Chapter 8 #3
They all ignore me and the men nod. Sauvage doesn’t spare me another look, just leaves me in the lab with his two goons, who watch me impassively from either side of the door.
‘Is there a bathroom?’ I ask.
One of them points at a narrow door opposite them in the lab.
I slide it open and find a clean toilet and a small sink on the other side.
I finally get to do my business. As I wash my hands, I glance into the small mirror.
I’m taken aback by my appearance. I’m thinner.
Dark circles ring my eyes. I look pale and sickly. Lu was right. I do look like shit.
I re-enter the lab and get to work, hoping that the end result of this is a decent batch of Envy and a crime boss who gives me the time of day. For once, I don’t have a Plan B.
If this doesn’t go well, I’m fucked.
MAV
‘What the hell do you mean, I’m not allowed into the lab?’ I snarl at Sauvage’s guy who’s waiting in the hotel lobby this morning to tell me to leave as soon as I get there.
‘Mr. Sauvage says that the space is being cleaned. You can come back tomorrow.’
He gestures to the door. ‘He invites you to leave.’
I stare at him.
‘This is bullshit,’ I mutter, taking out my phone and calling Shade.
I leave the hotel, standing out on the busy street.
‘What is it?’
‘Sauvage won’t let me into the lab. One of his goons just told me they’re cleaning it. What the fuck is going on? Has he contacted you?’
‘Nope.’
I hear Shade let out a frustrated breath. ‘Why is he playing games with us?’
‘I think he has someone in there trying to figure out the recipe,’ I say. ‘He told me I had another few days, but maybe he changed his mind. Maybe he found someone else to reverse engineer it and figure it out, so he doesn’t need us.’
‘Fuck,’ Shade mutters. ‘Did you see anyone?’
‘No, I couldn’t even get in there. Son of a bitch!’
Two women walking by side-eye me as they pass, and I lower my voice.
‘What are we gonna do? Is he trying to cut us out? We can’t let that happen. If we don’t have Envy, and we don’t have the club, and we don’t have Daisy, what do we have, Shade? Huh? What the fuck do we have left?’
I sound hysterical. I feel hysterical.
‘Come back to the house.’
He hangs up on me and I curse him out, gripping my phone so tightly that I hear the plastic creak.
I get in the truck and leave Sauvage’s swanky hotel. I get to the KIP house half an hour later, I’m still not feeling any better.
Inside, things only get worse. I find Shade pacing the kitchen. Never a good sign.
‘What happened?’
‘The cops were just here. The Bandervilles sent them. Joe thinks Daisy is with us.’
‘Well, she’s not,’ I mutter angrily.
Shade hits the kitchen counter with his fist, and then visibly tries to get himself under control.
‘As much as I hate it, it’s for the best right now,’ he says very quietly.
‘If she was here, they’d have found her and taken her back to my father’s house, or worse.
Joe will have people watching us, now. My father called me, too.
He told me to give her up. He doesn’t believe I don’t know where she is. ’
‘This is why she didn’t want us to know anything,’ I say quietly. ‘She knew it would be like this. She didn’t want us to get into trouble for her.’
Shade nods. ‘I haven’t heard from her. Lu hasn’t either. You?’
I shake my head. ‘Could they be monitoring our phones somehow, too?’
‘Get us some burners. Just in case.’
‘Did you find out anything from the bodyguard?’
Shade makes a sound of disgust. ‘By the time I got to Grinder, the asshole was gone.’
He stalks toward the stairs and I follow.
‘This shit doesn’t make sense,’ he says.
‘They are so fucking interested in Daisy. Why? Joe could find someone else. But he’s obsessed with marrying her.
And it’s not just him. Our fathers are invested in this like it's a multi-million dollar business merger. But she doesn’t have a dime of her own as far as they know! What are we missing?’
‘Maybe the Bandervilles just think she has money?’ I venture. ‘Your dad might be trying to get rid of her again. He could have lied to them, or made a deal with them for her.’
Shade rubs his face.
‘Maybe,’ he mutters. ‘Sauvage messaged me about five minutes ago. He said he had a lead on who blew up the club. Said to come tomorrow. He didn’t mention you or the lab, though.’
‘He’s fucking with us,’ I say. ‘Could be a trap of some kind if he doesn’t think he needs us anymore.’
We get upstairs and find Blake at his computer. He doesn’t turn around when we go in.
‘How was the State Forest?’ Shade asks.
‘Messy,’ he mutters, tapping on his keyboard quickly. ‘The usual. Got rid of the phone out there though. That should keep ’em chasing their tails for a while.’
Shade and I share a look. Besides wrestling and class, Blake has barely left his room. He mostly speaks in one-word answers when it's anyone but us. We’re both getting worried. When he’s like this, he tends to start taking unnecessary risks. Sort of like how Daisy does, actually.
‘Here,’ he says, turning around and almost catching our silent conversation about him. ‘I found this the other day. I didn’t mention it because I wanted to be sure, but…’
He opens a yearbook from Birchmore Academy from about twenty-five years ago.
‘Here’s John, Mark, and Applegate,’ he says pointing to a picture of four kids under a tree together smiling for the camera.
‘Is that April?’ Shade asks, snatching up the book.
‘Check out the name.'
‘Evelyn Carmichael?’
‘I looked her up. She went to Birchmore with them. I thought maybe she was a cousin of April’s. Having family in Richmond would explain how she met John and the others when she was younger.’
I take in my friend’s face. ‘Looks like there’s a ‘but’ in there somewhere.’
Blake nods. ‘A big one. It’s not a cousin. That’s actually April.’
‘But the name,’ I mutter. ‘Why the change?’
‘April wasn’t from here,’ Shade says.
‘Well, she definitely went to school here. I can’t find any other Carmichaels in Richmond or the surrounding areas at all though.’
‘So, which was the fake name? April or Evelyn?’
Blake shrugs. ‘No clue. Can’t find anything else on either of the names right now. Maybe if we,’ he winces, ‘when we talk to Daisy, she can tell us something.’
‘What the fuck?’ Shade says, starting to pace again. ‘April never said anything. She acted like… I mean I knew my pop and her had known each other before, but I didn’t know they went that far back.’
‘It gets better.’
‘An ‘Evelyn’ was meant to marry John. When I searched for the name, I found the announcement in some old microfiche articles that have been digitized. Wasn’t Evelyn Carmichael, though.’
We both lean closer.
‘What was it?’ Shade asks.
He shakes his head. ‘You’re not gonna believe it.’
He pauses for dramatic effect and I punch him hard in the back of the shoulder.
‘Just fucking say it!’ I yell.
‘Ow! Fuck you!’ he snarls, whipping around and trying to get me back.
‘Both of you cut it out!’ Shade thunders. ‘Jesus! What was the name, Blake?’
‘Fucking Winters!’
Shade and I both stop.
‘Winters, like the name on Daisy’s police report Winters?’
‘Yep.’
‘Fuck,’ Shade says faintly as he sits down. ‘Could April have been one of the kids? The ones who moved away. She could have come back to Richmond for school.’
‘But why the name change?’ I ask. ‘Why pretend she wasn’t a Winters?’
Shade just shakes his head. ‘Maybe there was a reason the Winters left this area, some scandal. Or she might have wanted to attend Birchmore incognito, but her family name was too well known around here, so she used another one. Who knows?’
‘Anyway, it looks like she called it off with John and married Mark Evans instead,’ Blake continues. ‘He wasn’t from a wealthy family. He was at Birchmore on a scholarship.’
‘Then he dies, and John is there to pick up the pieces,’ I mutter.
‘Jesus,’ Shade whispers, sinking down on Blake’s bed. ‘My dad might have killed Daisy’s dad…and her mom. What the fuck?’
He gets up quickly. ‘I’m going to speak to Stephens. He’s still in the hospital. Maybe he knows something even if he doesn’t know he does.’
‘I’ll go with you,’ I say.
I glance at Blake. ‘You coming?’
Blake’s attention is back on his screen. He shakes his head without looking at us. I catch Shade’s eye again.
‘No more using our regular phones,’ Shade says to him with a frown. ‘We’re getting burners.’
Blake nods again.
‘Don’t do…anything while we’re gone.’
He ignores me.
We leave his room.
‘I’m worried about him,’ I say quietly as we walk down the hall ward the stairs. ‘I’ve never seen him like this. He’s just…closed down.’
‘We’re all in freefall without Daisy,’ he replies.
That’s for fucking sure.
‘You think she’s okay?’ I ask.
‘I have to,’ he says, glancing at me. ‘If I don’t, I feel so worried, like…’
‘Like your heart is being torn out of your chest,’ I nod.
He returns the gesture. ‘Yeah.’
We get to the hospital in Shade’s car. While we’re in the Richmond grid system, I notice a Prius about three cars back.
‘Think we got a tail,’ I say, staring at the car that signals left about thirty seconds after Shade does.
‘Not surprised about that,’ he says. ‘Kinda shocked Joe sent his guys in a Prius, though.’
I chuckle in spite of my low mood. ‘Outsourced?’
Shade nods, eyeing the car. ‘Maybe. Could be a private eye.’
We turn into the underground parking lot slowly, and the car passes us, but I notice it taking its time and coming to a halt just as we go under the barrier.
In the hospital, we find Stephens’ room. The Novelle butler is sitting up, eating a Jello cup. When he sees us, he gives Shade a small smile/grimace and puts it down.
‘Master Jack.’
‘Hey, Stephens,’ Shade says, pulling up a chair to sit next to the older man’s bed. ‘How are you doing?’
‘Could be worse, sir.’ He gestures to his arm that’s in a sling, and his cast-covered leg. ‘Should be up in a day or so,’ he quips.
Shade grins. ‘If anyone would be, it’s you, my friend.’