Accidental Witness

by Sam Mariano

  Accidental Witness

  (Morelli Family, #1)

  By Sam Mariano

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination, or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Accidental Witness (Morelli Family, #1) Copyright © 2017 by Sam Mariano

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Dedication:

  Nicole Duman. You’re basically my Morelli soul sister. It’s so much fun seeing your reactions to all my favorite Morelli moments! You’ve made my day so many times, you totally deserve a dedication.

  Acknowledgements

  I want to give a huge thank you to my beta readers, Sara Jimkoski-Sanchez, Ashley Williams, and Sonya Vaughn. You guys had the first eyes on my book, when I was pulling my hair out with fear that no one would even like it, and you guys were so helpful! Thank you so, so much for your time and valuable feedback—you rock!

  I also want to thank Evelyn Summers for being such an awesome proofreader! You always manage to catch things I miss, even after reading through the manuscript so much that I can practically recite each scene! (On reflection, that’s probably why, lol.)

  Last but certainly not least, the amazing ARC readers and bloggers who do so much to help get this book in front of new readers. When you love a book so hard, you just want people to discover it, and without you guys, they probably never would!

  Chapter One

  My mom always told me not to fall into the “bad boy” trap.

  After watching them use and leave her all my life, you’d think I might’ve learned. As I slip my shoes on and creep out the back door—cringing at the squeal it makes when I try to ease it open—to call Jace Bradford, the friendly neighborhood bad boy who’s been flirting with me on and off for a few weeks, it isn’t looking so good.

  Even as I crouch down beside the stone steps, pulling my cheap coat tighter against my body as a chilly gust of wind whips my mess of dirty blonde hair around my face, I try to talk myself out of it. He’s barely off a two week bender with Debbie Reyes, after all. Beautiful, beautiful Debbie Reyes. A chain-smoking, badass bombshell whose facial expressions are limited to bitchy variations of boredom and murderous.

  Probably murderous when she looks at me if I go after her sloppy seconds.

  But he has such great eyes. And the way he looks when he smiles at me….

  “Screw it,” I mutter, whipping the phone out of my pocket and taking a couple steps forward, looking back at the house, up at the darkened window of my mother’s bedroom. The house has such thin walls you can hear a stream of piss as it makes its way to the toilet basin; no way am I calling a guy my mother would not approve of so late on a school night inside those walls. No way.

  I practiced what we might say in the mirror earlier, and as my fingers scroll through for his contact name (“Jane babysitting” in case my mom sees his number flash across my screen), I imagine the gravelly “what’s up” he will likely answer with.

  A flicker of light in the window of the house next door catches my attention. Junkies live there and they’re always having people over late at night, so I shouldn’t be so startled. Even at eighteen, I’m a little afraid of the dark.

  All thoughts of my illicit phone call vacate my head as I watch the orange illumination climb the side of the window, swallowing up the curtain, and my brain slowly processes that I’m not looking at light, but flames.

  Fire.

  My eyes go wide and for a second, I don’t know how to react. I look around for an adult, someone who knows what to do, but of course there’s no one. Running around to the side of the house, my eyes dart to their front porch—as if they might be standing outside, laughing at some prank?—but it’s empty. I notice a car parked across the street, but that’s not unusual, especially outside that house.

  Heart hammering in my chest, I fumble for my phone, but then I hear a muffled noise from inside the house and panic makes me blank again, staring at the window. Are there people inside? Should I try to help?

  My feet move nervously, trying to debate what to do. I move closer to the front porch, my eyes jumping from the window to the porch, fingers curling tightly around my phone. My brain tells me to call 911, that every moment counts, but something stops me.

  “Come on,” called lowly, hoarsely.

  A shadowy figure slowly backs out the front door, peering inside. I can’t tell what he looks like, but I know from his shaggy hair it’s not my neighbor or her bald boyfriend.

  I open my mouth to call out, but something about the way he’s moving—calmly but quickly, hunched, as if trying to hide himself out in the open—gives me pause.

  Instead of pushing past the bushes to check on the person emerging from the house, I sink down, hoping the bushy branches are adequate cover. The hand gripping my phone shakes as I push the tab on the side to ensure my phone’s on silent. I bring up my camera app, sliding it over to video, and push through the branches of the shrubs. I have a reasonably clear view of the man on the porch—his back, anyway. He looks to his left, then back my way. Ice water pours through my veins, but I don’t move, and he doesn’t notice me from his quick glance.

  A second figure emerges from the house, launching the first guy into motion. Another “c’mon” and then the first guy heads down the front porch steps, making his way toward the parked car.

  The second guy lingers at the door longer than the first, peering back inside. He stands there long enough for my thighs to start burning pretty badly from my crouched position. I shift slightly for relief, but lose my balance, falling forward into the shrub.

  The second guy jerks in my direction and I draw a quick breath, my heart sinking. His eyes connect with mine through the branches and I drop my phone, seized by terror as he holds my gaze for several seconds.

  I know that face.

  Not well, but I’ve seen him around school before, heard the stories about his family.

  He’s in my English class, and as he takes a step in my direction, I can’t wrap my head around what’s happening.

  He hesitates, looking to the car, then back to the bushes where I’m sprawled. I scurry back, pushing to my feet and running like my life depends on it to my back door, nearly ripping it off the hinges and throwing myself inside. My chest heaves up and down rather violently as I slam the door shut, locking the doorknob and the dead bolt as well. I run to the front door, checking that both are locked—not that a few locks will do me any good if they storm my front door.

  “Oh, God,” I whine lowly, slowly inching my way to the front door. I have to see if he went to the car. If he hasn’t, he’s outside my house somewhere.

  I’ve never known dread until this moment.

  The car is gone, and I see it—the tail lights, down the road.

  He’s gone.

  I consider my phone, outside in the bushes.

  I think of the house next door, of the fire I just saw inside.

  If I run back outside and grab it, I could call 911.

  If I did, they would know I’d seen it first. They’d ask me questions, investigate what happened.

  I would have to tell the police that Vincent Morelli, of the famously criminal Morelli family, had been inside that house when the fire started.

  It feels like my heart beats inside my roiling gut as I make my decision and head back to my bedroom, as if I hadn’t seen a thing, and hope like hell so
meone else will call for help.

  Chapter Two

  My eyes burn and my stomach churns as I stand at my open locker, staring blankly at the books inside.

  It’s been three days since I last ate or slept.

  The fire happened on Friday. After an eternity cowering in my bedroom, I finally heard sirens.

  By the time help arrived, rushing us out of our house as they worked to extinguish the flames, it was too late. The woman who lived next door—Crystal, her name was Crystal—and her boyfriend were both dead.

  I shook violently as my seven-year-old brother clung to my legs, listening to my mother blathering about how it could have been us, how the fire could have spread, clutching my four-year-old sister close and placing terrified kisses on her mop of pale blond hair.

  I wondered if they were still alive when Vince Morelli spotted me in the bushes.

  I wondered if my phone was still in those bushes, incriminating me.

  Incriminating him.

  The queasiness I felt in that moment never left. In fact, it only got worse. After the workers had all left the scene and night had fallen, I ignored my terror and snuck outside, kneeling by the shrubs and searching for my cell phone.

  I didn’t find it.

  Which meant someone else had.

  Every moment since, I’ve waited for the police or a Morelli goon to show up on our front porch.

  It hasn’t left much time for sleeping. My nerves can’t handle food. My hands shake like a drug addict in withdrawal.

  At this point, I’m a pale, exhausted, nervous wreck.

  My stomach makes an angry noise and I close my eyes for a moment, wondering how I’m going to make it through the day. I grab the books I need for class, each heavier than the last, and push my locker door shut.

  Behind the door, propped against the locker beside mine, stands Vince Morelli. I jump back, squeezing my books tightly as my heart drops out of my rib cage, my back slamming against the cool metal door behind me.

  The girl shoots me a dirty look before ducking back inside her locker to retrieve her book, then slams it shut and pivots, heading off in the other direction and leaving me alone with Vince.

  He isn’t moving, hasn’t spoken. He just stands there in his dark jeans with a rip in the left knee cap, the black T-shirt that hugs his biceps, displayed more prominently with his arms crossed. Like all Morelli men, he has luscious, pitch black hair and chiseled features with dark brown eyes that pull you in and threaten to drown you with their intensity.

  I’m already drowning, panic clawing at my insides while I try to make my mouth work.

  As if he has all the time in the world to wait, he merely watches me.

  He must know I haven’t turned him in, right? If I told the police what I saw, they would have already called him in for questioning, at the very least.

  “Tommy asked me out!”

  I jerk back again, turning to face my best friend, Lena Korell, as she beams at me, leaning against the closed locker beside mine and rolling her eyes dreamily.

  I turn back toward Vince, but he’s gone.

  Like my sanity is about to be, I’m pretty sure.

  I try to listen as Lena goes on about her Friday night plans. Any other time I would be excited for her, but I do not have the capacity to be girly right now.

  Hours later, I’m still pale and quiet at lunch, still without much to say about Lena’s date, hardly touching the slice of Oreo pie I ordered, dramatically reasoning that if I’m about to be offed by the Morelli family, I should at least have something delicious first.

  I can’t stop watching for Vince. I imagine him around every corner, search for him at every table. Following lunch is English, the period we have together, and I debate skipping it, but I’m more afraid of him coming to my house to confront me. What can he actually do to me in a school building with security cameras and faculty members milling through every hall?

  “What is your deal?”

  I glance up at Lena without much enthusiasm. Her dark eyebrows arch expectantly up toward her dark, springy curls, and exhaustion mingled with defeat suddenly sweeps over me. Maybe it would be better to throw myself at Vince’s mercy and be done with it.

  “You know my house nearly burned down a couple days ago, right?” I ask.

  Lena rolls her eyes as she dips a fry in Ketchup. “Your house did not almost burn down.”

  “It could’ve.”

  “No, ‘cause you’re not a dumb shit who left her crack pipe going by the curtains and then nodded off to the point of not waking up when she’s on fire,” she states, without sympathy.

  “They were human beings, Lena.”

  “They were gross addicts who broke into your house and stole your television over the summer,” she returns.

  “She had three kids.”

  “All of them in foster care. I’m sorry, I know you’re a drama queen, but I’m not going to cry over the loss of scum of the earth with you.”

  I want to tell her, but I can’t. I doubt she would be so glib if she felt responsible for not saving them, even if they were kind of shitty people. I can’t say that, so I keep my mouth shut.

  Besides, I don’t need to bring anyone else into my mess. I haven’t told a soul what I saw, but I have an uneasy feeling with Vince lurking around, I’m about to have to tell someone.

  ---

  The sound of a chair skidding across the floor startles the hell out of me. My head jerks up, fully expecting to find Vince Morelli straddling the backwards chair suddenly beside my desk, but instead I see Jace Bradford.

  He’s giving me that little smile that made me melty a week ago, but I’m curiously unaffected, looking at it now.

  “Hey.” There it is, the gravelly voice I was all hyped about a few days ago.

  I can tell he expects to flirt, but I don’t have the energy for it.

  Flashing him the least convincing tug of my lips ever, I make a point to look at my desktop, straightening my notebooks. “Hi.”

  “Lose my number?” he teases.

  “It’s been a rough few days,” I tell him. “There was a fire next door. My neighbors…”

  “Oh, shit,” he says, rearing back a little. “Is everyone okay?”

  Dread trickles through my veins, pooling in my stomach. Just the thought of the house fire makes me queasy—not to mention the lack of food and sleep.

  “Pretty sure that’s my seat, Bradford.”

  I’m pretty sure my soul falls out of my body as I look up to see Vince Morelli standing at the desk beside mine.

  It’s not Vince’s seat, but Jace doesn’t argue. Standing easily enough, Jace swings the chair back behind its desk so Vince can sit down. “My bad, man.”

  Vince leisurely watches me for a moment before he takes his seat, dropping a notebook and pen on the desktop. It’s a perfectly normal thing to do, but somehow it feels menacing.

  Jace glances from Vince to me, then skulks away without so much as a goodbye.

  My stomach somersaults as I shift in my seat, glancing back at the door. My previous thought about ditching circles back around, but the teacher is already standing at the front of the class. We have a test today, and if she sees me cut out, she may not let me make it up.

  Not like I’ll be able to focus with Vince sitting beside me anyway.

  He normally doesn’t sit beside me, and we do have assigned seats, so I wait for the guy who normally sits here to show up, or the teacher to say something about it.

  Minutes like hours stretch on before the teacher tells everyone to settle down. She brings a stack of stapled papers and begins doing a head count at each row, passing them back. I wait for her to notice Vince next to me and say something, but if she does, she doesn’t seem to care.

  As the tests are passed back, I dare a glance over at Vince. He isn’t looking at me, but he must sense my eyes on him, because he turns to meet my gaze.

  I break eye contact immediately, looking down at my paper. I fidget with the st
apled corner and run my fingers aimlessly over the edge. I try to look at him out of the corner of my eye, then I try to stop my leg from bouncing underneath the desk.

  The burning question that’s been running through my mind nonstop the previous few days emerges again: why was Vince in that house? Was he responsible for the fire? Had he…wanted my neighbors to die? Had he killed them?

  Had I, with my silence?

  I try to focus on the test, but I can’t even get through the first paragraph.

  Pushing back my chair and grabbing the paper, I make my way to the front of the room. The teacher turns, startled, since I should’ve only raised my hand.

  “I think I’m going to be sick. I need to go to the nurse.”

  It must show on my face, because she doesn’t argue, merely nodding her head, her eyes searching my face with a trace of concern. “Okay.”

  I hustle back to my desk to gather my things. I avoid looking at him, but I can feel Vince’s hard gaze on me as I flee.

  I don’t care. I can’t. All I want is to get the hell out of that classroom and never see Vince Morelli again.

  Chapter Three

  Macaroni noodles stick to the pan and I curse the broken dishwasher. Hand washing dishes is the worst, and I never feel like I get them clean enough.

  Screwing up my face, I grab a sponge and begrudgingly knock the macaroni off, scrubbing the mushy noodle residue it leaves behind.

  It’s been a long, long day.

  After I left school I had to pick up my siblings and watch them all night while my mom worked. She went to her boyfriend’s house after, so I ended up putting them both to bed. It’s not an irregular occurrence, since my mom works late hours a lot, but I’m so exhausted that just dragging myself across the room feels like a workout—making them eat and do homework while not fighting was too much to ask.

  I have to get some sleep tonight.

  Part of me wonders if I should just approach Vince and be done with it. If I could do it at school, I would feel safer. I’m not sure how much more of the cat and mouse games my nerves can take, and at the end of the day, I could actually be endangering my family.