Sweet Liar

by Debra Doxer

  “How could you do this?” Jonah asked.

  Victor’s expression never changed, but he looked at me as if anything Jonah had to say was my fault, my influence.

  “She’s no innocent bystander,” Victor replied.

  Jonah took my hand gently and held it. “She did nothing to deserve this.” Flexing his jaw in anger, he turned toward Victor. “I saw Mom.”

  Victor’s eyes narrowed.

  “You’re doing this because Sebastian helped her leave you, and because they’re together.”

  Victor scoffed. “Is that what she told you? The man is a traitor. You know that.”

  Jonah nodded. “I also know why he did it, and that it’s something you would never do. Not for anyone.”

  Jonah’s gaze shifted toward the front door that still stood open. Placing his hands on my shoulders, he encouraged me to look in the same direction.

  I turned and saw someone standing in the doorway. At the sight of him, my heart stopped. It was my father, looking at me with the saddest expression I’d ever seen.

  Dressed in an ill-fitting gray sweatshirt and faded jeans, he took in the scene silently before he stepped inside the house and closed the door quietly behind him.

  Victor said nothing, but his smug expression held fast, as if the three of us could do or say whatever we wanted and he’d still remain in control. He only asked one question of Jonah. “Who’s the traitor now?”

  While Victor was looking at his son with a world of disappointment in his eyes, my father plowed into him from the side and brought them both crashing to the floor. I gasped as Jonah rushed toward them.

  With a growl, Victor surged upward, throwing my father off him. Jonah came at Victor then, landing a punch to his jaw, which hardly fazed him. His fist came around and slammed into Jonah’s face with enough force to make his head snap back.

  When I saw Jonah stumble with blood pouring from his nose, I realized Victor might be able to take the both of them. Then I remembered the gun.

  Turning, I saw it was still on the side table. When I looked back, my father was trying to overtake Victor with Jonah coming at him from the other side, but somehow Victor withstood them both.

  I pushed up off the couch and limped across the room, my calf screaming with each step. When I reached out and closed my fingers around the gun, it felt familiar, cool and solid in my hand as I lifted it and aimed.

  Victor concentrated on Jonah, glaring at him with such animosity it turned my blood ice cold. I adjusted my aim just as Victor’s fist connected with Jonah’s stomach and then his face again. I flinched with each blow. Jonah’s nose and eye were both swelling, but he fought back as best he could, landing his fist in his father’s side hard enough to make the man grunt in pain, but not enough to stop him.

  It was then that my father saw me. His face was taut as he assessed the situation. He crossed the room quickly but said nothing when he held out his hand.

  My fingers went slack with relief. Without hesitating, I placed the gun in my father’s waiting palm and he gripped it like it was second nature. His fingers surrounded it with ease and confidence, as if it were an extension of his arm.

  When he held up the gun, his expression smoothed out and his dark eyes cooled. He looked preternaturally calm. The change in him was astounding, almost frightening, and I knew he wouldn’t just wound Victor. That wasn’t what he did. I was looking at a cold-blooded killer.

  My father had been right all along. I wasn’t like him, not in this way, and I never could be.

  A loud pop sounded and Victor’s head jerked back. A second later, he slumped to the floor at Jonah’s feet.

  Breathing hard, covered in blood, Jonah rested a hand against the wall to help him stay upright as he stared down at his father. Then slowly, he looked up at us in shock.

  “It’s going to be okay,” my father said quietly in a soft voice meant only for me.

  Without another thought, I went to Jonah. My heart ached for him, but not for the fate of his father, and I was sure Jonah knew it. Even so, he wrapped his arms around me and pulled me to him.

  Jonah had freed my father but lost his own in the process. Once that fact sank in, I wondered how he’d feel about it, about me. The thought that he might hate me for it was terrifying because I knew I loved him now. I loved him so much it hurt.

  Someone had heard my screams and called the police, although they arrived long after the danger was over. We all looked at each other when we heard sirens outside, but my father was quick to advise us.

  He saw no need to cover up what happened. He put the gun down on the side table and asked Jonah for his phone, since he didn’t have one of his own. Then he placed a call to someone and told them where he was and what he’d done.

  The police already had my father in handcuffs when the men from the organization arrived, the ones my father must have called. They both wore dark clothing and serious expressions. The men hardly spared us a glance as they spoke to the local officers, who went outside to confer. After a few moments, the police came back in wearing annoyed expressions, looking completely put out as they uncuffed my father and left.

  “You need to go to the hospital, Candy,” my father said. “I’ll have one of these men take you.”

  “Jonah’s hurt too.”

  “They have to talk to him first.”

  I eyed him stubbornly. “I’m not going anywhere without Jonah.”

  My father tried to persuade me again, but I wouldn’t budge. Adrenaline had masked the pain, keeping it to a dull roar.

  The two organization men, one with a beard and the other with thinning red hair, took Jonah and me to separate rooms to speak to us. Before that, Jonah had just stood there looking dazed, in a world of his own. I wanted to tell the men that talking could wait, that Jonah wasn’t up to it now, but my father thought it was best for him to cooperate.

  The red-haired man only asked me what happened tonight, nothing else about my father or the accusations against him, and I started at the point where Drew drugged me and brought me here. I ended with my father shooting Victor because my father asked me to tell the truth and I trusted him. Nothing I said surprised or fazed the organization man.

  By the time I finished and returned to the living room, Victor’s body was gone and the blood had been cleaned off the floor. Jonah was still being interviewed when I joined my father. Now that I had a chance to really look at him, I noticed how weary and thin he was.

  “How did it go?” he asked, still waiting to have his interview.

  “I don’t know. He didn’t say much. How is it that you’re here?” I asked, figuring Jonah probably had just enough time to go back and forth to where they were keeping my father. Why hadn’t he told me that he was going to get him?

  “I’m not sure. My door opened and someone told me I was free to leave. A moment later Jonah was standing there, waiting to take me home.” He smiled. “You’ve been busy, little one.”

  “Not just me. It was mostly Jonah and his friend Heather.” I realized I didn’t even know Heather’s last name. “Her parents are the ones who got you released. I guess they’re supposed to be important or something.”

  Amusement sparked in his eyes. “Yes, they are important or something. It’s good to have friends in high places, or a daughter who does.”

  “I met Lorraine,” I said after a moment. “I wish you’d told me about her.”

  He tilted his head. “How would you have felt?”

  “Happy for you.” At his speculative look, I glanced down at my feet. “Eventually, I would have been happy for you. She seems nice.”

  He rested his hand on my shoulder. “She is, and I’m sure she was glad to see her son again.”

  “She was. He’s taking a little more time to warm up to her, though. I think he feels guilty that he didn’t know what was happening to her. He thinks he could have helped if he’d known.”

  “He’s wrong. He was just a kid.”

  Like I was, I thought, when
my mother was sick and my father was trying desperately to save her. “What you did for Mom,” I whispered so the organization men wouldn’t hear me. “What you sacrificed . . .”

  Shaking his head, he glanced at the man by the door, the one standing closest to us.

  “I just want you to know that I never believed what they told me about you. I figured if it was true, you must have had a good reason.”

  He smiled sadly. “You still have so much faith in me, Candy. I wish I was worthy of it.” His gaze traveled over me, taking in the cuts on my face and hands, and the place on my leg that was crusted with blood.

  “You can’t wait any longer for Jonah to be finished. You need medical attention.” He looked at the man standing by the door. “My daughter needs a doctor.”

  He approached us. “I can take her to the local hospital.”

  I gripped my father’s arm. “I’m not going without Jonah.”

  Again he glanced at my leg. The material of my jeans was soaked with blood. “Five more minutes. Then you go either way.”

  I said nothing, but I silently disagreed. I wasn’t taking a step out of this house without Jonah by my side. The five minutes was nearly up when he finally came down the hallway, pushing his hands through his hair as he stared down at the place where his father’s body had been.

  “I’ll run them both over to the hospital,” the bearded man said.

  That woke Jonah up from the haze he’d been lost in. He looked at me and his expression tightened. “I’ll drive us.” He turned to my father. “Can you get a ride with them?”

  My father assessed him. “Are you sure you’re up to driving?”

  Jonah nodded. “I wouldn’t take Candy in the car with me if I wasn’t.”

  Jonah and my father looked at each other and something passed between them, some sort of understanding.

  “I’ll meet you there,” my father said. Then he looked at me one more time, hesitating for a moment before he pulled me into a tight embrace. I lost it then and broke down, crying as I pushed my face into the old sweatshirt he wore, a shirt I knew he would never have chosen for himself. He looked terrible. What had happened to him while he was gone? I doubted he’d ever tell me.

  We released each other, and he reached down with his thumb to brush a tear off my cheek.

  “Go with Jonah now,” he said. “I’ll see you in a bit.”

  I only turned away from him reluctantly, afraid something else could happen and I wouldn’t see him again. It wasn’t until Jonah took my hand and tugged gently that I finally agreed to leave.

  “Where’s your coat?” Jonah asked as we walked outside.

  I stared at the Christmas trees in the front yard, looking like dark, uneven ripples on a white ocean of snow. “Back at Lea’s.”

  “We can get it tomorrow. I’ll turn up the heat for you.”

  Jonah’s voice sounded so normal. After what had happened, he shouldn’t sound so completely normal, and it worried me.

  The Jeep was parked on the street. As always, he opened the passenger side first and waited for me to get inside.

  “My phone is out here somewhere,” I said as I looked around on the ground.

  Jonah pulled out his phone and tapped the screen. A moment later, “The Vengeful One” blared in the quiet night from somewhere beneath the branches. Before I could move, Jonah walked past me and pulled it from beneath the trees.

  “Thanks,” I said when he handed it to me. “Nice ringtone, by the way.”

  He shot me a smile that never reached his eyes. I wished I would have heard it ring earlier when we could have laughed about it together.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you I was going to get your father,” he said as he settled into the seat beside me. “I didn’t know for sure if they were going to release him until I got there, and I didn’t want you to be disappointed.”

  “It’s okay. I don’t understand, though. How did they make it happen so fast?”

  “It wasn’t fast. There were people inside working on getting him out since my father had him locked up.” Jonah looked at me. “Turns out, your father is very well-respected, much more than mine is. Like I told you, the organization doesn’t like messes. Since there was no proof, they preferred to let your father go along with mine. They just wanted the situation to go away. But I didn’t find out my father was out until it was too late. I’m sorry, Candy. I never should have left you at that party.”

  His words were as stilted and stiff as his body language. It was as if he was purposely trying not to feel anything.

  “None of this was your fault,” I said. He shouldn’t have been apologizing to me. His father was gone, and I played no small part in that.

  His throat worked as he swallowed, but he said nothing.

  “What about the secrets my father leaked? Shouldn’t the organization care about that?”

  “If they believed it. He covered his tracks. Heather’s parents couldn’t find my father’s mysterious contact, and they suspect he never existed. Other than my father, there wasn’t a single person who believed the rumors about Sebastian could be true.”

  “They were true, though.”

  “Yes. They were, and if your father’s lucky, no one who knows that will ever say a word.”

  Besides us, the Hoyts knew and so did Lorraine. With Victor gone, I doubted the Hoyts would want to tell anyone and risk implicating themselves.

  Moonlight shone into the car, emphasizing the swelling around Jonah’s eye. It was his scarred eye, and I wondered if more damage had been done to it. His lip was also swollen and he’d tried to wash off the blood, but there was some left behind below his nose and lips.

  “I’m so sorry about your father.”

  The muscles in his face tensed.

  I reached out and laid my hand on his arm. “It’s okay to feel whatever you’re feeling right now. No matter what he did, he was still your father.”

  Jonah exhaled heavily and turned his face away from me. His breathing hitched, and when he wiped at his face I knew he was crying. I smoothed my hand over his arm, letting him know I was here, but he kept his face turned away, not wanting me to see him fall apart. Even so, I never took my hand off his arm, and after a few moments he leaned into it, pressing toward me. Eventually, he took my hand and just held it until he’d pulled himself together again.

  “I love you.” I said this to him as he started the engine. My chest swelled with such an intense feeling, one that had to be love, even though I’d never felt this way before. I felt it so strongly and needed to tell him.

  He stilled, not moving for several long moments.

  Nerves bounced around my stomach as I second-guessed myself. Had I said it at the wrong time, or made him feel guilty because he didn’t feel the same way anymore? As devastating as that would be, making him feel any worse was the last thing I wanted to do.

  When Jonah finally turned and looked at me, his eyes glittered in the darkness. He leaned in and placed a soft kiss on my lips. “I love you too, Candy,” he whispered.

  I blinked against the tears that gathered in my eyes and smiled at him, but he didn’t smile back. He looked away.

  “But other than my feelings for you,” he said quietly, “all I feel is empty.”

  I stared at his profile, his words echoing in my head. Of course he was devastated, but empty? That sounded so much worse. As he drove away from the house, I couldn’t let that statement hang there like an ominous cloud.

  “That’s how it feels now, but it will get better with time.”

  Jonah glanced at me but said nothing in response. My words were insignificant in the face of everything that had happened. Just as I’d gotten my father back and my world began to brighten, Jonah’s world had darkened. I didn’t know how to comfort him because it was my life that had cast the shadow over his.

  The ride to the hospital was quiet, and so was the time we spent sitting in the emergency room, holding hands as we waited. The wait was so long that my father a
rrived before we’d been seen by anyone, and a short while later, Lorraine came too. My father must have called her.

  I watched in fascination as they embraced. Lorraine sobbed as she threw her arms around him, and my father’s eyes closed as he held her, like it was something he’d waited a long time to do. Despite the way my heart twinged at the idea of him with anyone but my mother, I could see that he cared about Lorraine, and was glad he’d found her.

  I looked at Jonah to see his reaction, but his face was oddly blank. It stayed that way when his mother came and hugged him too as he sat in the plastic waiting room chair.

  My name was called before Jonah’s, and I didn’t want to leave him. I had this terrible feeling that something awful would happen if I walked away.

  That premonition was confirmed when I came back out again an hour later.

  Jonah was gone.

  Neither my father nor Lorraine knew where he was. When no one was looking, he’d slipped out of the hospital.

  ***

  Three months later

  It was nearly April, but Ryberg must have missed the memo. Even though all the snow was gone, it still felt like February outside, and I made sure to choose a desk far from the drafty windows of the classroom. I hadn’t realized how old and dingy Ryberg High was until I saw Glenn Valley High.

  But I wasn’t going to school in Glenn Valley anymore because I’d moved back to Ryberg. My father and I both moved this time, and that was part of the reason why I didn’t hate this town so much anymore. The other reason was sitting across the aisle and two desks up from me.

  Theo. He was here too.

  While my history teacher droned on about the French Revolution and Napoleon, I yawned widely and stared down at my fingers. Last month, my father had driven me down to Glenn Valley to see Dr. Fox and finally get the bandages off. Now that they were gone, I couldn’t help but stare at my misshapen fingertips. Chunks were missing from them, and the skin was raw and pink.

  That night at Jonah’s house had been the final straw, when I was out in the cold running through the Christmas trees. The frostbitten parts of my fingers became infected, and the verdict was that the black skin had to come off. Now my ugly hands were even uglier, but I wasn’t devastated the way I thought I would be. My hands still functioned, and with everything else going on, their appearance didn’t matter at all. Neither did the dime-sized scar on my calf where the tree branch pierced my skin. It would forever remind me of that terrible night, but it also proved to me that wounds could heal, no matter how deep and painful. I was healing, and I hoped someone I missed terribly was healing too.