Chapter Fifty-Four. Cat
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
CAT
At five, I’m walking through the doors of the Sherman Ranch Amenity Center to an overwhelming amount of gold décor and a flurry of activity.
Teenage girls arrange vases, move folding chairs, carry buckets of paint.
They’ve made good progress. Scaffolding on the stage supports the backdrop, a castle cut-out silhouetted against gold sequined drapes interwoven with twinkle lights, a shimmering garland of stars scalloping the top.
Hannah is offstage, stringing more lights along the edge.
Olivia sits center stage, her back to me, while she paints a giant plywood star with gold glitter.
As I slide closer to the stairs that lead up the side of the stage, I notice Sarah Lynn tucked behind the scaffolding, talking to Magnuson, who is adjusting the lights.
I can see immediately what she is doing, in the tilt of her head, the feline grace with which she weaves her way around him, finding little excuses to linger too close.
He’s young enough to make a teenage girl’s imagination run wild, and the kind of good-looking that’ll have her drawing hearts in the margins of her homework.
I picture that scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark when the student writes LOVE YOU on her eyelids.
“That must have been … a lot,” he says, as he tightens a bolt. “Finding something like that in The Hollow.”
She looks up at him through her lashes, playing the perfect damsel in distress. “It was really scary.” She leans just slightly closer, and for a moment his eyes catch on her like he can’t quite look away.
Then he rests a hand on her shoulder. “My door’s always open.”
On the surface, it sounds innocent enough.
Just a concerned teacher, offering a sympathetic ear.
But I can see exactly how dangerous it is, how easily it can be read another way.
He should be shutting her down right now, drawing a clear line.
Then, over her shoulder, he catches sight of me, and the color drains from his face like I just yanked the covers off the two of them.
I open my mouth, ready to cut in, when a sharp crack splinters the air, and we all whip our heads toward the sound.
The massive scaffolding structure shudders, then, horrifyingly, begins to lean.
The cables running to those heavy canister lights pull taut, then snap.
For a terrible heartbeat, the whole structure hangs midair, groaning like a beast. And, in that time-clung moment, I realize my daughter sits directly beneath it.
Then it is falling. Fast. Too fast.
“Olivia!” The name tears from my throat, a strangled, useless shriek.
She leaps, springing toward the edge of the stage, just as the scaffolding comes crashing down, metal screeching as it buckles, aluminum bars collapsing in on each other.
Lights burst, popping like firecrackers, exploding fragments of glittering glass across the stage.
Girls scream. The impact shakes the floorboards, the vibration running up through my shoes, rattling my bones.
I run to her. Olivia is on her hands and knees, clear of the wreckage by mere inches. She blinks up at me, wide-eyed but upright. I drop to the floor, grabbing her face in both hands. “Oh my God, honey, are you okay? Are you hurt?”
“Mom…” She breathes. I’m already running my hands over her shoulders, down her arms, checking her. Patting for injuries, for cuts I can’t see. But her bones feel solid. Her skin is warm. She’s whole. That simple fact—that my daughter is alive—nearly shatters me. I pull her into a crushing hug.
Over her shoulder, in the space left by the fallen scaffolding, stands Kennedy Claire, hand to her chest, a look of perfect shock painted on her face.
I don’t buy it. That bitch did this. And for what? A crown? A title?
White-hot certainty floods my veins, and I’m on my feet before I can think. Anger consumes me, dark and feral. I march to her, so close I can see where the mascara has fallen to dust her cheekbones.
“What is wrong with you?” I spit.
“With me?” Her voice is a flawless mix of confusion and hurt.
“You could have killed her,” I say, through gritted teeth. My hands are in fists by my sides.
Kennedy Claire’s eyes go wide, feigning innocence. “Catherine, you can’t possibly think…”
I want to knock that smug look off her face. I want to deck her, like I promised I would so many years ago.
Someone’s hand finds my arm. “Cat, it was an accident, sweetie.”
I shrug the woman off, my vision tunneled down to Kennedy Claire alone. But before I get the chance to open my mouth again, to tell Kennedy Claire exactly what I think of her, Olivia’s voice snaps me back: “Mom, please.”
Olivia stands, working the long sleeve of her oversized sweatshirt over her hand nervously. She looks so small, so vulnerable. All I want to do is protect her, but I can see the desperation in her face, the plea she won’t make out loud. Don’t embarrass me. Not again.
And then I notice the room, all the other mothers watching, pity on their faces, the tightness of their lips. Kennedy Claire says nothing to defend herself, just lets the stark relief of her cool composure against my wild panic speak for itself.
I deflate. For Olivia’s sake, I won’t say any more. Not here. Not now. “Let’s go home,” I tell her.
But as I walk toward the glass doors, I make myself a silent oath: She touches my daughter again, and I’ll put her in the fucking grave.