If Ben is stealing money from Jax, The
He will do anything to keep his secret safe,
Else He has another motivation, like maybe trying to protect someone else.
Ben swore to me that it wasn’t what it looked like, that I was completely safe with him. But, he said, there was stuff going on, serious stuff, and we needed to discuss it. He said we needed to go somewhere private to do that.
And then, “I know someone’s stealing from Jax,” he’d finally said.
That’s when I got in the truck.
But now he’s turned into Granite Face Man, and my brain is jumping around between all the disconnected pieces of information. What was he doing at the Grand Bohemian? Who did he meet with? And who’s having the affair? I can’t seem to reconcile the facts I know. All I can say for sure is that I’m confused and things are bad. Very bad.
“We’re close to Gigi’s. Will you please drop me off?” I say in a shaky voice when he slows at the light near the golf course.
“I don’t want you going there right now. We need to talk.”
“We can talk at Gigi’s.”
“No. I’m going to take you somewhere else. Not Jax or my house. Maybe somewhere outside of town. We need to be alone.”
I take a deep breath. “Is it you who’s stealing from Jax? You and Layton?”
He laughs like he can’t believe I’ve said that. “No, Shorie. It’s not me. It’s not Layton either.”
“Then who was the person at the hotel?” I say. “And why were you meeting them?”
He shakes his head. “I’m handling this, Shorie, in the way I think is best for all of us. I need you to trust me. Can you trust me?”
And then my brain starts working again, and all the separate facts and ideas and pieces chunk into this one cohesive mechanism.
“Oh,” I say, a tinge of wonder in my voice. “It’s Sabine, isn’t it?”
He presses his lips together. Bingo.
“It’s Sabine, but you don’t want to tell anybody. You’re protecting her!”
“Shorie,” he says. “This is a complicated thing. A complex, adult situation. There are implications that you haven’t thought of, fallout that you can’t predict. It’s got to be handled delicately. By the people who are directly involved in it.”
“That’s bullshit.”
“You don’t have all the facts.”
“I have more than you know!” I blurt out.
“What are you talking about?”
“Mom’s in trouble,” I say.
The truck swerves the slightest bit. “In trouble? What do you mean?”
“That place you sent her. Hidden Sands. She’s gotten into some kind of trouble there.”
He keeps staring at me, then back at the road. “What makes you think that?”
“She sent me a message on my Jax. It wasn’t specific, it was only part of a message, but I think she was asking for my help.”
I pull up the app, open my read messages. “Read it for yourself! She sent me a message, please send—I think she left off the word help. I don’t know, maybe she’s in danger or something.”
“Here’s what I think.” He brakes at the red light at the Baptist church—almost to the turnoff to Gigi’s house. “I think you and your mother have been through a life-altering trauma that has affected you both more deeply than any of us realized. And I think that what you really need is for all of us, your friends and family, to give you both the time and the space you need to get better. There is definitely something going on at Jax. And . . .” His jaw works for a second. “I think maybe Sabine has gotten involved. But like I said, it’s complicated, and I will handle it. And hopefully get everything under control before your mom comes home.”
“But what Sabine is doing and what’s happening to Mom is connected. Don’t you see?”
He shakes his head. “I understand you believe that, but I don’t think you’re right.”
“That’s why I want to go to Gigi’s. Because she’ll believe me.”
“Shorie, you can’t involve your grandmother. You’ve got to listen to—”
“Take me to Gigi’s,” I yell, “or I’m going to call the police!”
“Shorie, no.” He turns to me, and I’ve never seen an adult’s face look so scared. “Please. Promise me you won’t call them. When it’s time, I swear I will do it, but right now I need to talk to Sabine first. I think there’s a way to handle this—”
Listening to him is getting me more and more confused. I feel like I’m underwater, drowning, bursting for a breath. And now we’re at Montevallo and Church, and even though the light is green, traffic is backed up and we’re inching along.
I claw at the door handle, jump out, and take off across the wide intersection, dodging the line of cars. A chorus of car horns fills my ears as I leap over a honeysuckle-twined picket fence and run through the yard of a little white house with a rain-faded Cozy Coupe on the front walk. I cut through backyards and side roads like some kind of fugitive from the law, keeping an eye out for Ben’s truck.
My grandparents’ house is a stately red-brick Georgian with a yellow climbing rose that canopies the front door. Two gas lanterns flicker on either side of the door at all times, day and night, and there’s a thick slate roof. It’s one of those houses that announces I’m rich, but don’t like to talk about it. Still, when you look closely, you can see paint’s peeling on the shutters, and the grass is patchy and overgrown.
I hunker down in the azalea hedge that borders the rise behind the house. It gives me the perfect view into Gigi’s 1980s-era kitchen.
Sure enough, she’s cooking away, wearing a white button-up blouse with the collar turned up, a pair of pink pleated linen pants, and a full face of makeup. She’s done this, made supper five nights a week, every week of the year, ever since I’ve been alive. A meat, starch, and veggie, with a sourdough roll on a separate plate. Sweet lemon iced tea and maybe a glass of sauvignon blanc with one ice cube.
I open my Jax on my phone. There’s a new connection request from some rando. But Mom hasn’t responded to my message yet. And there’s nothing new from Ms. X’s account either, except she got gas and ate a roast beef sub sandwich at Subway.
When I look up, Gigi’s gone. I stand, panicked. What if Ben followed me here, and now he’s at the front door, asking Gigi where I am?
I run around the house and see Gigi returning from the mailbox with a handful of mail. Ben is nowhere in sight.
“Shorie.” Gigi manages a hug and an air-kiss about a foot from my cheek. “It’s the middle of the week. What are you doing here?”
“I got homesick,” I say in my most pathetic voice. “My friends brought me up yesterday, and I stayed the night at Ben and Sabine’s.”
She ushers me in the front door and back to the kitchen. It smells like pot roast, and even though I haven’t eaten in hours, I feel slightly sick.
“Why didn’t you stay here?” she asks.
“I wanted to talk to Ben.” I hesitate. “Gigi, I really want to go see my mom.”
“Oh, hon. I know. But we don’t want to interrupt her rest. We need to give her time, let her heal in peace and quiet. Soon enough she’ll be home and we’ll all go shopping and to Red Mountain Grill, okay?”
“Okay. I just really miss her.”
“I know. But we have to buck up and be strong. That’s what she would want.”
She’s talking as if Mom’s dead. It makes my stomach hurt even worse.
I twist my fingers. “Hey, Gigi, do you mind if I use Arch’s computer? Schoolwork.”
“Of course not, hon. Supper’s soon. I’ll call you.”
Arch’s office is wood paneled, with a huge leather-topped desk at the far end against bookshelves packed with spy novels and a cushy leather chair that I used to spin around in when I was a little girl. I have no interest in that now. All I want is my grandfather’s computer.
But his desk is empty, except for a few piles of paper and a fountai
n pen. I look in the drawers, but they’re mostly empty too. Some files stacked in manila folders, old contracts and receipts for stock trades.
No computer.
I bang my fists on the desk, then grab my phone. I google the FBI, and right away a short form pops up—a tip sheet for anyone who wants to report a crime. I stare at it a minute, then quickly fill it out: name, address, and phone number. In the very bottom field, I tell them about the fluctuating balances on Sabine’s account. I don’t mention how I accessed it. Then I tell them I think my mother may be in danger at Hidden Sands. I think whoever is stealing money from my mother’s app is also trying to kill her, I write.
They’re going to think I’m a nutcase.
“Shorie,” Arch says from the open doorway.
I hit “Send” on the form and put down my phone.
He grins, then lifts his crystal tumbler to me. As always, I think how dashing he looks, like he’s stepped right out of one of those old movies where the men always dressed in slim-cut gray suits and the women wore dresses and bouffant hairstyles. I run to him, and he folds me in his familiar whiskey-aftershave-starch-scented embrace.
“What are you doing in my office, June bug?”
“I was hoping to borrow your computer. For research.”
“A school paper?”
“Flannery O’Connor.”
“I’m sorry, Shor. It was acting up, so I took it in for repair.”
“It’s okay.” I give him a pat on the shoulder. “I can work on it later.”
He smiles down at me. As a child, I never had to wonder what books meant when they said someone’s eyes twinkled. I knew exactly what they meant because my grandfather’s eyes did just that. But now they just look tired and old.
“Arch?”
He sighs and upends his glass. “Ah. I was thinking. How life is a constant ebb and flow. How we lose things and gain others.”
“We lost Dad,” I say. “What do you think we’ve gained?”
He cocks his head at me. “Time will tell, I suppose. Time will tell.”
Right then Gigi calls us to come for dinner. In the dining room, the table glows, candlelight reflected in china, crystal, and silver. Gigi’s gone all out for the guest of honor.
“Sit, everybody,” she says. Arch has already settled at the head of the table, so I know she means me. I take the chair across from Gigi and drape a starched linen napkin embroidered with a G in the corner over my lap and wait for my grandmother to begin to eat. It takes her forever.
“Shorie?” Gigi says. “Would you like some lemonade?”
“Water’s fine.” I go to work on my dinner, but the roast feels like a rock in my throat, and my eyes start to burn from the effort of holding back the tears. I set down my fork, blinking.
“Darling?”
“I’m fine,” I say, but I’m not, and they can both see it.
“Sweetheart,” Arch starts to say, but I cut him off with a sob. A loud, strangled cry that makes them both sit bolt upright and stare at me, eyebrows nearly to their hairlines.
“Oh,” Gigi says.
I plant my hands on either side of my plate and, surprising even myself, burst into a series of dry, cawing sobs. After a moment or two, the tears follow, and eventually my nose runs unchecked, all of it mingling in a giant mess on my cheeks and mouth and chin.
Resignation . . . flipped out . . . powerless.
I have so many emotions, I give up trying to list them because they’re all in one roiling clump inside me. I am crying, but I also want to wreck Gigi’s dining room. To smash her crystal and break her china. I’m out of control. I’ve become the Godzilla of emotion.
“Now, now,” says Arch faintly.
“Shorie,” Gigi says over him. “You have to tell us what’s wrong if you want us to help.”
“I want my mother,” I scream at their stunned faces.
In thirty minutes, the pot roast has been Tupperwared, dishes stacked in the washer, and Arch’s travel agent has the two of us on a flight to Saint Lucia first thing in the morning.
44
PERRY’S JOURNAL
Saturday, March 16
TO DO:
Talk to Mom & Dad about their finances
Send Shorie another Jax message???—do NOT let Gigi send extra $$
Call Mason P. @ Global Cybergames
IDEA: New functionality for merchants—make corporate social responsibility (CSR) public/accessible to all users in real time?
Pop-ups for participating merchants—nonintrusive, piggyback spending suggestions?
Environmental, philanthropic, employee ethics, etc.—best practices
Monetize?
Shor, you’ve got the skills, I’ve seen to that, just do me a favor? Be careful how you use them. In life, it’ll be tempting to use your talents to get ahead of others, but your talent is a gift for the betterment of humanity . . .
No, too preachy
45
SHORIE
At six thirty in the morning, the Birmingham airport is deserted and creepy, just like in a horror movie right before the zombies stagger out. I’m rolling Gigi’s hot-pink carry-on with some toiletries and the few spare clothes we picked up from my house when I grabbed my passport.
It’s no wonder I’m thinking about zombies. Everything feels off—inside of me and out. I don’t know if Mom’s responded to my Jax message yet, but if she hasn’t, I’ll send her another message anyway. Just to let her know I’m coming to help her. To let her know I love her.
I did, for one brief second, consider telling Arch what was going on with Jax and my worries for Mom’s safety. But he’s old, and he’s been through so much already with my dad’s death. He doesn’t need more to worry about. Once we get to Ile Saint Sigo, I’ll have to figure out something to tell him while I simultaneously search for Mom.
And then there’s my message to the FBI. I wonder if anyone’s read it, or if it just got dumped into a backlog file. Nobody’s called me back, and I’m worried that means they laughed off the kooky teenage girl’s message.
Arch and I have just gotten in the practically nonexistent TSA line when I see a kid race-walking toward us. It’s Rhys, auburn hair sticking up behind a green bandana, cutoff sweats flapping around his shins, flip-flops slapping on the tile. He’s carrying something strapped around his chest, and he’s headed toward me. Running toward me, to be specific.
I step away from the line, nerves jangling. This is it, I think. The moment of truth. If Rhys is somehow caught up in this situation at Jax, this is the moment when he tries to keep me from going to help my mom. If not—if he’s truly my friend, I guess this is when I find out.
“Shorie?” Arch calls after me.
Rhys doesn’t slow down; he runs right up to me, wraps his arms around my torso, and puts his lips on mine.
“Ahhh,” I gasp under his mouth.
The bag he’s carrying swings around and thunks me on the hip, but we keep on kissing. I breathe him in. His lips feel like poetry. Like red velvet cupcakes and sweet tea cut with lemonade and sleeping until noon on Saturday. Turns out there is a movie moment after all, right here in the Birmingham airport. But not one from a zombie movie. More like a rom-com.
“Shorie.” Arch is standing beside us. I disentangle myself from Rhys. My face is flushed, and my pulse has gone through the roof.
“Arch, this is my . . . this is . . .” I look blankly at Rhys.
“Rhys Campbell.” Rhys holds out his hand. “Nice to meet you.”
They shake. I look down at the bag Rhys is carrying.
“I brought your computer,” he says. “Dele told me you were flying out this morning, and you mentioned . . . I thought you might want it.”
“You drove up here from Auburn? At five in the morning?” Our eyes meet, and he removes the strap of my computer bag over his head and loops it over mine.
“Well, it was three actually when I originally left.”
My face is flaming. I feel like I’m about
to topple over.
“That thing you texted me yesterday,” he says. “The question . . .”
I wait.
“I never followed you. But I did, maybe, drive around town to see if I could find you.” His face is now so red it matches mine. “I know that’s probably kind of creepy. And I’m sorry. But I wasn’t stalking, I swear. I was just . . . hoping to run into you.”
A woman announces the next zone of boarding over the loudspeaker, and a rush of sorrow engulfs me.
I feel Arch’s hand on my elbow. “Here we go, love.” He nods once at Rhys—“Young man”—and then pulls me into the security line.
The plane’s full, and because Arch and I got our tickets at the last minute, we’re not sitting together. Which helps me, because I can fire up my laptop and dig into Jax’s servers without having to explain myself. Even before they close the doors, he’s strapped in three rows in front of me and waving down the flight attendant for a drink. The flight to Miami is too short to get much done, and even though we got a rare direct flight to Saint Lucia and I’ll have more time, I wonder if attacking the servers is the right approach. I’m starting to think that maybe I should focus all my efforts on getting in touch with Mom. Leave the tech stuff to Ben.
Once we’re in the air, I pull out my phone, pay for the airplane Wi-Fi, and open Jax. There are no new messages from Mom, just that one from some rando dude I’m not even connected to yet. I angle myself in my seat so no one can see my phone and click over to my email to see if Ms. X—Sabine—has been up to anything. But the latest screenshots reveal nothing. Her balances have stayed level, and there are no new private messages.
And then something occurs to me: there are probably old messages that Sabine may have traded with Yours which she either deleted (if she was smart) or archived (if she was sentimental). I can’t believe I didn’t think of that. There could be a whole section of messages that could give me a clue as to who Yours is.
Until the Day I Die Page 24