“You’re right. Let’s go.”
I run to my room and toss everything in my bag, then zip it up. I grab my purse, my sweatshirt I’m going to wear and glance around the room, making sure I haven’t left anything.
Really wouldn’t matter if I did. I so want out of here, I don’t even care.
I wait for Drew in the living room, keeping watch out the window, my gaze zeroed in on the main house. They haven’t left yet for whatever they planned to do to mourn Vanessa’s death. I see the Range Rover parked out in the drive, as if Drew’s dad pulled it out earlier in preparation. At least it’s not blocking Drew’s truck.
Thank God.
“Do you want to say goodbye to your dad?” I ask when he comes into the living area, his bag slung over his shoulder, his expression still somewhat blank.
He slowly shakes his head. “I’ll text him. Have they left yet?”
“No.” The panic is blatant in my voice and I clear my throat, irritated with myself. “Drew, I don’t think it’s a good idea if we go over there…”
“I don’t either,” he interrupts.
Relief sweeps through me and we head out to his truck with hurried steps, my movements downright frantic as I toss my bag into the narrow back seat of his extended cab. He climbs into the truck the same time I do and we slam our doors in unison, Drew jabbing the key into the ignition.
We’re so close to being out of here, I can almost taste it. I’ve never been so happy to leave a place as I am at this very moment.
“Andrew!”
I jerk my head to the left, watch in disbelief as Adele runs toward the truck, stopping at the driver’s side door. She’s smacking the glass with her fist, yelling for him to roll down the window and he stares at her, his hand on the gear shift, ready to put the truck in reverse.
“Don’t do it,” I murmur. “Don’t open the window. She doesn’t deserve your attention anymore, Drew.”
“What if she tells my dad?” His voice is small, he sounds like a little boy and my heart breaks for him. His pain has become mine.
“Who cares? You’re not wrong in this situation. She is.”
Keeping his head bent, he reaches out and hits the button so the window slowly rolls down. “What do you want?” he asks her coldly.
“Just…please come with us. I want you there, Andrew.” She flicks her cold, hard gaze at me briefly and I stare back. Just as cold, just as hard.
I want to tear her apart I hate her so much.
“I already visited her grave yesterday. I paid my sister my respect. What more do you want from me?” His voice is like ice, his glare just as frosty as he turns it on her and it’s like she’s completely oblivious.
“There’s so much more you don’t know and I—I need to tell you. Privately. It’s important, Andrew. Please.”
“Stop calling him that.” I can’t help it, I have to make her stop. I can’t stand the way she says his full name.
“It’s his name.” Her voice is flat. “And who the hell are you to tell me what to do?”
“Don’t talk to her like that.” His low voice is a warning, but still doesn’t seem to affect Adele.
“She’s nothing, Andrew. Worthless. Why do you spend time with her? Is she good in bed? Does she spread her legs for you constantly and that’s why you keep her around?” Adele sounds downright manic. I refuse to let her insults affect me whatsoever.
She’s so beneath me for what she’s done to Drew, she deserves to rot in hell.
“At least I’m not some child molesting piece of shit,” I mutter under my breath.
The gasp I hear come from Adele clearly indicates I didn’t mutter low enough. “What did you say, you little bitch?”
Holy shit, I’ve stepped in it now.
“She knows, Adele,” Drew interjects harshly. “She knows everything.”
The heavy silence that settles over the three of us is almost painful. I can’t look at her. I keep my focus on my trembling knees, trying my best to keep my breathing even and controlled. I glance at Drew out of the corner of my eye, see the tick in his jaw, the way he’s gripping the steering wheel so tight, his knuckles are white.
“Well.” Her voice squeaks and she gives a little cough. “So. You told her everything, hmm? She knows about our little affair?”
“Molesting a fifteen year old boy is a far cry from having an affair.” I clamp my lips shut and close my eyes. My mom always said my big mouth would get me in trouble.
I guess she’s right.
“Fine, you want her to know everything, then I’ll go ahead and tell you what I wanted to say in private in front of your big mouthed whore instead.” Her voice is sweetness and light, so unnerving I can’t help but lift my head and look at her.
I don’t like what I see. There’s a murderous glow in her eyes and her mouth is curved upward in a crazed smile. She’s clearly on the verge of losing it.
“We should go,” I whisper to Drew and without a word he starts the engine.
“Don’t you want to hear what I have to tell you?” she asks in her creepy sing-song voice.
“Not really.” He keeps his gaze trained on the steering wheel.
“That’s too bad. Because it’s about Vanessa.”
He turns to look at her, as do I. “What about her?”
“I’ve been trying to tell you this for what feels like forever, the timing was just never right. But you need to know. I’ve always felt it was the truth…I wasn’t sure. I know it now though. Without a doubt, I know.”
“Spit it out, Adele.”
My stomach is churning as I wait. Fear makes my palms clammy and I clutch at my knees, scared out of my mind at what she’s about to say.
“Vanessa’s not your sister, Andrew.” Adele pauses, the smile she shoots my direction devastating. “She was your daughter.”
~* Chapter Thirteen *~
Day 7 (Departure), 11:30 a.m.
Where there is love, there is pain. – Spanish Proverb
Fable
Almost two hours later, and I still don’t know what to say.
I’m in a perpetual state of shock over Adele’s devastating confession. I’m not the one who’s most traumatically affected by it either. I’m scared to death by the way Drew’s taking it. Which is, zero reaction whatsoever.
He’s cold as ice. Expressionless. Emotionless. Void of anything and everything.
I’ve spent six full days and nights with him. I’ve seen him at his lowest and highest points. His most angry and his most caring, yet I’ve never seen him act like this. I don’t know what to do for him. And he won’t talk to me.
It ends up being the longest, quietest four plus hours of my life. Traffic was brutal. The weather shitty, with constant rain and slick roads, making it nearly impossible for him to see through the windshield, the rain fell so heavily.
He flicked on the radio at the very start of our journey, a clear indicator he didn’t want to talk, so I didn’t press. But I wanted to. Oh, how I wanted to. There were so many questions and I had no answers.
Was Adele telling the truth? Had Vanessa really been Drew’s daughter? Did his father—her husband—have any sort of clue? Had he been aware of their affair? Exactly how long had it gone on anyway?
From my calculations, she’d done this to him for a long time. At least four years. In the bits that he told me about the day Vanessa died, I have a feeling Adele dragged him into the house and had her way with him. So while they were f**king, Vanessa drowned.
Brutal but the truth, I can feel it. Hence that extra heaping dose of guilt he piles on himself.
I’m not angry at him though, and I can’t hate him for what happened. It’s not his fault, no matter how much he thinks it is. She trapped him into this crazy, sick relationship, and he didn’t know how to get out of it. He was a child when she started playing her twisted game.
It’s a wonder he was able to be with me at all last night.
I slept fitfully the last hour or so of the drive, waking up with a jolt when the truck comes to a complete stop and he shuts off the engine. I lift my head and peer out the window, discovering we’re in the parking lot of my apartment complex.
Yay. I’m home.
“We’re here,” he says, his deep voice deathly quiet. “Need help with your bag?”
I stare at him in disbelief. “Is this really how we’re going to end it?”
His gaze meets mine and it’s full of so much pain, I almost look away. But I refuse. He’s not going to win. I refuse to let him drive me away. “You heard what she said, Fable. No way do I expect you to stick around for that.”
“You really think that less of me? Really?” God, he infuriates me. I want to smack him and hug him, all at once. “Fine.”
I reach behind me and grab my duffel bag then throw open the door, climbing out of the truck so quickly, I almost fall on my ass.
“Fable.”
The sound of my name makes me pause, my fingers gripping the edge of the truck door that I was so eager to slam only a second ago. “What?”
“I—I need to process. I need to figure this all out.” His eyes implore me to understand. “I need time.”
Shaking my head, my chin trembles and I push past it. I refuse to cry in front of him. “How many times do I have to tell you? Don’t push me away, Drew.”
He inhales deep and looks away from me. That tick is still in his jaw and his expression is so tight, I’m afraid he might shatter. “I don’t know how to handle everything with someone else’s help. I’m used to coping on my own.”
My heart breaks just a little more. I don’t know how it’s still intact, with everything we’ve gone through. “Come in with me. I need to check on Owen and then…then we can talk. Okay?”
“Owen.” His gaze meets mine and he sighs. It’s like he’s forgotten everything and I brought him back to my reality. “Go to your brother. He needs you too. He’s more important right now.”
“Drew…” Owen is important, he’ll always be important, but my worry for Drew matters far, far more. I’m afraid of what he might do if I’m not around.
“Go, Fable. I’ll…I’ll call you.”
“No, you won’t.” Anger fills me and I slam the truck door hard, disappointed at how unsatisfied that still leaves me.
I head toward my apartment building, my shoulders hunched against the light smattering of rain that falls from the dark, angry sky. I hear Drew start up the truck, hear his voice call my name from his open window but I don’t turn around.
I don’t answer him.
I do as he says and go to my brother instead.
* * * *
I stop short when I see my mom sitting on the couch, her eyes bloodshot, her cheeks blotchy. She looks like she’s been crying. Owen’s standing behind the couch, a helpless expression on his young face and his eyes fill with relief when he sees me.
“What are you doing here?” I ask her as I shut the door.
She glares at me. “I live here. Where else do you think I’d be?”
Not bothering to say anything, I go to Owen and give him a quick hug. “You all right?”
“Yeah.” He slants a nervous glance in Mom’s direction. “Now that you’re here, do you care if I go over to Wade’s for a little bit? I’ll be back by dinner, I promise.”
“I thought we were going to the movies.” I so need the distraction. My head is filled with Drew and all the crazy drama that is his life, and I’d prefer to watch a mindless stupid movie for a while and forget.
Though I know that won’t really work. How can I ever forget him? Even for a little while?
“I think Mom wants to talk to you.” He fidgets. Clearly, he wants to make his escape.
“We’ll go to the movies some other time.” I ruffle his dark blonde hair and he ducks from under my grip, shooting me a winsome smile. “What do you think about having pizza for dinner tonight?”
His face lights up as he heads to the door. “Really? All right.”
I watch Owen leave, turning to Mom when the door shuts behind him. She’s watching me warily, her blonde hair—so like mine—tumbling over her eyes. Her eyeliner is heavy, her lips pinched. I have a flash in my mind of me looking exactly like this twenty years from now and the thought alone nearly takes me to my knees.
I refuse to turn into my mother, no matter how similar of a path I’m taking to hers.
“Why does he ask you if he can leave and he doesn’t ask me?” Mom waves a hand at the closed door. “He acts like you’re his mother.”
“If you were home more often, then maybe he would ask you.” I take the duffel bag into my room and dump it onto my unmade bed. I left the place a mess. There’re clothes everywhere, a jumble of cheap jewelry left on my old dresser and the mirror could use a good rubdown of Windex. I use this room to sleep and really for nothing else, since I’m always running around working or doing…whatever.
Imagining bringing Drew to my apartment, into my room, he’d probably be disgusted. He’s sort of a neat freak and everyone that lives here is sort of not.
Like I’m ever going to bring him here anyway. There’s no way we could work. I need to face facts. He’s too damaged, too stubborn to give me a chance.
“I’m home all the time,” my mom has the nerve to say when I come back into the living room. She’s cracked open a beer and she sips from it, blowing out a harsh breath. “I’ve had a tough weekend. I don’t need you giving me crap to make me feel guilty.”