Take It to the Grave Part 5 of 6

by Zoe Carter

  The temptation was too seductive, too captivating, and I relaxed against his muscled side. I quashed the guilt that flared as I watched my mother lean down and say something to my nephew, then saw the door shut behind her.

  Elliot would be fine; he wouldn’t be in any danger, not from Alice. I’d probably seen her talk more in the last few days than during my teens.

  She’s a different woman now. Harmless. Let’s focus on Caleb, Lucy whispered as I surrendered to the body-to-body contact with Caleb. So delicious.

  Caleb turned me toward the French doors that opened out onto the massive deck that separated the Taylor-Coxes’ home from the pristinely manicured lawn that slowly gave way to the beach.

  “Enjoying yourself?” He murmured the question against my ear as he led me to a secluded section of railing. Despite the oppressive heat, I shivered.

  “Yeah, it’s been...fun.”

  “Liar.” He turned to face me, leaning an elbow on the wooden railing. He gazed at me intently, his dark blue eyes assessing. Too observant. I noticed a little too late, and summoned Lucy to step in, to divert attention.

  “Okay, well, cucumber sandwiches aren’t quite my thing, I’ll admit.” Lucy chuckled softly, the seductive sound sighing away on the lightest of ocean breezes.

  He tilted his head, and although his lips quirked at Lucy’s chuckle, his gaze remained serious.

  “Come on, I know you, Maisey. You and Sarah. Something’s going on between you.” He arched an eyebrow, exactly the way he used to when he caught Sarah and me trying to creep out of the house when we were kids, or when we were trying to hide evidence of a transgression we knew Peter would punish us for.

  Lucy tried to laugh it off, and I looked out at the sea, desperately trying to think of a way to distract him. “Oh, Caleb—”

  “Don’t ‘Oh, Caleb’ me,” he interrupted, his voice husky. “What’s going on, Maisey?” His expression clearly showed his worry.

  I stood there, stunned that Lucy couldn’t deceive this one man. She was in as much shock as I was, having such a plainly spoken question put to us.

  I shrugged. “It’s nothing,” I said. He didn’t need to get involved with this. Whatever “this” was, it was ugly, it was damaging, and I didn’t want to contaminate Caleb with it.

  His lips pressed together, and he leaned forward. “Maisey,” he said softly, his hand sliding toward my waist. My breath hitched, and my heart pounded. “You should know by now that you can’t lie to me... If you need to talk, Maisey, I’m right here.”

  I stilled. This was driving me mad.

  Hey, I take exception to that.

  I shook my head, trying dislodge Lucy’s voice from my head. I was suspicious of everyone. I was scared of everyone, and I was tired. So tired. This was Caleb. If anyone could help me, could understand, it would be him.

  I pulled out my phone and showed him the email.

  He read the single line of the message. His brow dipped. He blinked. Read it again, then his gaze met mine, and beneath the worry there was a steely resolve. “Explain,” he commanded.

  I held my hands up, shaking my head. “I’m not sure what’s going on,” I told him. “I actually think Sarah’s the one sending the emails...”

  “Emails? There are more?”

  I nodded. “Yeah, but like I said, I think it’s Sarah. I think she’s just a little paranoid when it comes to Elliot. Surely you’ve noticed? She’s so...” I tried to find the right word. “Clingy.” Hmm. Not sure if that was it. I tried to clarify. “She’s so fixated on him, she doesn’t want to let him out of her sight. She finds it hard to let others hold him... You should have seen how hard it was for Warwick to convince her to let Mom take him back to the house and babysit. She’s paranoid about her baby.”

  Caleb stared down at my phone for a moment, then nodded, handing it back to me. “You might be right. She does hold Elliot close. Do you think that might be because of what happened to Frankie?”

  I turned off my phone. There’d be no more peeking. No more sharing. For anyone. I shook my head. “I don’t think so. No, of course not.” I didn’t want him getting curious about Frankie. I didn’t want to talk about Frankie, not with Caleb.

  Caleb’s eyes narrowed. I hadn’t quite convinced him. “So Sarah’s getting these emails, too? Why would she send herself emails? That’s crazy.”

  I shifted, turning my gaze out to the beach, and beyond. “There’s a lot of crazy in the world, Caleb.” I murmured the words.

  Why, you little—

  Caleb sighed. “It’s hard to believe, though. What about Alice? Do you think she could have sent them?”

  “No,” I said slowly, shaking my head. “No, Mom wouldn’t do that. She’d have to know how it would affect Sarah, affect me... She wouldn’t do anything to hurt us—she loves us.” I tapped the railing emphatically. “She loves us,” I said, as though repeating it would make it true.

  Caleb shifted, his back against the railing as he looked toward the party. I turned, too, to survey the group.

  Move closer.

  I shifted just the slightest bit closer to his side. I followed his gaze. He was staring at Sarah. Warwick was close by her side, his arm tight around her waist. Every now and then Sarah’s expression morphed into a grimace, only to be quickly replaced with a smile when Warwick tugged her even closer.

  “I have to get her away from him,” I said quietly. It felt so good, being able to talk to Caleb like this, letting him in on my secrets, having that supportive buddy that I’d missed from so long ago. “He’s dangerous, Caleb. Sarah needs to get the hell away from him.”

  “She’ll never leave him, Maisey.”

  “She has to. He’s not good for her. Or for Elliot. He’s too...heavy-handed with her,” I stated, shocked that he couldn’t—wouldn’t—see it.

  Caleb shook his head. “Look around, Maisey. This is the kind of life she craves, the kind of man she craves. She wants this.”

  “No, Caleb.” I turned to face him fully. “I thought that, too, at first. I mean, seriously, look at her home—what’s not to like, right? She’s got a handsome husband, a gorgeous little boy...” Baby Elliot, despite his screeching, was beginning to grow on me. “But Warwick isn’t as nice or as easygoing as he makes himself out to be.” I saw the pharmaceuticals he was making her take. There was no way I’d accept that this was the kind of life my sister wanted, the kind of life that made her feel safe, secure and content. Not by a long shot.

  “This is exactly what she wants, Maisey. Your sister knows how to set herself up. Trust me. She did it with my dad. Now she’s doing it with Warwick.”

  There was a harsh undertone to his words, dark and meaningful. I must have missed something. “What do you mean?” Peter? What the hell did he have to do with Sarah’s situation with Warwick? My heart crumpled a little. Did he mean that Warwick had a similar mean, controlling streak like his father? Did that mean he knew what his father had done to us? And he’d left us?

  “Sarah and my father were having an affair.” The words came out low, yet I flinched at the anger, the raw pain and contempt he’d managed to pack into the sentence.

  “What?” No, he’d said something, but my brain wasn’t making any sense of it.

  Caleb scoffed as he turned his back on Sarah and her husband, to face the sea once more. “They were sleeping together, Maisey.”

  I shook my head, my mouth agape. No. No way. Denial, instant and hot, flashed through me, burning my ears, triggering my heart into a higher gear. No friggin’ way.

  I don’t know if it was my expression or my movement, but Caleb shrugged. “I saw them, Maisey. With my own two eyes,” he said, pointing to his eyes. He frowned. “Why do you think I left?”

  I was still shaking my head, still gaping like a dead fish.

  Did you know about
this, Lucy?

  Nuh-uh. Lucy’s voice reflected my shock.

  “I found them together. I won’t go into the sordid details, but trust me when I say, she was enjoying it. I couldn’t handle it,” he said, raising his hands, palms out in a “hands-off” gesture. “Couldn’t say anything, couldn’t stomach it. I just left.”

  “No...” I finally choked out.

  “Yes,” Caleb corrected me. “Dad came to see me at the barracks, and I confronted him about it. He tried to deny it, but when I told him I’d seen them, he finally admitted it. He told me they were sleeping together, but Sarah was the one who’d instigated it.” He pursed his lips together, as though it was as painful for him to utter the words as it was for me to hear them. He cleared his throat.

  “Dad said she’d tried to seduce him when your mom was pregnant with Frankie, but he’d rejected her. Then, when Alice went to prison, your sister just kept coming at him until she finally wore him down. He said he fell for it, in a moment of weakness. He was missing Alice, feeling incredibly lonely and lost, and there was Sarah, seducing him.” Caleb blinked a suspicious sheen away, the muscle in his cheek ticking as he clenched his teeth. “My father cried. It was the first time I saw him cry, Maisey. Ever. Even when my mom left him, he didn’t break down, but he bawled when he told me about Sarah, he was so ashamed. She broke him.”

  I held up my hand, and it fluttered like a butterfly caught in a hurricane. “I can’t listen to this. No. No more.”

  I walked away, trembling, grabbing hold of the railing to walk over to a corner by the house. I leaned on the railing, clenching my hands together tightly, staring down at the grass below. My stomach roiled, and the perspiration dotting my forehead turned cool in the summer heat, causing me to shiver.

  Seriously? What the hell? I looked at every memory in that house with a different set of eyes. Did Sarah actually have an affair with our stepfather? Was that why he was always so angry with us, so bitter? All that shame and self-recrimination, perhaps? My fingers tightened on the white wooden railing. Oh, God. Had Sarah wanted to get rid of Frankie because she was jealous? Of my mother? My stomach heaved, and I braced my elbows against the railing, dipping my forehead into my palms. No. Surely not. Sarah knew, I knew—Peter was violent. How could she sleep with him? Much less have an affair. I seriously couldn’t see my sister having an affair with the man who’d dragged us around the house by our hair, who’d shoved rotten food into our mouths, who’d raped and beaten our mother...

  And yet, she’d married a guy like Warwick. Was that her type, maybe? Did she actually like that in a man?

  I glanced over my shoulder toward my sister, holding court with her dominating husband. I stared at them both for a moment, especially Warwick. He was similar to Peter. Controlling... Although I hadn’t seen him be violent toward my sister, that would explain the long-sleeved blouses she’s been wearing. I had assumed it was because of the frigid temperature in the house.

  But...how? Why? She’d had a chance to be with Caleb. I couldn’t deny it; I had seen them growing closer, the developing intimacy and attraction between them... Yet she’d chosen Peter, and that was why Caleb had fled to the army. She’d broken his heart and, by extension, had broken mine. Why else would Caleb turn his back on us? Was there an element of truth to Caleb’s claims? I lifted my head, covering my mouth as I gazed out at the sea. Good God. Seriously? It was just so hard to process.

  Lucy?

  For once, Lucy was quiet. She’d checked out, was now looking for a drink to wash this all away. I didn’t know what to do, how to cope. I gazed around for a waiter. Where was that champagne? Wine? Beer? Anything that would give me some escape, some induced haze to blur the disgusting, horrific images now playing out in my mind, the dreadful suspicions...acceptance. Sarah and Peter. Oh. My. God.

  Did Mom know? I reeled at the possibility. Fuck. Fucketty fuck.

  “Maisey.”

  The muscles in my shoulders tightened at the deep voice behind me. Caleb.

  “God, I’m so sorry, Maisey.” His hands clasped my shoulders, forcing me to turn. To face him. His expression was tortured. “I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  I clutched the lapels of his jacket. My knees were shaking, and I needed to hang on to something solid, something substantial.

  “No, I—I just need some time.” Some time to process, to figure out what the hell this all meant. Frankie, Peter... I shook my head. Wow.

  Caleb cupped my cheek. “God, I never wanted to hurt you, Maisey. You, of all people...”

  I gazed up at him, and Lucy’s curiosity awoke. Me? Of all people? What did that mean? Me, more than Sarah?

  “It’s okay, Caleb,” I murmured. “You can always tell me anything.”

  His eyes stared into mine, and something heated flared to life in the dark blue depths. “You’re right,” he said huskily as he took a step closer, his gaze touring over my face, down my neck and over my body. “I could always tell you anything.”

  He lowered his head. My heart pounded. I waited, breath held, my gaze on his until he was so close and I couldn’t keep him in clear focus any longer, and my eyelids swept shut as his lips pressed against mine.

  Finally, Lucy sighed inside my head, and I agreed. Finally. Caleb’s arms slid around my waist, pulling me close against him as he angled his head, deepening the kiss. I gave myself up to it, loving the slide of his tongue against mine, his hands slipping over my butt, pulling me closer. His body pressed against mine, and I trembled when I felt his hardening erection against my stomach. Eyes closed, I focused on the feel of him, so strong, so warm in my arms, my hands easing up over his shoulders to slide into his hair. He tasted wonderful, a mix of whiskey and smoky flavors.

  I inhaled as his mouth widened against mine. He smelled like leather, whiskey, soap and male musk, and I flinched at the familiar scent, pulling back in shock, with a tinge of repulsion, of horror.

  No. No, no, no, Lucy wailed, and I wanted to wail along with her. After all this time, I was finally in Caleb’s arms, we were finally moving beyond this friendly, pseudo-sibling relationship, and his scent whisked me back in time.

  He smelled like Peter.

  He looked down at me, panting, his hair tousled, bewilderment edging out that warm desire in his eyes.

  “What?” he whispered, confused and perhaps just a little crushed by my sudden rejection.

  Run. Run, Lucy chanted in my head.

  I stared up at Caleb, eyes wide in shock, in dismay, and shook my head. “I—I can’t do this.”

  I stepped away, shaking my head, apologetic and panicked all in one hot mess. “I’m so sorry,” I whispered as I turned and walked away.

  Sarah

  Warwick’s eyes dissect me from across the room. Even his mother has noticed and tries to distract him, to no avail. Drifting around the veranda, I do my best to ignore him, nodding and smiling until my lips ache and my head feels like it will roll right off my neck. Feigning interest in the breezy chatter that swirls around me, I navigate my way through the sparkling crowd, struggling to remember when this sort of thing was fun.

  Eleanor has outdone herself, turning her property into a fairy-tale wonderland, all twinkling lights and flower blossoms and tiny gnomes peeking out from the trees. Everything is white, of course. Well, except for the gnomes.

  She’s invited the girls, and not even Tessie has found anything to criticize. A month ago, this would have pleased me, but now it means nothing.

  My mind reels with thoughts of Elliot, lying helpless in his crib under the care of my drunken mother, a mother who may or may not suspect the truth of what happened all those years ago. I long to go to him, to huddle with him in the nursery until the party ends, but Warwick would never allow it. If only I could find something to distract him—or someone.

  As if the universe has decided to
take pity on me, Jessica materializes, holding court in the middle of a group of women. She juggles a glass of champagne with an uneaten petit four, which is perched on one of Eleanor’s Limoges plates.

  “Hello, Jessica. You’re looking lovely,” I say, and she is, in a sundress the same blue as the ocean. “Can I get you a refill?”

  She arches an eyebrow at me, but I signal a waiter before she can decline. “Thank you,” she says as the young man tops off her glass. “This is a great party. I have to hand it to you. You really pulled it off.”

  The compliment flows over my shoulders without settling. For the first time since I married Warwick, I neither need nor care about the approval of the echelon of society Jessica represents. Only Elliot matters now.

  How much did Alice have to drink? What if she drops him? What if she puts his blanket over his face and accidentally smothers him? What if she forgets to take his bottle away and he chokes?

  Babies are so vulnerable. It only takes a few seconds to lose them forever.

  “Thank you. Although I have to admit, it’s not a total success.” I lower my voice, affecting a conspiratorial tone that makes her lean in, separating us from the other women. Taking her arm, I lead her even farther away. “I’m worried about my husband.”

  “Warwick? Why, what’s wrong with him?” She is a hound catching the scent of a wounded duck; her nose almost twitches. Jessica glances in my husband’s direction, and for once he must not be giving me the stink-eye, because her brow furrows in confusion. “He looks fine to me.”

  “Yes, he’s very good at keeping up appearances. You know how it is. But the truth is, he’s been moody all summer. Something is bothering him, but he won’t talk to me about it.” I rest my hand on her arm. “You’ve always been such good friends. Why don’t you see if you can cheer him up?”