Thicker Than Water (26 page)

I wonder if Charlotte has already told them. She couldn’t possibly, if Stan isn’t drawing a connection right now.

I wonder why she’d cover for me.

I study my brother. “You think they’d question you, too?”

“I know they would.”

“Is that why you gave him a fake last name?”

“You think I made that up on the fly?” He laughs under his breath. “It’s our grandmother’s maiden name. I enlisted under it. It’s on my driver’s license.”

Stan returns with a worn plastic bin stacked with clothes. My messenger bag is thrown on top. He thrusts it at me unceremoniously. “I’ll box up the rest of your things this weekend. You can call me, and I’ll tell you when you can pick them up.”

This is it. My entire life reduced to a box. My mother’s husband, one of the few people in this town who’d bothered to show kindness to me, reduced to another cop who hates me. I take it from him, surprised at the sudden emotion that snakes around my throat to pull tight.

“Thanks.” I turn away.

He catches my arm. “Tom.”

I stop, but I don’t turn back to face him. “What?”

“Are you okay?”

Stan always surprises me. I look at him. “Yeah. I’m okay.”

He glances at JB. “How long have you known your . . . friend?”

“Not long. He’s all right.” I begin to move away.

He lets me go, but he watches me. “Tom.”

I shove my box into the backseat, then turn to look at him. “What?”

Uncertainty almost shimmers in the air between us. “You can call me if you’re in trouble. You know that, right?”

JB climbs into the car and slams the door. My nerves are shot: the sound makes me jump.

I look back at Stan. “I tried that once. You didn’t answer.”

His face falls, and I can feel his shame. It’s amazing how emotion seems to have taken on a crystal clarity now that I’m aware of it.

I pull open the passenger door.

Stan doesn’t move, but he wants to stop me. “Tom.”

“I’ll call you next weekend.” I climb into the cab.

“I had hoped everyone was wrong about you.”

I can’t look at him. “They are wrong.”

Then I slam the door in his face.

JB doesn’t even ask if I’m okay. He can probably figure out my mental state better than I can. He just drives.

We’re a few miles down the road before I let out a breath. “That was both better and worse than I thought it would be.”

“He’s worried about you. He doesn’t trust me.” JB shrugs. “Kind of touching, really. You and he get along?”

“Yeah. Sort of. He said I was like a puppy.”

JB gives a quick burst of laughter. “A puppy?”

“Yeah. He said he wasn’t sure how to have a teenager in the house.”

“I can see that. He seemed kind of stiff.” He pauses. “Did your mom love him?”

“Yeah. She did.” I think of the excitement in her voice when she told me Stan had proposed. “He loved her, too.”

“Good,” says JB. “She deserved that much.”

And then, before I can say anything more, he reaches out and turns up the radio until it’s too loud for conversation.

 

For some reason, I thought JB would have a hard time getting Nicole out of the library. I wait in the parking lot by his car, because I’m worried she’ll panic at the sight of me.

He’s inside for less than ten seconds before she comes flying out the sliding doors. When she sees me, she storms across the parking lot.

I’m glad I’m starting to be more in tune with people’s emotional state, because I have a little warning before she takes a swing at me.

“Nicole!” I push her arm away, and she uses the other one. Thank god she’s so tiny. It’s like being attacked by a vicious kitten. “Stop it!”

“I told you I’d kick your ass if you hurt Charlotte.” She tries to smack me, and I throw an arm up. “I can’t believe I defended you. I can’t believe I
covered
for you.”

“Want me to take her down?” says JB. I’ve been so distracted trying to defend myself that I didn’t even see him come out of the library.

I’m beginning to know when he’s kidding, but he’s so deadpan that she whirls around. “Ooh, you can try. I’ll kick your ass, too.”

He glances at me, eyebrows raised, wondering if she’s for real.

“Nicole,” I say. “I just came to see if she’s okay.”

“No, she’s not okay.” Nicole’s chest is heaving, and she glares between us. “You need to get the hell out of here before I call the cops. She can’t sleep, thanks to you. She’s scared to be alone. Are you a psychopath? What the hell are you even doing here?” Suddenly, her face goes pale, and she takes a step backward, glancing between me and JB, who’s leaning against the car behind me now. A lick of fear threads through the air. “You leave me alone, Thomas Bellweather, and you, too, creepy other guy. Do you understand me? If you put so much as a
hand
on me—”

“Nicole.” I’m torn between laughing at her and crying at how serious she is. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m not going to touch you.” I put my hands up in surrender. “I just wanted to see if Charlotte was okay. Is she hurt?”

“Yeah. Okay. Like I’m falling for this.” She turns and puts up a hand. “You get out of here. I’m calling the police.”

“Nicole!”

She gives me the finger and keeps walking.

Shit.
Shit.

JB calls after her. “Don’t you want to hear what he has to say?”

Her steps slow, and she hesitates, but then keeps walking.

“He didn’t want to hurt her,” JB says. “You know that. You can feel it. Don’t you think
Charlotte
would want to know what he has to say?”

Nicole stops. Her chest is heaving, but she’s stopped.

“Holy crap,” I whisper.

“No one is going to hurt you,” JB says. “You wouldn’t be out here if you thought you were truly in danger.”

She turns around and walks back to me. Her arms lift, and I’m ready for her to try to deck me again, but instead, she throws her arms around my neck.

“I knew there had to be some mistake,” she breathes. “I knew you were too hot to be a killer.”

My brain can’t handle the one-eighty. I look at JB helplessly.

He’s looking at his phone, not even paying attention now. “You’re welcome,” he says.

I put my hands on Nicole’s arms and gently push her back. “Is Charlotte okay?”

Nicole nods. “A little banged up, but she’s okay.” She pauses. “She’s very confused. She doesn’t understand.”

I let out a breath. “I barely understand it myself.”

Her eyes narrow, just a little. Questioning. “Did you break into her room?”

“I—don’t know. Something is happening to me. I’m losing time or something. I don’t—I don’t remember doing it.”

She frowns.

“Careful,” says JB. I have his attention now.

I run my hands back through my hair. I sound insane. I’ll drive her away again. “Please. Nicole. Please just tell her I never meant to hurt her.”

Her expression sobers. She nods. “I will.”

“Tell her . . . I’m sorry.” I pause, surprised by the sudden well of emotion. My voice turns husky. “Tell her that her kindness meant everything to me. I would never . . . knowingly hurt her.”

Nicole studies me. “Is that all?”

I hesitate, then nod. “That’s all.”

“You . . . don’t want to see her?”

I put my hands to my face and rub at my eyes. “I do.” I give a choked laugh. “I want to see her so badly.”

Nicole throws her arms around my neck again. She kisses me on the cheek. “I’ll tell her.” Then she starts jogging back toward the library. “I need to get back to work!” Then she stops. “Wait. How can she get in touch with you?”

I frown. I never thought I’d be so desperate for a cell phone.

“Here.” JB hands me a small card. At first I thought it was a business card, but it’s more like an index card. All he’s written is a number.

I hold it out to Nicole. “Here.”

She hugs it to her chest. “I can’t wait to tell her.” Then she dashes back through the entrance.

“What the hell just happened?” I ask.

JB sounds bemused. “She’s something.”

“Tell me about it. Now what?”

“Now we wait.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

I
’m in Lilly’s head again. We’re watching a rom-com with Alex. His arm is across our shoulders, but otherwise, it’s the most boring first date I’ve ever been on.

Except for the other person in the room.

I haven’t really seen him. I can’t force Lilly to look at him, and once Alex told her that there was nothing to worry about, she hasn’t so much as glanced in his direction. He hasn’t said a word. He’s just
there.

It’s weird. Creepy. Unsettling.

She’s completely relaxed, like random strangers come into her house all the time. When Alex begins to play with her hair, we gaze up at him and smile.

At first, I didn’t mind going through the motions with her. Now, I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop. It’s terrifying.

I don’t want to live through this with her. When Thomas was on top of me, choking me, it was terrifying enough. I don’t want to go through Lilly’s murder. I wish I could claw my way out of her body. I wish I could get her to wake up and pay attention to what’s going on.

I can’t. I’m stuck.

The scene shifts. We’re in Lilly’s room. On her bed. Her dress has been pushed up our body, and Alex’s hands are everywhere. Stroking, caressing, sliding between her legs. Inside, I’m scrambling away, covering my eyes.

But she’s not fighting him. She’s enjoying herself. She’s happy to be here. If not for the fact that she’s fifteen, I’d be giving her a high five and telling her to enjoy herself and practice safe sex.

She moans. I really don’t want to be a part of this.

Alex laughs under his breath. “Don’t forget. We’ve got an audience.”

Lilly sucks in a breath and turns her head.

For the first time, I catch a glimpse of the stranger. He’s handsome. Young. I’ve never seen him before.

He puts a finger to his lips. “Shh. This will all be over soon.”

 

I sit upright in bed. Afternoon sunlight arcs across my wall, and for the first time in days, I’m alone in my bedroom.

That sticks in my head. I don’t know why, but it does.

“Charlotte!” My mother is calling from downstairs. “Dinner is ready!”

I rub my eyes. There’s an imprint in my cheek, and I look down at my mattress. I fell asleep on my book.

I guess I didn’t get much sleep last night.

“Coming!” I yell back. “I need a few minutes.”

My hair is a wreck. Curls everywhere. I pull it all up into a high ponytail and wash my face, then brush my teeth.

We’ve got an audience
. The words won’t get out of my head.

I prick my finger with a lancet and squeeze a drop of blood onto a test strip, letting my brain work while I wait for the meter to spit out a number.

Those four words are killing me. They’re hopping up and down in my brain, begging for me to figure them out. I’m missing some key connection, I’m sure of it.

“Charlotte!” my mother calls again. “Are you all right?”

“Just checking my sugar!” I call back, because I know she’ll leave me alone if that’s the answer.

I stare at myself in the mirror. I still have Band-Aids on my neck, and they’re beginning to look a little ratty. I carefully peel them off. The marks on my neck have scabbed over.

Lilly saw him. I saw him too, but his image is frozen somewhere in my awareness, just beyond my reach. I can’t force him back into view.

“We’ve got an audience,” I whisper.

Then I have it. The answer comes to me so quickly that I almost knock the meter in the toilet.

Thomas said it. Two nights ago. I thought he meant the girls.

Did he mean he wasn’t alone? Did my subconscious recognize someone else in the room with us?

Is that why I’m dreaming about Lilly? Is this my brain’s way of showing me a connection?

Who’s the guy in my dream? Who am I missing in this equation? Was it the same stranger in Lilly’s bedroom, or is it someone else entirely?

What did Ben say about Lilly’s murder? They had a suspect, but they couldn’t bring it together.

Was he really innocent, or had he been there and just couldn’t remember?

And what would cause that? Rohypnol? If a girl could be conscious yet not remember a rape, could a guy be drugged and coerced into murdering someone? I don’t
think
so. But maybe there’s another drug?

Too many questions. I can’t draw enough connections.

Ben must be here, because I hear his voice when I go down the stairs. Danny’s working tonight, so I know he won’t be at the table. I hear an unfamiliar voice and hesitate before rounding the corner, but Ben catches me standing at the bottom of the stairs.

“Who’s here?” I mouth to him. I’m only wearing a tank top and yoga pants.

“It’s all right,” he mouths back, then tilts his head to encourage me to come the rest of the way into the dining room.

I come around the corner and stop short.

Stan is sitting at the table next to my father. He stops talking and stands up when he sees me.

He clears his throat. “Charlotte.”

It shouldn’t, but this feels terribly awkward. He’s not Thomas’s father, and I’m not Thomas’s girlfriend.

Somehow, it feels just the same.

“I’m so sorry this happened to you,” he says, and I can tell that he is. He looks so remorseful, you’d think he had something to do with it.

“I’m okay,” I say softly.

“I never thought the boy had it in him.”

I wet my lips and glance at my father. “I didn’t either.”

My mother comes to the doorway, a casserole dish balanced between oven mitts. “There you are,” she says. “Would you mind getting the side dishes?”

I go for the green beans and the mashed potatoes, bringing them out to set on trivets at the table.

“Your ankle isn’t giving you much trouble then?” says Stan when I make a trip back for the water pitcher.

I make sure to fill my grandmother’s glass first, because I’ll hear about it later if I don’t. “It’s okay if I take it easy.”

“Are you absolutely sure he didn’t have anything to do with that?” Stan’s eyes narrow. “There’s no sense in protecting him now.”

“No. He didn’t have anything to do with it. I was stupid.”

No one at the table disagrees with me. Well, then.

I sigh and sink into my seat at the table.

“We’ve been worried he might make another attempt,” my father says.

“He didn’t give me any indication of that this morning,” said Stan. Then he looks somewhat abashed. “On second thought, maybe I’m not the best judge of character. I think I gave him a lot more passes than I should have, what with him being her son and all.”

“You saw him?” I say.

Ben’s eyes lock on mine with laser-intense focus. I ignore him.

“Yes,” Stan says. “He came for his things. Showed up with a guy named JB Augury. Said he was crashing with him.”

JB Augury
. The name means nothing to me. I frown. “Who is he?”

“I don’t know.” Stan shovels mashed potatoes onto his plate. “I was kind of hoping Tom might have mentioned him to you.”

“No. Never.”

“I snooped on Tom’s Facebook page, but he doesn’t have any friends by that name.”

I know for a fact that Thomas didn’t have any friends in town at all, so I can understand why Stan would sound concerned. Despite what happened, I’m concerned, too. As terrifying as the assault was, I still can’t shake the feeling that I’m missing something. That we’re
all
missing something. “Thomas said he was staying with this JB guy?”

“What difference does it make to you?” says Ben.

There’s no gentleness in his voice. Just metal barbs.

I look back at my plate. “I’m just curious.”

“I didn’t get a good feeling about the whole thing,” Stan says. “I would have felt better if he hadn’t made bail.”

“So would we,” my father says.

“Was this JB guy the one to post bail?” I ask.

“I don’t know,” says Stan. “It was through a bondsman.”

I don’t know what to say to that. Could this be someone Thomas knew from Baltimore? I fall silent for a while, half-listening as the table talk shifts to more innocuous subjects.

Was Thomas alone that night? Or did he have someone with him? I turn that theory over in my head and examine it from multiple angles.

“How did he get in?” I ask.

The table falls silent, and everyone looks at me. They were in the middle of a conversation about baseball.

Ben looks like he wants to kick me under the table. “Let it go, Charlotte.”

“What, because I’m a girl I can’t try to figure it out, too?”

“There’s nothing to figure out,” Ben snaps.

“Charlotte,” my grandmother chides. “We have company.”

Like I’m the one snapping at people. “I’m just saying . . . how did he get in? The door’s not broken.”

My dad’s expression is a cross between exasperated and concerned. “He didn’t break the door.” He pauses. “We don’t know how he got in.”

Something else occurs to me. “How did he know where I live?”

Mom gives me a look. “What’s with the questions?”

Ben throws his fork down so hard that it rattles against his plate. “I don’t know what he did to her, but she’s still defending him,” he says hotly. “Let it go, Charlotte.”

“I’m not a child!” I snap at him. “I wish you’d stop worrying about me and start looking at this analytically. You’re supposed to be a cop, not me.”

My mother points at the stairs. “Go,” she says. Her eyes are hard, and she’s using her I’m-your-mother-don’t-screw-with-me voice. “Upstairs. Now.”

Ben and I both shut up and look at her.

“Which one of us?” Ben says. He might be grown up and live on his own, but he still knows the voice well.

“Charlotte,” she says. “Go upstairs.”

“Fine.” I throw my napkin at the table and storm toward the stairs.

I wish this meant I’d get a free pass from clearing the table, but I’d bet good money I’ll be allowed back down in time for that.

“Take your plate with you!” Mom yells.

Ah, yes. Always protecting the blessed blood sugar. I don’t want to push her more than I already have, so I return, grab my plate, and head back for the stairs.

Ben glares at me the whole time.

I know they love me. I know they’re looking out for me. But it’s like their worry won’t let them look past the facts. The details. There’s more at work here than just a crazy guy breaking into a girl’s house to rape her. They have to see that.

A tiny, niggling voice in the back of my head warns me that I’m still romanticizing him.

I tell that voice to stick it.

JB Augury.
I wish I knew the name. It means nothing. I find it hard to believe that Thomas would find a guy to open up his home to him so quickly. Everyone around here hates him or is afraid of him.

I replay our trip to Crisfield. He’d been sketching in the car. He drew a picture of his brother. We walked through the neighborhood and met his brother’s neighbor. We stumbled over names.

I almost fall off the bed. Did he find his brother? When? Only a few hours passed between the time I dropped him off at Stan’s house and the time Thomas attacked me in my bedroom. Had he found his brother in those hours and decided to attack me? That seems like a pretty narrow window, to meet someone and commit a crime together.

My parents keep the desktop computer downstairs, next to the kitchen. Originally, it was to keep an eye on the kids and what they were doing online, but now it’s just there because that’s where we’ve gotten used to it. There’s no way I can stroll down there and start researching.

Could I text Nicole? I look at the clock. She’ll be eating dinner, and her mom would have a stroke if she started texting at the table—if Nicole has her phone with her at all. I’ve got to wait. I slide my phone back into my pocket.

Hmm.

Danny. He has a computer. And he’s at work.

I sneak down the hallway to his room and ease around the creaky spot in the floor. I tiptoe across Danny’s floor and ease myself onto his bed. His laptop is
right there
. My heart bounces around in my chest, but I keep my movement stealthy.

I fire up Google. First, I search for “Jonathan Bellweather.” I get a ton of hits—it’s not that unusual a name. I narrow it to “Jonathan Bellweather, Crisfield, Maryland.” Now I get a lot of hits about high school football. Google offers images, so I click on the link. They’re all school football game shots from six or seven years ago, interspersed with a dozen random people, half of which are women. None of this is helpful.

I try a search for “JB Augury.”

The first link is for American Bail Bonds in Crisfield.

I frown. We were parked in front of a bail bonds place when the Asian guy dragged me out of the car. Coincidence? I click on the link.

My cell phone buzzes. I’m so on edge that I almost drop the laptop.

Nicole.

I choke on air. My fingers won’t type fast enough.