Killing Ruby Rose (The Ruby Rose Series)

by Jessie Humphries

  “Uh-huh,” I said, grabbing the orange juice.

  “Not too tired this morning?” she prodded.

  “Nope.” I filled up a glass and sipped the juice while studying the fruit bowl for something I could grab and get out of there with. But damn it, the bananas were too ripe and the oranges looked a day or two past edible.

  I turned to the cabinet to snatch some bread instead while Mom continued staring. Had she seen Liam in my room—or had she seen him sneak out this morning? Did she know something about what I’d done last night?

  “Is there anything you’d like to tell me?” she pushed.

  We were exceeding our spoken word limit for the day. I didn’t have time to toast this bread. Butter and jam would have to be enough.

  “Not that I can think of,” I said, throwing a fake smile in her general direction.

  She took off her reading glasses, sat back in her chair, and crossed her legs. One of her signature D. A. moves that meant, OK, I’m getting serious now. I bet it worked great on unwitting criminals ready to plead out, but it wasn’t working on me. At least, I was trying not to let it work on me. It would be a lot easier trying from my room. I started to go, but then she said, “Ruby, why do you lie to me?”

  I skidded to a halt. I didn’t even know which lie to cover for.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said, turning and accidentally making eye contact.

  “How long has this been going on?” she said.

  What? Stalking people, killing murderers, or having sleepovers with a boy? “Could you define what you mean by ‘this,’ counselor?”

  “It’s not a game,” she said, standing up and making her chair scrape against the tile floor. “You could be jeopardizing your future.”

  I needed a few more specifics. Everything I did lately was jeopardizing my future. “Seriously, Mom, just tell me what you’re talking about.”

  “Well, we’ve never had this conversation, and it is probably overdue…” She put her arm around my waist and led me back to the table.

  Two horrible “overdue conversations” sprang to mind: Either she’d found out about the deaths piling up around me or she actually wanted to have The Conversation. Yeah, like at seventeen I didn’t already know about the birds and the bees.

  I honestly couldn’t decide which discussion would be worse.

  I sat down at the table with my bread and butter as my only defense against her attack, jamming in mouthfuls of food so she couldn’t expect me to speak first. She sat down across from me.

  “I don’t know exactly how to say this,” she said, “but I hope you at least used protection.”

  As much as I suddenly longed for her to be talking about the gun and the knife, I knew she meant something else. And I wished she did know about Father Michael. Then she wouldn’t feel the need to torture me with this awful subject.

  “The last thing you need right now is to bring a child into the situation,” she said, now talking more to herself than to me. “Believe me, a mistake like that would be devastating, not just for you—but everyone involved.”

  I stared at her, trying to read where this was coming from. Something in her eyes made it seem like she wasn’t talking about me anymore. Like she was alluding to someone else. Maybe even herself. But that didn’t make any sense. She was in her thirties when I was born. Right about the same time she admitted to her affair with—

  “Please don’t tell me that Martinez is my real father.” I closed my eyes, unable to look her in the face.

  “Ruby! Of course not. No, that’s not it at all.” She paused, speechless.

  I reopened my eyes to make sure she was telling the truth.

  “I’m talking about you,” she said, straightening her posture to regain control.

  “What about me?”

  She hesitated. So un-Jane Rose. She was rattled, flustered. I’d never seen her thrown, so completely off her game.

  “I know about you and that boy.” Those words practically spurted from her mouth, oozing with disdain. “I asked him to leave this morning. I didn’t wake you because I wanted to know if you would be honest enough to just tell me the truth. And apparently, the answer is no.”

  “Really?” I asked, cocking my head. “This is so interesting coming from someone who lies for a living.” I set down my bread. I no longer needed it to defend myself. “You lie to the press, lie to the Court, lie to your only child—and you’re accusing me of lying!”

  “Young lady—”

  “You promise the world to everyone,” I said. “Promise the community to be tough on violent offenders and then cut them deals or allow enough incompetent mistakes to let them off.” I ripped that one straight from Bill Brandon’s talking points. I knew I should stop, but the words kept bubbling up.

  “You promise your family that you’ll be there for us, and you aren’t.” Just mentioning the “us” brought flames to my heart. There was no “us” anymore. Just her and me in our glorious isolation. At least she couldn’t cheat on Dad again. But I didn’t dare mention that. “So please remind me, Jane, where I was supposed to learn honesty.”

  “This discussion is not about me, Ruby, and I will not let you attack me to protect yourself. Don’t think I’ve forgotten this is how you work. Dr. Teresa has told you over and over that this is not an appropriate way to communicate.” She smoothed out her hair and narrowed her eyes. “I am the mother. You are the daughter, and you will treat me with respect. And you will tell me whether or not you are sleeping with that boy under my roof.”

  “OK, you want the truth? You want respect?” I said, narrowing my eyes right back. “No, I am not sleeping with that boy. We’ve never had sex. I’ve never had sex. He slept in my bed last night, but nothing happened. We didn’t even kiss once.” Part of me wished I had slept with him, just to throw it in her face. “And since you brought her up, Dr. Teresa is more of a mother to me than you’ve been in a long time. At least she accepts me and tries to understand me. She never bails on me.” Well, except for yesterday, but that was unheard of.

  Mom deflated like I didn’t expect. I’d hurt her. She sat still, shoulders slumped, a few tears suddenly running down her cheeks. Was she a wounded lamb or incensed tiger? I had no idea. I wanted to take back the words, even if they were partially true.

  In the lingering, threatening silence, I braced myself for her response.

  Even after she quietly got up and left the room, I held tight to the table for a while—just in case.

  CHAPTER 20

  For weeks I held on, waiting for my mom to lash out at me, punish me, forbid me to see Liam. Take away my credit card and shoe allowance. Surely, she’d come up with some retribution for my insubordination. But nothing happened.

  I wondered if I’d really hurt her. My grandmother—my mom’s mom—died before I was born, but I knew she’d worked more than one job to help put my mom through college and then law school after my no-good grandfather left. My dad had explained to me that one of my mom’s biggest regrets in life was not having her mother there when she walked onstage to receive her law degree. Which was why she pushed me so hard. It was her way of honoring her mother and rising above the hardship she’d endured as a girl.

  For days after our fight, she left early and came home late, which I liked to think wasn’t only because of me—Bill Brandon’s attack ads were picking up steam on every TV, radio, and Internet channel.

  I went to school and to bed without seeing her. I reviewed the assassination of JFK (and Charlie LeMarq), the carnage of World War II (and Rick “The Stick” and his cohorts), and the dissection of frogs (and Father Michael). Everything reminded me of those horrible moments. Not even Liam’s kissing skills, or several pounds of my mom’s best imported chocolates, could make me forget. As if committing “legally justified murder” wasn’t already hard enough on my soul, it was also taking its toll on my thighs.

  And to add insult to injury, I had absolutely no new evidence to lead me to the a
nswers I needed.

  Liam and I checked the California databases for any additional information on D. Silver, but there were over a thousand results. Even after we refined the search criteria to an adult male, there were over a hundred. Early one Saturday morning, before Liam’s football practice, we went back to Bayside Buccaneer Yacht Club. While Liam used his old scuba gear to search the shallow bottom of the boat dock for Father Michael’s body, I scoured the boat for clues. Big surprise—nothing.

  We went back down the coast—to the cliff we’d woken up on—to search for answers, but that was a bust, too. We had no idea where to start to find the warehouse we’d been taken to the night of the beach party. Liam even asked a bunch of kids if they’d seen anyone suspicious that night, but since it was a high school party full of all kinds of shady behavior, that didn’t produce anything helpful, either. One of his friends, pleasantly nicknamed Johnson (and not because it was his last name), thought he “might” have seen Liam being carried down the back staircase over the shoulder of “some dude,” but he said he didn’t think twice about it because he thought Liam was probably wasted, too, and anyway he was a “little high,” and in the middle of making out with a Swedish exchange student named “Molly or Marin or something.”

  It was like none of it had ever happened. Except that it had. Liam knew it, I knew it, Silver knew it, and Alana maybe knew it—she at least knew something, because she still wasn’t talking to me.

  Thanksgiving and the holidays were upon us, but no one would have known it at Casa de Rose. Not like last year when Dad and I got out the decorative fall wreaths and the miniature stuffed pilgrim set and spent days baking chocolate-chip-pumpkin cookies.

  This year, there was only the scent of silence.

  That is, until a bouquet of colorful autumn flowers arrived at my door, smelling maybe a little of marijuana. The delivery guy was clearly stoned even though it was only 7:00 a.m.

  “Are you Ruby Rose?” asked the weed guy. I noticed that his eyelids were barely doing their job.

  “That’s me,” I responded, ascertaining that his threat level was a mellow-yellow. I knew Silver likely had inside men helping him, but this dude couldn’t be one of them. Just in case, though, I had a bedazzled butterfly blade Dad had once given me for Christmas hidden in The Cleave.

  When he’d buzzed in from the video gate, I asked him to leave the flowers by the call box. He said he was given specific instructions not to do so. Out of curiosity and sheer desperation for any clues, I let him come to the door. But not without properly arming myself.

  “Rad.” He bobbed his head. “I’ve seen your picture on TV. You’re way hotter in real life, though.”

  Gross. Even though he wasn’t completely destitute in the looks department, slacker skater dudes in their twenties weren’t my type. Especially not ones who may or may not be working with psycho manipulator of the year D. Silver.

  “Are you going to give me the flowers or not?” I asked, holding out my arms. “I have to get to school.”

  “Oh yeah, totally.” He looked down like he’d forgotten he even had anything in his hands. As he gave them to me, he said, “You know, if you ever get sick of the guy who sent these, I’m single.”

  “Good to know.” I threw him a you-may-leave-now smile and shut the door before I got high simply from being near his clothes.

  I practically sprinted to the kitchen to read the card sitting on top of the scarlet, white, and ginger blooms. Inspecting the envelope for any initial clues, I gingerly opened the seal.

  Roses are Ruby red

  Autumn lilies are orange and white

  Let’s do something normal for once

  Will you go to the Sadie Hawkins dance with me tonight?

  Oh—kay. Sure, in the back of my mind I’d considered the possibility that Liam had sent the bouquet. It probably made more sense than D. Silver, who was more likely to send me a cryptic piece of art or a creepy message.

  So why couldn’t I decide if I was relieved or disappointed? Excited or terrified? Appreciative or angry?

  Despite my growing catalog of concerns, Liam was relentless about the dance. Even after I explained my aversion to underage binge drinking, awkward group dates, and cheesy picture stances, he still insisted that we go. All day at school, he went out of his way to make me smile, laugh, and forget. My answer went from a firm no, to a definite maybe, and then after his speech about being normal and going on our first real date, my answer turned into a hesitant yes.

  After all that he’d done for me, it was about time that I did something for him.

  I caught a glimpse of my androgynous ensemble in the reflection of his shiny Jeep door as it slammed shut in his driveway. “Sadie Hawkins, eh!” I said contemptuously.

  “Come on, they’re just T-shirts,” Liam said, batting eyes the same color as our matching baby-blue Billabong Ts.

  “At least we didn’t have to go all matchy-matchy in footwear,” I said, concentrating on my more flattering shoes. Sure, Liam could pull off the vintage checkerboard Vans, but I needed something with a little more lift.

  “Well, I thought about getting matching shoes, but I can’t rock the heels like you,” Liam joked.

  “Ha-ha.” I couldn’t restrain my smile. “These aren’t heels by the way, these are my stripey blue-and-white wedge-pump Toms with a bow.”

  “And I thought I had a shoe problem,” he said, grinning. I was already starting to feel more normal. “Come on, I promise this will only take five minutes. My family really wants to meet you and take a few pictures.”

  “Right.” I shook my head in disbelief as we walked to the front door. Why Liam’s mom and brothers wanted to meet the Vigilante Teen Killer was beyond me. Maybe they wanted to pat me down for weapons, or warn me to stay away from Liam when his back was turned.

  “And just so you know, it was my bro Christian who helped me write that poem for you. He’s the family romantic. Tug, on the other hand…” He blew out a breath. “Let’s just say you need good reflexes. Watch out for flying objects.” He winked and took my hand to escort me into his small house.

  “Hey, guys,” Liam said warmly to the two boys sitting in front of the TV. “I want you to meet Ruby.”

  At first, all I saw were eyes. Two big, bright brown eyes and two big, beautiful green eyes—looking up at me with the same excitement.

  The older boy stood up and came over to shake my hand.

  “Hi, Ruby. My name’s Christian.” He was thin, with short dark hair and glasses. He looked nothing like Liam. Actually, he was sort of the opposite of Liam in every way.

  “Well, hello, Christian,” I said, shocked at his polite and formal manner. Either he’d been prepped for this or he was the most charming twelve-year-old I’d ever met. “It’s nice to meet you.”

  He smiled and returned to the carpet. Tug teasingly punched him and made a googly face. Tug had the same dark hair but was thick as a tank.

  “Tug, be nice,” Liam warned, though he was obviously amused. “Don’t expect Tug to shake your hand, Ruby. He’s got cooties.”

  “Hey,” Tug said. A shoe went flying past Liam’s head, barely missing his scarred ear.

  “I see what you meant about reflexes,” I said to Liam.

  “Yeah, we’d better get going before someone gets hurt.” Liam smiled. “Mamacita! Estás lista?” he called into the back rooms. I hadn’t realized he spoke fluent Spanish.

  A woman with luxuriously dark hair and eyelashes that went on for days came gliding into the room. I could see where Liam got his lashes and olive skin, but other than that I was confused. Liam had much lighter hair and blue eyes. And I thought I looked nothing like my mom.

  “Oh, Ruby,” she said, her dark eyes just as vibrant as the boys’, but softer at the same time. She took my hand in both of hers, then swiftly pulled me in for a kiss on each cheek. “I’ve heard so much about you.”

  Oh, snap. Hearing things about me couldn’t be good.

  She pulled away to loo
k me in the eyes. “Thank you for taking a minute to come by so I could take some pictures. Liam doesn’t go to many dances. I have to seize my opportunities.”

  It was only now that I noticed she had an accent. And that kissy thing wasn’t very American, either.

  “Of course,” I said, finding myself naturally drawn to her. Either she didn’t know who I was and what I’d done—or she truly didn’t care.

  “OK, vamanos. I have to get to my shift, and you have to get to the dance.” She motioned for me to follow her out the back door. “My name’s Claudia, by the way—or Ma, as the boys like to scream at me.” She swiveled her head around to smile.

  Liam guided me through the house with his hand placed at the small of my back. True to his word, he made the whole thing painless. We took a few quick shots in the backyard flower garden, made pleasant small talk, and were out before his mom could ask any tricky questions.

  When we got back into Liam’s Jeep, his family came outside to wave good-bye. A pang of envy struck me as I absorbed the way they beamed at Liam. They were a family—perhaps a damaged, struggling family on some levels, but they were together.

  A wave of fear came rushing in right after. What if they lost him because of me? How would they ever fill the hole that Liam would leave? It made me sick to think my selfish desire for his help could destroy their world.

  “Was my family that bad?” Liam asked after a few minutes of silence.

  “What? No.” I shook the sour look off my face and attempted to smile. “It’s not that. They’re all lovely. Your mother is so beautiful. Where’s she from, by the way?”

  “Costa Rica. My dad was a big wave chaser.” He grimaced a little at the mention of his father.

  “What shift does she have to get to?” I asked, trying to get away from the dad subject.

  He frowned. “She’s sort of a…bartender. Works nights. It’s not like she’s the most powerful attorney in the county or anything, but she makes unbelievable tamales most Sundays.”