“I’m … okay.” My voice is small in the dark. For a moment the world tilts, the stars wheeling overhead. Then I take a deep breath, and everything falls still again.
“It’s just a little further. Come on. That’s it.” She helps me over a fallen tree branch. “I’m so sorry I dragged you into this.”
“None of this is your fault,” I say. Then, a moment later: “Who was that guy?”
She’s quiet for so long I start to assume that she’s not going to answer. It startles me when she speaks.
“I used to think he was my boyfriend. I don’t know what to call him now.”
Boyfriend. I don’t know if it’s the blood loss, or the shock, but it takes me a moment to understand the word. It feels somehow abstract, detached. Boyfriend, father. Alive, dead. Whoever he was, it doesn’t matter anymore.
“I’ll explain everything when we get out of here,” she says. “I promise. But right now we just need to focus on getting back to the car.”
Through the trees I see a glint of light. The motel. We’re almost there. We step out of the woods, and I feel some of the tension leave my shoulders. A wave of agony comes in on its heels. Catherine must notice; she pauses to let me catch my breath.
Something explodes; a branch shatters overhead.
Instinctually, I grab Catherine by the edge of her shirt and pull her as hard as I can behind a copse of trees.
I lean back against the bark, my shoulder screaming with pain. A gunshot. But there aren’t any red or blue lights pivoting through the parking lot. It can’t be cops.
And that’s when I know exactly who it is.
“Sasha,” I call. “Don’t do this.”
I hear her footsteps coming closer.
“This .40 caliber has some fucking kick!” There’s a jaunty rage in her voice, a grit-toothed smile. “You know, I think I like Mom’s .22 better, but she caught me playing with it the other day and hid it. All I could find was this monster.” Another echoing boom, and the ground explodes a few feet from us. “Daddy’s gonna be pissed when he sees I took it.”
I close my eyes, pressing my back against the tree. After all we’ve been through, after what I’ve just seen, this can’t be how our story ends. It can’t.
“How’d you find us?” Maybe I can distract her, defuse her rage, if I can get her talking. “Let me guess. Some of your mom’s super-spy shit.”
“Yeah. I put a tracker on your phone. That’s how she caught Daddy fucking his assistant last year.” She laughs. “Aren’t they all just dogs, Cathy? From what I’ve heard, you know a thing or two about that.”
“Leave her alone.” My voice comes out in an uneven snarl. I clutch my shoulder with my free hand, panting a little with the pain.
“It just makes me so mad.” The laughter is gone from her voice now. “You’re such a liar. You told me you were mine. You told me we’d be together forever. And the first chance you get, you go running after her.”
“The cops are on their way, Sasha,” I say.
She laughs again. It’s a dry, empty sound.
“I don’t care anymore.”
Next to me I can feel Catherine tremble. I look over at her—at her narrow features, at the slight, pensive overbite of her mouth. At her long-lashed eyes, pupils wide with fear. I lean down and kiss her cheek. Then, before she can try to stop me, I step out from behind the tree.
I don’t have a plan. All I know is that Sasha is here for me. She’ll hurt Catherine, but she’ll do it to get to me. So I’m the one who has to stop her.
Instantly there’s another shot. It disappears somewhere into the darkness past me. Sasha’s about thirty feet away, gun held out from her chest in both hands. She’s still in her drill uniform—a sparkly vest, a short white skirt. The sequins catch what light there is, flaring bright as flame.
She lowers the gun ever so slightly, her eyes meeting mine.
“Why do you love her, and not me?” she asks. Her voice is almost matter-of-fact.
There are a million and one things I could say. I could point out all she’s put me through. I could use all the labels she hates so much: manipulative, abusive, controlling. I wouldn’t be wrong.
But the truth is so much simpler, and so much more complicated.
“I don’t know,” I say. “I just do.”
We stand like that for a long moment, staring at one another. I look at her heart-shaped face, at the thick, dark hair like a tempest around her shoulders. I look at her mouth, sagging under the weight of her bitterness.
“I’m sorry,” I say. Because it’s true. For whatever she’s going through. For whatever I may have done to make it worse.
Her features crumple into an expression of anguish. The gun is aimed at my chest this time. No more wide shots.
Then, all at once, she turns the gun toward her own temple. The movement is so swift and so sure I realize that it’s what she’s meant to do all along.
“No,” I say, too soft. I start to run. There’s no way for me to get there in time; I know even as I reach toward her I won’t make it. “No, Sasha.”
I can hear sirens. I barely noticed them over the pounding of my own heart. But there are the red and blue beams, swirling across the highway. Lights go on inside the motel. Someone steps out, a silhouette in a doorway. A cop car swerves into the parking lot, another close on its heels.
Sasha’s hand trembles. I stop a few feet away, holding my hands up.
“Don’t,” I say.
She blinks, once, twice, like she’s waking up from a bad dream. She looks up at the cop cars. An ambulance pulls into the lot a moment later. The lights flash across her skin.
The gun falls to the ground. She sits down, hard, on the broken concrete. Her expression is empty, as if everything has been drained away.
FORTY-FOUR
Elyse
It’s the kind of gray day I love, the kind that makes me homesick for Portland. Town Lake is dull under the heavy clouds, and while December in Texas isn’t nearly as cold as I want it to be, there’s a cool current in the air.
It’s the day before Christmas Eve; the usual joggers and walkers and bikers are probably doing their last-minute shopping, so the park is less crowded than usual. I sit on a bench and watch a chubby guy with a beard throw a tennis ball for a sheltie in the dog area. All around is the hum of traffic, the noise of the city.
When the minivan pulls into the parking lot, my nerves shoot sparks.
It’s been a week since what happened in the woods. I haven’t seen Gabe since he disappeared into the back of the ambulance that night; and while we’ve been texting back and forth nonstop, I’m suddenly nervous to be face-to-face with him. Even though by now he knows some of the story—the news has covered the basics—there’s still so much to confess, to explain.
I’ve never stood in front of him as myself. Not completely.
The side panel swings open, and the first thing I see is Vivi, waving frantically. She’s holding a stuffed armadillo and beaming at me. “Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas!” she calls.
“Merry Christmas, yourself,” I say, getting up from the bench and moving closer. She holds the armadillo out toward me. I take it and make it dance along her lap, and she squeals with delight.
The passenger side door swings open, and Gabe steps carefully out. It’s surreal to be able to look at him directly in the light of day, without fear that we might be seen. There’s almost a rush to it. He’s wearing a loose black T-shirt that says SATAN’S CHEERLEADERS, and his curls are adorably tousled. He grins at me, that cocky sideways grin that pulled me in from the start.
Before he can even say hi, Mrs. Jiménez leans across the seat.
“You must be Elyse,” she says.
I nod, not sure if I should move to shake her hand or something. I don’t remember how normal teenagers talk to adults.
“It’s nice to finally meet you,” she says, hesitating. “How’re you doing?”
I don’t know how to answer, so I just
say, “I’m okay.”
“Mom,” Gabe says. “We only have, like, an hour.”
“Okay, okay.” She frowns. “I’m running your sister to her playdate. I’ll be back in a bit. You have your phone? Water bottle? How’s your pain?”
“Mom,” he says again, more firmly this time. “I’m fine. Thanks for the ride.”
She purses her lips like she’s about to say something. Then she sighs, and starts the car.
“Bye, bye, Leese,” Vivi says sadly. She waves at me again. She makes the armadillo wave. “Bye, bye.”
“Bye, Vivi.” I watch them drive away, more because I’m almost afraid to look directly at Gabe than anything else. But once they’re gone I can’t put it off. I bite my lip and turn to face him.
“Hey,” he says.
“Hey,” I say too. After all we’ve been through it feels ridiculous to start with “hey,” so I smile. And then he smiles too, and I’m almost overcome by the sweetness of it, the innocence. Our fingers slide together.
“I like your hair,” he says.
I touch the back of my head. I had one of the girls in the group home I’ve been staying at help me with it. It’s short now, just below my ears, and dyed back to the dark blonde that’s my natural color.
“Thanks,” I say. “I feel lighter now.”
“It makes you look … different.”
A quick surge of anxiety runs through me. “Different bad?”
“No.” He hesitates. “Less, like … hidden. But it’s good.”
I lick my lips, glance around. “Should we sit down?”
“Let’s walk,” he says. He pats his shoulder. “It’s not like I got shot in the leg.”
We take the path that skirts the lake. The city skyline is reflected in the dark water below. An egret floats placidly in the rushes. I look down at my feet, more from habit than anything else. My purple sneakers were ruined in the woods—they were covered in blood—but I found a pair of slip-ons in the donation bin at the social worker’s office.
“How’re you feeling, anyway?” I ask.
“Okay. It still hurts like a bitch, but they’ve got me on some pretty good drugs.” He gives a lopsided grin.
I try to smile, but my mouth feels dry. “Yeah, well, be careful with that stuff,” I say. “I mean … not to be a nag. But it’s not, like, recreational.”
His expression softens. “Shit. I forgot about your mom.”
“No, I’m sorry. I’m not accusing you of …” I bite the inside of my cheek, take a deep breath. “You know, Becky—the social worker—says the hardest thing for me is going to be learning that the worst doesn’t always happen.”
He doesn’t answer, just squeezes my hand. I force myself to look up. I don’t have to stare at the ground all the time anymore. I have to learn to look at the sky again.
“And she’s right,” I say. “I mean … you could have been killed, but you weren’t. We survived.”
“Yeah.” He strokes the inside of my wrist with his thumb. “And with Sasha caught out there with a gun, my name’s been cleared. No more po-po on my ass. She gave them a full confession, I guess … she told them she was the one that started the fire.”
I give a little shiver, remembering her expression in the spinning blue-and-red lights the other night. It wasn’t the gun that’d made her scary. It was the rush of recognition when I saw her turn it on herself. It was knowing that, while her brokenness wasn’t the same as mine, there was a way in which we were sisters.
“What’s going to happen to her?” I ask. “Are they charging her?”
“Yeah. But she’s got the best lawyer money can buy. She’ll end up with parole and some sort of court-mandated treatment program,” he says, rolling his eyes. “I heard her parents are looking at therapeutic boarding schools. The further away, the better, if you ask me.”
I give a little laugh. Boarding school. It doesn’t seem fair, after everything she put us through. But then, who am I to claim I know what anyone deserves? I just killed a man, and yet I’m walking free.
I’ve dreamed about him every night. And they’re the worst dreams—because they aren’t about Aiden as I came to know him, paranoid, possessive, territorial. They’re about the Aiden I fell for. The one who made me feel loved, and seen. And in the dream I still shoot him. I still shoot this man I love. I wake up with the metal taste of loss in my mouth, in the early morning hours before I have a chance to remember how angry I am. I lie in bed and wipe away tears, and by the time I’m completely awake I’m more mad at myself for crying than I am at him.
I’m finally free of him, but he’s still got a hold on me, at least in my dreams. I wonder if I’m ever going to be able to move on. If I’ll ever be able to forgive myself—not just for killing him. For everything. For all the choices I’ve made.
“Gabe …” I take a deep breath. His fingers tighten around mine reassuringly. “I’m so sorry for all of this. I wish I hadn’t lied to you. I wish I … I’d just trusted you. Instead I dragged you into my mess.”
He stops, turns to face me. Puts his palm on the back of my neck so I’m looking up into those warm, dark eyes.
“You didn’t drag me anywhere.” He caresses my hairline with his fingertips. It makes my breath catch a little in my throat. “And besides … if we got into some kind of apology contest, I don’t know who would win. Sasha could have killed either one of us. Or both.”
“It’s different,” I whisper. “You didn’t choose that. She was unhinged. But I … I’m the one who got in that car in Portland and let Aiden drive me away. I’m the one who set my own life on fire.”
A sweet little crease springs up between his eyes.
“You know you’re the victim, right? That guy was twice your age. He knew better. You …”
I look away. “Yeah,” I say quickly. “I know.”
For their part, the cops and the D.A. seem to agree that I’m not at fault. It doesn’t look like they’re going to press any charges against me. Bit by bit the whole story’s come out. It’s been all over the news—KIDNAPPING VICTIM KILLS CAPTOR IN TENSE STANDOFF. Or: MISSING SIXTEEN-YEAR-OLD FOUND AFTER A YEAR ON THE RUN WITH HER TEACHER. I don’t recognize myself in the story. A part of me wants to; to be able to absolve myself of all responsibility. To be able to shake off the guilt, the shame. But some other, bigger part of me can’t let go of all the choices I’ve made in the last year. All the lies, all the mistakes.
Becky says with time, the story will change shape for me. She says I’ll see it a lot of different ways—because life is messy, and weird, and hard, and no one story is the absolute truth anyway. And she says that’s okay, that I can be in charge of my own story. I’m trying to believe her. I keep getting messages from journalists and true-crime writers who want to interview me, but I’m not going to talk to anyone for a while. Not until I can step back and see things more clearly. I’ve been manipulated enough for a lifetime.
“Anyway.” I brush a lock of hair out of my face and force myself to meet his eyes. “Neither one of them can stop us anymore.”
“You’re right. Now it’ll just be half the United States between us.” He leans against the railing looking out over the water.
Tomorrow morning I’m getting on a plane to Redding, California, to live with an aunt I didn’t even know I had. She’s my father’s sister, though she said she hadn’t heard from my dad in about twenty years. Her name’s Roberta—Bobbi, she told me to call her. She has two kids. My cousins. Insta-family, I guess.
Gabe glances at me sidelong. “You nervous?”
“Yeah.” I play with the zipper on my hoodie. “She didn’t know about me—she didn’t even know Dad got married. And it’s not like he ever told me anything about his family. So I don’t know what to expect. But she seems nice. And Portland’s only about seven hours away—my best friend might drive down to see me over her Christmas break.”
I’ve talked to Brynn almost every day since Aiden died. I remember that first call, sitting hunch
ed in the private room they gave me in the hospital, my heart hammering as the line rang and rang. I was so afraid she’d be mad at me.
But she answered the phone sobbing. “You dummy,” she’d said. “I’ve been waiting.”
And of course because she cried, I cried. We cried for what felt like hours. But it felt good. It felt like letting go of something.
“Why didn’t you call back?” she’d asked. “Why didn’t you let me know where you were?”
It was an impossible question to answer, at least in that moment. How could I make her understand how desperate I’d been, how scared? How could I tell her that I’d been embarrassed to ask for help after tossing everything so casually away? How could I explain that I’d had to stay with Aiden after my mom’s overdose, because otherwise, I’d have paid too high a price for nothing?
Maybe someday we can talk about it. Or maybe we won’t. Maybe we’ll decide that it’s more important to have fun. We can go thrifting in Redding and she’ll find some Dior cocktail dress I’ll have to zip her into. We’ll get the sugariest drinks they make at Starbucks, and we’ll drive around singing show tunes with the windows rolled down. She’ll give me all the theater gossip and tell me about her conquests. I’ve missed that for so long now. I am ready for some lightness.
But even with Brynn back in my life, even with a new family to get to know … I won’t feel complete. Because I have to leave this boy behind. This beautiful boy, who came for me. Who drove out into the darkness and found me.
He puts an arm around my waist now. “I wish I could come with you.”
“Me too.”
Would it be so crazy? Why couldn’t we go together? He’s seventeen, and I’ll turn seventeen in May. That’s not so young. Especially when I’ve been on my own so long, anyway.
But that answers my question for me. I’ve been on my own so long. And I’m tired. I don’t want that life anymore, and I don’t want him to have to live it, either.
“We’ll text nonstop,” I say. “And Skype. And I’ll write letters—real ones, on paper.”
He grins. “I’ve only ever gotten paper letters from my grandma.”
Lies You Never Told Me Page 23