Until the Day I Die(82)

I force myself to read the rest of the exchange, including body parts and what they want to do with them. I feel lightheaded, sick to my stomach, like I want to retch. I click on the next screenshot.

First deposit rolling in at midnight. Congratulations. We did it. xx Okay.

Stop moping. Consider this your share.

Jax is going to sell at some point. You’ll be rich.

One day. But I have to make plans for us now. And making plans costs money.

If you say so.

If Jax sold right now my share would be, might be, roughly $2.5mm, and that’s if E doesn’t have a breakdown. I’m not gonna sit here twiddling my thumbs, following the rules, to end up with fucking peanuts for a “might be.” Another two years of this and, I swear, we’re set.

And then we finally start living?

Like kings. xx

The next screenshot is from a week later.

Another deposit! Damn what a high. xx

You’re brilliant, my Hermes, my golden girl, god with the winged feet. The god of thievery and cunning. I would follow you anywhere.

Good thing, it’s my name on the bank accounts. xx Don’t joke. You’re the most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen. I remember the first time I ever touched you. Eighteen and perfect.

Not 18 anymore, afraid.

Better, my love.

I love you, Arch.

I stare in frozen horror at the messages. I can’t be seeing this.

Arch?

Is that who Sabine is texting with? Arch, my grandfather?

I feel like I may pass out or die or start screaming right here in the plane. My lungs, my heart, my brain—they all feel like they’ve turned into molten objects, burning me from the inside out. My mouth has gone completely dry, so dry I can’t swallow, much less even close it. The plane engines drone louder and louder until they seem to knock around my skull.

Sabine and Arch.

Sabine, Ben’s wife, and Arch, my grandfather, are having an affair.

Arch is the one who said he had to see Sabine. He’s the one who asked her to meet him at the barbecue place in Childersburg. Obviously, their plans changed. Or, who knows, maybe one or both of them recognized Ben’s truck in the parking lot, and it scared them off. But, for whatever reason, neither of them showed that day, and Ben couldn’t confront them. So he tried again at the Grand Bohemian. I don’t know how he figured out that was their regular rendezvous spot, but he knew enough to show up early, before Sabine got there, to confront Arch first.

And I can see why. I don’t blame Ben. All those messages, those raw, intimate words. Arch wrote those words to a woman who wasn’t Gigi. I can’t believe it. Not only that, they’d been involved for decades, ever since she was eighteen. Oh my God. She was Dad’s friend. Ben’s girlfriend. Ben must have been furious when he first figured it out. Heartbroken.

He must be heartbroken now.

I think of all those pictures Arch took of Dad at his track meets. I’d seen them years ago when I was flipping through old photo albums in his office. Did he take that picture of Sabine she kept in her bedroom? The sexy legs one, the one that made her look like a model?

Hermes.

My brain shifts into overdrive. Everything makes perfect sense now. Dele was right. Mom did get sent away to Hidden Sands at a really convenient time. Right after she announced she was going to sell Jax. Right after she blacked out after having one drink. Because, of course, selling would’ve ruined Sabine and Arch’s plan. She would’ve gotten her $2.5 million, but she would’ve lost the easy access to Jax’s customers’ cash.

The timeline falls into perfect, chilling order: I don’t know when exactly Sabine decided to steal from Jax’s customers to finance her and Arch’s new life, but she must’ve set up the process sometime in February or March, because Dad wrote about the error message in his March journal. She skimmed money at least twice in April and August. And probably also in May, June, and July. Which means she’s possibly stolen upwards of two million dollars so far.

Then Mom announced that she wanted to sell, and it threatened to screw up Sabine and Arch’s plan—so they had to get her out of the picture. They had to send her away. Far way. And to get her there they had to make sure Mom did something bad. Like drinking and driving. That’s why they roofied her, just like she kept saying during that stupid intervention, to make sure it looked like they had a good reason to send her away. She said that’s what had happened, but I didn’t listen.

And now she’s contacted me for help. Because she must be in danger. Which means Sabine and Arch weren’t satisfied with tucking Mom away on a remote island . . .

They wanted her gone forever.

They wanted her dead.

Just like Dad.

I am trembling uncontrollably now, my ears ringing. I want to scream. I want to rush up the aisle and grab my grandfather and force him to answer every question that’s running through my head. Did they kill Dad too? Did Arch and Sabine murder my father because he discovered what they were doing? There’s no mention of it in their messages. But if my grandfather killed his own son—or even if he let Sabine do it—that means he’s a murderer. And he won’t hesitate to do the same to me.

My phone dings with a text.

We’re descending, June bug.

I go cold, a chill running through me all the way up to my hairline. I want to cry. I want to die. I don’t know how I’m going to do it, but I have to pretend everything is okay.