99 Lies
Page 15
“We’re not doing your show again. Get Penelope,” I whisper into the phone as I hold my coffee higher than necessary, to block a particularly intrusive coffee shop patron’s less-than-subtle shot.
“Pen won’t come out of her room. She’s been crying all day. Holden’s going live on the radio this afternoon—ungrateful bastard—and Genesis is MIA. You have to do this, Maddie. I told everyone I’d have an exclusive.”
“What do you mean, MIA?” I stand and head toward the bathroom, for at least the illusion of privacy.
“I mean she’s totally off the grid. So is her dad. And Indiana. No one’s heard from them in hours.”
I hang up the phone and race back to the table. “Luke. Do you have your laptop? I need you to find my cousin.”
We won’t need to.
GENESIS
My father follows the man in the suit back into the small room where I’ve been answering questions all afternoon. “Well?” he says as he sinks into the chair next to mine.
The man in the suit sets a folder on the table, then sits across from us. “We’re satisfied, for now, though we reserve the right to ask more questions later, should the need arise. Here is the paperwork we mentioned.” He removes two identical sheets of paper from the folder, then pulls a pen from the inner pocket of his jacket. “We’ll need you each to sign one.”
“What is it?” I ask as I glance over the document.
“It’s an NDA. A nondisclosure agreement. It says that you agree not to talk about anything we’ve discussed here today, to keep from hampering our ongoing investigation into the Moreno cartel and its connections to David Valencia. If you violate the nondisclosure agreement, you will be subject to monetary damages in an amount to be determined by the courts, for whatever damage our investigation incurs as the result of your revelation, and our agreement not to prosecute will be null and void.”
“Wait, what?” As I mentally untangle his cruel knot of words, one thing becomes clear. “And if I don’t sign, what are you going to do? Sue us and prosecute me?”
“More accurately, we will leave the decision of whether or not to charge you for the damages or the loss of life on board the Splendor up to the federal prosecutor, and we will, of course, be obligated to provide whatever information he or she needs in order to best make that decision.”
“Charge me with what?”
“With the reckless handling of a potentially lethal weapon—three conventional warheads and a detonator—that resulted in the deaths of more than twelve hundred souls. One thousand two hundred thirty-four counts of involuntary manslaughter. If you’re found guilty, you’ll never see the light of day again. Assuming they don’t go for the death penalty.”
Shock crashes over me in a frigid wave, stealing my breath. Leaving me stunned. “But I didn’t know the bombs were on the boat! I was trying to—!”
“Genesis, stop talking,” my father orders, and my mouth snaps closed.
“Thus the ‘involuntary’ in involuntary manslaughter. All they have to prove is that you knew the bombs could kill someone and you detonated them anyway. That’s reckless endangerment. If you refuse to sign . . .”
“You’ll sell me out? I cooperated! I answered every question you asked!”
“Genesis, just sign the paper.” The way my father says it tells me this is not his first NDA. “They’re agreeing not to prosecute if you do.”
I turn on him, fear and anger coursing through my veins like adrenaline. “But if I sign that, we can’t tell anyone that I’m not guilty of murder.”
My father exhales slowly. Then he takes the pen the man across the table offers. “We won’t need to, because if you sign the document, no one will ever know you pressed the button,” he points out, in his most reasonable, no-nonsense voice.
But he’s wrong. Holden knows. And if I sign this paper, I will be at his mercy for . . . well, maybe forever.
I want to be free of Holden. I need to be rid of him.
“You should know that whether or not you sign, if you reveal classified information about our investigation, not only could you both face criminal charges, but I suspect my superiors will want to revisit their decision not to touch assets that we are legally entitled to seize, for the duration of our investigation.”
“What assets?” I ask.
My father is already signing. “Our assets. Genesis Shipping. The houses. The money. The cars. Everything.” He turns to me and hands me the pen. “If you don’t sign, they’re going to prosecute you, and we won’t have enough money to pay our lawyers.”
I’m sure that would be cozy.
MADDIE
I realize my mistake the second Neda’s car pulls up to the curb. She drives something sporty. Bright red, low-slung, and topless. Her goal in life is to stand out, and in my neighborhood, she’s getting twice the bang for her father’s buck.
Holden is in her passenger seat. When he opens the door, it takes everything I have to resist kicking him in the balls in greeting.
People turn to stare when Neda gets out wearing designer sunglasses, a top that is more straps than material—I can’t quite figure out how she got into it—and expensive sandals that look like they’ve never actually come into contact with the pavement. If my neighbors don’t know who she is yet, they will soon.
And they already recognize Holden. The national hero.
“Let’s go inside,” I say. But Neda leans against the hood of her convertible, practically posing for the cameras she imagines follow her everywhere. Lately, she’s right about that more often than not.
She glances up at my apartment building in obvious disgust. “I’m sure that would be cozy, but I get claustrophobic in buildings with low ceilings and poor lighting. And Luke looks like he could use some sun.” She crosses her arms over her chest. “Let’s just do this out here.”
“Quickly,” Holden adds. “I have a radio interview in an hour.”
“What did you find out?” Neda asks.
“Not much,” Luke says through clenched teeth. “Genesis hasn’t logged into any of her social media accounts in more than a week. I ran an open-source facial recognition software, looking for new pictures of her online. There are thousands of posts since yesterday, but most of them are just the same few pictures over and over. The one of Holden carrying her out of the jungle. Genesis getting off the jet. And a bunch of screenshots of Good Morning America from this morning. But nothing new in the past four hours.”
“Did she say where she was going when she left the studio?” I ask.
Holden shrugs. “She and Indiana just stormed out. She’s not answering my texts either. If she doesn’t show up for this radio thing . . .” He leaves his threat unspoken, and if I weren’t worried about what his revenge on Genesis could do to my mother, I’d call him out for his blackmail right here and now.
Neda’s gaze scans my block, and she actually shivers in disgust. I can practically see her urge to flee. “You could both blow off the radio and come on my show.”
Holden acts like he didn’t even hear her.
“Indiana isn’t answering his phone either,” Luke points out, hiking his backpack higher on one shoulder. “And there are no new pictures of him in the past day. They’re probably together. Probably alone. I’m sure they’ll start answering their phones when they’ve had enough privacy.”
He clearly isn’t worried about Genesis, and I’m not sure I should be. But . . . “Uncle Hernán isn’t answering either. Not even when my mom calls him.” I kick at a pebble on the sidewalk. “If he could answer, he would. I think they’re all three somewhere with no cell signal.”
Luke’s eyes widen. “They’re being questioned.” He sounds certain. Like he can’t believe we didn’t think of it before.
“For five hours?” I frown. “Agent Moore was done with us in under one.”
He shrugs. “We weren’t held in the jungle for an extra few days, with—” He bites off the rest, because Neda doesn’t know, but I hear it anyway. With
Maddie’s dad.
Holden smirks, well aware of what Luke was about to say. “I’m being interviewed by Homeland Security tomorrow,” he says. “She could be there now.” His phone buzzes and he frowns at the screen. Then he gives me a weird look as he answers the text.
“That has to be it,” Luke says. “I’m sure her dad and Indiana are with her.”
Neda shrugs as she rounds the hood of her car, clearly ready to flee my neighborhood. “That, or they threw her in a deep dark hole, with Domenica.”
But if the United States government has Sebastián, then they know that Genesis pushed the button. Which means Neda’s joke might be more accurate than she knows.
I’ll be able to forgive him.
GENESIS
Indiana is waiting in the hall when they finally let my father and me out of that little room. He stands when he sees us coming. “You okay?”
He looks tired, but he’s worried about me.
“Yeah. Did they make you sign anything?”
“No. They just threatened to charge me with obstruction of justice if I say anything that might compromise their investigation into our kidnapping and the explosion of the Splendor.” He huffs. “You’d think they’d want to help us, rather than threaten us, considering that we’re the victims.”
Huh. No NDA for Indiana. Because he doesn’t have assets that can be seized? Or because he didn’t actually see me blow up the ship?
In the parking lot, my dad tries to usher us toward his car. I only give in when I remember that Indiana and I were absconded with in an official government vehicle, but no return service was offered.
“Will you drop us at Maddie’s?” I ask as he clicks the key fob to unlock the doors.
My father frowns. “Genesis, I want you to come home. You’re going to have to talk to me eventually.”
He’s right. His money is dirty, but I’m still taking it. Still living on it. I just sold my soul—my First Amendment rights, at least—to the United States government to protect that dirty money, because the sad truth is that I don’t know how to live without it.
Especially if I find myself under arrest.
But I’m not ready to talk to my dad about that. Not yet.
“Indiana is welcome to stay as long as he likes,” my father adds as he opens the driver’s door, but I’m already shaking my head.
“I’m going back to school tomorrow, but I’m staying at Maddie’s.”
My father exhales, as if he’s grasping for patience. “Daniela came home from the hospital today. I think she and your cousin need some time alone, princesa.” I can tell from the stress he’s putting on my nickname that there’s more to that than he’s saying out loud. Because Indiana isn’t family.
Damn it.
“Get in the car. We’ll pick up dinner on the way home.” He turns to Indiana. “Please join us.” Then my father slides behind the wheel, as if there’s no question his order will be followed.
I’ve never openly disobeyed him before. I’ve always gone along, then done whatever I truly want to do afterward. In the past, he’s been willing to turn a blind eye to that, because obeying shows him that I respect him as a parent—and I truly did—and quietly disobeying shows that I’ve learned from his example.
But things are different now.
Businessmen lie and call it negotiation. They grease wheels and make deals. I’ve always known that about my father, but I’d believed he was straight with me. That he let me see beyond the curtain. That he was teaching me.
But really, he was lying. I’ll be able to forgive him, eventually, but I won’t be able to trust him, because I can’t ever be sure that he’s not still lying to me.
Beyond that, I’m not sure that I can trust myself and my own instincts, considering that I believed his lies for seventeen years.
“I’ll be home by midnight.” I pull my phone from my pocket to open the ride-share app and realize I missed six phone calls and twenty text messages—most from Neda and Maddie—while I was being questioned in that black hole of an interview room.
My father frowns and gets out of the car, but he doesn’t argue. While I click through the app to request a ride, I hear him talking softly with Indiana. I can’t make out what he’s saying, but I can guess the subject matter.
“I’ll see you both tonight,” my father says when I slide my phone back into my pocket. Then he gets in his car and drives out of the parking lot.
“Did he try to recruit you as his spy?” I ask Indiana. “To keep him in the loop?”
Indiana laughs. “No. He asked me to look out for you.”
“Because I can’t take care of myself?” Does he seriously think he wasted all the money he spent on my self-defense classes?
“He’s just worried about you. With good reason, considering where we were two days ago.”
Our car pulls up to the curb and I call Maddie as Indiana gets in. She answers before I even hear the phone ring. “Where the hell have you been?” my cousin demands into my ear.
“Being questioned by Homeland Security,” I whisper. “It’s a long story involving the Patriot Act and the theory that I might actually be a terrorist. Why?” I climb into the car next to Indiana.
“So you’re okay? Neda seems to think they threw you in some kind of federally funded hole in the ground with Domenica.”
“They very nearly did. But I’m fine.” Except for the governmental gag order that just gave Holden virtually limitless power over me. But she doesn’t need to know about that.
“Did they know about . . . my dad?”
“Yes. But they didn’t seem to be in any hurry to publicize that fact.”
As our ride pulls into traffic, my gazes catches on a familiar form looking back at me from a parking lot across the street from the police station where we were questioned.
Silvana. Chill bumps rise all over my arms. This time I can see her face. It’s really her.
She’s watching me. She’s following me.
If she’s still alive—if she’s real—my uncle’s plan B could be real too. . . .
6 DAYS, 2 HOURS EARLIER
I don’t even like her.
MADDIE
The surreality of this moment hits me as I glance around the wrought-iron table stretching the length of the cabana. This jungle hostage reunion is bizarre, and I’m not sure what Genesis was thinking.
We weren’t exactly a cohesive unit before the kidnapping—most of us didn’t even know Luke or Indiana a week ago—and throwing us together now isn’t going to change that.
We haven’t been together as a group since the day we hiked into the jungle, and tonight we’re all every bit as tense as we were that day.
“What do you think they’re talking about?” Luke leans closer to whisper as he stares down the stretch of private beach at Holden and Penelope. Indiana, Neda, and I are all staring with him.
Genesis’s jaw is clenched so tightly I have a feeling she’ll have to go get her caps repaired in the morning. Yet she’s not focused on the beach drama. Her gaze is constantly skipping from Holden and Penelope to the stretch of sand behind them, to other tables in private cabanas, then behind us to the clubhouse itself.
She looks like she’s waiting for something. Her unease is setting me on edge.
I try to catch her gaze, but Genesis is focused everywhere but on the people at this table. The people she’s brought together.
“I think he’s dumping her,” Neda says, drawing my attention back to Holden and Penelope. We’ve all been thinking it, but she’s the only one who would ever say it out loud. “‘I know I told you this was real, but a tiger can’t change his stripes, baby,’” she continues in a cartoonish approximation of Holden’s voice. “‘I’m a lying dick.’”
Luke and Indiana laugh, and I fight an unexpected urge to give Neda a fist bump.
Genesis’s teeth make a terrible grinding noise. Then she drains her wineglass.
Immediately, the waiter steps forward to pour more.
Luke picks up his glass and sniffs the contents. I know he doesn’t like wine, but he accepted a glass to be polite, and now he looks curious. “Did you see the wine your cousin ordered?” he whispers near my ear, while two more waiters set a plate of salad in front of each of us. “It’s five hundred dollars a bottle.”
I did not see that. I’m not surprised to see my cousin spending her father’s money with abandon, but I am surprised that she doesn’t seem to be enjoying it.
She looks like she wants to march down the beach and punch Holden in the head. We caught a rebroadcast of his radio interview in the car on the way here. He told all of Miami that it was true that they’d had a fight in the jungle, during the trauma of the kidnapping. But that ultimately, stress had brought them back together, and that they are closer now than ever, despite the rumors to the contrary.
Even from fifty feet away, I can see that Penelope is upset. She’s hugging herself with both arms, nodding with every word Holden says, as if she agrees. Or at least understands why he’s saying whatever asinine thing he’s saying. When the truth is that he’s clearly breaking her heart.
I don’t even like her, but at this point I would gladly hold Holden down so she could kick him in the balls.
Holden and Penelope start back toward the cabana, and he has his arm around her shoulder. He looks like a smug coach comforting a disappointed player forced to take one for the team.
I wish Sebastián had killed him in the jungle.