doesn’t make them bad.
If anything, they were victims in this, too.
And if Miles and I are successful today, they’re going to find that out
and lose another child. Then they’ll only have each other left.
I want them to know, even when they find out I’m not Nate, that I appreciated them. I also want Gramma Sharon to know that.
When Valencia lets me go, even Marcus hugs me.
“I’m taking Nate to my mom’s for the day; could you pick him up on your way home? I have appointments until six.”
Marcus says he will, and Valencia and I leave.
After taking me to Gramma Sharon’s, Valencia comes in quickly to say hi to her and bye to me. Then she gives us both kisses
on the cheek and leaves. When she’s gone, Gramma Sharon breaks out the deck of cards.
She doesn’t speak to me, and I know how much her mouth hurts right now, but she still tries to give me a smile.
My phone vibrates with a text from Miles.
On my way. ETA five minutes.
I have five minutes to say what should probably take closer to a few hours. But we don’t have a few hours. And I can’t wait
any longer for her to be able to speak.
So I put my hand out and stop Gramma Sharon from shuffling the cards.
“I have to tell you something,” I say.
She looks at me, her jaw relaxed and her lips slightly parted. I can see a few of the stitches in her mouth.
Five minutes. And I need her to not call the police or text Valencia. If she does, it might ruin everything.
“I don’t know how to say this so I’m just going to say it.”
Gramma Sharon lets out a low grunt that I take to mean go on.
“I’m . . . not Nate. I lied when I was arrested. I’m a gay kid from West Virginia who ran away from home when his parents
tried to send him to conversion therapy.”
Sharon’s expression doesn’t change.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I never meant for things to get so out of control. I thought the police would do a DNA test and prove
I’m not Nate before they even let Valencia and Marcus know. But then they showed up at the hospital and everything went so
off the rails. I know it’s no excuse, but also . . . it was nice. Having a family who cared about me. Having people who actually . . .”
I can’t say the word because it feels so foreign to me.
Sharon clasps my hands tightly. Her eyes are glassy. She gives me a slow nod.
Continue.
“I wanted you to know the truth. Before everyone else finds out, I wanted to tell you because . . . I wish I had a gramma
who was like you. I mean, I did once. And you reminded me why she was so special. She might be the only person who ever loved
me.”
Sharon takes her hand away and smacks my arm hard.
“Ow!”
She looks mad now. “Mmm!” She points to herself.
Me.
And that’s all I need to lose my composure. Tears spill down my cheeks and she pulls me into a hug, swaying back and forth as she holds me and lets me cry. She probably has so many questions and so many things to say—I mean, this is Gramma Sharon we’re talking about. But she can’t, so she holds me.
Soon a car horn bleats out front. She turns her head toward the front of the house and then looks back at me questioningly.
“I have to go do something.” I can’t get into the whole Easton thing right now. Not without proof. But she needed to know
the truth about me. Because if I do find something, it won’t be long before that secret is out, too.
I stand and pull back the curtain to see Miles sitting in his car out front. I hold up a finger, telling him I’ll be out in
a minute.
When I turn back to Gramma Sharon, she claps her hands together and then holds them out, palms up.
Where are you going? What’s going on?
“I have to fix something. Or it’s going to make it all worse.” Miles texts me and I start a text back to tell him I’ll be
right out.
Gramma Sharon snatches the phone out of my hand. I reach for it back, but she shakes her head. She walks over to her bag on
the kitchen counter and takes out her own. Then she hands it over to me. She holds a backward peace sign up to me and makes
an mmm sound. V.
Valencia.
She can track my phone’s location. I nod and put Gramma Sharon’s in my pocket.
Miles honks again and she growls and looks in his direction. Then she holds my face in her hands, looking up at me. And it’s
still there. The love I’ve always felt from her.
I hug her. Then she holds up my phone lock screen. I give her my password and she types out something quickly. Gramma Sharon’s phone dings in my hand—because hers is never on silent.
It’s a text from me. I knew.
Of course she did.
She’s Gramma Sharon.
Another honk from outside, this one longer. Gramma Sharon takes an annoyed breath through her nose and shoves me toward the
door. I kiss her on the cheek, then run out to Miles.
As I shut the door, Gramma Sharon’s phone dings again.
“Jesus,” Miles says. “Put that thing on silent.”
I do. It’s another text from “Nate Beaumont.”
Be careful. I love you, kid.
I love you, too, I send back.