Scared To Death (Live to Tell #2)(94)
That much is true. La La lives in complete isolation, alone now in the brick mansion she inherited along with her parents’ fortune.
He knows she graduated from college, that she had vague plans of moving away and finding a career of some kind.
“But then I found you instead,” she likes to tell him.
As he pulls into the driveway, Caroline speaks at last.
“Whose house is this?”
What do I even tell her? Do I explain here, in the car? Or wait until we get inside?
“Jake?”
Maybe La La won’t be here after all. Maybe she’s…out somewhere. Or sleeping—she couldn’t have gotten much sleep…
Thoughts racing, Jeremy reaches for the garage door opener.
“Jake!”
Oh. Right. He’s supposed to be Jake, and Caroline is waiting for him to answer her question.
“It’s a friend’s house.”
The door opens and he pulls into the garage.
No luck. La La’s Mercedes is parked there. He’d known it would be, and yet he feels sick at the sight of it.
He turns off the car, closes the garage door behind them, and gets out.
Caroline hasn’t moved.
“Coming?” he leans in to ask her, and she turns to him.
“Is this your girlfriend’s house, Jake?”
The question catches him off guard. Her dark eyes are narrowed—eyes that are so like his own that sometimes he feels as though he’s looking into a mirror.
How can she not know? Doesn’t she realize that we have some kind of connection? Doesn’t she sense that the same blood runs through our veins?
“Jake…I asked you a question.”
“Yeah. The thing is…she’s not going to be my girlfriend for much longer. It’s over.”
“Mrs. Quinn?”
Caught up in a wistful reverie, she’s startled by a male voice beside her. She looks up to see the cop who left the room a short time ago with the telephone number Annie had found in Caroline’s room.
“Two things. Your credit card was used this morning at an electronic kiosk in Penn Station to purchase a one-way ticket to Boston on the Acela.”
“What?”
“Also, we’ve checked your daughter’s phone records, and she called this number last night and again this morning.”
“Whose phone is it?”
“We traced it to a twenty-two-year-old named Jeremy Smith from California.”
Jeremy.
“La La?”
Standing with her back to the doorway, she hears her name spoken behind her, but it doesn’t register.
Nothing has registered, other than the words that floated to her ears from the garage, when she opened the door to greet Jeremy.
She’s not going to be my girlfriend for much longer. It’s over.
La La chews her lip, tasting blood.
Really?
Really, Jeremy?
You’re going to leave me, after what you did to me?
Arms folded, she stares at a photograph on the mantel. In it, she’s with her father, sitting on his lap. He’s grinning, and her mouth is wide open. She’s probably singing. She was always singing.
Then Jeremy came along.
“There you are.”
Slowly, she turns.
There he is.
Not Jeremy the way he used to be—a dark-haired imp with troubled eyes. Not the Jeremy who beat her beyond recognition. Not on the outside, anyway.
This Jeremy looks different.
His hair is blond now.
He had plastic surgery to repair the damage to his face, as did she. But his was more recent: surgery to repair the scars and bruises and broken bones inflicted by the man he called Papa.
Her own scars, bruises, broken bones—her broken voice, her broken heart—were inflicted by Jeremy.
This Jeremy. He’s still the same person, deep down inside. The person who destroyed her.
“La La! What are you doing?”
She blinks.
He isn’t alone.
She recognizes the girl.
“This is Caroline. Caroline, this is La La.”
Looking hesitant—so different from the cocky girl La La followed in New York the other day—Caroline cautiously takes a step toward her. “Hi, Lila.”
“It’s La La! Not Lila. You stupid bitch.”
“Hey!” Jeremy steps in front of Caroline, almost as if he’s protecting her. Her—not La La. That’s rich.
La La strides toward the two of them.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m just telling your little sister that she got my name wrong.”
“Jesus, La La, shut up!”
“Oh, and I think she has your name wrong, too. She thinks you’re Jake. Isn’t that funny, Jeremy?”
Beside him, Caroline Quinn has gone pale, her mouth gaping open as she absorbs La La’s words.
Jeremy turns toward her, touches her arm. “Caroline…”
“Sister?”
He shakes his head, and La La grins.
Caroline touches the door frame, as if she’s going to faint. “You’re—”
“No, Caroline, I—”
“What is she talking about?”
“She’s crazy.” He glares at La La.