Little Secrets (ARC)

by Jennifer Hillier

  They both know she’s not talking about this conversation.

  She reaches for her purse, then pushes past him and into the mudroom, where she grabs her coat, shoes, keys. When she opens the garage door from the inside, she’s surprised to see Castro’s car parked in their driveway, right in the middle of it, making it impossible for either car in the garage to exit. Marin walks over and taps on the windshield. Castro rolls her window down.

  “Going somewhere?” the woman asks.

  “Prosser. I’ll need you to move your car, please, Vanessa.”

  “Get in, both of you,” Castro says, her gaze directed over Marin’s shoulder. Marin turns to find Derek right behind her. “I’ll drive.”

  Chapter 31

  They’re trying to pretend like everything is normal at dinner, when it’s so not normal, for reasons Kenzie can’t even begin to speculate.

  Lorna, quirky on her best day, is agitated, muttering to herself as she picks at the tuna casserole, her eyes darting toward the clock on the stove every few minutes. The house is warm from the oven, and it’s a mild evening in general, but she’s wearing a quilted robe over her lounge pants like it’s the dead of winter.

  J.R.’s plate is clean, but it’s not because he ate. It’s because he didn’t. He’s currently pacing back and forth in the living room, smoking weed, drinking beer, and trying desperately to get ahold of Julian, who isn’t answering his phone.

  The small, ancient tube TV that Lorna keeps on the kitchen counter is tuned to Jeopardy!, which just started. I’ll take “What the Fuck Is Wrong with Everybody Tonight?” for six hundred, Alex.

  “Motherfucker,” J.R. shouts suddenly from the other room.

  Kenzie jumps, dropping her fork into her casserole at the sound of a beer bottle hitting the wall. It shatters, the shards falling onto the wood floor.

  Across from her, Lorna is rigid, her eyes flickering to the living room, ears pricked. She relaxes slightly a few seconds later when she confirms that whomever her son is mad at, it’s not her. A plastic container of Two-Bite Brownies sits open on the table, and she grabs one, munching rapidly even though her plate is still half-full of tuna and macaroni. She mumbles syllables under her breath that sound like words, but Kenzie still can’t make out what she’s saying.

  Is she really not going to ask her precious boy why the hell he just smashed a beer bottle against her living room wall? Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs, the both of them.

  J.R. calls for her, and Kenzie leaves Lorna at the table. She steps into the living room, careful to avoid the shattered glass all over the floor.

  “Julian isn’t picking up.”

  “Uh, yeah, I got that.”

  He glances past her into the kitchen, checking to see if his mother is listening. She’s not. Lorna has scooped a helping of casserole onto J.R.’s plate and is now studiously buttering a dinner roll. Kenzie rolls her eyes. For fuck’s sake, old woman, he said he wasn’t hungry.

  J.R. grabs Kenzie by the arm, harder than necessary, and yanks her a few paces farther away from the kitchen.

  “Julian’s phone is going straight to voice mail,” he says.

  “Maybe it’s dead.”

  “He has a charger in his car.” J.R. jabs at his phone again. “If he fucks me out of this money, I swear to God . . .”

  “Why would he do that?” Kenzie rubs the spot on her arm where his fingers pinched her. “He has no reason to do that. You’re being paranoid.”

  J.R. resumes his pacing. “Derek said he’d pay the money. Julian is supposed to text him when he gets back to Seattle with a meet-up point, and then let me know when it’s happening. He hasn’t texted.”

  “Maybe he’s still driving.”

  “He should have been in the city an hour ago at the latest. They should be meeting up right now.”

  “Maybe they are, and he’ll text any minute.”

  “Then why is his phone off?”

  “Maybe they’re at a place with no cell signal.”

  “He wouldn’t pick a place like that if he was meeting up with the guy who has the money, M.K. For fuck’s sake, think.”

  “I am thinking. Maybe he just . . . forgot to check in.”

  “Julian doesn’t forget.” J.R. looks at her. “He’s gonna fuck me over, I can feel it.”

  “Well, if that’s true, it means he’s fucking me over, too.” Kenzie flops onto the sofa. “And you know what, I don’t even care at this point. I’m so sick of this. If you had let me handle it, I would have had a hundred grand in my pocket and been done with him.”

  “Yeah, and I would have gotten nothing.”

  “Why do you deserve anything?” She glares at him. “Derek was my rich married boyfriend, not yours. Mine. None of it was supposed to go down like this. These men were a source of income for me, do you understand? They treated me like a side piece, but hell, they were my side hustle, so fair’s fair. You were never supposed to be involved in any of this. You’re not my pimp.”

  “I deserved this,” J.R. says. “I need this money, M.K. You think it’s easy running a bar and supporting my mother and supporting myself? We got nothing from the sale of the winery once the creditors were paid, and my mom’s still in debt. But if Julian’s done what I think he’s done, then he’s got all of it. All five hundred thousand. And now he’s fucking gone.”

  Kenzie looks up. “Five hundred thousand? What are you talking about?”

  He pauses his pacing, glances at her. “Never mind.”

  Whatever he just let slip, he didn’t mean to, and she sure as shit isn’t letting it go. “J.R. What five hundred thousand?”

  He cranes his neck, looking into the kitchen again for his mother, but Lorna is gone. J.R.’s plate of casserole is gone, too, as is the container of brownies. Strange. Her bedroom is down the hallway. She would have had to pass right by them to get to it. Did she go outside with the food?

  The woman is a total nut job.

  “J.R., I’m going to keep asking until you tell me what the hell you mean,” Kenzie says. “You just said five hundred thousand dollars, when all we’re expecting is the two fifty Derek said he’d pay, a hundred of which is mine. I’m no math wizard, but that doesn’t add up.”

  J.R. rubs his face and lets out a sigh. “Marin paid Julian two hundred and fifty thousand to have you killed. When she found out about you, she wanted you gone, and I told her I knew a guy.”

  “Excuse me?” Kenzie sits with this for a minute. Her instincts were right all along—Marin did know about her and Derek. Showing up in a drunken rage to embarrass her in front of the neighbors like Paul’s wife did is one thing; paying to have Kenzie murdered is on a whole different level of crazy, well beyond what anyone could consider a reasonable reaction to marital infidelity. Fucking insane, all of them. “And she actually gave him the money?”

  “Relax,” J.R. says. “You were never in danger, obviously. But yeah, she hired him, or at least she thought she did. Julian and I were supposed to split it.”

  “Were you ever going to tell me?” Kenzie asks in disbelief. “Or even offer me a cut of the . . . blood money?”

  He doesn’t answer, which tells her everything she needs to know.

  “So then you used me,” she says. “When I told you about Derek, all you could see was a payday and a way to get Marin back. You sonofabitch.” She laughs bitterly. “I can’t believe you conned a sad, grieving woman out of a quarter of a million dollars. She’s supposed to be your friend, J.R. You know what, I hope Julian takes off and doesn’t give you a fucking dime. Because I don’t know who the bigger sucker is, me or you.”

  He moves toward her, fist raised, but this time she doesn’t flinch. Instead, she remains seated, looking up at him, as if seeing him—really seeing him—for the first time. Sal Palermo Jr. isn’t the exciting older man she thought he was—street tough, clever, independent. He’s just a manchild, damaged from years of his father’s abuse, stuck taking care of an equally damaged mother, and in love with a woman who’ll
never love him back. He’s nothing more than a shitty, low-level criminal. Seven years she’s wasted on him. Seven.

  It’s enough.

  “Go ahead, hit me,” she says. “It’s the only thing you’re good at, anyway.”

  She hears the sirens before she sees the lights, and she bolts up from the table, where she’s been sitting with Lorna watching the end of Jeopardy! J.R. is upstairs in his bedroom. When he’d stormed out of the living room earlier, she heard his door slam, which signified he’d be in his room for the rest of the night.

  Lorna came back into the house a few minutes after their fight. The old woman’s face was flushed from the exertion of wherever she’d gone and whatever she’d been doing. J.R.’s mother moves around quite well for someone who’s apparently on the verge of another hip replacement, and she plopped herself down at the table to catch the Final Jeopardy question, which of course she knew the answer to.

  This fucking house. These fucking people.

  Kenzie moves back into the living room and looks out the window. Blue and red lights flash from somewhere down the road, and while she can see only a flicker, it’s clear they’re coming.

  Shit. The cops are coming for her, of course. Tyler must not have cancelled the missing persons report in time. It’s no secret that Kenzie’s hometown is Prosser, and that she’s close to J.R., so his family’s farmhouse would be a logical place for the police to look for her. How the hell is she going to explain this? Surely the police won’t arrest her for her roommate thinking she’s missing. She can just say it’s all a misunderstanding, which it is.

  Unless, of course, it’s not about the missing persons report, specifically. Maybe it’s about the ransom demand. Maybe Derek called the police to report that she’s being held against her will, and that her kidnappers are demanding money in exchange for her life. If that’s why the cops are coming, then she’s in trouble for sure. And so is J.R.

  There are so many lies, there’s absolutely no way to know what, exactly, is happening.

  She feels Lorna moving behind her, and she turns to see that the woman is frantic. Above them, she can hear J.R. stomping across his bedroom. Without warning, Lorna grips Kenzie’s shoulders with surprising strength.

  “Wine cellar,” she hisses, as J.R. thunders down the stairs.

  Before Lorna can say anything more, her son bursts into the living room, red-faced, looking like a wild animal. Lorna rushes to him, puts her hands on his chest, but he shoves her away. The older woman stumbles back onto the sofa.

  “Calm down, son, please,” Lorna says, but her words have no effect.

  J.R. is the furthest thing from calm. He’s pacing the living room like before, but his strides are longer, and he’s rubbing his face and hair, agitated. He reeks of marijuana. His pupils are fully dilated; his normally brown eyes are black.

  “What do I do?” he says to them. “What the fuck do I do?”

  “We’ll have to see what they want,” Kenzie says, trying to remain calm. It’s not easy. J.R.’s negative energy is infectious. “Whatever the cops think, I’ll just tell them it was a stupid joke—”

  “Did you call them?” J.R. asks.

  “Of course not,” she says. “Why the hell would I call the police on myself?”

  “Jesus Christ, you’re so stupid.” He paces again, and the sirens grow louder. The lights are flashing through the curtains. “They’re not here for you, M.K. They’re here for me.”

  He turns to his mother. “They’re gonna arrest me, Mom. I’m going back to prison. Forever this time.” He’s on the verge of tears, his eyes searching every inch of the room as if looking for an escape. “It was Julian, I know it. Motherfucking weasel must have ratted me out.”

  “You’ll talk your way out of it.” Kenzie doesn’t think she’s ever seen J.R. so worked up before. “Deny it all and say that Julian planned the whole thing. He took Marin’s money, then kidnapped me and sent the ransom demand. Blame it all on him. I’ll back you up.”

  It occurs to her then that Lorna is hearing all this right now and isn’t surprised by any of it. It’s like she knew about all of it, all along.

  “Mom, you still have Dad’s gun?” he says.

  “Bedroom,” Lorna says. She doesn’t seem surprised by this question, either. “In the wall safe, in the closet. The code is your father’s birthday.”

  What gun? Kenzie didn’t know they had a gun.

  The second J.R. is out of sight, Lorna grabs her again.

  “Wine cellar,” the woman whisper-screams into Kenzie’s ear. “Go. Lock the door behind you. And no matter what, do not let my son in, no matter what he says. You understand me?”

  Lorna is dead serious, and in this moment, she’s not the loopy, batty woman Kenzie is used to talking to. But why is J.R’s mother telling her to hide in the wine cellar? And to lock her son out? It makes no sense.

  The lights are getting brighter, the sirens louder. The road leading to the farmhouse is long and relatively straight. The cops are almost here.

  “Mom! The gun’s not in the safe!” J.R. shouts from down the hall.

  Lorna opens her robe. The gun—the one that she sent her son to find, the one that was supposed to be locked in the wall safe that Kenzie didn’t even know they had—is tucked into the waistband of her lounge pants.

  “McKenzie,” she says, and it might the first time Lorna has ever addressed her by name. “Wine cellar. Now.”

  Kenzie turns and bolts.

  The door to the underground wine cellar is underneath the old tasting room, about a football field’s length to the left of the farmhouse. Kenzie makes a run for it, sufficiently freaked out by the look in Lorna’s eyes to do as she’s told. J.R. is unstable, and looking for a gun, which Lorna has in her possession. The cops are coming. Enough said.

  She reaches the tasting room and enters through the old double doors, sprinting across the now empty showroom, past the dusty wine barrels and the long counter. At the back of the room, there’s another door that leads down to the cellar, and she finds it unlocked, with the lights for the stairs left on. Kenzie slams the door shut behind her and bolts it, pausing for a moment at the top of the stairs to catch her breath. She puts an ear to the door, listening for any sounds that someone might have followed her. She was told not to let J.R. in.

  She begins making her way down the stairs to the bottom, where the wines are stored in a temperature-controlled room. Fifty-five degrees is ideal, J.R. once told her, and the temperature must be carefully maintained to preserve the integrity of the wine.

  As she nears the bottom, Kenzie realizes there’s no way it’s 55 degrees in here. At 55, it should feel chilly, and yet it’s warm and growing warmer with every step. It now feels more like regular room temperature—72 degrees, or maybe even 75. When she hits the last step, she hears a TV playing.

  A TV in the wine cellar? A warm wine cellar? She stops in her tracks. What the hell is going on?

  And then she sees.

  Her brain takes it in all at once. The large room, the empty wine shelves, the bed, the desk, the lamp, the table with a half empty plate, the container of Two-Bite Brownies, a bunch of ripe yellow bananas, a water bottle, and toys of all shapes and sizes scattered everywhere.

  And in the middle of it all stands a little boy, dark hair choppily cut, dressed in blue pajamas too short for his legs and puppy dog slippers too big for his feet, clutching a stuffed teddy bear nearly as big as he is. The teddy bear is wearing a brown sweater with some kind of animal face on it.

  A reindeer sweater.

  Kenzie’s hand flies to her mouth. She can’t move. She can’t speak. All she can do is stare at the little boy. He stares back, his brown eyes wide, his expression a mix of fear and hope.

  “Are you my mommy?” he says, and his confusion is obvious. His voice is so small, so sweet, and it’s trembling. He’s trying very hard not to cry. “Grandma Lorna says my mommy is coming.”

  Before Kenzie can say anything to reassure him—w
hich is what she wants to do, because it’s what the poor kid deserves—she hears the sirens, right above their heads.

  The police are here.

  Chapter 32

  Vanessa Castro is as good a driver as she says she is, and they make it to Prosser in a record two and a half hours. By the time they get to the farmhouse, it’s surrounded by cop cars, and the house itself has been cordoned off with crime scene tape. Just like in the movies.

  Being squished into the back seat of Castro’s car for over two mostly silent hours gave Marin a lot of time to think about what they would find when they got here. It doesn’t feel like her son is dead. Marin used to think she would sense it if it ever happened, that she’d feel a tremor in her bones or a piercing in her heart, or she’d wake up one morning and somehow just know. Frances knew, after all. Frances had dreams about it.

  But maybe what happened with Frances was just a coincidence, and a mother’s intuition doesn’t really extend that far. Castro told Marin not to get her hopes up, and she hasn’t, but the tiny morsel of hope that she still has left—hope that’s dwindled day by day since the moment Sebastian was taken—is still wedged deep in her heart. It’s the only thing keeping it beating.

  Castro parks the car and they all get out. They’re immediately approached by two police officers, and the PI gives Marin’s arm a squeeze.

  “Let me find out what’s happening,” Castro says. “Hang tight.”

  Marin looks around. The scene is overwhelming. Both the police and the FBI are here, and there’s a flurry of activity, made even more chaotic by the police cars’ lights flashing across the farmhouse. She doesn’t recognize any of the agents, and can only assume that the one assigned to their case isn’t here yet. One of the agents breaks from his group and joins Castro and the officers. The PI must have said something about her, because they all look over to Marin at the same time. From this distance, Marin can’t hear what they’re saying.

  Sal’s family farmhouse looks different at night. Under the light of the full moon, it appears even more dilapidated than she remembers, all dirty windows and peeling paint. In the daytime, the rolling vineyards provide a stunning backdrop, giving the house a rustic charm it doesn’t otherwise have.