2. A Hot Beverage #3
We sat in silence, that weird family line that tied us all together going unspoken.
My stepfather, Luke Gray, was the brother of Turner Gray.
None of us ever said it out loud. It was a dark, but open, secret of Mourningkill Turner had impregnated a 15-year-old Dagny Whitlaw when he was her soccer coach.
Officially, she was a single mom, and the dad was out of the picture. But we all knew. There are no secrets in a small town!
How did she cope with seeing Turner in her son?
A son the Grays would never acknowledge?
Did she also look at Cohen and see the man who had hurt her?
Did she feel it in the stares of people around her?
People who knew and blamed her for being a victim?
Did she shrug it off her wide shoulders the way she did everything else? The way I never could?
I saw so much of Luke in Marcus. I wondered if she saw Turner in her son. How did she look him in the eyes? How did she love him when he reminded her so much of someone that hurt her. That abused her.
“Would you like me to come with you?” Worry now mixed in with the pity on Whitlaw’s expression. “I can drive you there and back. I get this is a lot for anyone to handle.”
I smiled, but there was no joy. I smiled to let her know I understood. That I had this. That I’d be okay.
I had to be.
“Thank you, but I’ll be fine,” I said through the lump in my throat. “Now?”
“You can take a few minutes. Maybe even days. Not like he’ll get any deader—” Her eyes widened in surprise, then she flushed. “Shit, sorry, Mel. I didn’t mean that.”
I smiled, because it was a little funny.
He definitely wouldn’t be any deader than he already was.
“Tomorrow, then. Marcus and Miriam have a half day today. I’ve got to pick them up in less than four hours.
I don’t think…I want to make sure they’re not stuck.
You know? In case the busses aren’t running… ”
I’d have to get on my phone and check the app.
“Do I have to come to the station now? Or…tomorrow?”
I’d thought about this for a long time and assumed there would be the inside of a jail cell waiting for me.
If not now, then soon. After they figured it out.
Because the forensic shows I’d started watching obsessively after the high of slaying my own personal demon turned to the dread of discovery—the paranoia of the ticking bomb that was the truth—always showed the murderers getting caught right when they thought they were safe.
So I never felt safe. Partially as a precaution, and also because it was true. I was one clue away from being the maid in the ballroom with the whiskey full of muscle relaxers.
And Miriam and Marcus were one detective’s clue away from foster care. Unless the Grays took them in. But in the end, was that any better?
I looked at Whitlaw. She was young. She looked as young as I did, really. And she had a thirteen-year-old of her own. The big open secret was that the Gray men liked them young.
I made myself believe it had nothing to do with me, even as his hand touched my thigh in the car a little too long, and a little too high. He was just affectionate. Right? He was just a nice guy. Right?
“Sweetheart, I’m not taking you into custody.” She squeezed my hand. It was meant as a comforting gesture. It wasn’t. “I’m here to support you through this tragedy.”
I looked up at her and her deeply tanned skin that was uneven because of the hats she always wore. She saw too much. I only hoped and prayed she didn’t see through me.
“I know how the Grays can be.”
We both knew well. Too well.
The Grays of Mourningkill. There was a right and wrong side of the mountain to be from, and my mom was considered wrong from the very beginning. Not good enough to be one of them. Just a gold digger. An ambitious social climber.
I remembered Grandma Gray looking my mom up and down as she sneered, “She works.”
Whether you were a prostitute or a CEO, jobs that didn’t have to do with horses weren’t good enough for Lady Gray. Good ol’ traditional small-town values…
“You know you can always call me. Anytime.” Sheriff Whitlaw smiled. She might look my age, but she was decades more mature than I was. She had to be. “I know what it’s like to have to grow up a little too fast, and to take care of someone else when you’re hardly more than a kid yourself.”
“I’m fine. And I’m not a kid.” I jutted out my chin, prickling at the idea I was somehow too young, too naive to be taking care of Marcus and Miriam. I grew up fast because I had to. Because I would have been dead if I hadn’t. Because I’d had to live in terror, humiliation, and fear for so long.
“I’m not saying you are, sweetheart. But this is a lot to deal with.”
She wasn’t much older than I was. She was dealing with it just fine. She was dealing with it so well, I wished I could talk to her about it. But I couldn’t. That would break the rules of this fucking town.
I tried to give my most Oscar-winning performance, but it fell short. All I could do was politely croak, “Thank you.”