Blind Faith (18 page)

Will wasn’t sure he wanted to hear any of it, not when she was making it sound so ominous, but what choice did he have?
 
Rose was right.
 
If he was going to help Serena exorcize her demons, he had to know what he was up against.
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                      
***

Serena put the last of the papers she needed to grade over the weekend into her briefcase and snapped it shut.
 
The day had been painfully long, just as she’d suspected it would
be
, but now that it was time to go home she was starting to feel a little apprehensive.
 
Oh, she knew Will wouldn’t deliberately do anything
to
hurt her, but opening old wounds was going to be painful no matter how gentle he was about it.
 

She’d thought about it a lot last night; about how much easier it would be if she left the memories buried in her mind where they couldn’t hurt her.
 
But somewhere between Will’s good-night kiss and the time she fell asleep, Serena realized the fear of those memories resurfacing was doing just as much damage as the memories themselves.

Granted, she didn’t recall much about that night but that was because she’d been running scared ever since and it just hadn’t caught up with her yet.
 
But it would, and the consequences could be devastating unless she stopped running right now and faced them down.
 
Maybe all she’d needed was someone who believed she could do it, someone she could trust to be there for her if she stopped believing in herself.
 
A soft smile curved her lips.
 
Will
.

“Looks like someone had a good day,” a familiar voice sounded from the classroom doorway.
 
“Or is there some other reason for that secretive smile you’re wearing?”

Heat crept up Serena’s neck.
 
She wasn’t about to admit who was responsible for making her smile, or just how flustered she was by the question.
 
She opened the side drawer of her desk and pretended to search for something, keeping her head turned away from the doorway in an attempt to hide the furious blush that was scalding her cheeks.
 
Pulling out a file of papers she’d graded the week before, Serena opened her briefcase and stuffed them inside before replying in what she hoped was a convincingly irritable voice.

“Hasn’t anyone ever told you it’s not nice to sneak up on a blind person?
 
You nearly gave me a heart attack.”

“I wasn’t trying to sneak up on you,” McKinley said with an exasperated sigh.
 
“Besides, isn’t super dog supposed to warn you when someone is approaching?”

“He’s not here.
 
I loaned Rufus out last hour for a special course the school is offering to the parents this quarter.
 
Someone should be bringing
him
back shortly.
 
So what brings you here?”

“It’s been awhile since I’ve seen you so I thought I
would
drop by and take you to dinner.”

“Oh.
 
I’m sorry, but I already have plans for tonight.
 
Maybe we could get together one night next week?”

“Can’t you cancel your plans?
 
I have something important to talk to you about and I really don’t think…”

 
“Sorry for the interruption, Miss Cross,” one of Serena’s students apologized.
 
“Mr. Thompson asked me to bring Rufus back to you.”

Serena thanked the girl, taking advantage of the opportunity to grab her briefcase and head for the door.
 
She hoped McKinley would take the hint and agree to meet next week, but she should have known her sister wouldn’t give up that easily.

“It can’t wait,” McKinley persisted as soon as they were alone again.
 
“If you won’t have dinner with me then at least let me drive you home.
 
We can stop somewhere for a glass of wine and talk.
 
I promise it won’t take long, and I’ll have you back at your house in plenty of time to get ready for your dinner date.”

Serena hesitated.
 
She wanted to take a shower and put on something nice for Will before he got home, but she supposed being thirty minutes late wouldn’t strap her for time as long as she didn’t linger in the shower.
 

“All right,” she said, “but you
had
better talk fast because half an hour is all I can spare.”

“No problem," McKinley replied.
 
"That’s all the time I’ll need.”

Rufus wasn’t any happier about being in the bar McKinley had brought them to than Serena was.
 
She sensed his restlessness, or maybe he was picking up on her own rattled nerves and reacting to it.
 
She’d foolishly assumed they were going to a restaurant and hadn’t realized it was a bar until after McKinley led her to the table.
 
The moment she sat down, she’d been aware of the overpowering smell of alcohol, the most repugnant being the sickening stench of beer.

It was too early for there to be much of a crowd, and she highly doubted McKinley frequented anything but high class drinking establishments.
 
Even so, she could feel the panic bubbling up inside her because hole-in-the-wall dives weren’t the only places predators used for their hunting grounds.
 
She told herself she was safe here.
 
She had McKinley sitting right across the table and Rufus by her side, but the low drone of male voices that surrounded her shattered any rationality she was clinging to.

“I can’t…stay long,” she stammered.

“Stop being such a worry wart.
 
I’ll tell you everything as soon as the…ah, here she is.
 
Two glasses of chardonnay,” McKinley told the waitress then turned back to Serena.
 
“I know I was being a little pushy about talking to you today but I discovered some things recently that are very…disturbing and I felt you had a ri
g
ht to know.”

Distracted by the sounds and smells going on around her, Serena only caught the last few words.
 
“Right to know?”

“About Will.”

That got her attention.
 
“Will?”

“Look, Serena, I don’t want to upset you
,
but I was talking to Mom about your situation with Will and…”

“Situation,” Serena repeated.
 
“By that, I assume you mean our living arrangements?”

“Mom is really uptight about it
,
and after what she told me, I really can’t blame her.
 
Here’s our wine.”
 
McKinley was silent for a moment, dragging out the dramatic pause as long as possible.
 
“It’s about Will and…well, his
strange
behavior that night.
 
He’s the one who found you, did he tell you that?”

“Technically, no.”
 
Serena shivered despite how warm it was in the bar.
 
“I remembered…bits and pieces, and Will helped filled in the gaps.”

“I’m sure he did.”

McKinley’s caustic tone set off all kinds of alarms.
 
Serena pressed her lips together, refusing to do what her sister so clearly expected of her; ask what she meant by that remark then wait on tenterhooks while McKinley pretended to battle her conscious before springing whatever earth shattering news she had.
 
She reached for her glass of wine, knowing McKinley would have positioned it directly in front of her, and curled her fingers around the glass stem.
 
All right, she
would
play the game, but she wasn’t going to be the spineless jellyfish McKinley believed her to be.

“Why don’t you just spit it out, McKinley?
 
You’re obviously leading up to something but I don’t have the time or patience to coax it out of you.”

McKinley’s reply was waspish.
 
“Maybe I shouldn’t tell you at all if that’s the way you’re going to be about it.”
 
 
 
 

“Maybe you shouldn’t,” she shrugged.
 

Let her stew on that one for awhile, Serena thought.
 
McKinley didn’t say anything, which was almost as surprising to Serena as her own display of assertiveness.
 
It felt…liberating to say exactly what she was thinking for once instead of biting her tongue.
 
Serena had witnessed the verbal lashings her sister doled out to others and didn’t relish being on the receiving end of those venomous barbs.
 
She’d always avoided any type of confrontation because McKinley could be downright vicious when she was angry, but instinctively she knew it would be a huge mistake to allow McKinley to intimidate her right now.
 
 
 

She didn’t have to ask herself where this inner strength came from; it had lay dormant in a place in her heart that she’d sealed off from the rest of the world until Will came along and awakened it again.
 
It was because of Will, or rather her faith in Will, that she was empowered with the self-confidence she’d always lacked whenever McKinley was around.
 
It was proof that the depth of her feelings for Will went beyond the old high school crush; it was also a measure of how much she trusted him.
 

“I love you, Serena, and I care what happens to you,” McKinley said in a much gentler voice.
 
“You know that, right?”

“Of course I do.”

“Good, because it’s important to understand I’m only telling you this because I’m concerned about you.”

Serena offered no encouragement to continue.
 
Instead, she took a few sips of wine, stalling for time while she tried to figure out what McKinley’s angle was.
 
She knew her sister loved her, in as much as McKinley was capable of loving someone else anyway, but that had nothing to do with why they were here.
 
Serena wasn’t fooled by the change of tactics either; McKinley never did anything for anyone unless it benefited her
in some way.
 
The question was; what did McKinley have to gain by trying to convince her not to trust Will?

“I know this is difficult, Serena, but having Will live with you could trigger memories, and that scares me because I don’t think you’re strong enough to relive it.
 
You were practically catatonic for weeks afterwards, and I don’t think you
have
considered the possibility you could end up like that again.
 
Everything you’ve worked for would be lost, have you thought about that?”

“I’m stronger now,” Serena said with a defiant lift of her chin.
 
“I’m not that naïve fifteen year old girl anymore and I can’t avoid everyone from my past just because it could bring back memories.”

“No, you can’t avoid people from your past
,
but you don’t need to
invite
them into your life either.
 
I mean, what do you really know about Will?
 
How do you know he didn’t orchestrate this whole thing or that he might have an ulterior motive for getting…close to you?”

That struck a nerve because Will
had,
by his own admission, orchestrated the plan to move in with her.
 
“No,” she murmured, then more firmly, “No, that’s ridiculous.
 
You’re making him sound devious and Will isn’t like that.”

“Isn’t he?”
 

“No, he’s not,” Serena shot back testily.
 
“Will is an honest man and I think it’s horrible that you’re trying to make me suspicious of him.
 
He’s kind and gentle and
would
never do anything to hurt me.”

“
Honest
,” McKinley repeated with a derisive huff.
 
“You think he’s honest just because he told you he
was
the one who found you and got you to the hospital?
 
Come on, Serena, you can’t be gullible enough to believe that’s all there is to the story.”

Serena’s reply was curt.
 
“We haven’t really discussed it.
 
I’m sure he
will
tell me everything when the time is right.”

“By then it may be too late
,”
McKinley said with that dramatic flair she was so good at
.
  “
Serena, you have to listen to me.
 
I think Will is obsessed with you, and I think it goes all the way back to high school.
 
I’ve thought about it a lot, tried to fit all the pieces together and make sense of them
.  E
verything I’ve come up with makes me
suspect
Will had more to do with what happened that night than anyone knows.”

“No,” Serena shook her head, adamantly refusing to believe it.
 
“You’re wrong.
 
You know what I looked like back then; too tall, too thin, no figure…how could someone like Will have even the slightest interest in me?”

“Don’t ask me,” McKinley said dryly, clearly finding the idea unfathomable.
 
“At any rate, I completely misunderstood his reasons for asking me to take a walk in the woods with him that night.
 
I thought he was interested in me, but after I’d embarrassed myself by kissing him, Will asked about
you
.
 
It wasn’t until I talked to Mom that I put it all together.”

Serena’s brows furrowed.
 
“Put
what
altogether?
 
I wish you
would
say what you have to say and stop dancing all around it.”

“All right, all right.
 
I think Will followed you and Randy into the cave and that he knew what was happening.
 
Maybe he thought you were…willing, and he got jealous, or maybe he just panicked and left.
 
That’s why he found me and
insisted I
take a walk with him; so he
would
have a witness to prove he wasn’t anywhere near the cave.”

Acid churned
in Serena’s stomach, burning a path up her esophagus and leaving a sickening metallic taste in her mouth.
 
Sounds and smells began to infiltrate her senses; the sharp pop of a can being opened, flirtatious laughter from men and women coming at her from all directions, the bitter stench of beer and the underlying scent of mingling perfumes and
colognes
.
 
She wanted to scream at McKinley to get her out of there and stop feeding her lies about Will, but she couldn’t seem to make her mouth work.
 
All she could do was sit there in petrified silence while McKinley continued to torture her.

“Think about it, Serena.
 
How did Will know where to find you?
 
Why would he sneak you away from the party and take you to the hospital himself without even sending someone to find me or Anthony and Sawyer?
 
And he didn’t wait around to be questioned by the police, did you know that?
 
Later, we found out he’d gone after Randy and those other boys
. 
I always believed it was because he wanted to avenge you.”

McKinley paused, drawing in a deep breath.
 
“But now…I think it was because he wanted to find out if any of them had seen him inside the cave.
 
Had the case gone to trial
,
it might have come out, but of course we’ll never know the truth now.
 
After what Will did to Randy, Mom and Dad had no choice but to follow their attorney’s advice and let all four boys go with nothing more than a slap on the wrist.”

Serena sat there, rigid as a board, her mind and body too numbed by what McKinley had told her to respond right away.
 
She wanted to say with certainty that McKinley was wrong, to refute every single word and offer an explanation that would prove Will was being unjustly accused, but she couldn’t.
 
She didn’t know how he knew where to find her or why he hadn’t asked anyone to go get her brothers.
 
And she’d always assumed the case hadn’t gone to trial because she
was
too frightened to testify
.  B
ut now McKinley was insinuating she’d never had the choice at all, and that is was Will’s fault.

Serena’s temples throbbed.
 
It was too much to digest all at one time and she didn’t think she could bear to hear any more.
 
The room was beginning to close in on her and that old familiar feeling of panic rose hard and sharp, mercilessly clawing at her insides
until her nerves were raw.
 
She needed to be alone, to get way from McKinley and this foul smelling bar so she could think.