“Victor is going to flip when he finds out we came here alone,” I say, but my voice wavers and I’m so wound up that I bet you could tell if you were looking down at me from space. I’m lost in a dark orbit here, and I don’t like it.
“Breathe,” Cal repeats, holding me still, standing together on the bed I didn’t sleep in for years. I’m so tired. I’ve been so tired for so long. I exhale and close my eyes, pulling in a shuddering breath that smells like peaches and vanilla from the sprays and lotions still sitting on my abandoned desk. “You’re not alone, Bernadette. You never were. If you need to fall, let your knees go and I’ll catch you.”
“You can’t sweet-talk me during the middle of a robbery,” I murmur, but I’m feeling lightheaded anyway. “I’m your monster.” That’s what Callum told me. I can feel an edginess to him, this violent burning that’s on the brink at all times. It wouldn’t take much to set him off. Yet, I feel no danger standing here with him right now.
I open my eyes.
“I stalked you, Bernadette,” Cal says with a sigh, his shoulders slumping slightly. “There is no other way to put it. I can’t romanticize it or explain it. I’m sure it isn’t healthy.” He looks back up at me, but there’s no shame or regret in his gaze. None at all. “I’d do it all over again though, if given the chance. We are beautiful poison, not perfume.” He steps back and then climbs off the bed, looking up at me.
Nothing about my relationship with Havoc is what most people would consider healthy or normal.
I don’t care.
While I would discourage my sister from ever living a life like this, I’m throwing myself headlong into the dark.
I hop off the bed, looking around the room and trying to decide what it is that I want. Looking at it all now, it’s virtually meaningless. Things don’t matter, not at all. Be practical, Bernie, I tell myself, moving over to my closet and pulling out a dark blue Adidas duffel bag that used to belong to Penelope.
“Your room looks nothing like you,” Cal says, looking around as I pack underwear and bras, pictures and old journals. There’s an entire shoebox full of old poems under my dresser, pieces titled with macabre names like Suicidal Letters from a Stalker. There’s one about a girl named Penny who gets her leg cut off. I stare at the work for a moment and then shove it all into the bag.
I really don’t want to be here when Pam comes home. I’m not afraid of that bitch, but I also don’t want a confrontation in a dark, quiet house. What if I can’t control myself around her?
What if Cal can’t?
“Please,” Kali’s ghost says, staring at me with blood draining down the side of her face. She’s riddled with bullet holes from Aaron’s gun, but that doesn’t stop her from taunting me, even more so from beyond the grave than she did when she was alive. “You couldn’t kill me. You could never hurt your mom. You’re too soft and weak.”
I ignore her, moving out of the room and then pausing in front of the door that used to belong to Pen, the one that Pamela wouldn’t let her install a deadbolt on. When I open it, I see exercise equipment that belongs to the Thing.
“This was her room,” Cal says. It’s not a question; it’s a fact. He already knows. “Where are her things?”
“You mean the stuff that Pamela didn’t sell?” I quip, feeling my stomach bottom out. My sister was wiped from existence before the ink was dry on her death certificate. “In the attic.” Before we head up there though, using the hatch in the ceiling of the upstairs landing, I go into Pam’s room.
I steal her best jewelry, the stuff she’s so proud of pinching from Nordstrom or Neiman Marcus, from the rich women she hangs out with in Oak River Heights or Oak Park. I take it all, even though it means nothing to me.
It will, however, destroy her when she finds out it’s missing.
Callum helps me, making a systematic sweep of the room like the career criminal he so very clearly is. Doesn’t matter to me though. Just like he had no shame in his eyes when he talked about sitting outside my window, I feel none at taking things that don’t belong to me. Corporate thievery happens every day and people let it go because it’s legal, and it’s much harder to see. This isn’t any more or less honorable than raising the price on a lifesaving medical device like an Epi pen to rake in extra cash.
Actually, I lied: this has heaps more honor in it.
“Let’s clean her out,” I decide after Cal dumps an armload of valuables into another bag. We hit the downstairs next, and I’m surprised when Cal fiddles around with a wooden shelf installed on the wall near the front door. It opens up to reveal two pistols and plenty of ammo. “Holy shit,” I breathe as Cal takes that, too, filling his bag to the brim.
Finally, we’re standing at the top of the stairs and looking into the dark rectangle above my head where the last of my sister’s earthly possessions await.
I don’t want to go up there, but I know that I’m going to.
Taking a deep breath, I curl my hand around the first rung and force my shaking body up the ladder and into the dark. There isn’t enough room to stand, not even really enough to sit. Everything that’s stored up here is stacked around the edges of the opening, surrounded by insulation and mousetraps with tiny skeletons in them.
There’s just one box of Pen’s stuff in here, just one single box. Last time I checked, there were fifteen. Where are the others? Where are all of my sister’s fucking things? The last box is wedged against the wall, almost lost in shadows. Someone came up here to clear my sister’s things, but they missed this one, lost behind an open box with bits of plastic Christmas tree sticking out. There’s a pile of electronics still in the boxes, clearly stolen and ready for resale.
I grab Penelope’s box and pass it down to Callum. It says Old Homework and Assignments on the side of it, but I know it’s hers because I recognize the handwriting. She hid some of her most important things in this box, tucked onto the top shelf of her closet. She wrote that on the side to dissuade my mother and the step-monster from going through it.
Cal takes the box and I hop down, my hands curling and uncurling with violent thoughts.
“Her things are gone,” I tell him, wondering when the attic was cleared out. Last time I checked on her stuff, about six months ago, it was all there. Did this happen after I moved out? Before? When the Thing was still alive?
There’s a sound from outside, but not from the front yard. It’s coming from the back, like footsteps on the rotten old porch that takes up what little crumb of a backyard this place has. Cal and I exchange a look and he slips over to the window in Penelope’s old room, looking out.
The frown that takes over his mouth scares me a little.
“Cops,” he tells me, glancing back in my direction. “Sara Young, to be specific.”
“Shit,” I breathe, feeling my heartrate pick up. This is unexpected. “How do we get out?” I ask, looking at Pen’s box and the two bags of crap we’ve packed. It’s going to be hard to sneak this shit out without anyone seeing. I was planning on walking out the front door …
Callum watches me with an infinite well of dark, placid patience. It’s like, he could sit there forever, just to hear what I have to say.
“Let’s go out the front,” I say when I hear a loud knock at the door. It’s harsh, unforgiving; it demands to be let in. “I have every reason to be here, and it isn’t like Pamela can report her stolen things as, well, stolen.” I shrug and Cal smiles.
“That was going to be my suggestion as well,” he says, moving away from the wall and coming to stand beside me. The air between us feels charged, like the molecules are dripping with desperation. I lift my hand up and Cal does the same, pressing his palm to mine, letting our fingertips touch. “We should hide this bag”—he points at the one full of jewelry and other stolen items—“in the attic for now.”
He moves away suddenly, before I can fully appreciate the moment, and scales the ladder with the heavy bag like it’s nothing. Then he drops down, closes it all up, and thumps down t
he stairs loud enough to alert every officer to our presence. An intentional move, and a good one. Don’t want to spook the cops and end up shot.
I follow after him, so that by the time he opens the door to the third pounding knock, I’m standing beside him and looking out at Sara Young.
She’s standing there with Detective Constantine and a bunch of uniformed officers.
“Bernadette,” she says, the faintest hint of bewilderment in her voice. “I’m surprised to see you here. I thought you’d moved out?” She exchanges a look with Constantine, or at least, she tries to. He won’t look at her. He’s too busy frowning down at me.
“She has moved out,” Cal says, leaning forward and obscuring me a bit by putting his forearm up against the left side of the doorjamb, his body propped against the right. “We’re here to get her stuff.”
“So, which one of the boyfriends are you?” Constantine asks, glancing down at his phone like he’s got a list on it that he needs to consult. “Because you’re certainly not Victor Channing, the husband.” He looks back up with an expression that says he’s more than happy to bait Cal into doing something stupid.
But come on, this is Havoc.
This is Havoc, and all along, I still haven’t quite figured out how well-oiled they are, how deep their plots run, like a vein buried deep inside the heart.
“You’re Callum Park, correct?” Sara says, attempting to smooth over her partner’s bad cop persona. How stupid do they think we are?
“He’s Callum Park,” I answer, pushing Cal’s arm down. He bands it around my waist, and I have to really focus to remember to breathe. In that moment, his energy is my energy, a dark swirling storm that only I can control. “And yeah, I’m dating him, fucking him, fucking four other guys. What’s your point?”
“Fucking five guys?” Detective Constantine says with an ugly male laugh. Some of the officers behind him titter like schoolgirls. I blink back some of my own rage. “That must be … I mean, wow. You’re, what, seventeen? Those boys must fight over you like animals.”
I just stare at the man, for so long that he actually starts to look uncomfortable.
“Is your partner done with his sexist bullshit or can we leave? We were on our way out.” I look back at Sara, telling her with my eyes that I have something I need to say. No idea what, exactly, that is now, but I have to come up with something so that she feels like we’re still on the same side.
Now that I know she’s with the VGTF, and that she was looking into Neil Pence, I have several clues I can put to good use. One, she’s more interested in finding out all the awful things my stepfather has done, rather than the things I’m doing. Her questions all come rushing back to me in a flood, and they all seem to make a hell of a lot more sense than they did before.
Second, if she’s with the Violent Gang Task Force, then she’s specifically put on cases involving dangerous gangs. Neil wasn’t in a gang, as far as I know, so he must’ve been working with one. The Charter Crew hardly qualifies, but they were working with the GMP.
That’s what she’s here about.
The enemy of my enemy is my … friend.
“Whatever you’re taking out of the house, we need to search,” Sara tells me sadly, her pretty mouth forming into a frown as I lean into one of my many, many boyfriends. Fucking eyeroll. His smell settles over me, sweet and clean and deliciously male, and I feel myself calming. “That won’t be a problem, will it?” she asks, but I shake my head.
Cal already stashed the bag of my mother’s stolen goodies in the attic. They’ll find it there, I’m sure, but that can only be a good thing.
“You want to dig through my underwear?” I ask, feeling my jaw clench with irritation. “Play with my vibrators?”
“I’m sorry, Bernadette,” Sara says sadly, looking at me and not Callum. Constantine can’t seem to tear his eyes away from Cal’s. When I look up, I see Callum smirking, his blue eyes glittering, his blue-painted fingernails curved around the doorjamb. He looks dangerous and unpredictable, which is a good thing, I guess, since he really is. A tiger with obvious stripes.
“You have a search warrant?” I clarify, and Sara nods, holding up a piece of paper with a judge’s signature on it. Oh, Pamela is going to love this. I step back, allowing Sara to come in with Constantine and the others following along behind her.
“I’ve got the guns in my pocket,” Cal whispers against my ear, making me shiver. I smile in just such a way that Constantine scowls, like he thinks Callum’s whispering perverted wishes into my ear with those Disney prince lips of his.
Sara bends down and opens my bag, looking through my panties and the pair of vibrators at the bottom of the bag, the dildo I stole from the sex shop downtown. She exhales sharply, but doesn’t lose that sense of professionalism. When she reaches for Pen’s box, however, my stomach aches so fiercely that I feel like I might throw up.
“These are Penelope’s things?” she asks, and my heart stops.
“Please don’t take them from me,” I say, my voice cracking. That gives Sara pause, and she looks up at me from her crouched position, pink wool coat pooling on the floor around her. “My mom or Neil or whoever got rid of the rest of it sometime recently. All I could find was this.” I stop for a moment, trying to keep that edge of panic from overwhelming me. “This is all I have left of her.”
Callum wraps me up from behind, holding me like a specter while the cops fan out around the house, their efforts directed by Detective Constantine.
“I’m so sorry, Bernadette,” Sara says, and I feel so dizzy I could puke. “We might need whatever we find in here for our case.” She looks through the papers for a moment and then stands up, taking the box with her. “Once we’re finished, you’ll get back whatever we don’t need as evidence.”
I just stare at her like she’s a fucking monster, and it shows.
“You didn’t care about Penelope when she was alive and asking for help, but now that she’s dead, and Neil has run off with one of his whores, you suddenly care so much that you need a box of old papers?”
“If I’d known about Penelope—” Sara starts as I scowl. She just stops talking then, like she knows it’s a moot point. With the front door open, it’s impossible to miss the sound of Pam’s Oldsmobile rolling into the driveway behind the cop cars.
Cal leans over again and whispers in my ear.
“Do not fight with your mother here. We have plans.” He stands back up and releases me, watching my mom with eyes like spears of ice. She’s lucky that I asked Havoc not to kill her. So goddamn lucky.
“What the fuck is all of this?” Pam yowls, like one of the unneutered alley cats that fight in the alley two doors down. She looks like one, too, when she comes in the door with her keys in her hand, eyes spitting fire. The way she stares at me, I wonder if she wouldn’t try to kill me if we were alone in a room together. “What have you done now, Bernadette?”
I say nothing, looking down at the floor instead of at her face.
“I just came by to grab my stuff,” I start, but Pam is too busy being freaked-out by the idea of cops that aren’t Neil Pence inside her house of horrors. She doesn’t pay me any attention as I grab my bag and give Sara Young a long, studying sort of look.
Callum doesn’t want me to fight with Pam in front of her? Why? I need to know, and I need to know tonight.
“What is all of this about?” Pamela asks as Sara moves up to stand beside Constantine, the box of Penelope’s things under her arm.
“Why don’t you take a seat, and we’ll talk,” Sara says, and I find my feet slowing at the door. She guides Pam into the living room and then kneels down in front of her, putting her hand on my mother’s knee. “I regret to inform you that we’ve discovered Neil Pence’s body …”
I stumble, but Cal keeps my arm and pushes me forward, even when I try to stop and listen.
“You … what?” Pam asks, and then she starts to wail, in a way she never did for my father or her own fucking daughter.
“Keep walking,” Cal whispers as I stumble down the sidewalk, my mind white with fear. If they’ve found Neil’s body then it’s only a matter of time before our house of cards comes tumbling down.
“I’m freaking out,” I whisper, choking on my own breath as we pause at the curb and Cal takes my heavy duffel bag from me, swinging it over his shoulder like it weighs nothing. “Why are you not freaking out?”
Callum smiles back at me, softly, almost sweetly.
“Because,” he begins as I glance back at the nightmare that is Pamela Pence’s house. “We always intended for him to be dug up.”
I look back at Cal in bewilderment, but he takes my hand and pulls me along beside him.
Well, fuck me. I did not see that one coming.
Victor Channing
“Good morning, son,” Ophelia says, dressed for tennis and smiling at me like she thinks she’s winning our little coup d'état. She has no idea how close I am to killing her. If she did, she wouldn’t look so triumphant in the face the way she does right now, like she’s finally done it, shown me how small and insignificant I am.
See, that’s the thing about my mother that makes a relationship between us difficult. We have different fundamental principles. She thinks money and clout make up a person’s worth; I think it’s about honesty and respect.
And love.
Oh, it’s all about that, isn’t it?
“Good morning,” I reply, knowing she’d only call me to the club for good news. She wants to parade me around here like a son she actually cares about, instead of some old sweater she shucked as soon as it went out of style. I start lighting a cigarette, and Ophelia panics, dragging me outside by the arm with a smile plastered on her face.
“You could try to be a little less … you in public,” she suggests, but then, she’s the one who made me live alone with my alcoholic father my whole life. Where was I supposed to learn fancy blueblood manners? I blow smoke in her face and smile when she frowns.
Anarchy at Prescott High Page 30