Complicit (13 page)

But
after,
well, I found out some things about Cate on my own. Bad things. And maybe when I found those things out, I should have handled it differently. All right, I know I should have.

Only I didn't.

And I have to live with that.

It happened like this:

In the immediate aftermath of the fire, the only thing I thought about was my hands. Oh, maybe part of me thought fleetingly about Scooter and his Sarah, wondering why she might've been dumb enough to be in a burning barn at night. But having to wait in the ER all those hours, worrying whether I'd had a stroke or a spinal injury or if some fast-growing tumor was pressing down on my cranial nerves, I mostly thought about myself.

In the end I learned nothing. My hands came back to life on their own after hours of being poked, prodded, and referred for further testing. I was discharged and sent home. Relieved, Malcolm and I drove back to the house on Oak Canyon only to discover Angie alone, and Cate long gone. She'd bolted from the house right after the police had questioned her that morning.

“She's with that Ramirez boy,” Angie hissed at Malcolm the moment we walked through the front door. She didn't even look at me or the knot on my forehead from where I'd fallen down in the school nurse's office.

“I'll call over there,” Malcolm said wearily. Then he patted my shoulder. “Go get some rest, Jamie. Your hands are doing all right now?”

“Yeah, they're totally fine.”

“Maybe you should take a break from piano for a few days. It could be carpal tunnel or something.”

“The doctor didn't think it was.”

Malcolm snorted. “ER docs don't know anything. They're just there to keep you from dying. I'm going to make you an appointment with my neurologist, okay?”

“Yeah, sure,” I muttered. I went to walk upstairs. Malcolm had already had surgery twice for carpal tunnel, so it made sense that that's where his mind went. But not doing things like playing piano was an overreaction. I hadn't been playing when my hands went numb. I'd just been sitting there, listening to everyone freak out about Sarah. Maybe I should stop listening to other people. Maybe that was the answer to all my problems.

“Hey, Jamie,” Malcolm called out, forcing me to turn around.

“What?”

“You notice anything different about Cate recently?”

“Different how?”

“I don't know,” he said, frowning.

“Yeah, well, me, neither.”

 

 

It wasn't long before Scooter called, hysterical.

“They won't let me see her, man! Me!”

“What? Why not?” I asked. I squeezed the phone between my shoulder and ear and lay on my back on the floor of my room. I held my hands up and wiggled each of my fingers, one after the other.

Just to be sure.

What had made them freeze up on me like that?

Would it happen again?

“I don't know,” Scooter squeaked. “The hospital says it's policy. Only
family
can see her.”

“Oh,” I said. “Well, maybe that's true. The policy. That sounds right.”

“That sounds like
bullshit
! She'd want to see me. I know she would!”

“Calm down.”

“I am not calm. I am anything but calm right now.”

“Scooter…”

“There's something else going on, too,” he said. “My dad said the
cops
want to talk to me.”

“Wait, what for?”

“I don't know what for. Something about the fire. They think it was set on purpose. It started in Bailey's stall, I guess, and…”

I frowned. Bailey was Sarah's horse. I'd heard Cate mention her before. Listening to Scooter talk, my worries about my hands began to fade. They were replaced with a heaviness in my gut, a brooding sense of dread.

“I bet it's not a big deal, Scoot.” I said weakly. “You're going out with Sarah and she was hurt. I'm sure it's standard to talk with you.”

“I didn't do anything,” he said in a low voice.

“I didn't say you did.”

“What if she dies? What am I going to do?”

“I don't know, Scoot. Don't worry about that now. She's going to be fine. Everything will be fine.”

His voice cracked. “I love her, man. That might sound crazy, but I
do.
”

I sighed. Honestly, it did sound crazy. It wasn't nice, but a part of me was hoping this might get them to finally break up. It was time. I mean, they weren't exactly Romeo and Juliet. Or hell, maybe they were—two oversexed kids with nothing in common except their belief that novelty was enough to keep them together.

“Everything will be fine,” I repeated.

“Have you talked to Cate?”

“No,” I said. “Why?”

Scooter made a gasping sound. Sort of a laugh-sob. “It's just, sometimes I wonder about her. Remember that stuff Sarah told us? What she'd do in the woods with those girls? And we both know what the guys say about her. Supposedly there's a video—”

I stiffened. “You're talking about my sister.”

“I
know.
But I've heard other stuff, too. Like how she was the one who fucked up Dane's Boxster last month. And I know how pissed she was when Sarah's horse kicked hers during that show. Plus she's with Danny and it's his family's barn. People are saying she was mad at him. Something about Gwen. Look, other people are talking, too. So maybe—”

“Maybe what?”

“You know.”

My tone grew stern. “We are not having this conversation, Scooter. We are never having this conversation. So back off. Now.”

“But this is about Sarah,” he whined.

“Cate is my sister. End of story. Got it?”

He hung up.

Scooter's suspicions stewed in my mind after our phone call, and stirred me into action. I had to find my sister. I had to make sure she was okay and let her know what people were saying about her.

I also had to make sure the rumors were
wrong.

I jumped off my bed and grabbed a jacket. I'd told Malcolm I didn't know where Cate was. Technically, this was true. But I thought I
might
know.

Without a word to my parents, I slipped down the back staircase and into the garage to grab my bike. Helmet firmly on head, I pedaled down the hill toward the Ramirez property. My lips moved the whole way. I was praying out loud for my hands to stay strong.

And for my sister to stay good.

Autumn wind and dying sun. I smelled the fire before I saw it. Nearing the ranch, I spotted rows of police cars and ladder trucks crowding the drive. The burned barn wasn't visible through the trees but my eyes and throat stung from the smoke. I thought of Sarah and charred horseflesh and started to gag. I threw my bike to the ground and kicked it into the bushes.

Pulling my shirt up over my mouth and nose, I traveled the rest of the way on foot, scrambling up the hillside and doing my best to stay upwind from the smell. I hiked through brush and forest, slipping on dry leaves and fallen branches, until I reached the main house on the Ramirez ranch, which sat in a copse of pine trees, far from where the horses were boarded.

Hector was the one who answered when I rang the doorbell. It figured. We stared at each other for a good long time, the air crackling with ego and the simmering threat of violence. I hadn't forgotten what he'd said to me that day in the library. Clearly, he hadn't forgotten my response.

“Where is she?” I said finally.

“How should I know?”

“Because she's with your brother.”

Hector narrowed his eyes. Despite his or my wishes otherwise, Cate and Danny Ramirez had been seeing each other for a while now. In a serious sort of way. It was supposed to be a secret, but like most small-town secrets, everyone knew about it. Even Danny's ex, Gwen, who'd sworn she'd get him back.

“Check in the guesthouse,” Hector said. “That's where Danny stays these days.”

The way he said the last two words made me wonder if the living arrangement was somehow Cate's doing, but it's not like I could just ask.

“Thanks,” I said. “I'm sorry about the fire.”

He lifted his chin. “Did you set it?”

“N-no.”

“Then don't be sorry.”

“Yeah, fine, whatever.” I turned to go.

“Heard you had some kind of medical thing going on today.”

I looked over my shoulder and nodded. “Yeah, I did. Something happened to my hands.”

“Your
hands
? What about this?” Hector pointed to the spot on his temple that correlated to the location of my cut.

I reached up to feel the bandage. “Oh, that. Yeah, I fell or passed out or something in the nurse's office. I'm okay now, though.”

“You sure? No offense, but you look kind of fucked up.”

“Sure, I'm sure. Uh, thanks again, Hector. I'll go find Cate now.”

“All right then. You go do that.”

“Pretty sad about Sarah Ciorelli, huh?”

“There's a lot of sad in this world,” Hector said, before swinging the door shut.

 

 

No one answered at the guest cottage. Set back in the woods, the small outbuilding looked like it'd been updated recently, with a new redwood deck off the side that had a view of the valley. If I twisted my head and looked straight up, I could make out my own house perched on the canyon's edge, mostly bright glare and sun bouncing off glass. I walked around to the back of the cottage. An abalone shell ashtray sitting on the deck railing, with a crumpled pack of Camel Lights beside it, told me Cate had been here recently. A wind catcher woven with feathers and sticks twirled from the eaves.

I peered through a pair of French doors but couldn't make out anything but an unmade bed and a pair of jeans. I stepped back quickly. I didn't want to think of my sister on that bed, all sprawled and wild and bewitching, doing whatever it was she and Danny most likely did. Sex and Cate were topics I never wanted to think of together, no matter what rumors I heard or how much she liked to flaunt her body. I mean, of course, I saw the way guys looked at her.

I just really, really hated it.

A low snarl escaped my throat. I leaped from the porch to the ground, then wished I hadn't. My head hurt more. A gust of wind whispered up the valley floor, bringing some of the sick fire scent with it, and that's when it came to me. A faint tinkling. I turned in the direction of the noise, but saw nothing.

Then it came again. The soft tinkling of a bell. Like a lost melody.

I listened more.

It was coming from the woods.

I squeezed my hands into fists, then let them go. I'd been doing that a lot, wanting to make sure my body hadn't betrayed me again.

I headed into the woods, winding higher and higher up the hillside. The trees closed around me, stealing the sun, leaving me shivering. I kept walking.

Maybe an eighth of a mile in, I found the source of the noise. It was a second wind catcher, hung high off a draping oak branch. This one was also made of sticks and feathers, but someone had tied to it a long strand of copper bells weathered white-green with verdigris. Nudged and jostled by the wind, the bells filled the air with their chaotic harmony.

Where was I? I turned around and around. I stood in a secluded hollow, deep in the woods on what must be the far edge of the vast Ramirez property.

I was washed with the strangest sense of déjà vu. Had I been here before?

Above my head, the wind catcher swayed and tinkled more. Dead leaves spun across the dirt path, making sounds like falling rain. My gaze moved from the singing bells to the massive oak branch they dangled from. The trunk of the tree was split, straight down the middle, so that half of it bent one way over a damp creek bed. The other half bent the opposite way, straight into another tree. This left a gaping hole in the center of the trunk. A deep, black hole.

I walked over. I peered inside.

Darkness.

I felt dizzy, a swirling wave of vertigo. I thought of secrets stuffed into drawers and beneath linen closets, the way squirrels store nuts—as a means of survival. My chest tightened and I balled my hands into fists again. To make sure my nerves were still working.

Then I stuck one of those hands down inside the broken tree trunk.

At first I felt nothing of interest: a rush of cold air, cobwebs, something lumpy that might have been mushrooms. I stretched farther, plunging as far as I could go, until my armpit was hooked against the sharp bark. That's when I felt it. The tips of my fingers brushed against some kind of man-made object, also lumpy but with parts made of Velcro and nylon. I jumped and wriggled onto my tiptoes, straining and reaching even more to grasp it. Then I pulled hard, giving one huge heave. My momentum popped me free with great force, and I flew back, landing sprawled on the ground with a grunt.

But I had the object. I looked at it. And I gasped.

It was a bag, a messenger bag, black nylon with red stripes. And I recognized it because it was
mine.
It'd disappeared from my room last year and I thought maybe Angie had thrown it out, but now I knew who'd taken it.

Cate.

I shivered as the wind whipped through the clearing, bringing up goose bumps on my bare arms. There was a part of me that didn't want to be here. That part was telling me to get up and leave.

Go,
a voice inside my head said.
Don't do this. Don't. Some truths aren't meant to be known. You love your sister, no matter how screwed up she is. She's all you have. Don't let anything change that.

But like a soon-dead cat, my curiosity got the better of me.

So I sat up.

And I opened the bag.

 

 

The process of dumping the items onto the ground and sifting through them was one of desperation. I wanted what I would never find: proof of my sister's innocence. Proof that she wasn't as bad as everyone made her out to be.