by Ivy Smoak
"Do you two have a secret handshake?" I asked.
Eli laughed. "She makes me do it. No reason to be jealous."
"I'm not jealous." But I knew my face probably gave me away. I crossed my arms in front of my chest.
"Are you cold?" he asked as he shrugged off his blazer.
"No, I'm okay. I..." my words died away as he draped his jacket over my shoulders. The truth was, I had been cold. And it was nice that he had noticed. I just wasn't used to asking for anything. I was pretty sure he'd give me the world if he could.
My eyes gravitated toward him as we walked away from the restaurant. He was starting to get a five o'clock shadow. I couldn't believe I hadn't noticed how much older he looked before he told me the truth. He wasn't like the other boys on campus. He was a man. A detective. Someone looking out for me. And I knew he couldn't give me the world. But he could give me something that I needed.
"Will you teach me how to shoot a gun?" I asked.
He stopped walking, and I almost tripped because he was holding my hand.
"Why?" he said when I turned to face him.
I stared into his eyes. "You know why."
"There's still time to figure out another way," he said slowly.
"It's the only way. Please, Eli."
He immediately dropped my gaze. He didn't say anything to me as he hailed down a taxi. Or during the drive. Or even when we walked into the shooting range. He finally broke his silence and turned to me. "Don't say a word. Let me handle this."
I wasn't sure what he had to handle. It wasn't like the place was sold out of guns. I looked around at the storefront as I followed Eli up to a counter in the back. The man behind the counter greeted Eli like they were old friends.
Eli leaned against the counter. "Two today, John."
"So I see." John gave Eli a wink.
I turned away to study the store. I couldn't believe how many guns there were on display. Anyone could just walk in here and buy one.
"I'll just need some ID," John said.
Crap. Not just anyone, then. I couldn't give him my fake ID. I wasn't Sadie Davis. And I didn't know enough about the real Sadie Davis to know if she'd be allowed at a shooting range. I didn't even have my old ID claiming I was Summer Brooks. Not that it mattered. If he ran that, it would say that I was deceased.
"She's a new recruit," Eli said. "All her paperwork is being processed right now. Including her ID. Just set us up with one lane. I'm giving her some lessons."
"You know the rules, Eli. No ID, no entrance." John scratched the side of his chin. It looked like some kind of nervous tick. He scratched the other side too.
Eli laughed. "Her record is clean. Or she never would have been admitted to the police academy."
John turned to me and eyed me up and down before turning back to Eli. "I'm really not supposed to."
"You're acting like I'm doing a sting operation or something." He waved his hand. "It's fine. She's with me."
John shook his head as he pulled out a piece of paper. "At least give me her name. This is a liability nightmare."
"Sadie Davis," Eli said.
"Great." He wrote it down and slid it to Eli. "Sign your name. That way I'll at least have proof that a cop tricked me instead of a regular civilian. And so that you won't turn me in."
"What's got a stick up your butt today? Your wife still giving you trouble?" Eli grabbed the pen.
John laughed. "Don't you know it. The last thing I need right now is to be arrested by my buddy who moonlights as a cop. You owe me one for putting my neck out, man."
I looked away as Eli signed his name next to mine. I didn't want him to get in trouble for trying to help me. Eli had seen me during my worst years. And he wanted to make it so that I wasn't in pain anymore. He just didn't realize that killing Don was the only thing that would numb my pain.
***
I stared down at the gun in my hand. It was heavier than I imagined it would be. I was holding the thing that would give me justice. It was hard to pay attention to Eli's instructions when I realized just how heavy justice felt in my hands. Or was it revenge that weighed so heavily on my shoulders? I tried to keep the thought below the surface as Eli repositioned the large earmuffs on my ears. He nodded toward the target.
I turned around and lifted the gun. My arms shook slightly, but I wasn't sure if it was because of the weight on my sore muscles or something more. Everything was muted and time seemed to slow down. Even the safety glasses I was wearing altered reality. None of this felt real. I stared at the target, an outline of a man. And I pictured Don. I pictured the smile on his face that he got whenever he took away mine. I wasn't sure how long I stood staring at the target before I felt Eli's body behind me.
He steadied my hands with his and lifted the gun slightly. His fingers expertly removed the safety while I stared at the target. With his help, I pressed the trigger for the first time. With his help, I didn't fall backwards from the recoil of the gun. With his help, I shot the target right in the chest. With his help, I felt stronger than ever. I turned around. Eli's hands still lingered on my arms. It somehow grounded me.
He took the gun from me and set it on the tray nearby. "Let me do it," Eli said. "Let me pull the trigger."
I was supposed to be saying goodbye to Eli tonight. He had witnessed the worst part of me. And that part of me was growing. Soon it might be all that I had left. So, no, I wasn't going to let him go. If I did, that part of me might fade. And I needed it. I needed the darkness in order to end my pain.
"It has to be me," I whispered against his lips. Every second he seemed to move a fraction of an inch closer to me. "I don't want his blood on your hands."
He placed his hand on the back of my neck, drawing me even closer. "I'd rather it be on mine than yours." He stopped moving, as if he was waiting for me to make a choice.
I had made my choice the first time Don had touched me. But there was a new choice I could make. I could let Eli in. I could let him love that part of me that he knew. And I could revel in it. I could cherish it. I stood on my tiptoes and let my lips brush against his.
He immediately deepened the kiss. I had been right earlier. I did love him. I loved that he could love me despite how broken I was.
Maybe love was just an excuse to get hurt. Maybe I was just trying to die from all the pain in my life. When his lips were on mine, though, it felt an awful lot like living. But I had a terrible lingering thought as his hand slid down my back. What if I liked being hurt? What if that feeling was all I'd ever truly know? I tried to focus on the kiss, hoping that the warmth of his body against mine could take away the chill creeping down my spine.
Chapter 32
Wednesday
"Finally," V said as Eli and I walked into the door. "We've been waiting for you guys."
Liza continued typing on her computer without even looking up. "We were doing just fine without them, I think."
"Where have you been?" V said, ignoring Liza.
I didn't want V to know about the shooting range. "The restaurant. It just took a little longer than we thought it would."
"Yeah, the service was ridiculously slow for such a fancy place," Eli added.
V shook his head and turned away from us.
"Thank you," I mouthed silently at Eli.
He smiled and shrugged his shoulders. We both made our way over to the glass table. I cringed as I sat down next to Eli. Everything in V's apartment was spotless. But V hadn't managed to clean off the smudges my body had made against the table earlier. I could feel my face flushing. Had he done that on purpose? Did anyone else notice that there was an outline of my ass on the edge of the table? I glanced up at him and noticed the frown on his lips. I immediately looked back down.
"Glad you had fun on your fake date," Liza said. "Meanwhile, we've been doing all the real work. And you won't believe what we found." She finally looked up from her computer.
"What did you find?" I asked. It was good that someone else wanted to ch
ange the subject too.
"Well after a lot of digging, V and I figured out who Sadie Davis is," Liza said and lightly touched her hand on V's arm. She kept her hand there a beat too long.
I tried to focus on her words instead of her actions. Besides, I had just kissed Eli. I couldn't be jealous of a simple lingering touch. "So who is she?" I asked.
"Her real name is Jane Davis."
"Okay, so she isn't related to me then. Wagner was my mother's maiden name. Not Davis."
Liza shook her head. "No, your mother did have an older sister. The DNA proves it. And so do the records. Jane Davis is three years older to be exact."
I looked down at my hands. I ran my thumb along my index finger, remembering what it was like to feel the trigger. "Then where has she been the past 18 years?"
"That's the strange part," Liza said. "She's been...dead."
I looked back up at Liza.
"Her records show that she died when she was 16 years old."
"Okay," I said slowly. "But obviously that's not true. She's still alive."
"Right." Liza glanced at V and then back at me.
"We're still figuring out the specifics," V said. "We'll tell you when we finalize the data."
They didn't want me to know. My heart started to race. It was bad. If it wasn't bad they'd tell me. "Who is Sadie Davis if it's not me and it's not her?"
Liza cleared her throat. "Well, that's what we were wondering. Obviously she stole the name too. Technically you stole a stolen identity."
Liza stared at me as if she was expecting me to laugh. Was that supposed to be a joke? God, it wasn't funny. It felt like my heart was slamming against my ribcage.
"Tell me." I shifted forward in my chair. "Please just tell me."
"Jane Davis supposedly died in an accident when she was 16. But her body was never found. She completely disappeared. She didn't resurface until she enrolled in the army right after your mother died. With her new name. We think she was probably being held against her will somewhere and she joined the military once she got away for protection."
"Why do you think that?"
"Because of your mother's statement about the accident. Or rather, lack of one."
A chill ran down my spine. "My mom was there?"
Liza nodded. "Your mother was only 13 years old when it happened. She was clearly terrified. The statement shows that. Apparently they had been walking in the woods alone. Your mother said someone approached them. A male in his late teens. He tried to assault your mother. But Jane stepped in and attempted to fight him off. She told your mother to run. And as she was running she heard Jane's scream. The man was never seen again. Nor was Jane."
"Why did they say she was dead instead of missing?"
"They had been walking near a cliff. It was beside a river. They found Jane's shoe pretty far down the cliff. And some of her blood on the rocks. They thought the body washed away."
I went to reach for my pendant, but just felt the emptiness. It always gave me strength. I pressed my hand against my chest instead, trying to somehow ground myself despite the fact that it felt like I was sinking. I had been young, but even I could see the shift in my grandmother's demeanor. She hadn't really been able to lift herself back up after my mother died. Her smiles seemed rare. Her scolding became more constant. She was devastated. And the devastation was so much worse than I had imagined. Because she hadn't just lost one child. She had lost two.
I felt Eli gently rub my back, pulling me out of my thoughts. I pressed my hand a little harder against my chest. "So everyone thought Jane died trying to protect my mom?"
"Yeah. And that's not even the weirdest part," Liza said. "The name..."
"We really don't know everything yet, Sadie," V cut in. "I'd like to finalize everything before we fill you in."
"Whatever you have, you need to tell both of us," Eli said. "Keeping her in the dark isn't helping anything."
V glared at him.
"Please just tell me." I hated how desperate I sounded, like I was barely holding on. My heart couldn't take waiting another second. It felt like it was going to explode in my chest.
"The report also said your mother recognized the man," Liza said. "Apparently she had seen him around town before. She said she almost felt like he had been watching her. We think he probably followed her into the woods to...well, you know." Liza awkwardly cleared her throat.
"She was only 13 years old." I realized the irony of what I said as soon as the words fell from my lips. I had only been 12 when Don started hurting me. I swallowed hard. Touching me.
"The cops thought he may have been stalking your mom. Apparently it was clear to them that Jane didn't recognize the man, where as your mom seemed to. But you mom swore she didn't know the man's name. After the accident, your grandmother was so paranoid that he'd come after your mom again, she changed their names and moved away."
"So they became Wagners?"
"Right."
"So...Sadie Davis?"
Liza glanced at V and then back at me. "Sadie Davis was your mom's real name. But I guess she would have been Sadie Brooks after marrying your dad."
I felt sick to my stomach. Neither one of those names had meant anything to me a month ago. Now I was sitting here with the same name as my mom, a name I never knew belonged to her.
"Which brings us to Mr. Crawford," V said. "Whoever he is, he clearly wanted you to know the truth or he wouldn't have gone to such lengths to get you that new ID and everything."
I just sat there, staring at him.
He took that as a sign that I wanted to hear more. "But that doesn't necessarily mean the mysterious Mr. Crawford is on our side," V said. "He could have had reasons of his own to tell you."
I felt numb. I could barely even focus on V's words. Jane had risked her life to save my mom. And now she was trying to kill me? She was my only living relative. She was my last family. It didn't even make any sense. Unless... The queasy feeling returned as a terrible thought settled in my stomach. "Who was the man in the woods?"
"Your mom swore she didn't know his name," Liza said. "All that was in the report was this sketch of his face." She pulled it out and placed it on the table in front of me.
I put my hand over my mouth. Don. I could have been wrong. He was clearly younger. It was just a sketch. But those eyes. The death in them. I let the tears stream down my face.
"Shit," Eli said. He shifted closer to me and wrapped his arm around my back.
I immediately placed my head against his chest. I needed the comfort. For just one second, I needed to pretend that none of this was real.
"We agreed to leave the make-believe at the door," V said, his voice an octave lower than usual.
"Jesus, you psychopath," Eli said, continuing to hold me against his chest. "She's crying."
"And I'm asking you to get your hands off of her," V growled.
"Did you ever think that what you and her have is what's make-believe?"
"I'm giving you two seconds to..."
"Cut it out!" Liza yelled. "While you guys are busy having a fight over doomsday, I'm the only one trying to figure out just how long we have. We don't exactly have a lot of time to waste here."
I pulled away from Eli, wiping away my remaining tears. Liza was right. Crying over the past didn't change anything. We were running out of time. I could hear the clock ticking down in my head. "Did you just call me doomsday?" I asked.
"Mhm." Liza looked down at her notes. "We really need to know whether or not it's like a three-two-one-go deal, or just a three-two-one boom right away."
I hadn't even considered that the one would be the last day. I thought when Sadie Davis showed me one finger, I'd still have one whole day to figure it out. "I think the first one."
"It's more diabolical to jump the gun, don't you think?"
Everyone was silent.
"So that's it?" I asked. "I'm going to die tomorrow?"
"You're not going to die," Eli and V said at the same time.
I looked at Liza. For some reason her silence was louder than their words. All she seemed capable of was the truth, or at least, whatever she deemed the truth. "What do you think, Liza?"
She shrugged her shoulders. "We still don't know who Mr. Crawford is. We're not 100 percent certain what happened in the woods, but I'm pretty sure that Don had some kind of weird sexual infatuation with your mother. Who you happen to look a lot alike. And with the dye job that your aunt just got, he's probably fornicating with her too. Maybe consensual though. She looks a little off her rocker. I wouldn't even be surprised if the name change was her idea."
"This isn't helping anyone, Liza," V said.
She pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose, ignoring him. "Regardless, I'd have to run some calculations to get a more precise number, but I think the odds that you're going to die tomorrow are roughly 87 percent. And obviously the odds are even higher the following day because if you don't die tomorrow you're even more likely to die the day after that. Since death really appears to be the only logical conclusion to her threats. So that has to be like a 99.8 percent chance of you dying on Friday with a slight possibility of skewed data if there were any errors in the research V did. Because all my research was logically sound and I didn't have time to double check his work."
I swallowed hard. The information was jarring. But I appreciated her bluntness. There was no reason to sugar coat anything when I was living on hours. "So I'm probably going to die tomorrow. And if not tomorrow, definitely Friday?"
"Most definitely, yes."
"That isn't true," V said. "She's pulling numbers out of her ass. And we don't even know if it was Don in the woods. That could be a picture of any teenager. She's making leaps she can't justify."
"I never pull anything out of my ass, thank you very much. No one has ever even touched me there. Not that I'm opposed to it, it's just never happened is all." Liza cleared her throat.