“You can fuck off, too,” I told her, then closed my office door, shutting them both out, along with my wandering thoughts of Laikyn Quinn.
8
Laikyn
I woke up the following day toan empty house and a phone full of messages—both texts and voicemails. All the voicemails were from my mother, as were most of the texts, although there were quite a few from Wes sprinkled in there.
Now, as Waldo and I sat on the back patio, him snoozing, me drinking orange juice and staring out into the obscenely beautiful morning, I listened to my mother’s ramblings.
“Laikyn, I’m just calling to check on you. Make sure you’re all right. I talked to Wes earlier. He said he hasn’t heard from you. He misses you. When you get a chance, call me.”
I snorted. The fact that my mother talked to Wes directly was off-putting. I’d always wondered if she had an ulterior motive for setting us up. It felt manipulative at first, but I shrugged it off when I realized Wes wasn’t prime husband material. I always figured my mother would try to set me up with a man who could progress her career, not one who hadn’t yet figured out what he wanted to be when he grew up.
I pressed the button to play the second message.
“It’s me again, sweetheart. Call me as soon as you get this.”
My mother had never referred to me as sweetheart before, and her use of it felt calculating and shrewd.
Her tone was civil until about the fourth voicemail.
“Laikyn, it’s urgent you call me. I’m worried. Have you seen the news? Something terrible happened last night. I need someone to talk to. Call me as soon as you get this.”
That was Monica, making everything about her. I assumed thesomething terribleshe was referring to was the tragic news about Lawrence Pierce and his wife, who were found dead in their Hollywood Hills home. As though it wasn’t bad enough the media was currently picking apart Melati’s life, trying to figure out what would drive her to murder her husband and take her own life—neither of which actually happened. Now my mother was going to insert herself into their fictitious tragedy and make everything about her.
Ironic since she was the actual cause of theirrealtragedy.
I took a sip of my juice and flipped to the messenger app to see the nonsense she was spewing there.
— It’s terrible, Laikyn. Their lives were cut short, and for what reason? Why would she do something like that?
Oh, brother. I didn’t bother reading the rest of her messages because I knew they would be the same. That was how it always started. Monica would look at a situation as though she was on the outside. Lie or not, she would build it up into this grand tragedy and somehow spin it around to be detrimental to her. In this case, the story she was concocting was written on a ribbon of lies that weaved through the very foundation of her existence. By the time she was done, it would be about another person entirely, but affecting her all the same.
My thoughts drifted to that night and the truth Rule had revealed.
Take me. Make it look like a kidnapping. She has kidnap and ransom insurance on me. They’ll pay three million easy.
You know that’s not how it works.
Yes, it is. She told me.
They don’tpaythe ransom. They pay itback.Tell me you know this, Laikyn.
Although Rule was willing to elaborate, I wasn’t sure I was ready for the whole truth. It was easy enough to figure out what it all meant, and the notion that my mother had hired someone to kidnap me to make a dollar … it was terrifying. She was the only family I had, the only person I thought I could depend on. It didn’t matter that she was self-centered and spoiled, I believed I could trust her. But like everything else, it had been a lie.
I flipped over to the message thread from Wes, not wanting to dwell on my mother for another second. Unfortunately, his messages weren’t any better.
— Hey, L. I wanted to check in. See if you want to grab lunch today. Or dinner if that works better for you.
His next message came only a few minutes after that.
— So I talked to your mom. She sounds upset. What did you tell her? Did you tell her I took Chastity home last night? Why would you do that?
His next message came less than an hour later.
— I hope you’re not upset that I took care of Chastity last night. She was in a bad place. She’s my friend, and she needed me. I was just doing what a good friend would do.
I wasn’t sure whether he was trying to convince me or himself. I guess he felt guilty because his next message was only fifteen minutes later.
