“Prison.” Luke’s eyes practically sparkle with anticipation. “You have an idea. I can see it.”
I do have an idea. . . . “Holden sells.”
“Drugs?” Luke frowns as we step into the park. “Like, pot? Because that’s not really much of a—”
“Not just pot.” I lead us toward the swings, which are empty at eight thirty in the morning. “Prescription meds, mostly.”
“Why? He doesn’t need the money.”
“Genesis says he does it because it puts him in demand.” I sink into the left-hand swing and grip the chains, rocking back and forth softly with my feet still on the ground. “He likes to be the guy everyone’s looking for at any party.” As if Holden Wainwright isn’t already popular enough.
“Wow.” Luke drops his bag and takes the swing next to mine, but his gaze is unfocused, and I know what that means. He’s thinking. “Okay, so all we need is proof.”
“What kind of proof?”
“Well, a witness would be ideal, but no one’s going to come forward. So, a record of a deal? A text, maybe?” He twists in his swing to face me, brows arched high. Smile wide. “My parents will be at work until six. How do you feel about a skip-day pizza-and-text-reading extravaganza at my house?”
“I feel great about that.”
“I’ll buy if you drive,” he says as he grabs his bag.
“Deal.” We’re already headed back toward school, to get my car. “But how are we going to get Holden’s texts? Do we need to steal his phone?”
“Nope.” Luke’s almost left me behind, as if his brain is moving so fast the rest of him has to too. “His phone is new since the jungle, right?” he asks, and I nod. “So it won’t get us much, unless he’s sold something in the past few days. Which isn’t likely, considering the microscope he’s been under. But his old phone . . .”
“His old phone got left—and probably blown up—in the jungle.”
“Yes, but his cloud account didn’t,” Luke points out. “If he’s like most of us, every text, email, and photo he ever had on that old phone is still up on the cloud, waiting to be discovered. Or used in a plot to send him to prison.”
“And you know how to hack into the cloud?”
Luke turns to give me the hottest nerd smile in the world. “I know how to do a lot of things.”
I don’t want to see anyone.
GENESIS
“G?” Indiana’s voice echoes from down the hall, but I don’t answer. I don’t want to see anyone right now. Not even him. “Genesis?”
He pushes my bedroom door open, and I realize too late that I should have locked it. Or at least closed it. “Hey.” He rounds the end of the bed and sinks onto the floor next to me. “I’ve been calling you.”
“I left my phone in my car.” On purpose. “Did the reporters see you come in?”
“Yeah, but they might not have been able to tell it was me through the tinted windows. And the plates are registered to your dad, so . . .”
My dad had lent Indiana his SUV so he wouldn’t be stuck at the house while I was at school.
“It doesn’t matter anymore,” I tell him. “I still can’t believe he did it.” I sniffle and press my palms to my eyes. They come away smeared with eyeliner. “I mean, I knew he was mad about the video, but I didn’t think he’d go nuclear.”
Indiana shrugs, and somehow the gesture actually looks comforting. “The thing about playing your big card is that once you’ve played it, your hand is empty.”
“Only Holden’s hand isn’t empty. He’s still got the drug-trafficking card. And the terrorist card. And the illegitimate half-brother card, if he really wants to humiliate my dad and Aunt Daniela.”
“But how much worse could those cards be, G?” Indiana puts a hand on each of my knees and turns me on the floor to face him. “You’ve been trying to protect your family this whole time, but did it ever occur to you that they might want to protect you, if they knew they had that option? That if they knew he was holding you hostage, they might rather the truth come out than see you suffer?”
I shake my head. “I can’t put Maddie and her mom through anything more.”
“But, G, I don’t think Holden can either. Not really. What Maddie’s dad did isn’t her fault and it isn’t her mother’s fault. And those of us who were in the jungle with you, we all know Maddie wasn’t in on it. She and her mother are David’s victims just as much as anyone. Most people will understand that, if you give them the chance. And at least then it’ll be out in the open.”
I want to believe he’s right. But my faith in humanity isn’t exactly soaring at the moment. And even if he is right . . . “Indiana, my dad—”
He takes my hands and squeezes them. “Your dad’s already cut his deal with the feds. So as long as you don’t violate the NDA you signed, can things really get worse than they are right now? Hasn’t Holden already done all the damage he can?”
“I . . .” I frown, trying to think through the chaos in my head. “I mean, maybe.” Outting my dad and my uncle might earn him another news cycle’s worth of attention, but legally, that wouldn’t hurt my family or me any more than what he’s already done. And emotionally . . . we’re already traumatized.
“Stop living like a hostage and you won’t be one, G.”
I nod slowly. Then I climb into his lap and lay my head on his shoulder. Indiana’s arms wrap around my back and I press my face into his neck, breathing him in.
Something about him—about being this close to him—is calming. It’s as if chaos can’t quite touch him. As if it can’t touch me, when I’m with him.
I relax against his chest, sinking into this moment of calm, and for the first time since I can remember, in spite of the mayhem my life has become, I feel focused.
The way forward seems clear.
I’m not sure everything will be quite as easy as he’s made it sound, but Indiana’s right about at least one thing: I can’t let Holden Wainwright have any more power over me.
2 DAYS, 9 HOURS EARLIER
The rules don’t apply to him.
MADDIE
“How’s it coming?” I ask as I pick up another slice of pizza. There’s a grease stain on Luke’s comforter because we put the box on the bed, but he hasn’t noticed. I don’t think he cares.
“Asking that every five minutes doesn’t help.”
“But if I don’t ask, I don’t know.” I set the slice on the greasy napkin next to his mouse pad.
“Fair enough. I haven’t found his account yet.”
“So, what are we hoping to get from this? Do you honestly think he’d keep records of drug deals?”
“No. But then again, I’m surprised every time I hear about some idiot getting arrested because of something he posted on YouTube. Even smart people are stupid, and Holden’s the kind of guy who thinks the rules don’t apply to him.”
“Truer words were never said.”
Luke gives me a smile as he picks up his pizza.
A few minutes later, he leans back in his chair and rolls it toward me on the worn carpet. “Okay. I’m in.” He looks both relieved and astonished, and for the first time, I realize he wasn’t at all sure he could do this. Until he did.
“Holy crap. Will he be able to tell someone was in his account?”
“Maybe. But that won’t matter. If we find something, we’re turning him in, right? He’ll definitely know then.” Luke scoots his chair up to the desk again. “Do you know who he sold to most often?”
“No idea. Ryan went to a bunch of their parties, but that wasn’t my thing.”
“You went to at least one,” Luke points out, and I follow his gaze to the jagged scar on my left upper arm. The scar I got when I tried to match Ryan drink for drink—my misguided attempt to make a point about his drinking problem—and passed out on a glass bottle. “Did you see anything? Have any names that might help?”
“Um . . .” I close my eyes and think back. That night is mostly a blur. “I didn’t know mos
t of the people there.”
“Okay then.” He clears his throat and turns back to the keyboard. “I guess we’re reading texts.”
After two hours of reading Holden’s messages, I am both exhausted and disgusted. It turns out there is no truer window into the human soul than a peek at someone’s texts and as I’d already suspected, Holden’s soul is as dark as espresso, and twice as bitter. Unfortunately, other than a few vague and suspicious agreements he made with his friends to “meet at the place” and “bring the stuff,” we find nothing concrete.
Veronica Mars, I am not.
“Okay, I need a break,” I declare, pushing my folding chair back from Luke’s desk. “Can you pull up his pictures? If we can’t find anything incriminating in his texts”—and we’ve already discovered he rarely uses email—“maybe we can just post a humiliating picture of him.”
“Nothing nude,” Luke insists as he pulls up Holden’s pictures. “I don’t think my eyes could take it.”
For a few minutes, we laugh at Holden’s selfies. Then Luke decides to run some numbers. As it turns out, Holden takes an average of twenty-eight selfie variations of any one pose/location before he comes up with an image he likes well enough to post. But he doesn’t delete them. It’s as if he can’t bear to part with a single picture of himself.
“Oooh, what’s that one?” I point at a thumbnail image with a triangular play button in the middle. I hate to admit it, but this has become fun. “He has a bunch of videos. Please let him have one where he’s singing with a brush for a microphone.”
Luke clicks play. The video is somehow both repulsive and boring. It’s Holden complaining about the barista who made his coffee wrong a week before we left for Colombia. His condescending and insulting tone makes my blood boil. “Even if he never posted this anywhere, we could use it to show the world what an arrogant, entitled, bigoted asshole he is.”
“I think the part of the world that would care already knows.” Luke plays the next video, which is frozen on a familiar face—Penelope’s.
“Hey, Holden!” she says into the camera, and the angle of her arm makes it clear that she’s the one holding it. “So, we’ve stolen your phone so we can record a few secret birthday messages for you.”
The camera spins around unsteadily and I catch a blurry glimpse of a dimly lit room full of people. Music pounds from speakers in the background, and most of the bodies are moving in time with the beat.
“I think that’s his eighteenth birthday party. That would have been . . . a month ago?”
“March eighth, according to the date in the metadata,” Luke confirms.
“Aaron!” Penelope calls off screen as the shot zooms in on a guy I’ve never seen before, holding a damp bottle of beer. “What do you want to say to Holden on his birthday?”
We watch for several minutes as Holden’s mostly drunk friends record shout-outs for him. Most of them are depressingly uninspired and delivered with slurred speech.
I’m about to tell Luke to click on the next video when the camera catches Holden himself, from several feet away. He’s talking to another guy I’ve never seen before, both of them illuminated in a fall of light from an open doorway.
Neda’s voice giggles over the speaker. “He still doesn’t know we have his phone!”
Penelope appears in front of the lens again, still talking to the future-Holden who will later find this video. But over her shoulder, the other guy gives Holden a folded bill. In return, Holden gives him something in a small clear plastic bag. The other guy opens the bag immediately and throws two pills into his mouth. Then he swallows them dry.
“Holy crap . . . ,” I breathe.
Luke turns to me with a smile. “Maddie, I think we’ve got him.”
I don’t want to talk.
GENESIS
“Genesis!” A door slams downstairs. My father is home. And he’s clearly seen the news.
“Princesa!” he shouts again, and I hear his footsteps clomping up the stairs, then down the hall toward us.
“I don’t want to talk to him,” I whisper, hunkering down behind my bed. I know Indiana’s been texting him, and I suspect he asked my dad to give me some space. That’s the only reason I can think of that he would wait until lunchtime to come home.
“He’s going to find you, even if you don’t answer,” Indiana points out in a matching whisper. “Your own room isn’t a very stealthy place to hide.”
I laugh because I’ve cried all I can cry. And because he’s right.
“Genesis!” My bedroom door flies open and crashes into the wall.
“She’s fine.” Indiana lets go of me to stand, and reluctantly, I let him pull me up. Then I meet my father’s gaze. I don’t know what to say. So I say nothing.
“Why didn’t you answer your phone?” he asks from the doorway.
“Because I don’t want to talk.”
My father steps into the room and his gaze takes me in, lingering on my face. I’m sure it’s swollen from crying. He doesn’t ask if I’m okay. I’m clearly not.
He doesn’t ask if what Holden said is true.
It clearly is.
“We’re meeting with my lawyers at nine in the morning,” he says at last. “The whole team will be there. Jeff”—his primary attorney—“thinks we have grounds for a lawsuit, but I’m not sold on that because it may ultimately shoot us in the foot.”
“Dad, I don’t want—”
“Genesis, if the government brings charges, we need to be prepared. And we will be.” He won’t let this go. And maybe he’s right. But . . .
“School starts at eight. I can’t go see your lawyers.”
My father blinks at me in incomprehension, as if that’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever said. Indiana only smiles and squeezes my hand.
“No one will expect you to be at school.” My father exhales slowly and catches my gaze as if whatever he’s going to say next will be significant.
“I’m not going to hide.” I stand up straighter. This pity party is over. “That’s what Holden expects. That’s what he wants.”
“Meeting with our attorneys isn’t hiding, Genesis.” My father turns toward the door. “Lunch will be here in half an hour. We’ll talk about this then.”
“No, we won’t,” I snap, and he turns around sharply, anger and pity at war behind his eyes. “You don’t need me there when you meet with your lawyers.”
“I most certainly—”
“You don’t even know if you can pay for your damn lawyers!” I don’t realize how angry I am at him until the words burst from my throat. “If I comment on this, even through an attorney, they’ll come after me for violating the nondisclosure agreement and we’ll lose everything we’ve ever had!” I didn’t intend to shout, but now that I am, I can’t go back. These words have been burning a hole in my heart since the moment I found out that my father was a drug trafficker. That my entire life was built upon a foundation of lies and corruption.
“This is all your fault!” I shout, and my father flinches as if I slapped him. “You’re the reason those men held a gun to my head and a knife to my throat. The reason Ryan died. You’re the reason I made a phone call and killed twelve hundred people. If you’d never started working for Moreno, I wouldn’t be a murderer!”
Pain flickers across my father’s face. Then it hardens into anger. “If I hadn’t—”
“I know. We wouldn’t have all this.” I sweep one arm out, gesturing at all of our ill-gotten gains. “Maybe we shouldn’t have all this. Maybe I would have been happy growing up like Maddie if I’d never known anything different. Maybe it would have been okay to wear cheap shoes and go to public school if that meant not getting kidnapped and not accidentally killing twelve hundred people. Maybe my mother wouldn’t have been murdered right in front of me if you’d never started working for Gael Moreno in the first place!”
My father stares at me, stunned. Then his expression collapses into a twisted mask of pain.
Those
are the words I’ve never said. That’s the thing he didn’t know I knew. Until now.
“I know he had her killed, and I know it was because you tried to quit. I know you kept working for them to keep me safe, and I know I should probably be grateful for that. But here’s the thing about working for the devil. You can’t take it back. Going legit didn’t bring Mom back and it didn’t protect me, and there’s nothing you can do now to make either of those things happen. You didn’t just choose this life for yourself. You chose it for Mom and me too.” I take a deep breath. Then I spread my arms, taking in the disaster my existence has become. “Welcome to your decision, Dad. Now get the hell out of my room.”
You have ten minutes.
MADDIE
“I can’t believe he’s that stupid.” Luke shakes his head at the screen, yet he’s clearly pleased with his own work.
“It’s not just stupidity. It’s arrogance,” I insist, watching over his shoulder as I sink onto the end of his bed.
Luke shrugs. “Anyone that arrogant should be smart enough to enable the two-factor authentication on his cloud account.”
“Let’s just be glad he isn’t.” This is the first break I’ve caught since I got on that stupid plane to Colombia. Well, other than running into Luke on the beach . . .
“So, what do you want to do with the video?” He turns to me, his eyes bright with anticipation. “Send it to the news?”
I pull my phone from my pocket. “I have a better idea. We know someone who owes Genesis a favor.”
Luke glances at my cell screen as I make the call. His smile makes me feel warm all over.
My first call goes to voice mail. Instead of leaving a message, I hang up and dial again. Then again. Until finally, she answers.
“Maddie,” Neda snaps into my ear, and distantly I hear the click of her heels on the floor. “If I don’t answer, it’s because I don’t want to talk to you.”
99 Lies Page 21
