by Mia Sheridan
“Thank you.”
Five minutes later, she was pulling up to the curb next to a small, somewhat generic tan house with a picket fence surrounding the yard, while Camden pulled into the driveway. The house was at the end of a cul-de-sac, an empty lot on one side, and a copse of trees on the other. He was right, it was private. She couldn’t imagine it got much traffic, if any. She got out and walked slowly up the front path, climbing the three steps, and meeting him on the porch. Inside, three dogs of varying breeds and sizes scratched at the window and whined in excitement at seeing him. Camden leaned toward them. “Go lay down,” he called, making some movement with his hand she couldn’t see. The dogs looked briefly crestfallen but turned away.
“I’m assuming it was their food you didn’t buy at the pet store?”
“I’ll go back later.” He nodded to two chairs and they both took a seat.
“Tell me about the bunny,” he said, taking her off guard.
“The bunny? That’s what you wanted to talk about?”
“Not only, but that first.”
She screwed up her face, shaking her head. “What’s there to tell about the bunny? My daughter found it in the woods. It was half-dead and abandoned. I’m its mother now.”
Camden pressed his lips together. “She found it?”
“Yes, I mean, what else? She didn’t steal it from its den. She knows better and she’s not cruel.” Although, you’ve been wondering lately about that, haven’t you? The thought brought her shame.
“That’s not what I meant,” he mumbled. “And it’s burrow.”
“What?”
“Rabbits. They live in a burrow, not a den.”
She shook her head, frustrated that they were talking about burrows, and dens, and motherless baby bunnies, rather than things that actually mattered between them.
“I have questions for you, Deputy.”
He looked at her sideways. “Yes?”
“That story you told me about Taluta? How did you know about it?”
His eyes narrowed and he looked just as confused as she must have looked when he asked her about the bunny. “The legend’s well known around here.”
“Not the legend about the indigenous woman who passed away and turned into a red fox. Not even the reports of drumbeats sounding from those woods.” She shook her head. “I found all that online. What I didn’t find was the brutal background of those stories. There’s nothing at all about any of that.” Maybe it was local knowledge, lore that somehow hadn’t made it on to the Internet, but she needed to know if that trunk had belonged to him as she suspected, or if someone else had owned it. Someone who coincidentally created the same rare and intricate art using reeds of grass, a craft she’d never heard about, seen, or even imagined, in her entire existence.
His gaze slid away from hers and she could see his wheels turning. When he looked back at her, he asked, “Why are you asking about that?”
Scarlett hesitated. Why play games? Why not just come out and ask him? “I found a trunk,” she said and watched as his body stilled. “I found a trunk that contained the personal account of Taluta, translated by Narcisa Fernando. It also included Narcisa’s story. The trunk had books and photos in it, and inside one of the books was this.” She reached into her purse at her feet, retrieved a small notebook, and took out the grass art pressed between its pages, holding it up for him to see.
Camden swallowed, his gaze lingering on what she held carefully in her fingers.
“I think this is yours,” she whispered. “I think that trunk was yours too. And I want to know why it was in the basement of Lilith House. I want to know why you didn’t tell me you were planning to buy the house before I did.”
He closed his eyes for a second, exhaling a long breath. When he opened them, he stared at her for so long she wondered if he was going to speak at all. But finally, he said, “That trunk was mine. I used to live at Lilith House. I grew up there.”
For a second, Scarlett was shocked silent. “You . . . what? How is that possible?”
Camden scrubbed a hand down his face and then stared behind her, his jaw rigid. “I was born to one of the students who attended Lilith House. I was never given any details, only that she signed her rights away and then left me behind.”
Scarlett frowned, her heart giving a small twist. “Oh,” she said. “So then who adopted you?”
He shook his head. “No one. The school took charge of me. Ms. West . . . my tutor was the closest thing to a mother I ever had. We were kept downstairs, forbidden from interacting with any of the students. After the fire and school closure, she took me with her to San Diego. I took her name. She got sick, and I cared for her for several years until she died. Then I moved back here to start a life in Farrow.”
“You always do that,” she said. “You leave things out. Give me half stories.”
“What do you want from me, Scarlett?”
“The truth. Why is that so hard?”
He made a small hissing sound in the back of his throat. “It isn’t entirely mine to give,” he mumbled. He glanced quickly up and down the street. “Maybe we should go inside.”
“Why?” She glanced around as he had done. “Are we being watched?”
“I don’t think so, but . . .” He swore beneath his breath. “Listen, there are things you don’t know.”
“Then tell me,” she said, frustration causing her to raise her voice. “Tell me what I need to know about Lilith House. Tell me who you’re worried about seeing us talking. Is it the woman whose house I saw you leaving the other morning?” She cringed internally. She hadn’t intended to bring her up. The last thing she wanted him to think was that she was jealous and trying to stake some claim she had no right to because of a bit of flirting and one stupid kiss.
“Georgia,” he said. “That’s the other thing I wanted to talk to you about.” He paused. “What you saw . . . it’s not what you probably think it is. I . . . she needs someone to be with her sometimes. We’re good friends. That’s all.”
Friends with benefits, apparently. She didn’t care, not one bit. At least that’s what she told herself.
Although as she thought about it, she wondered how they were good friends if he’d grown up at a reform school and only recently moved back to town. Admittedly, Scarlett didn’t know him well, but she knew enough to guess that Camden West didn’t make friends all too easily, much less “good friends.” The sudden flash of those three rooms in the basement came to mind, the metal beds in each one . . .
“Oh my God,” she breathed. “She grew up at Lilith House with you.” She remembered back to the day at Mason’s hardware store when she’d heard them all arguing in the back. All three of them.
Camden, Georgia, and Mason.
She could tell by the look on his face that she’d just uttered the truth. She could tell. Scarlett swallowed, blinked. “Mason too. The three of you grew up together at Lilith House? You lived in those basement rooms.”
He let out a breath and ran a hand through his hair. “I didn’t want to drag you into any of this.”
“Drag me into what?” She shook her head, her mind reeling, thinking about what the sheriff had said. “You wanted to buy the house. Why?”
“Because there might be something inside that will tell us more about who our mothers were and why they left us behind.”
Her thoughts were spinning in all directions. “Aren’t there records of who attended the school? Surely you could use those to track down the women who, date wise, could have been your mothers? Why do you need the house to do that?”
“All the school records went missing sometime after the fire. No one knows if they were lost during the cleanup and subsequent estate sale of the contents of the house, or misplaced . . . stolen. But in any case, they’re gone. Poof.” His hand rose quickly, fingers flying open as he gestured the word. “It’s as if no one ever attended Lilith School.”
She frowned again. Weird. Spooky, even. “Okay, so . . . you we
re going to . . . what? Buy the place and then commence searching behind its walls?”
He looked away from her, using his hand to massage the side of his jaw, his lips set in a thin line. Her gaze moved to the breast pocket of his T-shirt where she saw the distinct outline of what looked like a small, oval stone. Like the one he picked up at the stream the day he’d kissed her. It took her off balance for a moment. Why had he kept it? “Something like that,” he muttered after a minute, bringing her smack-dab back into the moment. “All three of us were going to live there. To search it, yes, but also, to own it. We were going to make it ours. I was the only one who left Farrow. Georgie and Mason, they waited for me. We’d all waited a long time, Scarlett.”
As more of the picture formed, emotions warred within her, mixing, twisting together so that she couldn’t separate one from another . . . despondency, indignation, shock, and sorrow.
“That’s why you befriended me,” she said, her voice rough, a pit opening in her stomach. “It’s why you recommended Mason for the job. The house wasn’t yours, but that way, you could still have access to it. You could still be present while the walls were torn down, and the floorboards demolished. Mason’s been searching even as his crew worked.”
The look on his face confirmed what she’d said. To his credit, he obviously felt at least moderately ashamed. But it didn’t change the fact that he’d deceived her. Used her. Was that what the flirting had been about? Even the kiss? She’d thought him unpracticed at both, but maybe what he was doing was pretending. God, she felt embarrassed. He’d tried to get close to her as a means to an end, but he hadn’t quite been able to go through with it. Whether that was because he had a scrap of honor, or whether it was because the lie of his attraction toward her was too difficult to sustain, she didn’t know. And really, did it matter?
“It’s the reason you installed the lock and sealed up the crawl spaces? You were worried about them searching the house while I was there? They didn’t listen to you, though, did they? You fought about it. You were fighting that day at the hardware store. Why? Why did you care? Did you think you’d get caught?”
He cast his eyes downward. He had lied to her over and over and over since the moment they’d met, so why couldn’t she feel angry? Why was her overwhelming emotion hurt? She let out a long breath and then she stood. He came to his feet immediately as well.
“Scarlett—”
“No.” She held up her hand. “I get the picture. I’m sorry I ruined all your plans. Obviously, I can’t have Mason working at the house anymore. He’s more interested in his own agenda than in seeing my goals for the house to fruition. If I find anything that might help in your efforts to locate your families, I promise to hand it over. I’m sorry for the suffering the three of you endured and I wish you well. But let me make this perfectly clear: Lilith House is mine. I’m going to run a business from there, I’m going to build a life for me and Haddie there. And there’s nothing you can do to stop me.”
She knew she must be imagining the glint of respect in his forest-green gaze, because his allegiance to his two friends would have prevented something like that. It didn’t matter though. She didn’t care what he thought of her anymore. Scarlett turned on her heel and marched down his steps, getting in her car and peeling away from the curb.
When she glanced once in her rearview mirror, she saw him standing on his porch, leaning on one of the pillars and watching her as she drove away.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Thirteen Years Ago
Kandace grimaced as she leaned toward the shiny silver napkin dispenser, using it for a mirror as she picked a large scab off her cheek, but breathed out a sigh of relief when it came off clean. She stepped back, taking herself in as well as possible, turning right and then left. Her face finally looked halfway normal despite the wavy nature of her reflection in the makeshift mirror. Red, shiny, and still flaky here and there, but she no longer resembled Freddie Kruger, thank God for that.
“Let me see you,” Aurora said, coming up behind her. Kandace turned, showing her face. “Better,” Aurora breathed, dragging the word out with a smile. “So much better.”
“Told ya,” Kandace said with a smile. “Baby’s”—she leaned in and lowered her voice dramatically—“ass.” But then she clapped a hand over her mouth as a wave of nausea overcame her, turning and taking the two steps to the toilet where she went down on her knees and vomited into the bowl. At least her hair wasn’t in the way.
Bonus to having it hacked off by a power-hungry maniac.
Kandace groaned, bringing her head up as she took the paper towel offered to her by Aurora. “Thanks,” she said weakly, wiping her mouth and standing, remaining still as the toilet flushed, to make sure the wave of nausea had passed.
“Did you take that test, Kandace?” Aurora asked. Kandace filled the cup on the sink with water and rinsed her mouth. She couldn’t bear the thought of toothpaste at the moment. It would make her hurl again.
“No. I already told you. It can’t be that kind of bug,” she assured her. “I appreciate the risk you took, I really do”—she smiled softly at her—"but . . . it can’t be.” Aurora looked at her dubiously and she knew why. They both had histories of frequent casual sex. Hell, she probably couldn’t list all the guys she’d been with if someone offered her a million dollars to do so. She wasn’t necessarily proud of that, but it was a fact of her life. However, she’d had her period right before she got there . . . but not since. Odd because she was usually right on time but . . . stress could do that to a girl, and Lilith House offered stress in spades. Some of it she’d even brought on herself by choosing to sneak around the way she had. And get caught and severely punished. Anyway . . . “No,” she repeated. “Not possible.”
Aurora’s lips thinned, but she nodded. “Take it anyway, for me,” she said. “Just to be sure.” Aurora placed her hand gently on Kandace’s arm.
Kandace sighed. She’d felt fine all day. Tired, but that was to be expected, considering the trauma her body had gone through and that she was still healing. “Fine,” she said. The girl had gone to the trouble of stealing something from Lilith House for Kandace and so she’d make it worth the risk she’d taken. Worth the blood she’d shed.
Aurora—and to a lesser extent, Sydney—now felt as close as untrusting, cynical sisters could to Kandace, given their strange circumstances. They were both jaded by life, by disappointments beyond normal, yet they hadn’t rejected her, and that had kept Kandace sane. Particularly after the beating . . . They cared. They’d helped her survive.
She closed the door of the bathroom and unwrapped the test stick, keeping the wrapper so she could put it inside afterward and discard it somewhere where it wouldn’t be noticed, like the large dining room trash to be covered in leftover food. She followed the instructions and then placed it on the tank of the toilet, glancing at the negative result before washing her hands and opening the door. “There ya go,” she told Aurora. “Now you can rest easy.”
Aurora walked over to the test, picking it up by the handle, her expression grim. “It’s positive,” she said so softly, Kandace barely heard the words.
Her blood chilled as she took a step forward, grabbing the test from Aurora and looking at the two blue lines. Positive. “No,” she said, shaking her head. She looked up at Aurora. “I told you. This isn’t possible. There’s no way.” Panic flashed through her. “I . . . Aurora I had my period right before I got here.”
“It must have been a false period,” Aurora said. “That happens sometimes.”
Kandace put her hand on her forehead. She felt sick again. Her head ached. “Oh God,” she said. She met Aurora’s eyes. “What am I going to do?”
She shook her head, biting at her lip. “You’ll have to tell them,” she said. “You don’t have a choice. Maybe they’ll just . . . let you leave.”
“Yes,” she muttered, but some red warning signal flared inside. Would they? Would they just let her leave? Or would she be pun
ished again? This time far more severely than before?
Her gaze moved to Aurora. “You can’t tell anyone. No one at all. Not even Sydney. The fewer people who know, the better.”
She nodded but there was something in her eyes that caused Kandace to question her honesty. No, no, don’t feel that way. Aurora hasn’t done anything to make you mistrust her. Kandace looked at the test. She brought you the test. She was tortured for her efforts. What if it’s some sort of setup? For what reason? She massaged her temples. God, this place was making her crazy. She had to think. How could this be?
“I’ll get rid of it,” Aurora said, taking the test from her.
Kandace started to object, but a wave of nausea suddenly overcame her and she raced for the toilet for the second time that day.
Later, lying in her bed in her darkened room, listening to her roommates rhythmic breathing, she thought of the pills.
Each morning at breakfast, Ms. Harrah came around with a paper cup of vitamins for the girls to swallow with their juice. Kandace, in a small act of defiance, had been palming them and tossing them away with her breakfast trash. Fuck your vitamins, you tyrants.
She’d even wondered if perhaps instead of vitamins, at least one of the pills was a low-dose sedative. She’d originally thought her roommates meek . . . tamed. Or broken. But maybe they were mildly drugged.
She tried to picture the pills in the cup. A large, amber one filled with some sort of oil, one small round pill, a larger pinkish oval tablet, and a very small round, blue pill. Birth control? No. No, it couldn’t be. She could understand the mild sedative. But why would Lilith House give their students a birth control pill when they were restricted from seeing anyone except each other and the all-female staff? It was illogical. It didn’t make sense.
Kandace rolled over. Now she was just being paranoid.
No, she told herself. I am not pregnant. There’s just no way. The test was wrong. It was the only answer.