Chasing Truth

by Julie Cross

  I lean against the kitchen counter and smile at them. It’s going to piss off Harper, but I can’t help it. “You guys are cute.”

  “Are you high?” Aidan asks at the same time Harper says, “Are you drunk?”

  I stifle a laugh. “Um, neither. And even if I were, I wasn’t driving or anything like that.”

  Aidan gives me a pointed look. “Or walking near any pools?”

  My stomach sinks. I don’t want to think about that night last spring. After I heard about Simon…after Aidan learned that neither Harper nor I could swim. Sometimes I close my eyes to fall asleep, and I’m back in that deep end again, water filling my lungs, my clothes clinging to me, heavy and pulling me toward the bottom.

  I look down at my hands. “A bunch of us decided to cut and go to the mall. It was no big deal. I should have told you. I’m sorry.”

  “Who?” Harper demands. “Which ‘us’ are you referring to?”

  “It wouldn’t be very cool of me to rat them out.”

  My sister glares at me, and I know I need to give her something. I pull out my phone and stare at it for a moment before scrolling to Justice’s name. She’d given me her number last weekend, and she knows I know about her and Jacob’s little game over Chantel. She owes me. I hit call and luckily, she picks up after a couple of rings.

  “Hey Ellie, what’s up? How’s Bret? I heard you guys were having a study session the other day.”

  I glance at Harper. “You heard right.”

  Justice starts to ask for details but I interrupt her. “So my sister knows that we cut class together today. She’s not looking to get anyone in trouble, just for proof that I was with you. At the mall.”

  “Right,” Justice says, catching on quick. “The mall. I had that emotional crisis. Needed to get away and buy stuff. Hate when that happens.”

  I sigh internally with relief. “Mind telling her that for me?”

  Justice agrees, and I hand over the phone to Harper. She listens for a minute, looks way less pissed, then hands the phone back to me.

  “No more of that, Ellie,” Harper warns.

  I do the sign of the cross despite our kosher experience the other night, swearing my good behavior is back, and then I walk toward my room with Justice still on the phone.

  “Okay, so you have to tell me,” she squeals. “Where did you go today? And it better be good. I just told your sister that I lost my virginity to a college guy who has three other girlfriends and now I have chlamydia.”

  “Jesus Christ, you didn’t have to say all that.”

  “I just got so into it I couldn’t stop,” she says, sounding like someone with a post-con adrenaline rush. “Now you owe me a favor.”

  “Funny,” I say. “I thought it was the other way around.”

  “You are something, Ellie. Don’t know if anyone would see you coming,” Justice says. They usually don’t. “Okay then, just help me out, pleeeaase.”

  “What do you need? Fake ID? Forged absence slips?” I rattle off.

  “You can do that?” she says, surprised.

  “Um, no,” I lie. “It was a joke. Now tell me what you want.”

  “Miles Beckett.”

  I glance out the window of my bedroom, checking the pool. He’s not there. “Miles Beckett. Any preference how? Scrambled? Fried? Poached? Over-easy?”

  “Find out if he’s into me,” she says. “Carefully, though.”

  Of course. I roll my eyes, glad she can’t see me. “I’ll try.”

  And I will, because she’s proving to be quite useful. It’s best to maintain the connection. And I’ll refuse to notice the twinge in my belly at the thought of Miles hooking up with her, too. Liar.

  “Text me the second you find out anything.”

  “You know he’s only here for a semester, right?” I tell her. “Then he goes back to California or wherever it is they manufacture spray starch.”

  “I know,” she says. “But maybe we’ll sell him on Holden Prep and he’ll stay in Virginia? Or maybe I can just have some fun with him and be done with it.”

  “If you say so.”

  I hang up with Justice, sling my backpack over my shoulder again, and head for the door. Harper and Aidan both shout at the same time, “Where are you going?”

  “A party,” I say, but before they can yell again, I add, “To get the homework assignments I missed from Miles.”

  I think all I had to do was say Miles’s name and they would have let me go. Clyde and Aidan really hit it off the other night. Somehow that gave Miles even more credibility.

  Me, on the other hand, I don’t seem to have much cred with Miles. Which makes our neighborly visits a blast.

  CHAPTER 14

  Miles’s uncle Clyde answers the door. His hair is matted on one side like he’d been napping on the couch. The TV is blasting Wheel of Fortune. I try to look past Clyde into the apartment because it seems like many Miles Beckett secrets could be hiding in there. From what I can tell, the living room looks generically furnished like one of those model homes. Brown leather couch, glass coffee table, red-patterned accent chair, curtains to match said accent chair, black TV stand, some colorful decorative items on the coffee table, Linens and Things paintings on the wall—basic pieces to stage a room but nothing personal.

  I plaster on a smile. “Is Miles home?”

  “Sorry, honey, he went for a run.” He scrubs a hand over his face and glances at his watch. “A long time ago. What the hell is wrong with that boy?”

  “Oh, well, I’ll check back later.” I start to turn away, but Clyde stops me.

  “Eleanor, is it?” he asks. I nod, though it pains me not to correct him. “Are you interested in having dinner with us later?”

  My forehead wrinkles. “Dinner?”

  “Yeah, dinner.” Clyde nods as if convincing himself. “The kid—Miles—could use a little help making friends.”

  Oh, I doubt Miles needs my help in that area, but there’s no way I’m passing up a chance to get a look inside his place. I smile again. “Sure, that sounds great.”

  I take my bag and head down to the pool. Hopefully I can catch him when he comes back from this run. I spread out my books on one of the pool tables to start my homework. Before I can do anything, Justice sends me a text.

  JUSTICE: Anything????

  ME: He’s not home. His uncle said he went out for a run

  JUSTICE: Hot. Think he runs shirtless? Get a pic for me!

  Yeah, this is why I don’t do girl talk. There’s no way I’m going to tell her that I’ve seen Miles shirtless pretty much every day since he moved in. She’d probably camp out in the courtyard. And watching Miles move through his butterfly stroke from my bedroom window is my guilty pleasure; I have no plans to share it with anyone.

  I set down the phone and open my Algebra 2 book. Twenty minutes into my homework problems, and I’m regretting skipping this class. Big time. I’m close to my breaking point when shirtless Miles jogs my way. He’s covered in sweat, but his breathing is even.

  He’s got headphones in and doesn’t seem to notice me sitting here. He drops down on the pool deck and begins doing push-up after push-up. I take the opportunity to study him like this. He looks far gone, so deep inside his head I could probably yell his name and he wouldn’t notice. And he seems weighted down, too, despite the tireless ease of his push-ups.

  I don’t want to compare myself to Miles—I mean, I’ve never even touched a can of starch—but I get it. I get what he’s doing. Because I’ve done this before. I’ve thrown myself into something difficult, painful, and challenging just to escape reality for a little while. I think this is why I don’t hate all the schoolwork that comes with being at Holden Prep. It fills my head so completely I stop thinking about other things. Like the old woman who’s out ten grand and might never see her grandson again.

  With a sigh, I leave Miles to his escape and turn back to the integers, equations, and formulas in front of me. I channel Jack and his calm advice and try to
break down the problem into simpler terms, to guess the overall purpose and not let the small parts get to me, like he’s told me many times before.

  “Use the distance formula.”

  I jump when Miles’s finger lands on my notebook and his voice brings my surroundings back into focus. I look up at him, squinting into the sun. “Huh?”

  “The distance formula,” he repeats. He gently plucks the pencil from my hand and writes out a formula at the top of my paper. Then he solves the problem I’d been stuck on for nearly ten minutes.

  I stare at his work. “That’s it? It can’t be that easy.”

  He drops the pencil and shrugs. “Obviously not for you.”

  I wait for him to walk toward the steps before I flip him off behind his back.

  “I saw that, Ellie,” he says.

  The lighter, teasing Miles is back.

  But whatever. At least I can do the rest of my homework now. “See you in a little while, for dinner,” I call after him.

  That gets him to stop and turn around. I grin, feeling a little satisfied. “Your uncle invited me.”

  “Great,” he mutters. “He’s decided to be neighborly.”

  I don’t get a chance to answer him because Miles stomps up the steps, probably to have a word with his uncle. I’m even more excited about this meal than I was before.

  ...

  “What’s wrong with eating at your place?” Miles drops a salad bowl onto the table with a loud thud. “Your sister starting fires again?”

  I shrug. “Probably not. Thursday is PB and J night.”

  “Sounds great,” Miles says. “You shouldn’t miss out on that.”

  Clyde places three glasses onto the table and then smacks Miles on the head. “Don’t be an ass.”

  The way that Miles inhales, his nostrils flaring, his glare trained on Clyde’s back, it’s obvious they aren’t happy roommates. So yeah, this dinner is getting better and better.

  Miles points a finger—aggressively, I should note—at a vacant chair, ordering me to sit. Though I think it’s more of a “keep your mouth shut and stay out of my way” command. I laugh under my breath. It’s nice seeing him flustered for a change.

  “What can I get you to drink?” Clyde asks me.

  “Water is fine.”

  He takes a jug of filtered water out of the fridge, fills my glass, and sets the jug in the center of the table. Miles immediately moves the jug six inches to the right. He grabs several bottles of salad dressing from the fridge and sets them in the space where the jug had been. I can’t remember the last time I ate salad. Based on their dressing selection, it must be a regular occurrence here.

  Clyde releases a frustrated breath, and then somehow he concedes in this silent argument he’s having with his nephew because he takes a seat across from me, leaving Miles to finish up the dinner prep. Miles is fresh from the shower, wearing a T-shirt (unfortunately) and gray sweatpants. Clyde and I watch his nephew move around the kitchen like a pro, pulling a casserole out of the oven, placing it carefully at the center of the table. He fills his own glass with milk, then places the carton nearby like he’s planning on having a refill.

  Clyde reaches for the spoon resting beside the casserole, but Miles smacks his hand away. “The bread isn’t ready yet.”

  A couple of minutes later, Miles opens the oven again and removes a loaf of French bread. He slices it and then sets it on the table beside a stick of butter. My stomach rumbles at the sight of all the home-cooked food. Finally, Miles sits down with us. He takes my plate, loading it with something white and gooey from the casserole pan. I lean forward to examine it.

  “It’s tuna casserole,” Miles says. “Remember, one of two things I know how to make.”

  “I remember.” I stare warily at the food. “I guess I was hoping for eggs. Or maybe for one of Clyde’s specialties.”

  Clyde laughs. “My specialty is Roni’s Pizza Palace. I just figured out how to order on the line.”

  “Online,” Miles corrects, his voice full of annoyance. “Not on the line.”

  Before I can decide about the tuna casserole, Miles drops a large portion of salad onto my plate. I lean in again to examine the casserole. And yeah, I do have excellent table manners when I need to. But when I don’t need them, they seem to go out the window. “What’s the crunchy-looking stuff on top? And those are peas, right?”

  Miles has this exasperated look on his face that almost makes me laugh. “Either eat it or don’t. Seriously.”

  He loads up his plate with so much food it’s practically hanging off the edges. I sift through the salad dressings looking for a familiar type—Italian. I can do Italian.

  We eat in silence for a few minutes, Clyde glancing between Miles and me the whole time. Finally, I turn to Clyde. “So what kind of business do you do?”

  Miles chokes on the gulp of milk he’s just taken.

  Clyde gives him a pointed look. “Mostly check fraud. I work as a consultant for several different companies.”

  “Check fraud,” I repeat. I know a little bit about check fraud. “Sounds interesting.”

  “Pretty boring, actually,” Clyde admits. “Lots of comparing handwriting, reviewing files… If it weren’t for coffee, I’d fall asleep on the job all the time.”

  “Like you don’t already,” Miles snorts. But when Clyde glares at him, he drops his gaze to the plate in front of him and shovels in food.

  Because I can’t pass up a learning opportunity, I drill Clyde with questions for several minutes. “Aside from handwriting, how do you identify a serial?”

  “Great question.” Clyde points his fork at me, obviously impressed with my knowledge. If only he knew the truth. “With the serials, there’s always a pattern. Sometimes it’s a set of numbers that repeat. One time, I caught this woman who’d stolen more than a quarter million using fraudulent checks, and all her false names had the same middle initial. V.”

  Amateur. “Wow…so she really screwed up, huh?”

  Clyde’s face is lit with excitement. Doesn’t seem like such a boring job. “I think they want to be caught. To be known, at least. These guys—”

  “And women,” I remind him.

  He nods. “And women… They’re smart as hell. If I can follow even ten percent of their thought patterns, I’ve learned something. It takes intelligence and patience to pull off the big jobs, the quarter-million-and-more jobs.”

  “They’re criminals,” Miles says, looking at Clyde like he’s dirty laundry. “They’re fucking criminals. They steal money. How can you act like they deserve any amount of respect?”

  My gut twists and knots. My face warms. The salad on my plate is gone. I have no choice but to fork a bite of casserole and stuff it in my mouth. I wait for my gag reflex to kick in at the mere thought of tuna fish, but I don’t taste anything fishy. It’s warm and cheesy.

  “This is good,” I tell Miles, hoping for a change of subject. I shouldn’t have taken us down that path.

  “I didn’t say they were good people,” Clyde snaps, both guys ignoring my big taste test. “I just said they were good at what they do. That’s a fact. Not my opinion. If they weren’t good, I wouldn’t have a job.”

  “Maybe you shouldn’t,” Miles says.

  They stare each other down, tension flowing between them. The table is suddenly small, the room stuffy.

  In poetic, sitcom fashion, someone knocks on the door and the ice in the room cracks down the middle. I’m expecting it to be Harper or Aidan checking on me, so I shovel some more casserole in my mouth before I’m asked to leave.

  But it’s not Harper or Aidan.

  It’s Dominic DeLuca.

  He takes one look at me and tenses. Yeah, this is gettin’ weird. But whatever. Maybe an opportunity just fell right into my lap. I stand and cart my plate to the sink while polishing off the rest of the casserole. “I’d better get going. Homework and all that.”

  Clyde starts to protest, but I head for the door anyway. I give Miles
a pat on the back. And then, despite his entire body turning to stone, I attempt to give Dominic a hug. “Good to see you, Dominic. We should definitely hang out more often.”

  While he’s stiff as a board, I slip the keys from his shorts pocket. I hold them against my stomach and grab the door, flinging it open. “Thanks for dinner!”

  Back in my apartment, Harper and Aidan are in their bedroom watching TV, so I’m able to grab the device Connie gave me and sneak in and out unnoticed. I head down to the parking lot and hit the unlock button on the keys, identifying Dominic’s SUV. I open the driver door just enough to slip inside, and then I look around for the perfect spot. I glance down at the plastic key chain bought during a tour of the White House from the looks of it.

  I split it open and slip the tiny bug Connie from Tech Gear Unlimited loaned me. A perfect fit. I snap the president’s house back into place and grin at my work. “Your country needs you, Dominic. Speak all your secrets into this key chain.”

  My voice emerges loud and clear from the transmitter. It’s working. I tuck Dominic’s keys into the ignition, making it look like he left them there, and then I take the long way around the complex back to my apartment.

  Minutes later, I’m at my desk, homework spread out, headphones on, waiting for Dominic DeLuca to get into his car so I can start listening in.

  CHAPTER 15

  The screaming punk music turns off and Dominic’s voice booms through my headphones. “I’ll have a double bacon burger—”

  “Lettuce, ketchup, and pickles only,” I recite out loud from my bedroom. God, this is useless. A week of spying on Dominic DeLuca and all I’ve learned is his fast food order. In addition, after finding out the transmitter was too small to listen outside a one-mile radius, I had to put on my whining rich girl act for Connie again to get her to loan me a few repeaters to stretch the signal. All for nothing, apparently.

  I go back to my homework and try to ignore the blaring punk music, but only minutes later, it shuts off again. I assume he’s getting out of his car but then I hear him talking, probably on the phone with someone.