“I’m sorry. I didn’t tell her she could come here.”
“It’s okay. Just stay out of my booze, and do not repeat anything I told you tonight,” she said before going back to her room.
“I know it’s late,” Olivia said as soon as I opened the door. “But I wanted to make sure you were okay.”
“I’m fine.”
“I didn’t really hump all of France,” Olivia whined. “I was just mad that you lied to me about Ojai.”
“I never thought you humped all of France. I didn’t know Marion told everybody I was in Ojai until your dad said something. It caught me off guard. I wasn’t sure what to say.”
“So, where were you?”
We sat down on opposite ends of the sofa. I covered us with a cream chenille blanket that was still warm from where I’d been wrapped up in it before she arrived.
“Your silence is starting to scare me,” Olivia said, adjusting her part of the blanket.
“Slidell, Louisiana.”
“Where?” Olivia’s mouth was as wide as her eyebrows were high. I gave her a look that said I wasn’t repeating myself. “Marion’s sister and her kids live there. I stayed with them.”
“So, how was that?” Olivia asked out of the corner of her mouth. I knew she was picturing the slummiest place ever imaginable in her head.
“Better than I expected. It was different, so much so, that at first, I didn’t think I’d survive. But I was actually really sad to leave.”
Olivia frowned. “What’s his name?”
“What?”
“The reason you were sad to leave?”
“I wasn’t sad to leave only because of him. It was all of them—the whole family. I got to experience what having a big family would be like and I loved it.”
“Name?” Olivia demanded, ignoring the rest of my statement.
“Mason.
“So, are you going to leave me now to become a swamp person?” Olivia asked, her tone sarcastic. I shook my head and shrugged my shoulders. I didn’t know how to tell her that that was exactly what I wanted. Malibu didn’t feel like home to me anymore. Slidell did.
“Kat.” Olivia jerked forward. “You’re going back, aren’t you?” she asked, accusingly.
“I can’t go anywhere right now.”
“But if you could, you would go back!” she shrieked. “Why would you leave Malibu? You have everything you could ever want here.”
“Not everything,” I said quietly.
“Are you talking about that Mason guy?” she gasped. “You’d seriously move two- thousand miles away from your home to be with a hillbilly named after a jar.”
“He’s not a hillbilly.”
“How long have you known him?”
“Since day one.”
“So…” she counted in her head. “Ten weeks! A guy you’ve known ten weeks is now the love of your life?” she barked.
“Why are you being so mean?” I asked.
“Wow,” she marveled, shaking her head. “You can’t love him, Kat, you hardly know him.”
“Don’t wow me,” I griped. “You’re chasing a twenty-six year old loser who lives off of his parent’s money.”
“He’s a pilot!”
“Was a pilot! Now he’s a douche who wears an aviator jacket trying to live vicariously through a character in a movie that came out when he was a fucking toddler!” I was standing up with my finger pointed in Olivia’s face. Surprisingly, instead of punching me, or calling me a clueless bitch, she laughed. She laughed so hard she was shaking.
“What the hell is so funny?” I spit.
“You,” she said. “Maybe you should go back to the swamp, Kat, because you sure as hell aren’t the same girl that’s been my best friend for the last four years.”
“You know what, Olivia? You don’t seem the same to me either.”
“I am the same, Kat. And you used to be just like me.”
“I’m sorry that I’m no longer the self involved bitch you remember.”
Olivia smirked. “No, Kat, that part hasn’t changed,” she declared, before walking out the door and slamming it behind her.
I knew Marion had heard it. Two minutes later, she appeared. “Is everything okay?”
“I don’t know.” I exhaled hard. “I’m sorry about that. I hope we didn’t wake you.”
“No, I was reading over some files. You need anything?” she asked.
I shook my head no, but she came and sat down next to me anyway. I figured it was her way of offering to listen, so I took her up on the offer.
“Olivia says she’s not different, but I don’t remember her being such a bitch.” Marion raised an eyebrow. “Sorry,” I muttered. Bitch wouldn’t have been a curse word at Dana’s.
“Well, you two spent a lot of time apart, in different parts of the world,” Marion said. “That had to have altered you some.”
“She says I used to be just like her. Was I as self-involved and judgmental as she is?”
“To a degree,” Marion answered honestly. “I can tell being in Slidell changed you for the better—less the drinking and swearing, of course.” I ignored that last part.
“Before I went to Slidell, I would have loved being at the party Olivia and I went to tonight, but I couldn’t stand it. It was full of rich douche bags who could care less about my dad—or me. You know, none of my so-called friends called me while I was gone. None of them.”
“Maybe they just didn’t know what to say. These kids have never dealt with what you’re going through before. Sometimes, saying nothing feels like the right thing to do.”
“I guess, but I still would have called and asked how a person was doing, or at the very least, sent a text.”
“Tell me about Mason,” Marion said, abruptly changing the subject.
“How do you know about—never mind.” Dana.
“Dana said you and Mason got to be pretty close.”
“We did,” I muttered. “I think I may have messed things up with him though—like it matters—there’s no way we could have a relationship living two thousand miles away from each other.”
“What’s he like?” Marion asked.
“Beautiful,” I grinned.
“Is that all,” she laughed.
“No. He’s…everything,” I breathed, wanting to cry.
“You love him,” Marion said, shifting my hair away from my eyes.
“I do.”
“Does he know how you feel?”
“He told me he loved me before I got on the plane to come home. I didn’t say it back.” My eyes filled with tears. “I really wish I would have.”
“You still can,” she offered.
Marion and I looked at each other for a long while, waiting for the other to speak. “Can I have some wine now?” I finally asked, sniffling.
Marion smiled. “No, you can get some sleep now. And think about what I said. “It’s not too late.”
Chapter 35
I’d laid awake most of the night as thoughts of Olivia, Mason and my father swirled in my head. I finally drifted off about 5:00 a.m. and didn’t wake up until two in the afternoon. Marion’s guest room was as dark as a cave when the blackout shades were pulled.
I stumbled into the living area and spotted Marion sitting at her Lucite dining table with paperwork spread across the top.
“Good afternoon,” Marion said.
I nodded.
“Kat, this is Lenny,” Marion said of the man sitting across the table from her. “He’s working with me on your father’s case.”
I waved, heading toward the kitchen.
“Is that?” Lenny asked Marion.
“Yes.”
“Do you have a second, Kat?” Lenny asked me.
“No,” Marion said, at the same time I said, “yes.”
“Which is it?” Lenny asked, looking back and forth between Marion and me.
“Give me a minute,” I spoke up.
“I just made a fresh pot of coffee if you’d l
ike some,” Marion offered.
“I prefer tea,” I said.
“In the cabinet next to the stove.”
I opened the cabinet and found an array of exotic teas. I moved the containers around until I saw a word I recognized. Chai. I took a large mug from the tea cabinet and filled it with water and placed it in the microwave for one minute, then dropped the tea bag in. I found a half gallon of skim milk in the fridge; I took the tea bag out of my mug and poured in a little milk. I stood in front of Marion and Lenny. “Nonfat Chai tea latte,” I bragged, holding the mug in the air before taking a sip.
Lenny looked unimpressed.
“What do you need?” I asked him.
“Your house,” Lenny stated, “had a new security system installed a month or so before your father way shot, correct?”
“Yeah.”
“Who installed it? We can’t find any records of payment being made to anyone for the install.”
“I don’t know,” I shrugged.
“Did your dad mention anything to you about a backup system? As you probably know, the security footage from that night was destroyed, along with most of the equipment. But if there’s a backup…”
There was something about Lenny that I didn’t like. Maybe it was his goofy haircut, or the leather tie he was wearing with a hound’s-tooth jacket. I’d never seen a man wear hounds tooth I didn’t think.
“I can’t remember him saying anything.”
Lenny sighed, shuffling papers on the table. “Okay, what about Veronica—how well did you get to know her?”
“I didn’t get to know her at all.”
“What about—” “I think that’s enough for now, Lenny,” Marion interrupted.
Lenny’s cell phone chimed. He scrambled to check it. Then Marion’s went off. I didn’t like the look they exchanged.
“What is it? What’s wrong?” I asked, sliding into an empty chair at the table.
“The story’s spreading,” Lenny said to Marion.
“What the hell is going on?” I demanded.
Marion gave me a look that said cursing would not be tolerated, so I apologized. Again.
Lenny looked at me. “This morning you were on the news.”
I groaned. “The good news is there wasn’t a photo,” he said.
“What’s the bad news?”
“All of Malibu knows you visited your house yesterday and went to a party last night, which you quickly left after you were confronted with the news of an alleged SEC investigation involving your father and Manger Mutual.”
“Caleb! That weasel!” I complained. “How can a credible news source report a rumor?”
“By using the word alleged,” Marion frowned.
“This is such crap! Why is what I did last night news?”
“With the mention of an SEC investigation, I’m afraid it’s going to get worse before it gets better,” Lenny offered, ignoring my question.
“There’s more,” Marion said, warily.
“What?” I gasped, anxious.
“We confirmed this morning that the photo of you shown on the national news was sent from Olivia’s phone.”
“Olivia lost her phone—two months ago.”
“The photo was first sent to a local gossip page, the national news lifted it from there. A kid runs it; he was easy to convince that he’d be in serious trouble if he didn’t reveal the source. The photo was sent from Olivia’s phone five days ago; three days before the story aired nationally.”
“So, Caleb didn’t tell, Olivia did.” It made sense. Out of the two of them, Olivia was the one who’d known I’d been at my house yesterday.
The landline rang. Marion answered it. “Tell him he’s been misinformed. She’s not here.” Marion’s cell rang. “Thank you,” she said, before hanging up the cordless phone and answering her cell.
The first call was from the front desk, the second from the reporter they’d turned away. Marion told him she’d not been informed of any SEC investigation involving my father or Manger Mutual and had no further comment. Olivia had betrayed me, I was sure of it. She was also the only one of my friends who knew I was staying with Marion.
“You should go back to Slidell,” Marion said. “I’ll make the arrangements.”
“Olivia knows I was there. She knows I was in Slidell. I can’t go back now,” I cried. “I can’t bring this circus back there. I can’t do that to them. I have to stay here now.”
“They’re not going to follow you to Slidell.”
“You don’t know that for sure. If there does turn out to be an SEC investigation, I’ll need to be here.”
The landline rang again.
“I have to see my father,” I muttered, and left the room. I brushed my teeth, put my hair in a ponytail, and snuck out the back of the building where Ray was waiting for me.
Chapter 36
My father was walking around his room when I arrived. “Daddy, are you supposed to be up?” I asked, panicked. “They didn’t tell me I couldn’t be,” he said. “They unhooked me from everything.” He held his arms wide open to prove it. He looked better today, his face had good color and hopefully he had his appetite back so he could start putting some weight back on.
My father and I sat down on opposite ends of a small table in the corner of the room.
“I’m so grateful you’re okay, daddy.” I reached across the table and touched his hand.
“Me too, baby,” he breathed. I’d told him the same thing yesterday, but it was the first thought I had when I saw him, and probably would be for a while.
“Marion filled me in on some of what you did while I was sleeping,” he smiled. Sleeping. Ha. “She said you loved Slidell.”
“I did.” I didn’t want to go into detail about my stay, so I changed the subject.
“I’m going tomorrow morning to register for classes at UCLA.”
“You were accepted, that’s great.”
“They had to accept me, dad. UCLA isn’t Harvard.”
“It’s still a great school.”
“I know, I just meant it’s a state school. I met the requirements, so they had to take me.”
“Did you apply anywhere else?”
“No.”
“Hmmm.”
“What does hmmm mean?”
“From what Marion told me about your time in Louisiana, I thought you might have applied to LSU also.”
I didn’t say anything.
“Well…”
I would have been lying if I said I hadn’t thought about applying to LSU, but I couldn’t do that now.
“Marion told me you met a boy in Slidell.”
“Of course she did,” I grumbled.
“You should tell him how you feel, Katara.”
“I think Marion should mind her own business.”
“She means well.”
My father’s nurse burst through the door before I could respond. “Dr. Briley is on his way to see you; you need to get back in bed,” she instructed my father. “And you’ll have to step out,” she said to me.
“I’ll get into bed, but I need a moment with my daughter before she goes,” he told her.
“Make it a short moment,” the nurse said and stepped out of the room.”
“Marion overheard you tell Olivia you’d move back to Slidell if you had the chance.”
“Jesus, daddy. Did Marion have someone transcribe every word I said last night?”
“No,” he laughed. I want you to be happy. Go to LSU. Be happy.”
“There are reasons I can’t.”
“I hope I’m not one of them,” my father said. I looked away. He was the only reason I had to stay in Malibu. I had no friends here, and people had already presumed that my father was a thief based on a rumor. He would need me to be there for him and I wasn’t going to leave him.
“Moment’s up,” the nurse said, barreling back into the room like a bull on the loose.
“I love you, daddy,” I said, and kissed his cheek.
“Love you, too, sweet girl. Think about what I said.”
I nodded, giving him a hard smile. Thinking about going back to Slidell was all I’d been thinking about since I’d arrived in Malibu. Mason and the Broussard’s—I missed them terribly and I’d only been gone two days. I hoped the ache I felt in my gut would fade as time passed.
On my way out of the hospital, my phone rang. I figured it was Marion, so I answered it without checking. “Kitty Cat!” Shelby shrieked. I smiled so wide, I almost laughed.
“Shelby, hey.”
“How’s your dad?” she asked.
“He’s doing great, should be home by the end of the week.”
“He’s fine,” Shelby announced, her voice carrying away from the phone.
“Good, let me talk,” Bit piped in.
“I just got on,” Shelby griped to Bit, then asked me, “How’s it in Richie Rich land?”
I laughed. “The same as when I left.”
“I have to tell her,” I heard Bit whine.
“It’s my turn,” Shelby scolded. It sounded like they were wrestling for control of the phone. “I’ll be quick,” Bit promised. Then Bit was on the line. “Kat, me and Logan did it last night,” she blurted.
“Wow. Great,” I laughed, wondering if I should have congratulated her instead.
“You were right; plannin’ it would have ruined it,” Bit gushed.
“You said it, now give me the phone back,” Shelby argued.
“Is that Kat?” I heard Russ ask.
“Yes! But I’m talking to her,” Shelby snapped. Russ hollered, “Hey, Kat, sorry I didn’t get to tell ya bye.”
My stomach was in knots. I missed them so much. I wished I was back in Slidell, and felt guilty about it. I’d just gotten home, and my dad wasn’t even out of the hospital yet.
A door slammed hard in the background and Shelby said, “Now I think that’ll keep ‘em off me a minute.”
“Are you hiding in the bathroom?” I asked.
“Yep, it’s the only place you can almost get some privacy in this place,” she grumbled.
“So, did y’all stay the second night in New Orleans?”
“No. Mason needed to go home.”
The knot in my stomach jumped to my throat. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for this to happen.”
“We all understand. Just bad timin’—that’s not your fault. None of it’s your fault, really.”
Two Thousand Miles Page 17
