by J. R. Ward
Her parking space, the one nearly across from the Palace, was open again, and she parked smoothly and locked up. Waiting for a break in the flow of cars, she jogged across and hoped that her luck with janitors continued.
Nope. She was able to get into the public foyer, but the lobby was locked and empty. Going over to will-call, she peered in. Nobody was in the office—
The staff-only door opened wide and she turned. A police officer was coming out, and he paused to look behind himself like he was waiting for a colleague.
“Excuse me,” she said to the guy. “May I go down to the office? I think I left something here the day before yesterday and I want to see if anyone picked it up.”
“Do you know where you’re going?”
“Just through this hall.”
“Okay, g’head.”
She walked fast down the corridor, passing by some other cops, probably the ones the uni at the door was waiting for. As she went along, it was ironic that she was yet again looking for a lost-and-found box. Maybe she’d have more luck than when she’d been on the search for her gold earring.
Coming around the corner, she straightened her skirt as she approached the glass office. She was not looking forward to going rounds with that receptionist again, but who else was she going to ask?
It turned out that the reception space was empty, but as she tried the glass door, she was able to pull things open. “Hello?”
The desk was orderly, the computer screen displaying a slowly rotating Palace logo, the phone ringing quietly.
“Hello…?”
There were clearly more offices in the back, a rear hallway going off in two directions, but she didn’t want to intrude—
Her foot hit something unexpected, her balance instantly going haywire as she tripped forward. Catching herself on the corner of the desk, she looked down. A cardboard box filled with personal effects was on the floor: Aluminum travel mug. Plant. Picture of—
Frowning, Cait knelt down. Without touching anything, she got close enough to see the image of two young women standing side by side on a beach, their arms around each other’s shoulders. The one on the right was…
An odd foreboding brought her head up and around to the empty chair behind the desk.
“Can I help you?”
Cait jumped up. A man had come in, an exhausted, half-bald, used-to-be-good-looking man in wrinkled clothes.
“I—ah, I’m sorry to bother you. I was looking for the receptionist?”
He recoiled like she’d slapped him. “You didn’t hear?”
Before she asked … before he answered her … she knew who had been killed. “No, no, I haven’t…”
“Jenny’s dead.” He marched past her. “So unless you’re applying for the position, I can’t do anything for you.”
And that was that. He disappeared down the inner hall, a door slamming shut a moment later.
Cait didn’t stick around. Trying to find her sketchbook was such a low priority compared to what was going on here.
At least it was a relatively new one. The only thing in it … had been those sketches of G.B.
By the time G.B. got out of his second round of questioning, he had reverted back to his old ways, the ones he worked so hard to hide, the ones that had gotten him into trouble before.
Unfortunately, his submersion into himself so complete, he was having trouble seeing what was ahead of him.
Fury, as great and wide a divide as it had always been, owned him.
Getting into his car, he grasped the steering wheel and tried to focus. He could feel a plan developing in his head, and he had enough sense to know that it wasn’t a good one. It wasn’t clean. It wasn’t tight.
And he was in enough trouble already with the whole Jennifer thing. But he couldn’t … concentrate … on … anything else—
As his phone rang, he fumbled with the thing, dropping the cell in his lap as he took it out of his inside pocket. He answered without checking, without thinking—
“Hello, G.B.” Female voice. Low. Seductive. “What are you doing, G.B.?”
The sound of the brunette he’d fucked in that basement workroom pierced through the veil of his emotions, the fog of his anger, the clouds of his past.
“I’ve been thinking about you.”
As she spoke, he thought that he should say something back to her to let her know he was actually on the line—but she seemed to be already aware of that.
“What are you going to do about all this, G.B.?” she asked.
“About what?” he mumbled.
“What are you going to decide to do?”
God, how did she know? Because he was torn, the urge to act warring with the sense that it was in his best interest to let this shit with Cait go.
But his brother was in the way. His fucking goody-two-shoes brother was getting her. And he just couldn’t let that happen.
The shit with that whole Nicole thing had been for fun. But he actually liked Cait.
“You know she cheated on you.”
“Who …” he asked.
“That blond you like so much. She fucked your brother last night.”
He frowned. “How … how do you—”
“You know she did. You saw him kiss her at the grave site. You think that happens between two people who are just friends? Don’t be naive.”
G.B. brought up a hand and started to rub his forehead, back and forth, back and forth, as if he were sanding the skin off. He had always hated Duke. Had come out of the womb detesting the guy. And yeah, sure, it had never been logical, but some things were so strong that you didn’t need to understand them. They just … were.
It was like he had a demon inside of him, and sometimes the evil needed to get out before it ate G.B. alive.
Like with Jennifer in the theater basement. A switch got flipped and … everything else disappeared except the malignancy—and keeping that inside? Impossible.
Man, one of the single biggest satisfactions in his life had been taking Duke’s boring-ass girlfriend away from him—seducing her right out from under his brother’s nose. God, so fucking pathetic—the pair of them had been so “in love,” parading around that college campus arm in arm, full of dreams. But there had been fractures in the relationship to exploit—Darling Nikki, as the song went, hadn’t been quite the nicey-nice girl Duke had believed she was. What a skank. And she hadn’t been on the pill—so when G.B. had poked holes in the condoms before he used them? Not long before she was nauseous every morning and then—oopsie! She’d had to tell her BF she’d cheated on him.
When Duke had found out, his first stop had been G.B.’s apartment—and the guy had beaten him so badly, he’d needed dental implants afterward. But it was so worth it—and the payback had lasted for years.
Was going to last at least until the kid was eighteen, right?
“G.B., I think you need to do something about all this.”
Coming back to the present, he shook his head. The brunette was right. So fucking right.
“Go to the mall, G.B. Turn your car on, and go to the mall. The food court, G.B. Go there, and find your path. I’ll be waiting for you at the end—and I’ve got a lifetime contract to offer you.”
He blinked, thinking that was a strange way of putting things. “What…?”
“I’m offering you what you’ve always wanted, what you sing about—I’m prepared to give you eternal life.”
“In the public eye?”
“You will be surrounded forever, G.B.—I’ll take care of everything. I’ll take care of you. Go to the mall, right now—think of this as your audition. Pass? And you’re in like Flynn.”
“I need to go to rehearsals.”
“Like I said, I’ll take care of it all.”
“I don’t understand how you—”
“You’re boring me, and wasting time. Stop with the questions. Start with the actions.”
The call was ended and he looked down at his phone. Man, those A & R people
really did have a lot of pull, didn’t they.
Before he was conscious of making a decision, he found himself driving, his hands and feet doing all the right things as he made turns and accelerated down straightaways and slowed down for other traffic.
The Caldwell Galleria Mall was a huge, sprawling expanse of stores that was surrounded by a Ford Motor Company production plant’s worth of parking lots. He hadn’t been there in years, but he remembered, back from his orphanage era, being brought here around Christmastime … paraded around the red and green window displays … unable to buy anything because he’d never had any money.
Which was what happened when you didn’t know who your father was and you killed your mother in childbirth.
He and that fraternal twin of his had had such a great start, hadn’t they.
The food court was around the far side, and he found a parking space that was pretty close to the doors. Walking like a zombie, he zeroed in on the entrance, passing by the smokers who were standing around the trash bins, and the mothers pushing infants around in strollers, and the next generation of bar sluts with their prepubescent legs showing under postage-stamp skirts.
Something told him to tuck his ponytail in under his jacket, and hunch his shoulders while keeping his head down. He didn’t want any attention on himself, and sure as shit, there were probably fans here somewhere.
He entered through the side push doors, not the revolving center one, and hung back. There was quite a distance between him and the teeming trough area, a Kay Jewelers store, a RadioShack, and a Brookstone separating him from the stalls of high-calorie junk food. For a moment, his head cleared enough for him to wonder what the fuck he was doing considering rehearsal was no doubt waiting for him, but then, off to the right, he saw a pair of dark heads going along. One was about two feet shorter than the other, the boy who walked next to the man looking sullen, the man who was beside the boy wearing a hard expression.
G.B. inhaled, a strange feeling in his chest making him want to cough.
The brunette on the phone had been right. Seeing those two together?
Certainly laid a path out for him, nice and clean.
Dipping his hand into that inner jacket pocket again, he got a hold of his phone.
His heart rate skyrocketed as he thought about dialing. For some reason, he had the sense that the decision he was about to make was going to affect so much more than just the situation with Duke. And not in a good way.
Turn away, he told himself. Just stop this.
After all, why the fuck did he care about Cait and his brother? He was on the verge of getting noticed, about to finally make it…
No, you aren’t, an inner voice pointed out. They’re going to get you for that murder.
He blinked and thought about the follow-up by good ol’ Detective de la Cruz, as it had turned out the guy was called.
They’d found something, hadn’t they.
“Goddamn it,” G.B. muttered. He should have stopped that shit with Jennifer. And he should be stopping this.
But come on, if he was going to go out, it might as well be with a bang … right?
The brunette had a point. He knew just what to do.
Chapter
Fifty-three
Cait sat back at her drafting table and inspected the second-to-last drawing of the book. The puppy, who had gotten himself in trouble trying to hide his bone, was being scolded by his owner, the little five-year-old boy telling him he had to be careful down by the river so he didn’t drown.
Which was the point of the whole series: It wasn’t so much what life did to us, but what we tried to do to keep life from happening that caused most of our problems.
I.e., don’t get so worried about keeping your things safe that you end up putting them on a raft that floats away from you.
She knew what the next page said, and she could feel herself easing up, sure as if she were the little chocolate Lab: She was a happily-ever-after person at heart, and as always, the puppy reunited with his bone made her feel like everything had been worth it.
She was just taking the drawing over to her display table when her phone rang. Jogging over to get it, she hoped it was Duke checking in. Maybe she was up to having him come over, after all.
“Hello?” she said.
“Hey.”
Cait caught her disappointment before it came out in her voice. “Oh, G.B., hi.”
“Listen … I’ve got to tell you something.”
The sound of his voice was all wrong, the words tight and awkward, nothing like the smooth cadence he usually sported.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m really sorry to do this.”
He certainly sounded like it. “G.B., what’s—”
“Did Duke ever tell you about his family?”
She frowned. “He said he didn’t have any.”
“That’s a lie, Cait.” There was a long pause. “I’m his brother.”
Cait backed up blindly, putting out a hand for her work chair. When she ran into it, she sat down—more like fell down.
“I’m sorry. I …” Had she heard that right?
He certainly hadn’t stuttered—
Oh, crap, she thought. That was why, back in the beginning, she’d kept thinking she’d seen Duke somewhere before: He and G.B. did look alike. They weren’t identical, but they were close, very close. Why hadn’t the similarity occurred to her before now?
“Oh … God.”
“There’s more, though.” G.B. cursed. “There’s so much more he hasn’t told you. Look, you don’t have to be with me, that’s not why I’m calling. But I like you, I honestly like you, and I know for certain you do not belong with him.”
With a sense that the world was spinning around her, she held on to the corner of her desk. Dimly, she noticed that in the background of the connection, there was a lot of chattering, as if he were in a public place.
“Cait, I want you to come out and see something. You deserve to know the truth—he’s not who you think he is.”
Abruptly, she thought of all those silences she and Duke had shared. She’d assumed that what he’d said was true—that he wasn’t good at talking. It sure as hell fit his macho, tough-guy persona. But had there been another reason?
“Cait, just see for yourself. Then you can make up your own mind. Come now, though, I don’t know how much longer he’s going to be here.”
After G.B. gave her a location and she’d hung up, she found that she couldn’t breathe. But she was clear on one thing. As memories from that nightmare with Thom began to replay in her mind, the need to have some solid footing, even if it hurt, drove her to get her purse, go out to her SUV, and head over to where G.B. had told her to meet him.
Fifteen minutes later, she pulled up to the Caldwell Galleria, and she almost forgot to lock up the Lexus as she strode over to the entryway of the food court. Going in through the revolving center doors, she looked around, expecting to see G.B., or Duke, or somebody.
There were a lot of people, but none she recognized.
Walking down past a display of pearl necklaces and engagement rings, she kept going, oily scents of stir-fry, French fries, and doughnut holes making her absently wonder how many calories she was breathing in. Where was—
Cait stopped dead.
About fifty tables were set up in the center of it all, red and yellow plastic trays full of logo’d food covering the tiny tops, all kinds of teenagers and parents and little kids stuffing their faces. And in the midst of them?
Duke.
And he wasn’t alone. He was sitting across from a carbon copy of himself, the young boy showing all the promise of the same height and strength of his father.
It was Duke’s son.
That was the only explanation.
Didn’t have any family here, huh.
Her first impulse was to march over and get into his face—but she wasn’t going to do that in front of the child. Nope. Duke had more than earned a lashing, b
ut his son did not deserve to see any of that.
Spinning around, Cait slammed face-first into a twelve-foot-tall biker, the bearded guy catching her in the nick of time, or she would have landed on her face.
“You okay there, lady?” he asked in a Southern baritone.
“Yes, yes, I’m sorry, yes, please, thank you.”
Scrambling out of the mall, she rushed into the fresh air, and quickly located the trash bins on either side of the entrance … because there was a good chance she was going to throw up the leftover lasagna she’d had when she’d gotten home from the funeral.
“Oh … God…”
Abruptly, she thought of her last conversation with Thom, the one that had revealed a truth that made things easier, not harder, to live with.
This shit with Duke in there?
It was so much worse than Thom falling in love with the woman he would later spend the rest of his life with. That had hurt, yes, but at least that particular ex of hers had proven to be the good guy she’d always believed him to be.
No family, she thought bitterly as she went out to her car. Duke must have a very different definition of the word.
Getting in, she slammed the door and gripped the wheel, and blinked hard—although whether that was from hurt or anger, she didn’t know. Wrapping her arms around her stomach, she couldn’t believe she’d invited that liar over to her house … welcomed him into her bed … woken up next to him just this morning with all kinds of delusions of intimacy…
Snagging her phone from her bag, she went into recent calls and hit the one that was at the top.
G.B. answered on the second ring. “Are you okay?”
“I don’t think so … actually, no, I’m really, totally not.”
“Cait—” His voice broke. “Cait, I’m really sorry. If I’d known you were seeing him, I would have told you. He’s evil … he’s an evil guy.”
Holding the phone up to her ear, she didn’t fully focus on the parking lot in front of her, or the sun that was just about to set behind the JCPenney up ahead, or the couple who were walking hand in hand in front of her.
