Twenty
EXPOSE THIS ASSHOLE. FIND PROOF.
The words ring in my head while McCoy and Kevin celebrate, while McCoy relays their success to the crew, while my phone blows up with excitement. I can’t join in. I’m riveted, consumed. I feel as if someone has just carefully disassembled my house of cards and showed me how to win millions with the perfect poker hand instead.
Proof.
What Mitchum said implies that my dad has done something illegal. Something I could send him to jail for.
Would I send my own father to jail?
It’s tempting. Very tempting. I designed this day because I want to hurt him. I want to make him pay for what he’s done to me and my mom.
But do I want to ruin the rest of his life? Do I want him in prison? Ejected from the family? Desperate?
Why isn’t the answer yes?
In my pounding heart, I wrestle with the conundrum into which Mitchum has unknowingly pitched me. The prospect of newer, deeper injury to my father should exhilarate me. The fact that it doesn’t is pushing into pressure points I didn’t know existed. I expected this day would test me. My intuition, my cunning, my improvisation, my persistence. How well I could withstand the emotional wounds every wall of this house inflicts. How deeply I wanted revenge.
In my every plan, I never expected this.
I never expected the day would force me to confront my capacity for mercy. How like a stain on my conscience it feels.
I remember furious nights under our new roof in Coventry, far from here, my eyes stinging from crying, my stomach sore from heaving. When Mom’s physical therapy was hard, or when the stack of bills on the counter left her staring dejectedly into space. Or just when everything overwhelmed me, when the new girl struggled to fit into her new school, when I didn’t know what kind of future the past year had left me.
Mitchum’s unforeseen insinuation is pushing me, forcing me to reckon with the worst I wished for my father even then. I wanted him to know fear and remorse. I never wanted him to disappear from my life forever.
Why not?
Because I love him, even now.
He’s my dad.
It’s fucked up.
I feel the weight of reality crashing down on me now, the inescapable nature of what I’m doing here, the fatal feature of my heist. My victim isn’t some faceless financial institution, my surroundings not the impersonal steel of meaningless vaults. It’s my own father. My home. I want to wound my mark—not destroy him.
Does it make me weak? Disloyal to my mom? Cowardly?
I don’t know.
Within it hides the final hidden piece of my motives, one I’ve concealed even from myself. Recognizing the figment of loyalty I still have for my father has exposed it like a message on my heart in invisible ink.
If I steal from him… he might even be impressed.
I read the financial press. I know his colleagues run empires of grift—stealing with fancy names like high-risk, high-return, and speculative investing—leaving people nationwide out of their money. If his own daughter, who for years he’s considered only his empty-headed, worthless heiress, proves she’s capable of the same machinations, he might just care.
Not if I falter now, though.
While I hate that any part of me wants his approval, the present is not the time to work through my issues. With the millions I’m planning to steal today, I’ll hire a very, very good therapist. In the meantime, I decide, I won’t let a stray comment from Mitchum derail me. I’ll determine if I want to pursue whatever he’s alluding to on a day when I’m not already in the middle of a heist.
Still, I file it away. In case.
I focus sharply on present company. They’re enjoying our victory, McCoy shaking the stress out of his shoulders, Kevin grinning like he’s won the state championship. We don’t have forever to celebrate. While we’re no longer facing the champagne welcome’s deadline, the entire day is densely scheduled.
“Pawn,” I say to McCoy, “get into position to escort Rook from the wedding after Phase Four.”
McCoy nods, fully fortified now with no further kidnappings on his schedule. He leaves up the stairs to the den.
“What are you guys stealing from the safe?” Kevin asks, as if he’s making friendly conversation.
Needless to say, I ignore his question. “Kevin, you can go now.”
“Blackmail? Money? Diamonds?” Kevin presses. “Ooh, are you forging his will?”
I iron my voice into patience. “You were an excellent hostage, really,” I say. “You’ve earned your cut. Now your job is to return to the party.”
His smile doesn’t change. I’d worry his face were stuck if his eyes didn’t match his mirth.
“Come on,” he urges me playfully. “I can do more.”
I’m about to reply, saying I don’t need more, when my phone buzzes repeatedly.
It’s Cass again. I pick up, annoyance rushing over me alongside worry. Even with our strict policy of phones on silent, she needs to have a really good reason to call this often. Which, knowing Cass, she probably does. It’s disconcerting, leaving me wondering if the security parameters have constricted further.
Or maybe she’s devised the solution to the problem of the study.
No—I don’t do optimism.
“Now what?” I ask.
“More radio chatter from security,” Cass replies. “The ceremony is delayed. Something regarding the bride.”
I close my eyes. Maureen.
I wish I could predict what’s gone wrong “regarding the bride.” Frankly, though, it’s difficult to know with Maureen. She changes from welcoming hostess to chatty friend to judgmental socialite to domineering lady of the house with surprising speed. I can be in the middle of something like candor, explaining East Coventry gossip to her delighted inquiries, when she hits me out of nowhere with “Well, now I know why no one there likes you” or some other comically evil, eye-watering stinger.
I understand it, sort of. In this house, it’s easy to not know who you’re supposed to be. Still—Maureen put herself here. She’s leaning into every contradiction of my father’s cruel, kind, indulgent, depriving world. Giving herself over to its worst impulses.
Including on her wedding day, I guess. It’s not out of character for her to upset her own Pinterest extravaganza.
“I’m on it,” I say to Cass, steeling my will. “Stay ready.”
“Always am,” she replies.
I hang up, grateful for Cass’s professionalism. It’s refreshing compared to the last twenty minutes.
“Is Maureen getting cold feet?” Kevin asks. “Let’s give her a pep talk.”
I let out my breath. Irritatingly, I can’t be mean to Kevin anymore, not after what he’s witnessed. But I cannot have him tagging along to everything.
I look him right in the eyes, going for gently earnest when I speak. “Kevin, I really appreciate your help. We couldn’t have done it without you.” A lie. If he hadn’t interrupted us, my original plan would have worked just fine, but whatever. “However, after successfully ransoming someone, you have to return whoever you’ve ransomed. Which, right now, is you.”
Kevin pouts. I purse my lips, holding firm.
“I know valuable legal stuff. I eavesdrop on my dad all the time,” he insists, hints of desperation stealing into his voice.
“I’m sure you do,” I reply. “While we’re on the subject of eavesdropping, I’m guessing you just heard him say he would call security if you weren’t returned to him.”
He slumps. “Fine, but my offer still stands. And”—he looks up, renewed—“we should celebrate when the job is finished. Movie night?”
“We’ll see,” I say.
I go up the stairs, ending the conversation. Returning to the house’s hallways, I head for my father’s office, where I know he and all the groomsmen are until the ceremony.
Walking the cream-white corridor, I prepare myself for contingencies. Surprisingly, the familiarity of my former home helps center me. On the polished hardwood, eyeing the patterns in the floor I’ve noticed hundreds of times, I can pretend I’m stretching my legs while memorizing the quadratic formula or rehearsing how I’m going to convince my mom I’m old enough to watch R-rated movies.
I feel my mind shift gears. If, as Kevin suggested, Maureen is getting cold feet, it’s a problem. Not for Maureen or Dash, who really shouldn’t be getting married. No, it’s a problem for me. Without the ceremony emptying the house, I would need another way to get alone with the safe.
I’m not in love with either of my backup options, which involve arson or calling in a bomb threat. They’re risky—very risky.
When I near the other end of the house, cigar smoke and the raucous laughter of drunk groomsmen greet me. With them come other flashbacks. “Investor meetings.” “Deal-closing drinks.”
I ease open the door. It moves noiselessly. The hinge, I remember, is oiled weekly. Inside, the room is disastrous. A frat house filled with fifty-year-old men.
And Jackson. Past the heavy smoke, he stands along the wall, looking uncomfortable and still heartbreakingly handsome.
Right beside him is the safe.