Creeping Beautiful

by JA Huss

  Adam snorted. “Oh, for fuck’s sake. You are the worst judge of character—”

  “Fuck you, Adam!” She was all up in his face, pointing her finger. “You’re ruining my birthday!”

  I stepped between them and looked at Adam. I had to place my hands on his shoulders to steady myself. “He’s gone now. It’s done. So… just… let’s try to have a nice day.”

  I looked over at Donovan and he was nodding. “It’s done, Adam.” But then he looked at Indie. “What time is he bringing her home?” His voice was what I like to call ‘doctor professional’. Better known as emotionally detached. But his words were somehow… wrong.

  “They’ll be back at four.”

  All three of us looked at the grandfather clock in the hallway. I thought it said ten forty-five. But I wasn’t sure.

  Adam said, “Five hours and fifteen minutes. He better not be late or I will hunt him down—”

  “He won’t be late. He’s meeting a contractor over at the cottage at four thirty.”

  This seemed to pacify everyone. At least, momentarily.

  Indie took advantage of the momentary calm and walked up to Adam and slipped her arms around his middle. She gazed up into his eyes with a look I’d never seen on her face before.

  Donovan and I traded glances. I thought this was a new look for him too.

  “Don’t you get it?” Indie was asking Adam. Then she looked at me. And then Donovan. “I wanted to spend some time alone with you guys. All of you. That’s how I want to say goodbye to my teens.”

  Then she did something I had never seen before. Ever. She leaned up on her tiptoes and kissed Adam right on the mouth.

  This was not a goodnight kiss like she would give me. It was… it was open-mouthed and filed with tongue.

  It was fuckin’ hot.

  And then… then Adam kissed her back.

  He put both hands on her cheeks and kissed her like she was the love of his life. He kissed her like he was about to rip her clothes off and fuck her up against the front door.

  He kissed her like Donovan and I weren’t even there.

  And that’s the day I knew… Indie wasn’t the only one with secrets.

  We all had them, didn’t we?

  Indie Anna Accorsi had played a starring role in our fantasies since she was ten years old, but up until now they’d all been dress rehearsals.

  That day of her twentieth birthday?

  That was opening night.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO - INDIE

  If I had to choose between them, I would die. There is just no way I could only choose one.

  I need them all.

  I don’t even care if that’s selfish. I want them all.

  And if I thought I could have Nathan St. James, then I would. I would have him too. I would keep all four of them because they are each different, and unique, and give me something I can’t get from anyone else.

  Every single way they fill me up has been written in this journal. So if it’s not clear by now, there is nothing left to be said. There are simply no words to describe my need.

  But I am afraid that you will see this and you won’t understand. And I don’t care if you are Nathan, or McKay, or Adam, or Donovan. I need you to understand.

  How many other ways are there to describe Nathan St. James? He is my boy next door. He is my best friend. He is the firefly-catcher, and the treehouse-builder, and the swamp-charmer.

  Oh, I know what Adam would say. “He was running around on you back in high school.” Yes, Adam. He told me all about what he did. He told me that you caught him. He told me what you said to him. And I get it. If Nathan loved me best, he would be more careful with my heart. He’d be like McKay.

  McKay is so very, very careful with me. McKay is my soul. He is my trainer. He is the dinner-maker, and the hair-washer, and the nightmare-chaser.

  But McKay will never admit he has always loved me. That I am his first, and only, one true love.

  So I have Donovan. Donovan is careful too. He is my mind-reader. My note-taker. He is the light in the dark, he is the filler of holes, he is the voice in my head that keeps me calm during my stormy nights of insanity.

  But he’s part-time. We all know it. He will never take me with him to LA and I wouldn’t want to go. This is my home. Right here. This is where I belong.

  And that’s where Adam comes in. Adam. My owner. My knight. My protector. He is my partner in crime. The fixer of mistakes, the leader of us all, the untouchable one.

  He is like a mean old dog who will bite anyone who gets too close.

  Everyone but me.

  He lets me get close.

  But will he share?

  Will any of them share?

  Only if I make them.

  So this is how I made them…

  I kissed Adam in the hallway. Nathan St. James wasn’t even down the driveway yet with our daughter when I rose up on my tiptoes and put my mouth right on Adam’s. When he placed his hands on my face and leaned into it.

  McKay was just two feet away. Shifting his feet, and his gaze, and wondering if he should make me stop. But what would that mean?

  He didn’t know. Or he did, and couldn’t admit it.

  I was looking right at Donovan when I kissed Adam. He would be the easiest to turn because he was the least invested in what happened tomorrow.

  But would he come back for more?

  I didn’t know.

  I didn’t have any idea why they were still here with me.

  When I pulled away from Adam his eyes were closed. And they didn’t open right away. It was like he was still there. Still lingering in the moment when our lips touched.

  When his eyes finally did open, I could see myself in them. A distorted shadow of a girl. Something black and not altogether whole. She scared me. She still scares me. Every time I see myself in a window, or a mirror, or a drinking glass, I am afraid of the monster looking back.

  But his gaze held me captive. Forced me to see the girl I’ve been trying to outrun my whole life.

  I went still. And then I made another executive decision. Just like that time Johnny Boston captured me and held me prisoner on that yacht.

  I let that girl in.

  Or maybe I should say… I let her out.

  It was time.

  McKay broke the silence when he said, “What the fuck was that?”

  Adam brought the back of his hand up to his mouth and made a fist. He held it there against his lips like he was coming to terms with something. And he would not look away from me. So I kept looking at that shadow girl reflected in his eyes. I could not unsee her now.

  Donovan let out a long sigh. I figured this was the moment when Donovan walked out for good. Cut his losses and said goodbye. Or maybe just left without saying anything. Because he is smart. And he knows about the lovely darkness hiding inside me. He sees my gorgeous misery.

  But he didn’t move. Just stayed right where he was.

  Adam looked away first and broke the spell the shadow girl had over me. At least for a moment.

  “Adam?” McKay was still asking his question.

  But Adam just looked at me, then at McKay, and said, “I don’t know.”

  Then someone said, “You know,” and I realized it was me saying that. Or some part of me, at least. And she kept talking. “You all know. We all know what’s going on here. Why do we have to keep pretending? Why can’t we just… accept it? And be who we are?”

  “What are you… talking about?” Donovan was confused. I understood that. He was not a cold man. Not really. He was fun, and he smiled, and he helped me through lots of things. But he was like me in a lot of ways.

  Detached and far away.

  Then McKay walked across the foyer, opened up the door, and walked out.

  I panicked. Because McKay was not the one who was supposed to walk out.

  Donovan was. I could deal with Donovan. I could lure him back with the promise of secrets.

  But I never had control of M
cKay like that.

  I looked at Adam and said, “Stop him. You have to stop him.”

  Adam looked at the door, which McKay didn’t even bother to slam behind him, and then back at me. “What am I supposed to tell him, Indie? What exactly do you see happening here?”

  I looked at Donovan for help. But he was shaking his head at me.

  So I looked back to Adam and said, “I don’t care what you tell him, Adam. Just make him stay. Don’t let him walk away. This will not work without him.”

  Donovan walked across the foyer and grabbed me by the arm. He jerked it, angrily. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

  But I was still looking at Adam.

  Still seeing that dark shadow of a girl in his eyes.

  And I said the only thing left to say. “It’s the only way to save me from myself.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE - DONOVAN

  PRESENT DAY

  It’s an awkward dinner of spaghetti and meatballs, garlic bread, and wine. We’ve had this same meal, minus the wine, in Indie’s case, dozens of times in the past. Maybe even hundreds. McKay used to make it a lot because back when Indie was small, she was a very picky eater. McKay worked hard on expanding her palate because he would eat anything. Food was an adventure in his mind. So he was always trying introduce new vegetables, or some kind of fish, or whatever at dinner time. And dinner, like church, was a constant in Indie’s life. She had to be home every night at seven o’clock to eat with McKay—and sometimes Adam and I, if we were around— or she would be in a lot of trouble.

  But Indie was a simple girl when it came to food and didn’t like much. McKay finally gave in and just started making her favorites. And spaghetti and meatballs was one of the few things I did actually learn to make because we ate it so often.

  On the surface everything around us almost seems the same. It didn’t take long to make the pavilion go back in time. A few cushions, and pillows, and blankets and it’s almost like we never left.

  But then again… all you have to do is look across the lake and see the missing carriage house and that illusion fades quickly.

  I do my best with small talk, filling them in on the partnership I’m about to buy into back in LA. Indie asks a few questions about my specialty—assuming, as most people do, that I’m heading for a career in breast implants, puffy lips, and face lifts.

  But that was never the plan.

  Facial reconstruction is where my skills lie. I have spent a fair amount of time repairing cleft palates in Mexico over the years. I have been on my own ten-year plan since I first saw Indie back on the island. Not that she’d know. Or Adam, or McKay for that matter.

  But that’s only because they never asked.

  I have never been part of the team in the eyes of Adam and McKay. It has always been the two of them against the world. Indie is the go-between. She’s not really Adam’s little assassin. She’s not really McKay’s little obsession.

  She is their reason to stay together.

  So why am I here?

  I lost track of that answer a while back now, but it started as a long, convoluted maze of rambling—possibly delusional—thoughts about my brother, Carter.

  Twins. Identical twins.

  Every Untouchable child has an identical twin. Every single one.

  We always have doubles. That’s what makes us so untouchable. This secret project was called the Negative Program.

  But there is only one reason to keep two copies of the same thing.

  One is a backup. It’s just that simple.

  Adam had a double once. He just doesn’t remember his brother because he died at birth.

  That’s the real reason McKay went to live with Adam when he was a kid. Mr. Boucher wasn’t buying Adam a playmate, he was buying himself a back-up copy.

  I know this because my family wasn’t really running a sex slave auction for little girls on the island. That was just an excuse to hide what’s really happening behind the scenes. The Couture Family had been running the Negative Program since its inception.

  James Fenici has a twin. His name is Vincent.

  Nick Tate had a twin too. But her name is Harper. That got a little messy for obvious reasons.

  Adam had a twin, and he died.

  I had a twin and his name was Carter.

  Of course, most of them die early—before thirty, for sure. James Fenici, Adam, and myself are the only exceptions to that rule. But often in their teens. They take a hit, or they go insane, or they are killed when they show sociopathic tendencies too early.

  Carter and I were ten when they separated us.

  Right after the Santa Barbara massacre.

  It was too early.

  They should have known better.

  They should’ve learned from their mistake with James and Vincent.

  I didn’t really join this little team to keep Indie sane. Oh, that was part of it. Because I needed her. I needed the secrets locked inside her head. I did like her. In fact, I liked her immediately. Indie was a cool child. She was tough, and smart, and she had this very special memory that would lock things up in deep dark places and hold them tight like a vault until someone came along with the key, opened her up, and asked just the right questions, in just the right way, so they could spill out.

  He did that to her. Carter. He did that. I know he did. I would recognize his handiwork anywhere because we learned how to do it together. We trained in PSYOPS together as children. And Carter was much better at it than I was.

  But they took him from me. The stole him from me.

  And for a while I thought he was dead. One of us had to die, right? Eventually?

  But then Indie came along and I started to poke around in her mind. This was how I spent my time on the island. Those girls were like little quizzes for me. Little tests.

  I would be their friend. Their ally. I would bring them special treats. Little cakes and sweet juices. I would let them cry, and whine about how unfair life is, and complain about anything they wanted. I would listen and then I would lie to them as I picked apart their minds for practice and told them it was all going to be OK.

  Until Indie came along and I found that secret place inside her head. And I recognized it for what it was.

  Carter’s work.

  That’s why I needed Adam to buy her. That’s why I joined his team.

  But I did not have the key to unlock that vault inside Indie’s head. She never told me a single fuckin’ secret. I figured that out fairly early. By the time she was fourteen for sure. I knew there was no way I’d get the information I was looking for and then the Company fell and Carter never made contact with me, so… I dunno.

  I just let it go, I guess. Moved on. Accepted the inevitable truth that my brother really was gone.

  I had not seen a single sign that he didn’t die the night my grandfather lost his mind and ripped us apart—but even if he was alive, our work together was over.

  The Negative Program was over.

  Everyone in my family was a doctor, every boy for as long back as the Founding, was a doctor. Every single one of us followed the same path.

  PSYOPS

  But it wasn’t just PSYOPS.

  It was surgery too. Mind and body. That’s the goal for the genius boys bred into the Couture family.

  Carter and I are identical in every way. Right down to the wiring in our genius brains. We started manipulating people before we could talk. And we had this kind of “twin language” with our hands, and our eyes, and our body movements.

  We were fluent in three languages by the time we were five. We learned how to control subjects under the PSYOPS drugs by the time we were seven. He took over his first mind when he was eight and a half. He did this like it was his God-given gift. Like his only purpose on this planet was to fuck up the minds of others.

  He scared people the way Indie scares people. And my grandfather decided to end it after Santa Barbara.

  He blamed Carter for that mess. I’m not even sure why
. We were ten, for fuck’s sake. If Carter was in on it, he didn’t tell me.

  Maybe that’s why I’m still alive?

  But Carter and I… we were never meant to be two separate people. We were always supposed to be one.

  My grandfather made a mistake taking my brother from me.

  Huge. Mistake.

  And he paid for it with his life.

  I have kept current on the advancing technologies in psychiatric therapy. Much more so over the past two years than the three prior to that. And I would like to try something with Indie tonight.

  I know Adam is not coming back here until he’s sure things are safe and the quickest way to get there is to figure out where Indie’s been and what she knows.

  I would like to be very clear. I never lied to her. Not once. Not ever.

  But I haven’t been completely forthcoming with any of them. And when it comes to Indie, I have taken great care to hide things.

  Not about me. I don’t care if they find out what I’m up to. That was always the plan.

  But I have hidden things from Indie about herself.

  And tonight I will pull back the cloak she’s been wearing and set her free.

  McKay is initially resistant. He doesn’t speak when I present my offer, but I know him well enough to hear what he’s not saying.

  If McKay had his way, he’d never let Indie know the truth. If he had his way, he’d keep her ten forever. I know it. I can see it in his eyes.

  He didn’t want to do what we did on Indie’s twentieth birthday. He was the one who walked out. Not me. Not Adam. Him.

  But he didn’t get far. There is no way McKay would walk away from Indie. Not ever. Even if Adam hadn’t chased him out the door after Indie made it clear what she wanted from us that day, he would not have left. He might’ve gotten in his truck. Maybe even started the engine. But he would not have left.

  But things have changed now. Indie was the one who left and McKay had no say in it. He will do anything to keep her now.

  Anything.

  So when I make my offer and he’s silently resistant, I know that from McKay, that’s implied agreement.