Chapter 14
Cassie
While I intended to just rest for a little while on the couch, I end up sleeping there all night and waking up before dawn. I rush to my bedroom, shower, and put on a fresh set of clothes before I make my way out to the station wagon. Lincoln is already standing there, leaning up against the car with his arms crossed. I do my best to hide my shock.
"There you are. I was wondering when you'd get out here," he says with a smirk. Wow, he’s too handsome for his own good, and I find myself staring a little longer than I should.
"Usually, it's the other way around. I didn't know you were in such a hurry," I reply.
"Look at that. People can change." He chuckles and opens the driver's door. "Do you have the keys? I feel like I've earned some driving time." It’s easy to see he’s struggled with not driving as much. He loves driving.
I shake my head, toss the keys to him, and then get to the passenger's side .
"So, what is the plan today?" I ask, thinking back to our conversation with Anita the day before. It feels like our efforts to find out what's going on have come to a standstill. "Do we keep investigating Anita or move on to other cases? And what on earth do I tell Meredith Thornton when she comes asking whether I've found Anita yet? What do I do if Meredith asks me if we have any breaks on the case?"
I glance at Lincoln. Maybe he'll have a better idea than just avoiding her calls. Confrontation is one of my least favorite things, and I’m already stressing about it.
"Try to stall for now. Maybe we can dig deeper into what Anita said about the Thorntons. Either way, do we really feel comfortable telling Meredith where Anita is when she seems so afraid of her?" He shrugs like it’s no big deal. Lincoln and his nonchalance. I envy that.
He already knows the answer to that. I wouldn't violate someone’s privacy just for a paycheck.
"As long as Anita doesn't proceed with anything against the Thorntons, I don't think we can rightfully give away her position." He continues with his logic, and I wither with each word. Protecting Anita’s whereabouts will lead to a nasty confrontation with Meredith at some point.
"Well, I'm with you on all that, but she won't be happy when she finds out." I run through how poised and in control Meredith was during our meeting. "She doesn't seem like the type of woman who takes being told no lightly.”
“That's why I say stall for time, and let’s not tell her. The longer we hold off, the more information we can get and use to our advantage." Lincoln says it like it’s easy. Meredith isn’t going to have patience forever. Half a dozen emails are in our inbox asking about our progress. I’ve held her off with platitudes, but sooner or later, she’s going to show up to see what’s going on for herself.
"All right then, let's hope this plays out the way you think it will. And what are we supposed to do in the meantime?"
"I don't know," Lincoln says, turning into the driveway at the office. "Let's go see if Quinn has anything interesting for us."
We step out of the station wagon, and I peer up at the familiar P.I. office. The way it's built doesn't make much sense. The bottom building is a storage unit with some of my dad's old things.
I haven't had a chance to go through them, and I'm not sure when I will. The actual P.I. office is built above the storage unit, with a long set of stairs leading up to it. It's a bit unconventional, and it sits right by an abandoned lot, so there aren't any other buildings nearby.
We climb the steps, and Lincoln opens the door for me.
"Don't tell me you're still going to get Quinn all riled up about the Nathan thing, are you?" he asks with a sudden frown.
How could he expect me not to?
"I would say she deserves to know the truth."
"You mean your version of it?" Lincoln shakes his head. "I really did think he would be a solid lead. It still could be. If we find Nathan, we can ask him why someone thought he was meeting with Anita and if there’s any truth to the rumors about the Thorntons."
Something more crosses his face for a moment, but I can't quite decipher it in time. He’s not wrong about the Nathan angle. We need to find him, and fast.
Quinn stands up from the office desk and stretches when she sees us.
"Are you guys going to stand out there and bicker, or are you going to come on in? We have an interesting case to deal with now that the Anita one is on hold. Speaking of which, do you guys know what we will tell Meredith? She’s already called the office twice this morning."
Of course, she did. I exchange glances with Lincoln. I knew Meredith wouldn't be that easy to get rid of. For now, though, I decide to focus on the other part of what Quinn said.
"What do you have for us?" I ask.
"It seems like a young lady in town has a stalker, and she needs our help to get him off her tail." Quinn turns the screen toward us so we can see better.
"A stalker?" I say, coming over to the computer. “How can we help?”
This should be a good case to distract us. Well, that and finding Nathan Thornton. I want to ask him why Lincoln, and potentially Phineas, have such an interest in him because I’m starting to think the Anita angle is only part of the truth.
Link
Phineas opens the door to a small cabin out in the woods. It took us nearly half an hour to drive here. In the center of the room sits a man tied to a chair with tape over his mouth. His frantic eyes bounce around the room, and I realize, just a little too late, what Phineas meant when he said he had a new lead and needed my help cracking it.
“Lincoln, meet Leo. Apparently, he used to work for Nathan up until a few months ago.” Phineas leans against a cane he’s carrying.
I eye the cane. “I can’t believe you’re using that.”
“It’s called style.” Phineas looks unbothered by my comment. I wonder if he will ever stop adding ridiculous props to his wardrobe.
I glower. What are we doing out here in this strange cabin with a man named Leo, who clearly doesn't want to be here?
Who is this? I glance toward Leo, who glares. I turn back to Phineas. “We’ve met. What do you want me to do now?”
I know what he wants. He wants me to get Leo to talk.
“Find out what he knows.” Phineas rips off the tape, a little chuckle escaping him as he shrugs and steps back, leaning on his annoying cane.
“I’m not one of your enforcers, Phineas.” I promised myself when we started all of this that I wouldn’t cross a line. It seems Phineas needs to be reminded of that. He only controls me so much. He can’t have my soul; there’s still a scrap of dignity there.
“It’s not anything crazy. You’re probably pretty decent at interviewing a person.” Phineas’s grin stretches across his face. My stomach turns. Cassie is already furious at me for being around him in the first place. If I allow him to make me torture a guy for information...
I motion to Phineas to follow me outside before leaving through the same door we walked through a few seconds before. I close the door behind us and turn to Phineas.
“What’s going on? You know I won’t be doing this sort of thing for you, right? No matter what leverage you have on me.”
Phineas eyes me long and hard, and then a maniacal grin lights up his face.
“All right then, good to know. I just need you to ask him the questions, and I’ll do the rest.” He shrugs as if it’s no big deal that I just told him I wouldn’t do what he brought me here to do.
“What?” I must have missed something because things like this aren’t usually that easy with Phineas. “Was this a test of some sort?”
I can see by the glint of pride in Phineas’s eyes that it was indeed a test, and I seem to have passed in some strange way.
That’s unexpected.
“A test is a little bit too generous; it was nothing so formal. I just wanted to know how far you would go to protect yourself. It’s good to know I have a man of character on my team.” He nods toward the front room. “I’m pretty sure Leo will tell you whatever you want. He’s pretty scared of me.”
“So let me get this straight: you set this all up to see how far you could make me go?” Figures, Phineas is crazy enough to be playing ridiculous mind games.
“Consider it testing your limits.”
“What if I would have gone along with it and tortured him? Would you have stopped me?” My throat dries. Phineas really is a twisted character.
“You didn’t get that far, did you?” His eyes twinkle.
I shake my head, perplexed and annoyed. For a moment, I was worried everything was about to come crashing down. It’s a terrifying state to live in, wondering how long Phineas will work with me instead of against me. He can blow my life up at any moment with a few buttons on his phone.
“I wanted to know where you stood on things like this, you know. Lorraine always says that it’s good to know your friends.” I’ll have to thank Lorraine for taking control of one of the biggest menaces on the streets of Pinecrest.
“Once again, I am not your friend.” If anything, this experience only proves that to be truer than I already knew it was.
“Semantics.” Phineas waves off my words, twirling his ridiculous cane, then leads me back into the cabin. “Leo, per what we talked about, you’re going to tell Lincoln everything he wants to know.”
I don’t even want to know what they talked about before. I wonder if this mission was Lorraine-approved. It’s hard to tell.
Phineas makes Lorraine sound like some sort of gentle angel. Then again, someone with only a basic sense of morality could be considered an angel in his eyes.
Leo’s eyes widen with fear. He looks between us, and when his expression is exactly the same for Phineas as it is for me, it makes me feel even worse. A stab of guilt runs through me as Leo agrees to cooperate with an eager nod.
“Do you know where Nathan is hiding out?” I watch for any sign that Leo might be lying as he starts to talk.
“No, I haven’t seen him in weeks. He was worried about something though. He got really jumpy the last week before he disappeared.”
I file that information away. It turns out Leo is more than happy to answer all of my questions. He doesn’t push back on a single one, pouring out everything he’s observed over the past months and years. Some new information for me is that Nathan was involved in financial blackmail. Anita’s story tugs at me; maybe the Ponzi scheme accusations have a chance of being true.
Even so, he doesn’t know much particular information about Nathan. By the time we’re done talking, I find out Nathan’s been missing for a while. Before he went missing, he was jumpy, extra paranoid, and worried about one of his bosses. When I’m satisfied, I asked Leo everything that could be useful. I joined Phineas in the car out front.
“What are we supposed to do with him now?” I ask.
“Don’t worry, I’ll have someone come and get him. You did your job well,” Phineas says as we pull away from the cabin and drive back toward civilization. “I’ve been meaning to tell you I’m sorry about making you lie to your friends about what we’re doing together.”
It’s the same way a good friend might apologize for spilling a drink all over your tuxedo. So nonchalant and even sincere. I’m not sure whether to accept the apology or laugh at him.
“You? Sorry?” I keep my eyes straight ahead. Believing Phineas for a second is dangerous business. He seems like a nice guy, even a friend at times, but he would stab you in the back just as fast. “I have yet to see any evidence of a real conscience, so I can’t say I believe you.”
“It’s been buried for a while.” He throws me a playful grin, and then his expression turns serious again. “I do feel bad about driving a wedge between you and Cassie. I know how nice it is to love someone, and I wish I didn’t have to mess with your chance at the same thing.”
Phineas turns toward me, and for a moment, I think I see something resembling regret on his face. “But don’t worry, you can tell her everything once all this is behind us.”
“Do you really think that would do any good?” My question is meant as a rhetorical one, but there is a sliver of truth in it. Lying to Cassie and Quinn now will destroy their trust in me, and there’s no coming back from that.
“Of course it will. When I came clean about everything in my past to Lorraine, she took me as I am. I think Cassie will do the same for you.” Phineas’s face softens at the mention of Lorraine, and it reminds me that he believes himself to be some lovesick puppy.
“You clearly don’t know Cassie very well,” I grumble, unsure why I’m following the conversation. Cassie was betrayed young, by her mother of all people. She’s never trusted easily and isn’t the type to erase the past, especially when someone hurts her.
I can already see that my lying is taking a significant toll on our relationship… or what’s left of it, anyway.