Crowd of Lies (Kingsley Academy Book 2)

by Lisa Helen Gray

  “My mum was ten times the woman your mum was. It should have been her who died that night, not mine. Your mum deserved everything bad that happened to her, so don’t fucking bring my mother into it.”

  “No, let’s talk about how your dad, and theirs,” she bites out, pointing to Grant and then me and the twins, “raped my mum, got her pregnant, and ruined her fucking life.”

  I turn to stone, studying her closely to see if her words are true. She doesn’t even flinch, staring right at Grant.

  The room is silent, all of us processing what she just said. A million thoughts run through my mind; the diary Ivy mentioned—though only she had seen it when she first arrived—and the way Nova had gone pale, not looking at her when she told her it was a lie.

  “Not got anything to say?” she baits, deliberately looking at Grant, who has had a lot to say until now.

  In the blink of an eye, I watch as Grant unfreezes, swiping everything off the table at the end of her bed.

  “You fucking liar! You sick, fucking liar. How fucking dare you!”

  I step forward, grabbing his jacket and pulling him back. Whatever the fuck is going on, we won’t get answers this way.

  Her gaze turns to me, and I can see she’s putting on an act. She’s angry, pissed, but this isn’t her, not the real her. Her emotions are running wild, something she rarely lets go of, and right now, she has no control, no matter how hard she’s trying to act like she does.

  “Ask Kaiden. He knows everything.”

  I arch my eyebrow at her, speaking up for the first time. “I have no fucking idea what you’re going on about, Ivy, but you need to start talking. We’re clearly the only ones in the dark.” I pointedly glance at Nova and Sam, who have the nerve to look away.

  Her face twists into a scowl. “Short version? Your grandfathers thought they could play Pinky and the Brain and take over the world. When they fucked up, they used their sons to make it right. Their two sons happily followed the rules like good little boys. My mum was an easy target, it seems. They raped her to get her pregnant, so they’d have to marry, and it worked. They took a gamble on who the father would be. She got pregnant by one of them. The jury is still out on whether she had an abortion, but I’m guessing she wanted the spawn out of her. When her own parents warned her to keep quiet about it, she turned to drugs and alcohol. She came back and must have seen how happy you all were and decided to share your dads’ dirty little secret. And now, here we are. Royce had my mum killed and tried to have me killed.” She turns to Nova, frowning. “I didn’t leave anything out, did I?”

  “Ivy,” she whispers, her voice filled with anguish.

  “How do you know all of this?” I ask, trying to remain calm, when all I want to do is punch my fist through a wall.

  I glance at the twins from the corner of my eye, noticing how pale they’ve gone. They shouldn’t have to listen to this. Dad has never been a good dad to them, never really been anything, but he is still their dad. I couldn’t care less. In my eyes, he’ll always be a piece of shit.

  “I listened to them rape her through a recording I found in your dad’s office,” she tells me. “But you know that, don’t you?”

  “My dad isn’t a good person. He’s a prick, Ivy, but this… this is extreme,” I admit, torn over what to think.

  Could he do this?

  I wouldn’t put anything past my dad, but rape, murder… it’s a little much to wrap my head around. If he did this, I’ll turn my back on him for good. I’ve never loved him, never cared, and often wished he’d die, but for the twins, I put up with him. But he’s still my father.

  For a moment, I wonder why I’m not going ballistic, why I’m not screaming she’s a liar and leaving.

  I try to think back, to pull a memory of any sign of this behaviour, but I’m coming up blank. I’m not sure if I blocked it out, or if it was never there. Or maybe I don’t know because I never paid that much attention to him. He wasn’t worth my time.

  However, he is still my dad and this doesn’t just impact those accused. It impacts everyone in this room.

  “She’s telling the truth,” Nova whispers, pulling a phone out of her pocket. “This is the phone she found, and it has evidence on it that proves he had her mum killed.”

  “She could have planted that herself after killing her mum,” Grant barks. “This is all fabricated so she can get her claws into my family’s money.”

  Nova shakes her head, her eyes filled with pity. “What money, Grant? Your dad has been stealing from Sam’s company for a while now. Sam found out last week.”

  “What?” he asks, taking a step back, paling further.

  “She’s telling the truth. I have all the evidence,” Sam admits, stepping closer to the bed.

  “And where’s yours?” I ask Ivy, ignoring Sam. My voice is raspy with shock, yet gentle. I don’t want to upset Ivy further.

  She looks down at her lap, fiddling with the blanket. “It’s gone.”

  Grant laughs. “Sounds about right.”

  She looks up, glaring at him. “Yes, because getting run off the road and nearly killed was my plan all along. The bag was ripped from my body, you fucking dipshit.”

  I stagger back, glancing to the floor. When we arrived, Carter told me the witness said a bag was stolen from her.

  I don’t want to believe my dad could do something like this. I’ve done some fucked up shit, even threatened to kill people, but the thought of committing murder the way Ivy is telling me he did… I could never, would never do that. As for the rape allegation and why he did it—only the worst of humankind could do such a thing, men on death row. My games with Ivy were just that: games. Yes, I’d wanted to hurt her, make her suffer for her mother’s crimes, but not once had it entered my mind to do something so evil. My plans had been child’s play compared to this. I would never have physically harmed her. I’d never have forced her to do something she didn’t want to do. I knew right from the beginning that she wanted me. I could feel it the first time I laid eyes on her as she watched me fuck Danielle.

  And Ivy is mine. If he tried to kill her, he will pay for it.

  I stare at Nova, and when she feels my gaze on her, she looks up. “Is this true?” I ask, keeping my tone even.

  “Yes. I didn’t believe it until Sam told me,” she explains.

  I look to Sam, arching my eyebrow questioningly. “I walked in on them the night they raped her. I saw it.” He bows his head, unable to look at us.

  I rub my tired eyes, blowing out my cheeks. Why had he never brought this up before if what he’s saying is true? I’m even more disgusted that if it is true, then he kept it quiet all these years. I didn’t think much of the man to begin with once I found out who he was. I think even less of him now.

  “You’re lying,” Grant bites out. “She’s your daughter. You’d say anything to win her over.”

  “If you really believed that, you wouldn’t just be standing there, Grant. The night your mother rushed out of the house was the night Cara told her what they had done to her. Your mum must have known something the others didn’t, because she left your father without questioning him. She packed her bags and left.”

  “That’s not true,” he whispers brokenly.

  “It’s true. She called my mum, who was her godmother, and asked for a place to stay. She believed it. She crashed before she even left Cheshire Grove. She was on her way to my mum’s cottage in Devon.”

  “This is bullshit!” he yells, picking up the chair and throwing it across the room. The twins duck, barely dodging it.

  Grant storms out, and a part of me wants to go with him, but another needs more answers, more than what they’ve given me.

  “How did you find the stuff?” I question Ivy the minute he’s gone.

  She rolls her eyes at me, but I can see the flash of hurt in her gaze. “Don’t stand there and pretend you didn’t know any of this. This is why you wanted me gone, isn’t it; to keep my mouth shut, to break me? That’s what you
said, right, that you were going to enjoy breaking me?” she yells, slamming her fist on the bed. “You can’t break what’s already broken, only shatter it further. You’ve got your wish, so get the fuck out. I never want to see your face again.”

  “What?” I ask, my heart in my throat. “I swear on my life I didn’t know anything about this. I assumed it was something else, that she slept with Dad and it broke my mum. I didn’t know he fucking raped her! We’re just as innocent in this as you. If what you have told us is true.” I look away briefly, catching my breath. I didn’t mean to lash out, but we’ve been through so much, and as much as Ivy likes to believe what we have is just sex, it isn’t. I’ve given her more of myself than any other person. It grieves me to know she thinks I’m capable of this.

  She screams, her entire face turning red with anger. “Get out! I’ve told you the fucking truth, all of it. Your dad is a monster.” She forces out a laugh, yet it sounds broken as she pushes the hair out of her face. “I’m so stupid. He wasn’t offering me money to get me away from you, he was offering it to me to pay for my silence. He didn’t want me getting close to the truth.”

  “What money?”

  “It doesn’t matter. I trusted you, Kai. I let you in, and you did exactly what you said you were going to do. Now go fucking gloat somewhere else.”

  “I’m not fucking gloating,” I snap, stepping forward. “You’re talking in fucking riddles and I’m just trying to get answers. It is my dad you’re accusing of rape.”

  “It’s not accusing if he actually did it,” she snaps. “And welcome to my world. You’ve been talking in riddles since I first met you.”

  “Ivy,” Ethan starts, but she glares at him.

  “Don’t! I don’t trust any of you. I want you to leave.”

  “We didn’t know,” Lucca adds.

  I can tell she’s torn on what to believe, but right now, it’s fresh, and she’s livid. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t trust you. You’ve played games from the very beginning, and it ends now.”

  “I’ve not been playing you. You know that,” I tell her, getting frustrated. I had no idea about any of this, not even an inkling. I assumed whatever Cara had said was bad, but not this.

  If it turns out to be true, I don’t even want to think about it. I feel sick now.

  “There’s no need to keep lying,” she whispers, anguish covering her features as she starts to tremble.

  “I’m not fucking lying!” I roar.

  She jumps, her monitors next to the bed going crazy. “Ivy, calm down,” Nova warns.

  “Tell them to leave,” she bites out, looking away.

  “Ivy, don’t do this. I didn’t know.” Silently, I plead with her to look at me, to see that I’m telling her the truth.

  “Goodbye, Kai,” she whispers.

  I turn to Nova, fighting hard not to yell at her. She’s known my hatred for Cara, the blame I wrongfully placed, and all this time she let me, knowing it was all a lie. It makes me wonder just what else she has been keeping from me. Where my mum is, for example. They are best friends. I asked her if she knew where she was and she said she didn’t know. I should have listened to my instincts back then. Because she had lied to my face. I can feel it in my gut. “Do you know where my mum is?”

  If someone can fill in the blanks, it’s Mum.

  She looks to Sam briefly before flicking her gaze back to me. “I do.”

  “Is she really sick?” I ask, feeling bile rise in my throat.

  Do any of our parents give a fuck?

  “Not anymore. She’s been clean for two years.”

  “Why hasn’t she come back?” Ethan asks, a hardness in his tone.

  “Because your father wouldn’t allow it. Any time she tried to get clean, he’d spike her food or drink with a prescription pill and she’d be back to square one. He was trying to take over as beneficiary for the Kingsley empire, so your mum disappeared before he could,” she tells him, and I can feel the tension in the room begin to rise.

  I grit my teeth together. “Call her. Tell her to come back,” I order, before turning and leaving the room.

  Outside, we stop in the hallway, and I scan the twins, gauging their reactions.

  “We’ll figure out the truth,” I assure them.

  Ethan glares over at me. “Who the fuck cares? He’s not even our dad. You’ve played that role for as long as we can remember.”

  “Ethan,” I warn, hating this for them.

  “Don’t!” Lucca growls. “It’s true. In there, while you were debating whether Dad did all of those things, me and Ethan didn’t even question it. We’ve only ever seen the bad side to him.”

  “What do you mean?” I ask, clenching my fists.

  Lucca shares a look with Ethan, and they silently communicate with each other. Ethan nods, giving him the go ahead before he turns to face me. “Remember the time he missed our game and you took us to the office to have it out with him?”

  “Yeah,” I ask, confused as to where they are going with this. They were, like, eight or nine at the time.

  “We went to go find the bathroom, but instead, we walked into a conference room and found him, his hand over a young woman’s mouth, fucking her.”

  “He was raping her?” I bite out. “Why the fuck didn’t you ever say anything?”

  “We don’t know if he was or not. But at that age, seeing a half-naked woman and your dad balls deep inside of her, was fucking gross. Neither of us wanted to speak about it.”

  “Fuck!” I roar, slamming my hand against the wall. I turn to the twins. “We need to go back to the house, find Dad.”

  “What about Ivy?”

  I look to the door, my chest tightening. “She doesn’t believe we didn’t know about this.”

  “So, what are we going to do about it?” Lucca asks.

  “We need to find Dad.”

  Ethan glares. “Are you seriously going to believe him over her? He’ll never admit it, Kai. And you saw her in there. That was fucking real.”

  I narrow my eyes at his tone. “I know that. But we need proof.”

  Lucca sighs, shaking his head at me. “She’s never going to forgive us.”

  I smirk. “She’s mine, whether she likes it or not. She can’t avoid us forever. She starts Kingsley Academy once she’s well enough, and I’ll make sure I get in some of her classes.”

  “You’ve already done them,” Lucca reminds me.

  I shrug. “I’ve only got a few classes to attend this year, a few extra won’t hurt. But right now, we need to track down Dad and see what we can find. He must have left some kind of clue as to what is happening.”

  “Let’s go then,” Ethan orders, clasping his hands together.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  IVY

  I’ve spent the past four weeks recuperating. My ribs still hurt, but the pain is nothing compared to the scabs I got from the road rash. I wanted to pick and scratch those fuckers like nobody’s business. It drove me insane. I’m glad they are finally gone.

  My cast won’t come off for another four weeks—if I don’t take the thing off myself beforehand.

  I’d rather be covered in scabs and have both arms in a cast than be in that hospital bed, forced to listen to Sam tell me about himself. He’d tried to get to know me, but I don’t think there is anything worth knowing, so I made it difficult for him, acting like a complete bitch.

  It had taken me that time to calm down and understand Nova’s reasoning. I couldn’t yet forgive her for her part in it all. But being in that hospital, nearly dying, made me realise how much I needed someone right then.

  Finding out the whole truth had been a wakeup call, not just for me, but for everyone.

  The day the doctor came in to discharge me had been a relief, yet scary, because I knew there was no way I could go back with Nova to Monroe Manor. I had a few reasons as to why, but mostly because I had been weak, and with Kaiden living next door, I didn’t want my guard down. I couldn’t take the risk of him sne
aking into my room. I just couldn’t. And a part of me worried I’d never be able to say no to him.

  Then there was Nova. I thought time apart would do us good, give us a chance to really be alone with our thoughts.

  When I broached the subject in the hospital room, she automatically assumed I was running away and began to panic. Once I explained why I couldn’t leave with her, she paused, actually taking in my words and my fears. She surprised me by agreeing yet wouldn’t agree for me to stay on my own in a hotel.

  And with Royce still out there, she didn’t want to make it easy for him to track me down. He hadn’t been seen or heard from since the day I was run off the road. If he had a brain, he’d have run to the other side of the world by now and not stuck around trying to finish the job.

  I’d be ready for him this time.

  Sam offered for me to stay with him in his home twenty minutes away from Monroe Manor. However, Nova took one look at my expression and fixed the awkward situation, pointing out Sam worked a lot and couldn’t be there. He went to argue, but when Nova mentioned Elle and her husband, Ed, I practically screamed yes.

  Which is how I ended up staying with Elle and Ed for the past three weeks. They had been more than happy to nurse me back to health and watch over me. It had been blissful having this time away from everyone, having the time to truly think. It was also a monumental moment for me. I finally got to feel what a home felt like.

  Ed isn’t as stiff and grumpy as he liked to make people believe. He’s a huge teddy bear and I’ve loved our time playing cards together. It would have been chess, but all the pieces confused me.

  My time is coming to an end though. I need to move back to Nova’s and get back to reality. I don’t want to leave. My chest hurts as I shove clothes into my bag.

  Being here has not only made me feel worthy and cared for, but it has taken my mind off the clusterfuck that is my life.

  Having Elle and Ed had been great, but it was her two Beagles that helped heal the pain missing Kaiden had caused. They were beautiful and made me feel at ease.

  I still don’t know how I could miss Kaiden, want him, when all he’s done is lie to me.