“This is a cloned version of what you’re wearing.” He touched the new device. “Only I can turn this one on and off. What this keychain is currently doing is copying the program off the monitor on your leg to this one. As it copies, I slipped a virus in that tricks your device into thinking it’s on, but it’s really off.”
“So, I can leave, and they think I’m home, right?” she asked giddily.
“Yeah,” Clint answered, rolling his eyes.
She was annoying, and he didn’t want to stick around any longer than he needed to. It beeped three times, then he threw the FOB into her lap.
“Here. Keep that on you. It’s literally the key to your freedom. Press the green button, and your ankle bracelet turns off, and this one turns on. Press again to switch it back.”
He stood and grabbed his backpack, slinging it over his shoulders.
“And if I press it by mistake away from home?”
“You have to be within a range of fifty feet of this new one, so be careful until you’re at least that far away. Oh yeah, and don’t call me again. If you’re caught, everything this thing is linked to will trace back to you.”
With that, he let himself out and shut the door behind him before she could ask another question. Kim didn’t care about the risk. She needed to break out of the tiny apartment for a while—and to see Kayden. First things first—she had to get to a drugstore to fashion some sort of disguise.
She would need to say goodbye to her blonde locks and decided red would look great on her. Kim stood and pressed the FOB. The clone lit up, and her ankle bracelet turned off. She sat on the couch, her heart racing in her chest for what felt like hours, afraid the door would be kicked in. After another hour of pacing and looking out the window for police lights, she noticed the sun had started to set. Kim unlocked the front door, took a deep breath, and stepped out into the world.
KAYDEN HADN’T VISITEDhisold home in many years, and it felt familiar and foreign to him all at the same time. The flight to New York was OK—he listened to music and slept while his mother kept her eyes out the window. He waited for her to bring up the subject of Lana and their conversation, but it never happened. He would force her to talk before the week ended, and no matter what she said, he’d get the truth. As he walked through the loft, nothing much had changed.
It still felt cold and sterile, too much white with chrome fixtures. The white marble floors and snow-white baby grand near the floor-to-ceiling windows were still there, too. Everything was the same down to the family portrait that hung above the fireplace. It was huge. Vincent stood behind Maureen, who sat next to Joshua. Kayden stood next to him with Paula seated on his left. He remembered being forced to stand for the portrait and being pissed that day.
He wanted to do regular things other boys got to do—play video games, run outside, get dirty—but he had to sit and have this portrait painted. Regular people took pictures, but not Maureen Capshaw. They were forced to sit for that painting for months. Looking at his father and brother reminded him of whyhe had never returned. It was too hard—like time was standing still. He turned left down the hallway and walked into his old bedroom. He smiled at the Blink 182 posters on the walls, the now ancient game consoles, and remembered the competitions he and Joel would get into playing them.
They lived on the thirtieth floor of the Leviathan Building, so the view was marvelous. He wished Lana were with him to see it. She’d arrived in Florida safely, and they’d spoken after his own plane had landed. Once he unpacked, he planned to give her a call before he got on the phone to handle business with Taylor and the issues with the Spence Hotel. Paula also decided to take the opportunity to go home to California.
He was sure she had to be missing Garrett after spending so much time being there for him and Lana. They were grateful, but she had a husband and eventually had to get back to her own life. Kayden opened his closet and snorted at his old wardrobe. The huge colorful bubble jackets and ripped jeans of the nineties stared back at him. Tucked in the corner was his old skateboard, complete with NWA, Nirvana, and Lost Boys stickers.
He wouldn’t dare get on that thing now. A slight knock on the door interrupted his nostalgia, then it pushed open, and Maureen’s head poked in.
“Are you hungry? I can have Rochelle whip something up?” she asked.
Rochelle was his mom’s live-in Housekeeper. She did a great job maintaining the large apartment on her own, which had been a lot lately.
“No, I’m good. I can go out and grab something if I need to,” he replied.
“Ok,” she said, and turned to leave.
“Mom,” he called out.
“Yeah?” she asked, looking up at him.
“We’re gonna talk about that conversation you had with Lana. She wouldn’t tell me what was said, but youwill,” he deadpanned.
“Understood,” Maureen replied, and closed the door behind her.
As she walked across her porcelain marble floors into her massive living room, she looked around and couldn’t catch her breath for a minute. This was it. She would lose everything once the awful truth finally came out. At the moment, she didn’t have much besides Heathcliff, and things with him had been rocky, as of late.
Everyone was tired of her, and she couldn’t blame them. If they knew what she’d done sooner, she would have lost them all years ago. Maureen had to decide just how much of the absolute truth she could control once she spilled the beans. She walked into her own room across the penthouse and closed the door she once shared with her beloved Vincent.
As she looked down at the bed, she could still see him lying there—cold as ice, a faint smile on his lips, his head towards the window. She often thought about what his last thoughts were as he passed into the unknown. The idea that he took his own life to rid himself of the chaos she created and her endless web of lies was one she had to live with every day.
Maureen only wished Kim hadn’t spent the night and been there that morning, but her options for confidentiality were limited. Now she would pay the ultimate price for trusting her and had to come to terms with losing it all. That would kill her, but it would still be better than telling Kayden the truth. The truth… that Vincent wasn’t his real father.
That Judge Thomas Hartwell was, and that his wife Rebecca hated her, and rightfully so when she found out about the affair and the child as a result. A knock on the door broke her train of thought, and she grabbed her coat from the vanity chair. It wasRochelle, no doubt, coming to see if she needed anything for the rest of the evening.
Her mind kept racing as she made the slow walk to the bedroom door. How could she ever explain any of that? Maureen turned and stared down at the California King bed and wondered if the impending heartbreak would killherin the same way. She knew there would be no smile on her face when it happened. Except on the faces of maybe her children, once they found out how truly awful a person she really was—and it would be soon.
