“I’m guessing your father appreciates the fact we’re not at my place.”
“He’ll be gone soon.” I dot kisses all along his jaw.
“Do you think you’ve restored your relationship?”
I bite down hard on my lip contemplating this. Now that I’m all about the truth it takes some time for the answers come.
“I think maybe, yeah. My mom was right. We all need a big sit down, but if we can put this behind us.” I shake my head. “Caleb, it’s strange, everything was such a nightmare in the beginning, and now I have you and my dad. Maybe my sister?” I give a little laugh. “It’s as if it’s too good to be true.”
“It’s true. Get used to it, Kennedy, because your life is about to get a whole lot better.” Caleb sits me on the bed. He performs a slow, methodical striptease in the shred of moonlight pouring through the window, and I devour every divine moment. Caleb is a god, a glowing being of alien perfection. It’s so hard to wrap my head around the fact everything is going so well. But Caleb is the most miraculous treasure, my heart’s deepest desire for so very long. Our lips smooth over every inch of one another’s bodies as Caleb buries his mouth over the most tender part of me, the most rock hard part of him thrusting down my throat. We go on like that for hours, our limbs twisted, our bodies knotted up in lust, me pulling his hair, him pulling mine. Those rock hard abs against my skin, his hot kisses warming my every inch. This is what I’ve dreamed of for so long on this very bed. And now my bedroom will never be the same.
And with Caleb in my life, neither will I.
We rouse lazily, well after eleven in the morning. Caleb admires my girly décor, my row of tiny ceramic Disney princesses, analyzes me by the books on my shelf, by the mountain of clothes building on the floor.
My phone bleats, and I flip it over. I glance at the screen, and my entire body goes numb with shock.
“What’s the matter?” he asks while fondling my soccer trophy from eighth grade.
“It’s a text from Brylee.” I can barely get the words out. I can barely breathe. “Keith is missing.”
Caleb
The next fewdays are lost in a whirlwind. Keith’s family isn’t so amused that the day their son’s phony obituary declared he passed away, he up and disappears. Kennedy is back to being the prime suspect, and her father and sister leave town with a shred of doubt hanging over their heads regarding her innocence once again. Then another bomb drops—this time right into my lap.
Zoey struts into my office with her sky high heels, her low cut dress with a hard V that shows off her cleavage straight to her belly. Which reminds me, I’ll have to instate a strict dress code, yesterday.
I take the envelope she hands me without glancing at all that flesh happening in front of me.
“It’s not postmarked.” I flip it over, still nothing.
“Really? That’s weird. It’s addressed to you. It was with the mail I picked up downstairs.”
I run my finger along the thin seam and pull out a CD.
Whenever an attorney receives a suspicious piece of mail that can somehow talk back to him, it’s never a good fucking sign.
I wait for Zoey to leave before putting it into my laptop and hitting play.
Here goes nothing.
The audio comes on—scratchy—nothing but static, so I turn it up all the way.
A female voice murmurs something. Then adds,“I’m sorry. I just want to get it all out in the open. No more secrets. I’m done with it.”
“Shit.” I bow my head because I know where this is headed.
“There’s something else I’d like to share. Keith already knows this but—you see,years ago, I lied for my mom. She and my dad were getting a divorce, and my mother gave me a script. It read like the white trash diaries. She made me tell the court all kinds of terrible things, that he abused us, that he brought women over into my mother’s bed in broad daylight. She made me tell the court that I saw him doing a line of coke in our bathroom with some whore. It was a load of bullcrap, but my mother was so hurt. She was so terribly hurt that my father would bang this twenty-year-old girl who was interning for him. She was desperate to get him back. My sister didn’t side with her—I did.”
Just like that it cuts out. What the hell? Why?
The memory comes back to me, fresh and alive. That’s the conversation we had at the lake. We thought we were alone with the exception of Keith and Brylee. All kinds of insane thoughts run through my head. Was Keith recording that? Brylee? God, was it Kennedy herself? She did all but accuse—askme if I was having an affair with Zoey.
I speed out the door and startle Zoey into slamming her laptop shut.
“What?” She sits up wild-eyed.
“Did you tell Kennedy we’re sleeping together?”
