Sick Remedies (Pretty Lies, Ugly Truths Duet Book 2)

by Natalie Bennett

  I grabbed two glasses and sat them on the island with more force than was necessary.

  “Sore subject?” Gabe laughed.

  I forced another smile and shook my head. “No boyfriend. Haven’t had one of those since high school.”

  “Yeah, Janine told me you were all alone out here. I didn’t believe it at first.”

  Years of perfecting my poker face was the only thing that stopped the unease I felt from making an appearance. If he knew I was alone, why did he ask who I lived with?

  “Janine?” I feigned confusion.

  “The secretary down at Parker Realty.”

  Oh, the man was an idiot. And a fucking liar. No surprise there. Everyone I encountered as of late lied about something.

  I went to the fridge and fetched a lemon, not letting on that he’d outed himself. Mispronouncing the name of Mr. Parker’s very own company could have been overlooked as a simple mishap, but I knew that wasn’t the case right now.

  I placed the lemon on the island, trading it for the glasses. Reaching past Gabe gave me ample opportunity to examine the envelope he had yet to relinquish his hold on.

  He was gripping the top of it with both hands, failing to hide that he’d already opened it.

  “Do you know what’s inside the file Lance left?” I asked, filling our glasses with water.

  “Some papers on your house, maybe?”

  Seriously? What bullshit. “Oh, yeah.”

  I placed the glasses back down and grabbed a knife from the chef block on the counter. Gabe, if that was even his name, didn’t bat an eye at my choice of cutlery. He was too busy staring at the back of my checkered shorts.

  “You know you didn’t have to drive all the way out here. I would have come down to the office.”

  I cut into the lemon, splitting off a piece to hang on the side of his glass.

  “Did you tell Janine that?”

  “She would have already known.” I slid the water to him and pretended to busy myself with my own lemon slice.

  “Hm,” he hummed beneath his breath.

  A silent clock ticked inside my head. With every second this man sat at my kitchen island, the desire to get him out of my house grew. My intuition was screaming at me that he wasn’t here on a friendly social visit. Not to mention he’d already looked at something he had no business seeing.

  Your average person wasn’t going to open a package addressed to a stranger. It was silly to think he’d be here to help me. Anyone on my father’s side kept winding up dead. Was that why he was here?

  Shit. No. I was such an idiot! I knew what he wanted. The same thing the person who killed Pamela Reedsy, and the Parkers, had no doubt been after. What I’d killed to keep hidden.

  Drumming four fingers on the smooth marble, I flashed Gabe another smile and took a sip of my water. He was nearly done with his already, greedily chugging it like he was parched from days in the sun.

  I sat my glass down, and discreetly grabbed hold of the knife I’d used for the lemon, firming my grip on its solid handle. Gabe shifted slightly in his seat. I caught a small glimpse of the gun he’d managed to keep hidden from me.

  Why did he have that? He obviously wasn’t a cop, and I’d just confirmed my suspicions that he wasn’t here for the reason he said he was. All these things placed him firmly in enemy territory.

  Like a switch being flipped, everything but self-preservation vanished from my mind. If he went for his piece, my chances of doing anything other than what he wanted were non-existent. I wasn’t faster than a bullet.

  I’d be damned if I let this man get the upper hand. I skirted around the island, making a move before he could. The knife met flesh, soft and tender. There was a satisfying squish as the tip of the blade sank into his side.

  A pained scream tore from his mouth. I turned the handle, forcing it deeper, splitting his skin on either side. Staring right into his surprised beady eyes, I gave one last twist, shoving the blade until it refused to go any further, watching the shiny metal disappear completely.

  My hands started to slip, I reaffirmed my hold, pulling the knife back out with little effort. Gabe grabbed his side as if to close the wound with his fingers’, an agonized sound coming from between his lips.

  “You bitch,” he choked out, falling from the stool. He tried to right himself, vomiting clear liquid all over my floor in the process.

  I stepped back, still holding onto the knife, hands sticky with his blood. I moved in again and pressed the blade to his throat, fisting the hair that had been lying so irritatingly perfect atop his head.

  “Tell me the truth. Who are you?”

  Something garbled came in response. I felt his body growing heavier, and relinquished my hold, watching him slump to the floor. I hadn’t really been expecting an answer. I was merely curious if he would tell me anything.

  I rescued the envelope before it could become saturated with blood, and rested my back against the island.

  On the floor, Gabe’s body began to twitch. He reached for me, a plea for mercy on his lips. Had the tables been turned, I knew he wouldn’t have shown me an ounce of compassion. I knocked his hand away and moved further out of reach.

  Minutes dragged by until he took one last ragged breath, going utterly still. Silence returned to my home, bringing an odd sense of comfort with it. I glanced around the kitchen, breathing in the metallic tinge of fresh blood and the nauseating stench of lemon-y vomit.

  I placed the knife on the island, and then squatted down to do a quick search of Gabe’s body. I didn’t bother removing the gun. It wasn’t like he’d be using it, and I wasn’t looking to horde stolen Glocks. Feeling something square and solid in his right pocket, I reached in to grab it.

  “Bingo,” I muttered, pulling out a brown leather wallet. Once glance at the ID confirmed his name was certainly not Gabe.

  He was Tony Roland. My second kill. Thirty-four-years-old, married, and from Daytona. That was a few thousand miles away from my little town.

  For the first time since this all began, I started to wonder just how far-reaching this all went. I still didn’t fully understand what Dad had been involved in.

  I searched through the rest of the wallet but didn’t find anything else of importance. There were a few credit cards, a receipt for a Big Mac meal, and a picture of Tony with his arm wrapped around a curly haired woman. Two young boys stood at their side. His family I assumed. He wouldn’t be returning to them. But whose fault was that?

  I knew firsthand how it felt to lose a parent, two at that. I didn’t feel sorry for them, or for what I’d just done. Later, maybe that was when the guilt would set in. Unlike the first time, I might be remorseful for taking a life, feel sick for enjoying the way the knife pierced his flesh.

  Right now, all I cared about was someone discovering my heinous crime. The first kill was not but a few weeks old.

  Could I cope with two? What happened if I got to three? It made me think of something my mother used to say. “We’re all a few genetics away from being insane.”

  The problem with that? I didn’t think of myself as crazy, and she definitely was. I still held firm to the belief I was nothing like her. I didn’t want to be. I’d have given anything to be the girl I spent so long pretending I was—shy and sweet. Not this recluse who used liquor to soothe her soul and hid her darkness in swirls on a canvas.

  A killer.

  A liar.

  Hedonistic.

  I blinked, bringing myself back to the moment. What was I doing? I didn’t have time for this. I needed to get this man’s body out of here before Emery came back, or worse, Rhett showed up.

  I took another look at Gabe’s ID to memorize his zip code, and then pocketed one of his credit cards at random.

  Once the wallet was snugly back in his pocket, I took in the blood all over my floor and island, contemplating what I should do with him. Dragging him out the back door wasn’t an option. My garage would have been perfect if not for the lack of hiding place
s. And, of course, there was the issue of him eventually beginning to smell.

  That only left one other spot to stash his body. I went to the kitchen sink to gather what I would need. A few heavy-duty trash bags to start with.

  I’d need the entire box judging by the size of him. I tore one free and bagged his lower half, repeating the process twice more before moving onto his upper body. When both ends were wrapped, I used another few bags to roll him up burrito style.

  By the time I was finished my arms felt as if they were going to pop out of their sockets. I used my shoulder to swipe a few droplets of sweat off my face, dreading having to move this man all the way to the basement. For once I was glad that Emery worked a good hour and fifteen minutes away. She would just be arriving if traffic flowed smoothly.

  I knew from experience her co-workers and boss would keep her talking for a bit. This all worked in my favor since it would take me nearly twenty minutes to get Tony downstairs.

  Careful not to tear any of the bags, I managed to get him across the vinyl without incident, using a clean patch on my shirt to open the door, and then flip on the light.

  A strong, dank smell floated up from below. When Mom was alive, this odor was non-existent. She made sure of that.

  Using the lone bare bulb hanging from the ceiling as a guide, I began to ease Tony down the steps. Emery never set foot here, she said it freaked her out. I wasn’t sure she even remembered that we had a deep freezer sitting in the back room. That would be Tony’s resting spot.

  The thing was rusting from old age, and made a faint humming noise, but it worked. I lifted the lid and pulled out the few frozen dinners that had been abandoned within it.

  The golf club I’d taken from the Reedsies had frosted to the side. Martin’s blood was barely visible anymore. I stared at the club for a minute, thinking of that night.

  I’d debated with myself many times about what I had done, denying the truth. Over the past few weeks, every time someone mentioned what a good person I was, I’d be reminded of the man’s head I bashed in.

  He’d known me since I was a little girl. He and Pamela, his wife, were like the grandparents I never had. All he’d wanted to do was hand over what my father had given me to look after, to keep himself self. I couldn’t let him do it.

  I knew if I could take his life in such a brutal fashion, I wouldn’t hesitate to kill again. Today confirmed what I’d been trying to deny, but I still wasn’t at a place where I could truly admit it to myself. So, I was going to place this body in my freezer, and then go upstairs to clean up the blood and vomit that was all over the kitchen floor.

  Before I left town, I’d have the car in the driveway towed. No one was going to know what happened to Tony Roland. On the off chance someone discovered him, it would save me from having to tell the truth.

  Everyone in town would know I was never as innocent as they made me out to be.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  NOVA

  Chaos entered my life without having the decency to knock first. It brought snakes to my garden, and enough pain to last me until I was gray. And still, it wasn’t done with me yet. In some alternate reality I had to of been a nightmare, far worse than the one I was becoming now.

  Maybe that was the point.

  Everything has balance, right? You get back what you put out in the world. It came full circle with my belief that sooner or later we all had to deal with the consequences of our actions. And because of that, I was totally screwed.

  I sat at the dining table, checking my phone every few minutes with more than a little impatience. My bags were packed, the blood was gone, the body hidden. I’d even texted Emery an address for where she could meet me.

  I still wasn’t entirely sold on the idea of taking her along for my grand escape, but if I decided to leave her behind, it was going to be somewhere safe.

  That was ten minutes ago.

  I should have been gone by now. Instead I was sitting here with my father’s urn in front of me, the contents of the envelope off to the left, and a near empty bottle on my right. It was the same one I’d been nursing before I went to see Rhett. What a major turn of events that wound up leading to.

  The day I met him, my life which was already in a tailspin, started to spin a little faster. I saw him in the super-market, and felt like an awe-struck schoolgirl.

  I knew he was exactly the kind of trouble a girl like me didn’t need. He’d all too easily managed to disarm me of all my defenses, finding a way past the wall I had constructed around myself.

  I’d accepted that sooner or later what we had between us would end. All good things did. It was meant to be a summer fling. I’d never be in any position to love a man like him.

  I knew my battered heart would be a little more torn the second he left town. It would make me question things. I’d been prepared for all of that. I thought he’d be worth it. I’d felt so much with him in such a small amount of time.

  He made me feel as if everything in my world would be okay, even as it crashed and burned around me. I never thought, couldn’t have imagined, that he would be the one holding the explosive.

  Worse was the way I’d come to need him in such a short amount of time. He a drug, gradually becoming the sweetest kind of poison. Coming to terms with the fact he wouldn’t be in life anymore made me want to break into a million pieces.

  I hated things had turned out this way. He took away the pain, and then he slowly gave it back. I didn’t want the heartache or the confusion. I already had enough to deal with. I didn’t want to hurt anymore. But that was my life. It never stopped hurting. I just had to take things a day at a time and numb the pain as best as I could.

  I checked my cell again, the only notice of time the minutes changing on its display. I lifted the bottle of liquor, and gave it a gentle shake, watching the contents swirl about in a gentle vortex. One long sip brought a satisfying burn to my throat. This was the last I could take, though, no matter how much I wanted more.

  Being drunk was the last thing I needed. A good buzz on the other hand wouldn’t hurt. Examining the contents of the envelope for thousandth time, I sighed and sat the bottle back down. There were names I didn’t recognize, each coordinating with a line of symbols and numbers that looked suspiciously like hieroglyphics.

  Why on earth would Dad or Mr. Parker have this left for me? I’d wanted answers, instead I got another impossible riddle. I stared at Dad’s urn, wishing I could resurrect him so I could kill him myself. All of this was his entire fault.

  I grabbed the navy cannister and pried the lid off the top. This was all that was left of him. Mom was buried in the cemetery just outside of town. I hadn’t been to see her in a while. Maybe I’d stop on my way out. I flipped Dad’s urn over, and watched his ashes rain out, spilling into a pile on the table.

  A small flash drive landed soundlessly on top of the gritty mountain. I lifted it, blowing pieces of Dad from between its little crevices. This small hunk of plastic was the root of so many problems.

  Like every other clue he’d left for me, I didn’t understand what it was for. I’d hooked it to my laptop and hadn’t been able to make it beyond the extensive password encryption someone had coded it with. Probably the same person who was smart enough to write with the Egyptian alphabet.

  I rubbed a hand over my face. I was no closer to figuring this situation out than I had been a month ago. All I knew for certain was that people were dying over this device. I’d killed two men because of it. If not for my mother, my father more than likely would have died for it too. In a totally messed up sort of way, she’d done him a favor.

  My phone vibrated with an incoming text. I read it over quickly.

  Finally. Shoving the flash-drive into my pocket, I gathered up the envelopes contents and then pushed away from the table.

  I could leave now.

  Right after I made one last pit stop.

  I stared into my parents’ bedroom, taking in all their untouched things. It’d been mon
ths, and I still couldn’t bring myself to pack their belongings away. It wasn’t as if they would be returning home from their trip and picking up where we all left off.

  As with everything else, the finality of emptying this room was one I wasn’t ready to deal with yet. I hadn’t come to terms with what happened. I’m not sure I ever would. No matter how many times I looked in here, I always asked myself the same questions.

  What was she thinking that morning?

  Did she know I’d never see her again?

  Were her actions premeditated, or did she simply snap?

  I stepped over the threshold, and immediately felt weighed down by melancholy. It clung to me like an anchor at my feet. Sunlight streamed through the slits in the curtains, doing nothing to change the depressing shade of gray coating the walls.

  My sole reason for coming in here sat on my mother’s nightstand, the bottles still neatly arranged. It was amazing what a tiny capsule of drugs could do. Sad how quickly the effects of them faded when they were no longer being taken.

  As I surveyed Mom’s collection of prescribed goods, a small voice in my head told me to stop and think about what I was doing, wait until I had all the facts. This was contradictory to what I’d claimed less than an hour ago.

  I’d told myself that Nika wasn’t important right now. I tried to shut down any train carrying thoughts of her, but it wasn’t that simple. The way things were going this might have been my last chance to do anything at all. If the trickle of paranoia that was riding the coattails of my disgust turned out to be a valid concern…Well, I’d cross that bridge when I got to it.

  After selecting a bottle from the nightstand, I stashed it inside my purse. Next step was retrieving Rhett’s gun from the closet. A second text from Nika came in as I made my way downstairs.

  She had no idea of the things that had transpired in the past twenty-four hours, clear across town in her own little bubble. I was surprised Emery hadn’t filled her in, but this kept things working in my favor.