Two Thousand Miles (23 page)

Ray was still parked in front of my house.

“Who’s the tail?” Olivia asked.

“My bodyguard,” I deadpanned.

Olivia laughed, “Seriously?” Her tone implying that my body didn’t need guarding.

“It wasn’t my idea,” I snapped.

“Chill out,” she demanded. “You’re going to get premature wrinkles or high blood pressure if you don’t.”

I shook my head, biting my tongue. I wanted to get out of the car. I knew Ray couldn’t have been too far behind us. He would pick me up.

“You’re not going anywhere,” Olivia said, as if she’d read my mind.

“I didn’t say a word.”

“I know you, you didn’t have to.”

I exhaled hard and sat in silence until Olivia stopped the car. I didn’t recognize the house she’d parked
in front of.

“Who lives here?” I asked.

“Do you remember that guy I was crushing on last summer?”

“That guy everybody called
Mav?” I frowned, hoping it wasn’t.

“Yes, him.
This is his house.”

“Are you and Maverick a thing now?”

“Not yet.” Olivia winked at me. I rolled my eyes as I got out of the car.

I reluctantly followed Olivia to the back of the house. A crowd of people w
as gathered around a small fire in the yard. Girls mostly.
Figured
. Any guy who nicknamed himself after a character in one of the all time greatest chick flicks was bound to get laid a lot. In my opinion, he looked more like Goose than Maverick, but he was still cute—in a pretty sort of way. His looks weren’t what had the girls in a tizzy though. What incited such an attraction to Mav—real name Gary Bruster—was that he had been an actual pilot in the air force. No one bothered with the fact that he had retired from that job at twenty-two. He was twenty-five when Olivia met him. She’d had a fit over him; he was all I heard about for two months solid. 

“Hey, why are you trying to get with
Mav now?” I asked.

“Because
now
,” she griped, “I’m eighteen.”

“You’re not here to sleep with him are you?”

Olivia laughed, “So what if I am?”

“You’re a virgin,” I said, my voice hushed so no one would hear. She couldn’t lose it to an ex-pilot
manwhore in a house full of people.

“I’m not a virgin.”

“What—when?” I gasped. Olivia had not only been famous around Malibu for the color of her lip-gloss, she was also known for being a monumental tease. She’d always said that being a tease was better than being a slut—until now, apparently.

“Cannes or Paris.
Paris—I think. It was sort of a blur. The boys there loved me.” She shot me a glowing smile. “Since my daddy made me go on that trip, I took his advice to take in
everything
France had to offer.”
Gross
.

“Jesus,
Liv,” I frowned.

“You can’t judge me, Kat,” she snapped. “You just lied to my face. My dad told me you weren’t in Ojai.”

“If you knew I wasn’t in Ojai, why did you ask me how it was?”

“Because I thought you might tell me where you actually were instead of lying.”

“Kind of like your dad, I guess. He asked me about Ojai, too. It’s none of his business. Where I was is nobody’s business.”

“Fine,” Olivia snapped. “Just like what and who I did in France is none of yours.” Olivia walked away from me and straight to
Mav, who was surrounded by a group of bobble heads—super skinny girls wearing hardly anything, agreeing with, and laughing at every dumb ass thing Maverick said.

I wondered why Olivia had brought me with her. She didn’t need me to talk Maverick into taking her to bed. He wasn’t picky. He pretty much gave it to
any girl who wanted it.

I looked around the yard, spotting a couple people I’d known of in high school. I would gravitate toward
them if I got desperate for someone to talk to. I didn’t see anyone I actually knew and felt so out of place, like an outsider.

I was about to tell Olivia I was leaving when Caleb
Brasheers stopped me. He smiled at me, obviously not recognizing me with dark hair. I’d elbowed Caleb in the gut junior year for pawing me like I was his possession when we were out on our one and only date.

Caleb grabbed Olivia’s arm to get her attention. “Who’s your friend?” he asked. She turned around and laughed when she saw me. “That’s Kat, stupid.”

“Kat Parker?” His eyes bugged out.

“Duh,” Olivia bellowed.

Caleb looked at me and laughed. “If I were you, I’d be incognito, too—if I even dared to show my face at all.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I heard the SEC is going to investigate Manger because of your dad.”

“What—where did you hear that?” I asked.

“My dad is a client. Duh,” he growled at Olivia. “And apparently the Securities and Exchange Commission thinks your dad is a lying, filthy thief, Parker.”

“My father is no thief!” I barked at Caleb. I looked at Olivia “Did you know about this?” I asked, feeling somehow like she’d set me up.

“How would I have known? I was on the other side of the world until three hours ago.”

“Because if the SEC is talking to Manger clients, your father knows why and he hasn’t been shy about sharing everything else he knows about me and my dad with you.”

“He doesn’t tell me everything, Kat. I didn’t know, I swear,” she said, and for the first time that night, the Olivia I’d missed all summer had surfaced. The best friend I remembered.

“I have to get out of here,” I said
, and started to walk away.

“Her dad’s still in the hospital, dickhead,” Olivia spit at Caleb.

“So!” he snapped back. “That shit’s his fault too. It’s called personal responsibility.”

I was thankful I’d walked far enough out of earshot to hear the rest of their argument. I was also thankful that Ray was sitting out front waiting for me. Having a babysitter had its perks, I thought as I helped myself into the car.
“Where to?” Ray asked. “Marion’s,” I said. I had a shitload of questions for her.

Marion was sitting on her couch with her legs stretched out, resting on the glass coffee table in front of her. She was wearing black yoga pants, a baggy gray top, and had a large glass of red wine adhered to her mouth.

“SEC investigation,” I said, angrily.

“How do you know about that?” Marion asked. She put her glass of wine on the table and sat up straight on the couch.

“Because I went out with Olivia
, and some jerk-off that I couldn’t stand in high school, called my father a filthy, lying, thief. He said Manger was going to be investigated because of my dad.”

“Sit down,” Marion said, and patted a place on the couch
next to her. “About a week before your dad was shot, he caught Veronica rifling through the files in his office at Manger. She said it was because she thought he was cheating. He didn’t buy it, but let her think he had. He knew that keeping a close eye on her would be the best way to find out what she was really after.”

“That night…his office was a wreck,” I said.

“Your father came to me several months ago and told me he had some information that could be damning to the company, but felt he couldn’t ignore it. Someone at Manger was stealing money from clients by reporting investment losses when there had been gains—” “And that person was pocketing the gain,” I interrupted. “But who was it?”

“He didn’t tell me and now he doesn’t remember any of it. My firm did some digging into Veronica’s background. She lived in Vegas. She danced in one of the clubs out there.”

“She was a stripper?”

“A showgirl.”

“Why was she here?”

“We think whoever was stealing from clients at Manger knew your dad had evidence against them that he planned to turn over to the SEC and hired Veronica to get close to him and find it
before that could happen. I feel like my team and I are very close to finding out who hired her. We’re still in dangerous territory here, Kat, which is why I don’t want you to go anywhere without Ray until we figure it out.”

“Okay,” I agreed. “But what about my dad, is he being protected?”

“I’ve got a plain clothes surveillance team planted in the hospital to keep him protected. And his room is bugged, so don’t say anything you wouldn’t want me to hear,” she smiled.

“Thanks for the head’s up. Can I have some of that wine now?” I asked.

Marion laughed, shaking her head no.

“Your sister would let me,” I taunted.

“I’m not my sister,” she warned with a smile before getting up and taking her glass of wine to her bedroom.

The landline rang twice, a minute or so later Marion peeked her head around the corner of the living room. “That was the front desk, Olivia’s on her way up,” she said.

“I’m sorry
. I didn’t tell her she could come here.”

“It’s okay. Just stay out of my booze, and do not repeat anything I told you tonight,” she said
before going back to her room.

“I know it’s late,” Olivia said as soon as I opened the door. “But I wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“I’m fine.”

“I didn’t really hump all of France,” Olivia whined. “I was just mad that you lied to me about Ojai.”

“I never thought you humped
all
of France. I didn’t know Marion told everybody I was in Ojai until your dad said something. It caught me off guard. I wasn’t sure what to say.”

“So, where were you?”

We sat down on opposite ends of the sofa. I covered us with a cream chenille blanket that was still warm from where I’d been wrapped up in it before she arrived.

“Your silence is starting to scare me,” Olivia said, adjusting her part of the blanket.

“Slidell, Louisiana.”

“Where?”
Olivia’s mouth was as wide as her eyebrows were high. I gave her a look that said I wasn’t repeating myself. “Marion’s sister and her kids live there. I stayed with them.”

“So
, how was that?” Olivia asked out of the corner of her mouth. I knew she was picturing the slummiest place ever imaginable in her head.

“Better than I expected. It was different, so much so, that at first, I didn’t think I’d survive. But I was actually really sad to leave.”

Olivia frowned. “What’s his name?”

“What?”

“The reason you were sad to leave?”

“I wasn’t sad to leave only because of him. It was all of them—the whole family. I got to experience what having a big family would be like and I loved it.”

“Name?” Olivia demanded, ignoring the rest of my statement.

“Mason.

“So
, are you going to leave me now to become a swamp person?” Olivia asked, her tone sarcastic. I shook my head and shrugged my shoulders. I didn’t know how to tell her that that was exactly what I wanted. Malibu didn’t feel like home to me anymore. Slidell did.

“Kat.”
Olivia jerked forward. “You’re going back, aren’t you?” she asked, accusingly.

“I can’t go anywhere right now.”

“But if you could, you would go back!” she shrieked. “Why would you leave Malibu? You have everything you could ever want here.”

“Not everything,” I said quietly.

“Are you talking about that Mason guy?” she gasped. “You’d seriously move two- thousand miles away from your home to be with a hillbilly named after a jar.”

“He’s not a hillbilly.”

“How long have you known him?”

“
Since day one.”

“So…” she counted in her head. “Ten weeks! A guy you’ve known ten weeks is now the love of your life?” she barked.

“Why are you being so mean?” I asked.

“Wow,” she marveled, shaking her head. “You can’t love him, Kat, you hardly know him.”

“Don’t
wow
me,” I griped. “You’re chasing a twenty-six year old loser who lives off of his parent’s money.”

“He’s a pilot!”

“Was a pilot! Now he’s a douche who wears an aviator jacket trying to live vicariously through a character in a movie that came out when he was a fucking toddler!” I was standing up with my finger pointed in Olivia’s face. Surprisingly, instead of punching me, or calling me a clueless bitch, she laughed. She laughed so hard she was shaking.

“What the hell is so funny?” I spit.

“You,” she said. “Maybe you
should
go back to the swamp, Kat, because you sure as hell aren’t the same girl that’s been my best friend for the last four years.”

“You know what, Olivia? You don’t seem the same to me either.”

“I am the same, Kat. And you used to be just like me.”

“I’m sorry that I’m no longer the self involved bitch you remember.”