Scammed Page 26

  CHAPTER 29

  I try to talk to Charlotte again that night, but she won’t let me in. I wish I could say something to help Sam, but I can’t face him and pretend I don’t know what Charlotte told me. With Henry still hiding somewhere and Grayson playing a Road Racers tournament in the pit, I go up to my room to do homework, but I keep the door open, just in case she needs me.

  Minutes pass, and the words and images on my laptop screen blur together.

  Charlotte is pregnant. Why weren’t she and Sam more careful? They never should have let this happen.

  The thoughts fizzle as soon as they enter my mind. Maybe they were careful. This was clearly an accident.

  It could be me in her shoes.

  Caleb and I never got that far, but we could’ve. Closing my eyes, I remember the rush of heat, the way I pushed those paper-thin boundaries. The way his kiss made me hungry for more, and tempted me to forget to be rational.

  Caleb always knew when to slow down, though. To ask.

  Is this okay? Are you okay?

  My insides twist in knots. I wish he were here. I wish I could talk to him about this. I wish I could trust him.

  I wish I could feel safe in this house, but at every raised voice down the hall and every creak in the stairs, I’m convinced the detectives are back, this time with a warrant for me.

  My head rests in my hands. I don’t know how to help Charlotte.

  If she keeps the baby, she loses Vale Hall. She’s right—Dr. O doesn’t need someone who can’t pull a con, and there’s no way she’s blending in with her rich girls with a giant belly.

  Keeping that appointment is probably the smart thing to do.

  But I’m not sure it’s what she wants to do.

  Every part of me hurts for her. Every part rages against this picture-perfect life for making the decision for her.

  I flip through the internet pages, seeing nothing. Finally, a face registers on the screen, and fear sharpens my vision like a blade. It’s Matthew Sterling, walking out of a restaurant in Uptown. He’s wearing jeans and a sweater, his eyes hidden by the same baseball cap I saw him wearing earlier.

  Sweetheart of Sikawa in the Dog House, the article says.

  I’ve unconsciously navigated my way to Pop Store, the gossip site where I first learned Susan Griffin had died in a hit-and-run accident.

  I scan through the words, my pulse kicking up, sending me back to the stairwell below the campaign office. I can get the gist of the article without reading the entire thing.

  The voters are angry with Sterling for changing his stance on two recent bills.

  The millionaires who stand to profit from these changes are overjoyed.

  I know which side Dr. O falls on, which side is keeping me here, in a giant room inside a mansion, on a laptop, with a cell phone and a limitless credit card in my pocket.

  I close the screen.

  Picking up my phone, I dial Mom’s number. It rings and rings, but she doesn’t pick up. I try Gridiron Sports Bar next, but the hostess tells me Mom quit two days ago.

  She works for Wednesday Pharmaceuticals now.

  * * *

  THE NEXT MORNING, I stumble through my classes, having spent half the night running dead-end searches on Jimmy Balder, and Mark Stitz, and Matthew and Grayson Sterling. Apart from an old Pop Store article, there are still no public records of Susan Griffin’s death—whatever report Caleb got his hands on isn’t online.

  I’m itching to ask him more about it, but he still hasn’t answered my texts.

  Even if he does answer, I’m not sure I can believe him.

  Charlotte’s already in Shrew’s class by the time I get there, but her gaze only glances off mine. While Sam sulks on a love seat by himself, she talks with Henry and Grayson, playing normal.

  This place used to be where we could all let down our guards and act like ourselves, but now everyone is pretending, and I can’t tell what is real.

  The afternoon finds the rest of the upperclassmen, Grayson included, in the glass-domed exercise building, where we’re warming up for our first test on the Viennese waltz. Petal the Pig sits on a gold place mat on a chair in front of the mirror, judging us with her spray-painted, plastic smirk.

  It’s no secret I’m counting on Grayson to get me through. If all goes well, we switch to something called the paso doble on Wednesday.

  “Thank God,” grumbles Geri. “I thought I was going to have to do this on my own.”

  I follow her gaze outside, to where Caleb is rushing down the stone path that connects this structure to the main house. He looks like a tree blown too long by the wind—his back is rounded, his head down. He’s wearing the same jeans and sweatshirt I saw him in three days ago.

  My heart lurches at the sight of him. But I train my face to reveal no emotion as I slip outside to intercept.

  He doesn’t see me until he’s almost reached the doors, and when his chin jerks up, the exhaustion in his face cues an alarm in my veins.

  I have seen Caleb in trouble before. It looked a lot like this.

  “You okay?” he asks, tense.

  I remain balanced on the balls of my feet, ready for anything.

  “I should be asking you that.”

  “I wanted to call you back, but my phone died. My mom doesn’t have the same charging cord.”

  His dad is ill. This is real. It isn’t some cover so he can work a job behind my back.

  But Myra … What was he doing with her?

  Distant. Troubled.

  Dishonest.

  Says he’s going somewhere, then heads another.

  I force Dr. O’s voice out of my head.

  “Is your dad all right?”

  He closes his eyes, and it takes an eternity for him to find my gaze again.

  “His feeding tube got infected. It led to pneumonia.”

  I can hear the weight in his tone. What he’s not saying is as clear as what he is.

  Caleb’s father doesn’t have much more time.

  The lies we’ve both told clear aside, and in that moment, there’s only us.

  “You should go back. Be with them.”

  “I had to see you.”

  Relief tastes bitter as I try to swallow.

  “We need to talk,” he says. “Now. It’s important.”

  He looks over my shoulder, through the glass doors. Inside, the music starts. Our test has begun. I know we should be inside—it’s not just Petal the Pig at stake, but our grades. With as much as Shrew is punishing us with calculus and physics, we both need this easy A.

  “What is it?” I ask.

  He steps closer, and I see the tic of a muscle in his neck and the panic in his dark eyes as his gaze lifts to the corners of the door, as if he expects to find a security camera watching us. His glasses have water stains and fingerprints on them, and I wonder absently when he cleaned them last.

  “It’s not safe here anymore,” he whispers.

  I think of Grayson, snapping at me last night. Of Sterling’s detectives. Caleb’s right, I don’t feel safe, but I can’t tell him this because whatever he’s got going with Myra is part of the problem.

  “Grayson’s into something.” His words are coming faster, water from a broken pipe. “Dr. O’s no better. The security. Ms. Maddox. All of them. We can’t trust anyone.”

  Adrenaline punches through me.

  “What are you talking about?” I try to grasp for reasons why he might be acting this way. He doesn’t believe Grayson’s story about Susan’s accident, but this paranoia is on a new level.

  His eyes pinch at the corners. He leans closer. “Next chance you get, you have to leave. Grab some cash and clothes, and get out.”

  I step back. I don’t know what he’s talking about. I don’t understand his urgency.

  “Why would I do that?” My mind flashes from Pete—did he get out of jail?—to the detectives. I’ve convinced myself they weren’t really stalking me outside the gates, but maybe Caleb knows something I don�
�t.

  My heart finds a faster tempo.

  Caleb’s gaze bounces off the mansion behind us. “Dr. O’s not who we thought he is.”

  I plant my hands on my hips. “A closeted superhero in red spandex? Yeah, I got that.”

  “He’s hurt people.”

  “I know.”

  “Badly.”

  I pause as his implications sink in. I know what the director’s capable of—he’s the first to light the match and fan the flames—but it’s not as if he’s running around with a sharp knife, thirsting for human sacrifice.

  “Look, we do our job, he does his. That’s the way this works.” Caleb knows this. Caleb taught me this.

  “He’s out of control.”

  “That’s not our call.”

  “People are dying.”

  My stomach sinks like a stone. My body believes Caleb, even while my mind argues that he’s officially fallen off his rocker.

  “Who?”

  “I…” Caleb shakes his head quickly. “I can’t tell you yet.”

  And here we are again.

  “Yet?” I give a short laugh. “But you will?”

  “Of course I will.”

  “After he strikes again?”

  He scowls. “I’m serious.”

  “He’s a twisted old man with money,” I say, “not a psychopath.”

  There was a guy who used to live down the street from my mom and me when I was a kid who talked like this. Jonah. He used to say the security guard at Freedom Hills Mall was a serial killer. He claimed half the murders in the slums could be traced back to that guy, and if we saw him, not to call the cops, because they were in on it, too.

  Caleb sounds a lot like him right now, and the way he keeps looking around, like someone’s watching, is making my heart hurt.

  “What about Charlotte?” Even if I were sure Caleb was right, I can’t leave her now. “If we’re in danger, what about Henry and Sam? What about you? Why aren’t you running for the hills?”

  Caleb glances behind us. He lifts his head. Smiles, like you do when you know someone’s watching. An icy breeze blows across the back of my neck.

  “I can’t leave.”

  Of course.

  We’re all on the verge of certain death, but Caleb’s not going anywhere. He needs to take care of his family. He needs the medical care his work here provides.

  But he wants me to get out of here.

  Because it’s not safe.

  “You’ve got to give me more than this,” I say. “Whatever it is, just say it.”

  His jaw bulges. “Why can’t you just trust me? Just one time? I don’t understand…” He shakes his head, frustrated. “Brynn, I gave you my trust. You know how many people I’d do that for?”

  My breath comes in a staggered pull.

  I want to trust him. I want to know, without a doubt, that this is real. But if it is, why can’t he just come clean?

  I force myself to be steady for us both. “Where have you been, Caleb?”

  He shakes his head too quickly. “With my mom. At the care home. I told you.”

  “What about the girl in Sycamore?”

  “What?”

  “Your assignment.”

  “She’s … still there, I guess. I don’t know. I don’t care.”

  I brace myself for the words I can’t hold back any longer. “You never went to Sycamore. There was no recruit. You’ve been working another job this whole time.”

  “Brynn…”

  “I saw you.”

  The fear drains from his face, and his jaw tints rose red.

  “I saw you with Myra Fenrir.”

  The door opens behind me, and we both jump. In the wedge stands Geri, looking like an angry pixie in her dark ponytail, black dress, and spike heels.

  “Um, anytime, Caleb.”

  The glare I send her could freeze hell.

  With a scoff, she looks to him for validation, and when she gets none, she lets the door suction closed behind her.

  “I don’t know who you’re talking about,” Caleb says when Geri’s out of sight through the glass.

  “Don’t lie to me.” My voice hitches. I know it’s wrong to demand the truth when I never offered it about Grayson, but now’s our moment of reckoning. It’s honesty or nothing.

  “I swear,” he says.

  “I followed you Sunday to Uptown. You met her in the alley past the police station.”

  His eyes go round.

  “Is she a mark? Are you working her for information or just keeping tabs on me?”

  “Brynn, that’s not who you think it is.”

  But I’m on a roll now. I want answers, and I’m tired of the guessing game.

  “Who is it then?” I ask.

  He looks down, ashamed, and I feel a wave of sickness roll through me.

  “I didn’t know she was back until that night at the restaurant, when that guy you were with tried to drag you into his car.”

  Absently, my hand slides over my wrist, remembering Mark’s grip as he promised to tell me what he knew about Jimmy.

  “I thought she was gone,” Caleb says miserably. “When she left, I had no way to reach her. I never knew what happened.”

  His gaze lifts to mine. Holds.

  “Brynn, that’s Margot Patel,” he says.

  The name hits, and resonates through me like a strike of a gong.

  Myra is Margot. Caleb’s ex-girlfriend. The girl who lived in my room before me. Who was kicked out for falling in love with her mark and telling him about the true nature of Vale Hall. Who disappeared when Dr. O erased her, but somehow ended up in a job scouting out Sterling’s campaign staff, working alongside me, pretending to be my friend.

  I’ve been conned.

  CHAPTER 30

  “Margot,” I repeat. “No. That’s not true.”

  I picture her sitting on the bench near the lockers at The Loft, sipping her coffee and smiling, her white button-down giving way to her black uniform skirt. I see the excitement in her face when we made plans to hang out, and the pain in her eyes when she told me about the guy—Caleb—who’d gotten away. She was so angry when she suspected Mark had hurt me. She was so intent that I stand up to him.

  But in my bones, I feel the truth. Caleb is not bluffing.

  How did she know I’d gotten a job at The Loft? What was she trying to get out of me?

  She asked so many questions. About my life. About school.

  Seems like a lot of pressure, she told me once. Just you and your assignments every day.

  She’d know all about that, having gone here.

  I never saw her coming.

  Fury sears up my spine as I remember her hand on Caleb’s forearm in that alley. I’d thought he was playing her, but she was playing me—they both were. That dinner at Risa’s was over a week ago; Caleb’s known she was onto me at least since then, but he said nothing.

  “What does she want?” I say between my teeth.

  “It’s … a long story.”

  “Of course it is.” I run my hands down the sides of my face. I can’t believe I was so stupid. I can’t believe I actually liked Myra.

  “I’ve got to be honest, I’m impressed with her dedication. Not every girl creates a false identity to get their boyfriend back.”

  “It’s not like that,” he says.

  “No?” I loop my arms over my chest. “How is it then?”

  He doesn’t answer.

  He’s right. He gave me his trust. I held it in my hands, on a three-by-five note card, but it was as paper-thin as his intentions.

  “Let me guess,” I say. “She’s the one who told you Dr. O’s a serial killer.”

  “She didn’t say serial killer.”

  I want to shake him, but I can’t get any closer. He’s a smart guy; how can he not see what’s happening?

  I think of her hand on his cheek, the way she hugged him. He can’t see it because he’s still got it for her. It’s chemical; we trust people we care about. It�
��s conning 101.

  “She’s playing you,” I say, loud enough for him to lift his hands in an attempt to quiet me. “She got kicked out, and now she hates Dr. O. She wants to scare you and everyone else out of here, too. It’s revenge, Caleb, that’s all.”

  “No.” Caleb’s shaking his head. “She wouldn’t do that.”

  Is he serious?

  “Maybe I got the story wrong, but I thought she cheated on you behind your back with some mark. I’m pretty sure she’s got the lying thing down.”

  She tricked me well enough. I didn’t even think to run an online search on her. She could have pulled me into that meeting room, arm linked in mine, to out me to the senator.

  Did she know the men he traveled with had guns?

  “You don’t know her,” he says. “She wouldn’t make up something like this.”

  “Can she prove it?”

  His weight shifts back on his heels. “She’s working on it.”

  “I bet. Did she give you that police report about Susan, too?”

  “Caleb!” We both turn sharply to find Moore standing in the back door of the house. His sunglasses are pulled down, hiding his eyes. “Dr. O wants to see you.”

  Despite my anger, worry crashes down over me. If there is some sliver of truth to Caleb’s claim, he’s the one who isn’t safe. Margot’s gone for a reason, and if Dr. O finds out she and Caleb have reestablished contact, he’ll be gone, too.

  Still, he paints a weary smile on his face.

  “Watch your back,” he whispers before turning toward the house.

  I stare blankly after him. In all the times I wondered what he was actually doing on assignment, hanging out with Margot never crossed my mind.

  She’s poisoning him. Tearing down the program from the outside, piece by piece. But even if all the evidence points this way, I can’t align the facts with the girl I met at Sterling’s club. I know a con when I see one—my radar can’t be that far off. Maybe Margot changed her name and lied about her school, but our conversations seemed real.

  If she’d told me, to my face, Dr. O was dangerous, I might have believed her.

  I need to hear the truth from her mouth of why she’s working me.

  The music inside changes, and with a start, I pull open the door and rush inside. Every face turns my way—all but two. Henry and Grayson, who are currently waltzing around the floor.