Lucky(40)

“Because. I don’t want to be with someone like…”

“Say it. Someone like you? Someone like your dad? You want to find someone you can pretend with, is that it? Someone who isn’t smart enough to see through you?”

“I don’t want to see you again. Ever.”

She hung up.



* * *




Reyes was waiting for her father outside the boat when Lucky left the boat the next morning. “I broke up with him, all right? Are you happy?” Lucky snarled.

Reyes looked startled. “Of course I’m not happy about this.”

“Well, it’s what you wanted, right?”

Reyes kicked at a splinter on the dock with her scuffed combat boots, which she wore even on the hottest of days. “I told you. Your dad asked me to look out for you. You were spending time with someone who wasn’t being honest with you. Priscilla found out, and that could be an issue. It’s what a friend does—”

“You’re not my friend—”

“I didn’t say I was your friend. I’m his friend. Your dad’s. And that’s why I did it. I don’t take any pleasure in this.”

Lucky’s eyes were swimming with tears. She turned away from Reyes, not wanting her to see them. She started to walk away, but then stopped and turned back. “Now that you’ve ruined my life, you owe me one. Tell me what it is.”

“What what is?”

“What you and my dad do for Priscilla. Tell me. I deserve to know.”

Reyes lowered her eyes back to the splinter. A long moment passed while she loosened it from the board completely. “It’s a charity,” she finally said.

“A charity?”

She looked up again. “For foster children. I’m the poster child.”

“Are you in the foster program?”

“Technically, no. I’m nineteen now. But I lived with Priscilla as a foster when I was a teen, and that’s how she came up with the idea.”

“So… the call center is…?”

“We get donations. But the foundation isn’t real.” Reyes glanced behind her. “And do you want to know something else? If we’re being honest? I’m getting scared. It’s turning into big money. And I know if we get caught, Priscilla will find a way to pin it all on us. I feel like we’re about to—”

A noise behind them. John had come out of the boat. “Oh, hey, you two! Glad to see you getting more acquainted.” But then his expression changed. “Everything okay here?”

“Oh, yeah. We’re all good. Come on, let’s go, John, the fifty-seven bus leaves in five.”

Lucky watched them go. Her plan had been to go to the beach and read all day, but she suddenly realized she didn’t want to go there, didn’t want to run into Alex, or Cary, or whoever the hell he was. And also that after her unsettling conversation with Reyes, she needed more answers.

She walked down the dock. There was a bike locked to a fence and she saw it had the kind of cheap lock you could crack by listening for the clicks; her father had taught her that ages ago. She looked around, but no one was nearby. It took her a few minutes, but she got the bike unlocked, jumped on, and headed for the bus stop, waiting at a distance while she watched her father and Reyes board.

Then she rode along behind. Traffic was heavy, so she could mostly keep up. She observed from afar as Reyes and her father got off at Chestnut and Windermere. They crossed the street and entered a low-rise office building. She waited a few minutes, then crossed the street, too. The directory inside listed doctors’ offices and other businesses—and, there: San Fran Foster Kids Association, at the bottom.

She crossed the street again, found a café, watched, and waited. A couple of hours later, Reyes emerged from the building and walked down the street. Lucky followed and caught up.

“What are you doing here?”

“I followed you to work. I’m worried about my dad.”

“I shouldn’t have told you,” Reyes said. “There’s nothing you can do. A few more months, that’s all, and then we’re going to shut it down. The best thing for you to do is to just stay out of the way. Go home.”

Lucky hated doing what Reyes told her to, but she couldn’t think of an alternative, so she got back on the bike and returned to the marina.

Later, she would come to wish she had done something more. But she didn’t. She just sat on the deck of the boat alone day after day, because she no longer went to the beach for fear of running into Alex. She tried to think of a plan to get her father out of this messy business he was embroiled in. But no ideas came to her—except the idea of taking off. And if they took off, she would have to let go of her dream of attending college.

The day it happened began like any other. Lucky was on the deck, reading a book, when the cell phone her father sometimes left with her when he went to work rang. “Lucky, listen to me. I think we’re in trouble here.” Her father sounded panicked; he was talking fast. “You know where the lockbox is. The code is under my mattress. Find it, open it, I’ve left you an—Oh, shit, I have to go.” The line went dead.

Lucky stared down at the phone in her hand, then jumped off the boat and ran down the pier, heading for the spot where she had hidden the stolen bike. She rode so fast she was soon gasping for air. But she kept going, until she reached the office building where her father had been working. She pulled her bike to the side of the road just as three police cars roared down the street, sirens blaring, and stopped in front of the doors.