Chapter 37
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Briar
As soon as I’m in my Mustang, I take out my phone. My hands are trembling so bad, it takes three attempts before I can call Marcus. I put the car into gear and peel out of Addy’s driveaway, one hand on the wheel and the other holding my phone to my ear.
“Pick up, pick up.” I push the words through gritted teeth.
He answers on the next ring. “Yeah?”
“You at home?”
“The fuck else would I be?”
He’s pissed off, but I can’t blame him. “Listen, I need you to do something for me.”
There’s silence on the other end of the line. It could have gone so many ways—he could have laughed in my ear and put down the phone. He could have cursed me to the nth generation.
But Marcus was, and always will be, my closest friend.
“Tell me what you need, bro.”
As I’m waiting for the golf estate’s boom to rise, I re-read the message my father sent last night. Judging from the time stamp, and if I remember correctly, I was probably on my third game of pool and my sixth beer. No wonder I didn’t hear it come through.
We need to talk.
11:45am
Angel Falls Cemetery
Don’t be late.
I lock my phone and toss it on the passenger seat. My eyes slide to the clock on my dash. I thought I would have more time, but I woke up late, and it took me a while to get my head straight.
I push down harder on the gas, opening up the Mustang’s engine. It tears down the freeway as my heart starts a slow th-thump in my chest.
We need to talk? Well that suits me just fine, because I have some questions for him.
Angel Falls Cemetery, poetically, is set in the small valley of Devil’s Creek. At the entrance to the cemetery, you can see a few yards of the wispy waterfall that gives this area its name. However, the craggy creek it plummets into is hidden—accessible only by hiking down a steep ravine lined in pitch black rock.
Massive oak trees litter the cemetery, throwing dappled shade over the paved road my Mustang skims over as I head deeper inside.
I only come here once a year with Dad, and nothing much has changed since the last time. The leaves have only just started changing color, and it’s a mess of green and orange out here.
And gray, of course.
Row upon row of concrete slabs and sad, pouting angels.
I park behind my father’s pearl-white Mercedes and take a second to drag myself together before climbing out.
“You’re late,” he says, as soon as I’m in earshot, but with his back still facing me.
“Was busy.”
I expect a reprimand, but he says nothing. He’s wearing a black-on-black suit, his hair slicked back, hands clasped behind his back. This could have been a replay from last year’s visit, until he turns to face me.
His blue eyes pierce through me like a spear, rooting me to the spot.
“What?” I ask, my voice too soft, too unsteady.
“Do I not give you enough, son?” There’s open contempt on his words when his sneer could have sufficed to convey his disgust.
“I…what are you talking about?” I’d been gearing up for some of his usual sentimental drivel about my mother, not a full-on confrontation.
“Is it drugs?” He steps closer. I wish I could move back, because I’ve never felt such venomous anger flowing from him before.
“Dad, I don’t know what you’re?—”
“Did you think I wouldn’t notice? That I’m that fucking obtuse?” He doesn’t raise his voice, not even a little, because he doesn’t have to. I’m fucking terrified, and I still don’t know why he’s angry with me.
I lift my hands, palms facing him. That, at least, stops his slow advance. But it does nothing to the set of his mouth or the righteous indignation glaring in his eyes.
“Couldn’t figure it out, even when I did it right in front of you, could you?”
Finally, my scrambling brain finds purchase. “The safe?” I blurt out. I wave my hands. “Dad, no, I have the money. All of it.” I stab a thumb over my shoulder. “It’s in my?—”
“Did he promise you a cut?” My father lifts his chin, hands still clasped behind his back for all the world like he’s having an idle chat with his son.
If you didn’t take into account his eyes, of course.
“Who?”
“That Baker boy. And don’t tell me he didn’t have anything to do with this. I know it’s him. It’s always been him!”
Now my head’s fucking spinning again. “Dad, please. I have the money from the safe. I can give it to you right now.”
My father cocks his head. “And the files? All my clients’s information? Do you also happen to have that in your car?” Sarcasm drips from every word. His face contorts into mock concern. “I’m assuming you haven’t made any copies, of course?”
I gape openly at him.
His clients’s…?
Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.
Four digits.
I thought it was the front door, that night.
It wasn’t.
It was the entry code for my father’s study.
Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.
How many times had he tried a different combination over the years? I know he never asked me about it, and I’ve never once been inside with him there. Dumb luck, or years and years of patient determination?
I stagger back shaking my head, doing my best to reign in a thousand abrupt thoughts tumbling over themselves in their rush to be acknowledged.
That’s why Marcus chose that room. It’s closest to the study.
Was that why he was okay living with me? Why he was so pissed off when I said my Dad had said no?
He must have accessed my father’s computer. Copied his files.
But when? Why? What use?—?
“Dad, do you keep their addresses on file?” I bark out, my eyes wide and my hands already curling into fists.
Dad lets out a rough bark of a laugh, shaking his head. “Just admit you’ve fucked up, Son. Admit it, and we?—”
“No, you don’t—” I cut off, grabbing my lips and twisting them in an effort to work through my thoughts before my father thinks I’ve lost my fucking mind.
But then something else trips me up.
“How did you know it was him?” I step closer to my dad, lifting my hands when his eyes narrow to wary slits. “Marcus. And you called him a deviant. Why?” I spit out the words as fast as I can, and my father’s suspicious glare slowly changes into a confused frown.
“The cat,” he says. “He killed the cat.”
I shake my head, laugh. “What fucking cat?”
“When you were six,” Dad says, staring at me like I’ve just told him the sky is green and we’re standing on air. “He killed your mother’s cat.”
I can’t even. Blood sings through my ears, and my heart’s pounding along to a 155 BPM track as I try to understand what the fuck my father’s telling me.
Then I remember.
It’s just a fragment of a faded memory, but it’s there.
Natalie’s white Persian, the one I always thought looked like it had run headfirst into a wall. Ugly as sin, but she loved that thing to death.
“You told me it ran away.”
Father shakes his head. “Because that’s what I thought. But when Baker tendered for one of my client’s security upgrades, I went to his house for a meeting.” Father waves his hand. “Brandon Baker, Marcus’s dad.”
I nod, but it’s not with understanding. I’m not getting any of this shit.
“I saw its collar. That—” he snaps his fingers. “Diana? Deena? Can’t remember what your mother called the thing. I designed it a collar.” My father brings a hand to his throat as if he’s about to strangle himself. “Beautiful thing. Put me on the map for pet couture.”
“Where did you see it?”
“In Baker’s house. That kid was looking at it. I only saw a glimpse, but I know my own work when I see it.”
“How do you know he stole?—”
“That whole family’s rotten as a barrel of week-old fish.” Father shakes his head, teeth flashing. “I told you back then I didn’t want you seeing that boy.”
We were so young. I thought we played in the woods because what fucking kid wouldn’t if they had the chance?
But now I remember.
We played there because else I would get into trouble. And I only brought Marcus over when I knew my father would be out of town.
Over the years, I must have forgotten the real reason. So much has happened since then, I mean, fuck. Junior high, high school, Jessica.
Indi.
“I…forgot.”
My father shakes his head, but I can see there’s a touch of doubt in his eyes now. “What were you going to use it for?”
I shrug. My father’s mouth twists.
“The money! What was it for?”
“A loan, that’s it.”
“Like the bracelet?” Dad’s eyebrow quirks up. “Is that in your car too?”
I shake my head. “No. I have to… I still have to get it back.”
“Then get it back.” Dad tugs at the hem of his suit jacket, twisting his neck. “The police are busy fingerprinting my computer and study. I already know what they’ll find.”
Because of course my fingerprints will be all over that shit.
But not his computer. I’ve never touched it. I knew it was off-limits.
“You’re wrong about Marcus,” I say. “He’s never done anything—” I cut off, aware of the bald-faced lie I’m about to lay on my father. “He’s a good guy.”
Father lets out a soft laugh. “No, son. You’re a good guy. Marcus? He takes advantage of good guys like you.”
Dad’s words play on end in my mind as I head home. I zone out so badly that the car behind me at the traffic light honks before I realize the light is green.
I coast down the freeway.
It doesn’t matter which way I twist things, I can’t fit the pieces together.
Of course, it doesn’t help that my mind keeps going back to Indi. How vengeful she looked. How hard she pretended that she’d actually be able to hurt me with that little blade if she tried.
Liar.
When could she possibly have overheard me and Marcus speaking about Jess? We know better than to run our mouths where anyone can hear us.
The church.
Was she there? Was that what I saw before I got so caught up in Marcus that I forgot?
What the fuck was she even doing there?
My hands tighten on the steering wheel. I lick dry lips and take a deep lungful of air.
No…what was Marcus doing there?