Vicarious (32 page)

Normally I'd say yes, but I'm not sure how long it's been since I slept. I'm too physically and emotionally drained to exercise. “I don't think I'm up for it,” I murmur.

He nods. “My brain is going a little crazy right now. I need to blow off some steam so I can think. Will you be okay here by yourself?”

“I'll be fine. I'm just going to rest.” I tug my hooded sweatshirt over my head and kick off my shoes.

Andy's gaze falls on my neck, on the bruises that are finally starting to fade. “Did you get karate chopped in the throat or something?”

“Something like that,” I say, not wanting to get into the details. He looks like maybe he's going to change his mind and stay with me, so I make a shooing motion with my hands. “Really. Go. I'm all right.”

“Okay. I'll be back.” Andy grabs his keys from the coffee table and hands me the TV remote. “Call me if you need anything.”

A blast of cold air enters as he slips outside. I curl onto my side and pull my knees up to my chin for warmth. I flip through the cable channels one by one, half hypnotized by the blinking lights and moving forms on the screen. I don't really watch much TV these days.

I used to watch it in L.A. all the time. I would ask my “dates” to put it on to relax me. Really all I wanted was something to focus on besides what was happening. I learned a lot of American slang and customs from all those hours of movies and primetime shows, but after we escaped to St. Louis, TV became just one more thing that reminded me of a past I needed to forget. Occasionally I'll watch a K-drama on my tablet when I'm feeling anxious. There's something comforting about hearing people speak Korean, even if I hardly ever speak it myself anymore.

I pause on a horror movie from a few years ago. A killer traps a girl in a cage and then sprays her with acid. Fabric smokes, skin sizzles, and giant bloody welts open up on the girl's torso. The violence should be disturbing, but I just feel numb. The next channel is showing a baby panda being resuscitated. Even the veterinarian starts to cry when the little black-and-white ball of fluff opens its eyes, but I can't feel anything. It's like I've run out of emotions.

I'm not sure how much time passes while I'm skimming through the channels. Eventually, I flick off the TV and glance around the living room—the comfortable furniture, the display case of trophies, the mess of football gear and fast-food remnants.
Normal,
I think. But this isn't my normal. I feel safe here, because I'm hiding—hiding from the fact that my sister is dead and I don't even know who killed her. Hiding from the guy who I thought cared about me but ended up hurting me, just like every other guy I've known.

Every guy except for Gideon. I grab for my phone and dial his number.

He picks up on the first ring. “Are you all right?” he asks.

“I'm fine. Have you heard anything more from Detective Ehlers?”

“No,” Gideon says. “I'm sorry.” And then, “Jesse told me what happened.”

“Which part? The part where I almost drowned, the part where I had some sort of psychotic blackout, or the part where I got to experience Jesse having sex with my sister?” I wait for the forthcoming lecture, expecting Gideon to chastise me for leaving Miami by myself.

“All of it,” he says calmly. He sounds very Zen. There's no lecture, only steady, even breathing. “Where are you?”

“With a friend.”

“You should go home,” Gideon says. “Give Jesse a chance to explain.”

“He slept with your ex-girlfriend and then tried to say it was me and that I just blacked it out. And you're going to take his side?”

“I would never take anyone else's side, but it's a little more complicated than that.”

“Really? Because that's fairly complicated all on its own.”

“We're worried about you,” Gideon says.

“I'm fine,” I say. But then, with no warning, I start to cry. Huge racking sobs. “I feel so alone. I can't believe she's gone.”

“Tell me where you are. I'll send someone to come get you.”

“If I go home, will you be there?” I ask.

“I'm still out of town. I had to make another trip, but I'll be back tomorrow. If you don't want Jesse around, I can have Sebastian—”

“No,” I say. “I just need—I don't know. I can't deal with everything right now.” My words come out in bits and pieces. “I'm all right where I am.”

“You don't sound all right,” Gideon says.

“I think I just need to sleep,” I say. “I'll come home tomorrow. I promise.”

“Okay.” He pauses. “We can talk about planning a funeral service, if that would help you deal with things.”

“No,” I say, more sharply than intended. I lower my voice. “Not unless we find her body. We
need
to find her body.” Even as I say it, I know it's futile. The Mississippi River empties into the Gulf of Mexico. We might never find her.

“You're right,” Gideon says after a short pause. “I'll call Ehlers and see if there's anything more the police can do. Get some rest. Maybe tomorrow will be a better day.”

“Maybe,” I say, but I don't believe it.

I have a feeling tomorrow will bring nothing but pain.

 

CHAPTER 36

I sense
the figure leaning over me even before I open my eyes. The instant my brain registers it isn't Andy, I slam the palm of my hand into the guy's nose. I roll from the sofa onto the coffee table and reach down for one of my knives.

And then I recognize my target. He's the older, meaner-looking guy who was with Andy the night Rose didn't come home. The guy I figured for a coach.

“What is wrong with you, you crazy bitch?” he hollers. Blood trickles from his nose. Pinching his nostrils together, he tilts his head up toward the ceiling.

“I'm not the one watching some girl sleep,” I snap. Reluctantly, I sheathe my knife. “And you're not supposed to tilt your head back. It makes the blood run down your throat.”

Andy appears from the kitchen with a couple of beers. “Holy shit, Ted, what happened?” His eyes flick to me and realization dawns on his face. His mouth twitches, like he's fighting back a smile. “I see you met my agent.” Turning to Ted he says, “I told you not to wake her.”

“Why is she even here?” Ted asks. He limps across the hardwood floor and collapses into the recliner.

I roll my eyes. How dramatic. I've never seen anyone develop a limp from being hit in the face before. “Why are you talking about me like I'm
not
here?”

“Relax. Both of you.” Andy holds out a beer to each of us.

Ted takes one and holds it against the side of his nose. I can't help it. I start laughing.

“I should sue your ass for battery,” he mutters.

Ignoring him, I wave off the beer and paw through my duffel bag looking for some clean clothes. “I can't believe I slept for so long. Is it all right if I take a shower?”

“Sure,” Andy says. “Second floor at the end of the hall.”

“She's
living
here?” Ted asks in disbelief. “How do your parents feel about that?”

“Don't worry about my parents,” Andy says. “They don't tell me who my friends are, and neither do you.”

I give Ted a dark look over my shoulder as I head upstairs. Andy's bathroom is almost as big as my bedroom. There's a separate claw-foot bathtub and Jacuzzi, with an L-shaped bench running between them. Behind the bench, a wooden door opens into a closet full of fluffy towels and baskets of soaps shaped like stars and moons. A strip of celestial-patterned wallpaper runs around the perimeter of the room. Someone has even painted a starscape onto the ceiling.

Stripping off my clothes, I step into the bathtub and turn on the water. As it pours down over my body, I try to relax, but I keep thinking about going home. Facing Jesse. What could he possibly say that would make things better? And then Gideon's offering to set up a memorial service. That's the worst of all. Doesn't he understand that part of my sister will continue to live as long as I don't fully accept that she's gone?

I try to block their voices from my head, embracing the pattering of the water jets against the marble tub. I crank the silver faucet farther to the left and steam floods the room. The scalding water turns the flesh of my arms bright pink. As my skin begins to burn, my mind clears.

I turn the water back to a bearable temperature. Hanging my head low, I watch the streams of water drizzle from tendrils of my hair. Then I step out of the bathtub, wrap myself in a towel, and stand in front of the sink. With one hand, I wipe the steam from a section of the large mirror. I use my fingers to start combing the snarls from my hair, the pain of each individual tug centering me, calming me.

Readying me.

You can handle whatever this day will bring.

By the time I'm done in the bathroom, Ted is gone.

“I hope Agent Asshole didn't leave on my account,” I say.

Andy is sprawled out on the sofa, flipping through the TV channels. “Nah. He was in the neighborhood and just dropped by to do some prep work for a lunch meeting with a potential sponsor.” He chuckles. “I can't believe you broke his face. That is going to be one awkward meeting now.”

I sit on the opposite side of the sofa from Andy. “Why would he care if I was living here? Not that I am.”

“Who knows? He probably thought you were Rose. I should have introduced you, but I try to limit the amount of information I share with him about my personal life.”

“Why would he care if
she
was living here?”

Andy picks up a baseball cap from the floor and rests it backward on his head, both hands reaching up to curl the brim. “He found out she was a recorder and assumed that was the only reason she was with me. To get some shocking footage and sell it.”

I wonder if Andy knows my sister
was
recording him, that she might have been doing exactly what his agent thinks. I twist my wet hair into a ponytail around my scarred palm, squeezing droplets of water from the end of it.

“Do you do that?” he asks. “Record people on the sly?”

“No. I'm more into stuff like—” I pause. I probably shouldn't tell him I break into companies and steal information. “Adventure sports.”

“Yeah? Like what?”

I tell him about the shark diving that Jesse and I did in Florida, and about some of my other past ViSEs—including rock climbing and snowboarding in Colorado. Jesse and I trained for both of those recordings together. I remember the way he drilled me on the climbing safety procedures for almost an hour before he even let me slip into a harness. Then on the flight home he surprised me with a snow globe he bought from Rocky Mountain National Park. There's no way he could be so sweet and protective of me if he was in love with my sister the whole time. Something doesn't add up. Something major.

“That's awesome,” Andy says. “You think you can hook me up with your boss? I would love to do a football ViSE.”

“Are you serious? He would probably love that. But why would you want to record ViSEs? Aren't you going to make a lot of money in the NFL?”

“I just think it would be cool to share the experience with other people,” he says. “When I was little, I loved it when they showed helmet cams on TV.”

“I bet a football recording would go over huge with guys. You could make a ton of money.”

“That makes me wish I had thought of it earlier,” Andy murmurs.

Before I can ask him what he means, my phone buzzes with another text from Jesse and I notice what time it is. “It's after eleven. What time is your meeting?”

He glances at his own phone. “Crap. I'd better get going.” He grabs his keys from the coffee table.

Touchdown appears from the doorway to the kitchen. He's got his leash in his mouth and a hopeful look in his eyes. Sitting back on his haunches, he whines.

“Shit,” Andy says. “He needs to go out again.”

“I'll take him out. It's the least I can do since he shared you with me yesterday.” I smile at Touchdown. I hope Natalie is taking good care of Miso. “Go. We'll be fine.”

“Cool.” Andy flashes me a grin. “Make yourself at home. I'll be back in a couple hours.”

“Sure.” I smile tightly. Andy leans in and for a second I think he's going to hug me, but at the last second he holds his fist out toward mine. I bump my knuckles against his.

“I still can't believe you punched Ted,” he says. “Awesome.”

Before I can respond, he's out the door, and I'm alone again.

Touchdown drops the leash and rests his chin on my leg. All right, so not exactly alone. I check my phone as I slip the chain around the dog's neck. I now have three texts and two voice messages from Jesse. I scroll through the texts as I stand up:

Call me. There are things you need to know.

There's something we can agree on. Too bad I can no longer believe anything Jesse says.

Please call. I'm worried about you.

Okay, fine. Don't call me if you don't want. But text me and let me know you're okay.

Touchdown wags his tail and bounds toward the front door, his long toenails skating across the wood. “I'm not okay,” I tell him. He barks. “Jesse's just going to have to worry for now. I don't feel like texting him.”

Touchdown places his paws up on the windowsill and whines.

“Fine. Let's go,” I grumble, unable to keep from smiling at the dog. A blast of sun hits me as I open the door and we step out into a rare warmish day.

Touchdown starts pulling me rapidly down the block, but I don't feel comfortable going too far from Andy's house since I had to leave it unlocked. I dodge puddles of melting ice on the sidewalk as best I can. The dog finally pauses in front of a Spanish-style villa. An elaborately coiffed poodle peeks out from the front window. Much barking ensues. I wind Touchdown's leash tight around my hand and wait patiently as he circles a light post trying to decide where to pee.