Chasing Truth

by Julie Cross

  “Relax.” I roll my eyes. “I’m just keeping this in case you talk. Not a word to anyone that I helped you, understood?”

  “What about Justice and Chantel a-and Bret…” he sputters. “They were in the car.”

  “Tell them you did it yourself.” When he looks unsure about that, I add, “You can say that I sent you a link to a background check site—any idiot can find what I dug up on your dad’s assistant. I’m not worried about that. But if you want to brag about running her off, you made the call, you posed as the IRS, not me.”

  “So I’m Betty Summers?”

  “Now you’re catching on.” I pat his shoulder. “Oh, and I’ll take my payment in cash.”

  I head for the school’s front doors, leaving Jacob standing there. “Thanks, Ellie! I owe you one.”

  “No, you owe me one thousand.” Realizing my position of power, I spin back around. “One more thing.”

  He waits while I walk toward him again.

  “I need you to answer a question and not mention it to anyone. Ever. Okay?”

  He swallows. “Okay.”

  “You’ve known Bret for a while, right?”

  “Yeah, like, forever. We went to St. Matthews together before Holden.”

  “Aren’t you Jewish?”

  He shrugs. “Yeah, but it’s a good school. That’s all my parents care about.”

  I lower my voice. “Can you think of any reason Bret would have followed Simon and me from the spring formal to my apartment?”

  “You and Simon—” His eyes get huge. “Wait, the spring formal? That’s the night he—”

  “Died,” I finish for him. The jock brain is getting annoying. “Any ideas?”

  Jacob stands there for several seconds looking like the most uncomfortable person in the world. If I wasn’t so desperate for this answer, I’d enjoy watching him squirm.

  “I don’t know, Ellie…” He appears to be thinking. “Simon did hang out with us that one time, and Bret was all buddy-buddy, kissing his ass, probably because of his dad, but he wouldn’t— Hell, I don’t know.”

  “Yeah, that makes two of us.” I sigh and leave him there while I head inside the school.

  When I get back to algebra, Ms. Swanson gives me this look that says twenty-five-minute bathroom trips are outside of the don’t-need-to-explain window.

  “Sorry I was gone so long,” I say. “Mrs. Harris was giving a tour and got interrupted. I offered to show the family around the east wing. I remembered my tour of Holden and how nice it was to have an actual student offer insight.”

  Her frown turns to a smile. “How nice.”

  Then she proceeds to tell me everything I missed over the last twenty-five minutes. Unfortunately, not all my teachers are this gullible, even if I am a favorite.

  Later, after lunch, I find an envelope full of cash at the bottom of my locker. Jacob is a man of his word. But I still can’t believe he’s paying me a thousand dollars for that. And he footed the bill for the criminal and credit checks, so I’ve got no overhead costs.

  After school, I’ll take this money straight to the dentist office and have them put it toward that bill Harper is struggling to pay. A few more scandals among my classmates, and I might be able to take care of all of it.

  CHAPTER 20

  “What exactly is she doing?” Harper whispers.

  “It’s called an accent wall.” We’re both hovering in the hall outside my bedroom watching Justice slide a paint roller over the back wall of my room. She’s got headphones in her ears, iPhone tucked in the pocket of the denim overalls she changed into when we got here right from school. She’s dancing and singing along to the music. “I don’t get it. Why bother painting? It’s a rental.”

  Harper gives me a weird look. “It might be a rental, but we’re not here on vacation.”

  “I know that,” I assure her. But it’s easy to forget that this is what regular people do. They live somewhere longer than six months. They paint their walls.

  The paint is fuchsia, which is, um, bold. But whatever. She also brought gray paint and, after a quick lesson, she sets me up with a roller on another wall. I take the opportunity to plug in my headphones and check in on my boy Dominic. If only I had more devices. I could keep track of Bret, Jacob, and Miles, too.

  But the first voice I hear isn’t Dominic’s. It’s Miles’s.

  “I don’t know, man. You sure about this guy?”

  “He’s cool. No worries.” Dominic laughs. “Dude, relax. I buy from him all the time.”

  The paint roller nearly slips from my hand. Justice glances over, and I quickly re-grip the handle and smile. “This is gonna look great.”

  She sighs. “My mom would never in a million years let me do this stuff in our house. Not even with a big budget. I had to bribe the gardener to make sure she didn’t tell my parents I swiped this paint from the shed.”

  I’m too caught up in what Miles and Dominic are up to to consider what kind of bribe she may have pulled.

  “But you buy weed from the guy, right?” Miles asks. “Not anything else?”

  “I’ve bought other stuff from him.”

  “Like what?” Miles asks.

  “Usually whatever illegal Mexican or Russian version of Valium or Xanax Davey can get.”

  “But you’re not doing that stuff anymore?” Miles asks, his voice gentle, concerned.

  I almost drop the paint roller again. What the hell is he doing? There is no way to make sense of him meeting up with a drug dealer. Unless he’s trying to get someone in trouble? Could he be that crazy? Or that committed to his neurotic drug-free campaign?

  “This summer kind of sucked for me,” Dominic says, and then adds in a lower voice, “Here he is.”

  Through the headphones, I hear an engine rumble and then shut off.

  “Hey, man,” Dominic says. “This is my buddy, M.B.”

  M.B.?

  “’Sup,” a deep voice says. “Did I hear you right on the phone? You want the new shit?”

  “Only if it’s really the new shit.” Miles’s voice comes through smooth, calm, a tad bit defensive, but with none of the hesitancy he had minutes ago. He knows how to hold his cards, that’s for sure.

  Silence falls. Then finally, Davey’s deep voice comes through again. “Not so fast, Slick. I don’t deal to new guys. Dominic knows that. We hang first. I get to know you. Starting with where you live. You get me?”

  “Yeah, I get you.”

  I don’t know where they met up, but I know they’re headed here. I do the worst job possible spreading paint over the wall while the three guys end up in one vehicle—not sure whose—and make small talk for ten minutes.

  The most effective plan of action for a problem like this, when someone defies the laws of predictability, is what my dad calls a “private lesson.” Meaning I give myself a private lesson in the science of Miles Beckett by searching his place. This usually requires studying an asset’s schedule, patterns. And of course anyone in the household.

  Out the window, Miles, Dominic, and a big guy—probably early twenties—are walking through the courtyard. I expect to hear them thunder up the steps, but Miles stops them.

  “Let’s hang out here. My uncle’s upstairs.” Miles points out his apartment, lifting a finger to identify it from the ground floor. “Is that cool?”

  Davey shrugs, and the three of them take a seat at one of the umbrella tables. Dominic and Davey both immediately light up cigarettes.

  I know for a fact Clyde is gone all week. He told me himself. Miles won’t bring Davey the Drug Dealer up to his place. Which means I may have found the perfect hole in my asset’s pattern. Perfect for a private lesson. But only if I act quickly. And get rid of Justice. I glance over at her, checking her progress. She won’t be done anytime soon.

  “Where’d you hear about…?” Davey asks.

  Either he left out the name of whatever they’re trying to buy or he said it so low it didn’t come through the device planted in Domin
ic’s key chain.

  “You know, around,” Dominic says. “I keep up with your accomplishments.”

  Davey laughs.

  “You tried it?” Miles asks him. He must have nodded or something because Miles adds, “What’s it like?”

  “It’s fucked up. I stayed awake for three days straight. Like wide awake. And I got shit done, you know? And then I just…” He makes a sound like an explosion. “Not for me. The ups and downs. But if you got something you need it for…could be useful as fuck.”

  “How much?” Miles demands.

  “I already told you to slow down, Slick,” Davey warns. “And you know it ain’t money I want from you. I hear you’ve got something I need.”

  “Maybe.”

  “You really brought that shit back from Switzerland?” Davey asks, sounding impressed. “Bet you pissed your pants walking through customs.”

  “Only a little,” Miles says.

  Switzerland. The sight of his parents’ fictional murder. Coincidence? Unlikely.

  “So it’s here?” Davey presses.

  “Maybe,” Miles repeats.

  Okay, it’s now or never.

  I set down the roller and tell Justice that I need to go to the office and get the mail. I snatch some tools and a flashlight from the kitchen drawer and stuff them in my pocket. I turn the volume way up on the receiver to keep track of my neighbor. Inside the apartment, everything is perfectly in place, quiet, empty. If my time is limited here, I’m gonna start with the most interesting room.

  I kneel in front of the mysterious bedroom door—the one where Clyde supposedly keeps his junk—studying the complicated lock. A lock that definitely didn’t come with the apartment. After several failed attempts, I finally get the top lock undone and move on to the doorknob, which is nearly identical to the front door and takes no time at all.

  I slip inside the dark room and shut the door behind me. There aren’t any windows. It’s pitch black until I click on my flashlight, shining it on my bare feet.

  “…Left my bag in your car,” I hear Miles say through the headphones. “Let me have your keys.”

  Shit. There goes my security system. I debate bailing and trying again later but then decide I’ll still hear him open and close the car door. I stand there frozen for a moment and then, the car gives that clicking sound when it’s being unlocked. I release a breath and raise the flashlight. There’s a small table and two chairs. I shift the light to the tabletop. My heart stops, the air catching in my lungs.

  Spread out across the table is Simon’s face. Newspaper articles, at least ten of them. Like the ones I found in Dominic’s bag. The shadow of papers hanging from the wall catches my eye. I raise the light and gasp aloud. A large picture hangs above the table. A picture of me. Actually, Simon and me, walking from his house to the car the night of the dance.

  Beside it is a photo that looks like it was pulled from the surveillance video Aidan showed of the parking lot. My shoes, my dress, a shadowed figure that looks like me. Another shot of Bret Thomas’s license plate in the parking lot that night.

  My heart beats at race-car pace, my stomach turning. I spin slowly in a circle, shining the light around the room. Simon is everywhere. Strings are pinned to the wall, connecting photos and scraps of paper with words scrawled on them. I study one scrap of paper and see my own handwriting, my email address. I’d written it down for Simon when he offered to study together after our first week of bio. How the hell did Miles get that? Where would Simon have kept it? In his wallet? His room?

  The thud coming from my chest echoes in the silence. I’ve been curious about Miles all along, wanted to figure out what his deal was. But I never thought he was dangerous. Dangerous for my heart maybe, but not like actually dangerous.

  The flashlight in my hand moves on its own, shining on a note with writing I recognize as Simon’s.

  I know my timing is really, really bad, but I have to tell you before this is over, before it’s too late. I love you. Like love love you. I don’t know how you feel and I need to know before it’s too late. I know we’re friends. Best friends. But maybe…

  Sorry I’m too chicken to say all this to your face.

  Love,

  S

  I can’t even absorb that note because I’m too distracted by the photo beside it. It’s Jacob and me outside the school the other day. How the hell did Miles take that photo? He was half asleep in the back of Mr. Chin’s classroom. And how did he know I was out there?

  Panic engulfs me. I drop the flashlight and start patting down my clothes. The answer hits me, but just as my gaze drops to the tennis shoes on my feet, something moves across the room in a blur.

  Arms grab me from behind. A hand covers my mouth, stifling my scream. A hard, round object presses into my side. A gun.

  The grip on me loosens and another scream rises in my throat, but light floods the room, freezing me in place.

  Miles stands a few feet away, pointing a gun at me.

  CHAPTER 21

  My hands lift slowly in the air, deliberately. Already I’m replaying all of our conversations… Miles asking me about Simon. Miles digging, watching, always watching. Did he do something to Simon and now he knows I know? If so, I know how this story ends. I swallow and stand perfectly still.

  My arms shake, but I keep my hands up where he can see them because there’s a gun pointed at me and I’m in new territory. I’ve been caught before, but not like this. I don’t have a trick for this. And he can see me shaking. He can see the fear. See that I’m powerless.

  “How did you get in here?” he snaps. Before I can answer, he says, “You planted the bug in Dominic’s keys, didn’t you? You knew I wouldn’t be in here when you broke in.”

  I remain silent, but I do turn my head enough to notice an opening in the wall. A sliding door of some kind. What the hell is this place? Have I been stalked and conned by a con man or a serial killer?

  “Was it that night on the yacht? When I caught you digging through Dominic’s stuff?” Miles shakes his head, like he’s pissed at himself for missing it. “That’s why you made up that shit about your parents. To distract me. You’re even better than I thought.”

  “I…I…found a bug in his stuff that night. I wasn’t planting anything,” I manage to say, my gaze hyper-focused on the gun. “I thought Dominic might be— I just wanted to see if…”

  “If Dominic or Bret knew anything,” Miles says with a nod. “If they were onto you.”

  “Onto me?” I drop my arms.

  “You can’t give it up, can you?” He grits his teeth, jaw tense. There’s a fierceness, a deep-rooted anger on his face that steals my breath, and a chill runs through my entire body. I’m not gonna make it out of this room.

  Keep him talking. Just keep him talking.

  “Give what up?” I force the eye contact, using whatever persuasive power I possess to draw him in.

  Please let Justice or Harper come looking for me. Or Aidan. That’s who I really need right now. He’s the one with the gun and choke hold. Carefully, I pat my pocket. No cell phone. God, I’m an idiot.

  “The lie.” Miles steps closer, the anger rising in him, filling the small area between us. “You’ve owned it, haven’t you? Simon’s dead and you’re here playing the good girl, still hurt, still upset over it.”

  I think I finally understand what it feels like to have a rug pulled from underneath you. “You think I killed Simon?”

  “You were the last one to see him,” Miles argues. He moves another step closer. “I know you’ve devoted a lot of time to sneaking around, trying to dig up dirt on people in his circle. Making sure they aren’t onto you. What I can’t figure out is why you’d kill him. But then again, your life before Holden Prep is a mix of many different stories all revolving around a fire I’m not sure ever happened. Convenient how you basically have no identity. You and your sister. Are you working together? Is Lawrence in on it, too? I’ve heard Secret Service agents sometimes get offers they ca
n’t resist to go over to the dark side…”

  I back up but soon run into the wall. A photo of Simon holding a corsage slips off it and floats in the air until it lands by my feet. I look up at him, my eyes widening. “I didn’t kill Simon.”

  “Well, I don’t think he killed himself,” Miles says as if this automatically points a finger in my direction. “In fact, I’m nearly positive he didn’t.”

  He’s nearly positive. How?

  “What about Bret Thomas?” I point to the photo of his license plate. “He could have been the last one to see Simon. He could have done something to Simon or upset him enough to make him—”

  “Or maybe he was waiting for you. To hook up. Or for both of you to hop in his car and go after Simon. The more I think about it, the more that fits. Nice girl comes to Holden, makes friends with Simon. Simon suddenly gets invited to the cool kids’ party… Nice girl keeps her distance from Simon’s new group in public and no connection is ever made. Parking-lot footage was mysteriously corrupted. Until recently. And it’s distorted to not show faces.” Miles’s hold on the gun becomes less steady, his hands shaking.

  A question that should have come to mind at the beginning of this conversation finally hits me. I take a chance and move a step closer, studying his face.

  “Don’t move,” he commands.

  I pause. “How do you know Simon?”

  “The police report says only Harper was home when you supposedly returned to your apartment, and we both know she’d lie for you. No one else saw you go inside. Not a single witness.”

  “I didn’t kill Simon,” I repeat. Is this what murderers do? Turn the tables on their accusers?

  “I eliminated you almost immediately. I thought you were just a lonely girl who lied to get her way and push people away. But then…” He releases an angry breath.

  “Why would I kill him?” I ask, my voice rising. Having a gun pointed at me is really starting to piss me off. “I was in his circle. Not Dominic DeLuca and Bret Fucking Thomas. Neither of those guys knows anything about Simon. I cared about him. He was my friend!”

  “No, he was my friend!” Miles shouts, his eyes glossy.