White Rabbit(50)
“We have to,” I say, firmly and urgently. “I’m serious. Sebastian? We have to get out of here right now.”
That finally seems to make an impression, and my ex-boyfriend’s eyes widen even further, his voice hollowing out. “You think Hayden might come back?”
“I think we don’t need to give the neighbors any more chances to see us and tell the police we were here.”
“We’re not even gonna call the police?” He pulls away as I start dragging him down the stairs. “Are you freaking kidding?”
“Do you really feel like explaining how we just happened to turn up at the site of a second murder tonight?” I challenge frantically, every fiber of my being itching to be back in the Jeep, halfway to anywhere else. “They’re gonna find him any minute now, anyway, because April has to have already handed over Fox’s guest list for the party. You think it won’t look shady as hell if we’re standing here when they roll up?”
He just stares at me, not wanting to understand. “We have to tell them about Hayden, Rufus. He’s still out there, and apparently he’s lost his fucking mind! What if he comes for you again? What if he goes for Lia?”
“Don’t you get it?” I finally snap. “We can’t tell the police why we suspect Hayden without telling them about the money—which means telling them when we really got to the lake house, and everything else that we lied about!” I hear myself, and guilt twists at my insides, followed by a rush of panicked adrenaline as time continues slipping away. “Look, I know it’s my fault. It was my stupid decision to help April, even though we both knew I shouldn’t, and now it’s blowing up in our faces. I’m sorry. I am really, really sorry I got you into this; but here we fucking are.” I take a deep breath, guilt twisting harder. “We can’t help Arlo, but if you’re right, and Hayden is going back to Lia’s … well, then we need to get over there now.”
It hits him where I meant it to, his eyes sparking with fear, and he nods sharply. “You’re right. Shit. Shit, we need to make sure she’s okay.”
Silently, he sprints across Arlo’s yard, heading back for the Jeep, and I follow behind, tormented by mixed emotions. It’s not my fault that Arlo is dead, but I am responsible for putting Sebastian in a position to lie to the cops; I was the one who took the money, not him, and he’s risked a lot by covering up for me. I’ve been so angry at him for so long, but I’ve put him in an impossible situation that only seems to be getting worse.
Maybe I preyed on his feelings for Lia as a way of punishing myself, I reflect miserably as I climb into Sebastian’s car and it jerks away from the curb. I knew his instinct to protect her would be the one thing that might override his desire to call the police; maybe I wanted to see him go all White Knight for Lia, because I needed to feel how much it would hurt. He used me unjustly, but I’m digging a hole that could bury us both, and that’s something potentially far worse. Maybe I deserve a little pain right now.
Sebastian drives one-handed, shooting past parked cars with centimeters to spare, cell phone pressed to his ear as he calls Lia. I cross my fingers and hope that nobody is still awake to report the suspicious vehicle speeding away from the Rossi house, and listen mutely to the relief in my ex-boyfriend’s voice as he gets his ex-girlfriend on the line. “Are you okay? Has Hayden been back?” He pauses, and then says, “I can’t … look, we’re on our way over to you now, and I’ll tell you everything when we get there. Just … if Hayden does show up? Don’t talk to him. Don’t go outside, don’t let him in, don’t answer his calls. Just ignore him. No matter what. Okay? Promise me.”
He hangs up, and a palpable silence once again vibrates around us, both of us too tense to speak. I want to put Sebastian at ease, tell him he’s just jumping to conclusions. I want to tell him that Lia probably has nothing to be afraid of. But how can I? Maybe she does.
I wanted to be suspicious of Sebastian’s ex earlier, but it’s become increasingly evident that I might have to let that self-serving theory go already; in order to support it, I’d have to accept that she: 1) murdered Fox and framed April for it, but then tried to get us to believe that Arlo was the actual culprit all along, and 2) killed Arlo (to keep him from denying it?) and then tried to make it seem like Hayden did it. To get away with all that, she’ll have to eventually kill my brother, too, and I simply don’t believe she’s that diabolical. It’s not as if I actually trust her, and I definitely don’t think she’s been entirely honest with us, but I still haven’t even figured out a motive for her to want Fox dead.
Hayden, on the other hand, has “two dead bodies and a heaping side of arson” written all over him. With an ego the size of an aircraft carrier, he long ago established a cult of personality at Ethan Allen, and he likes being revered; any sign of disrespect is a crime, punishable by cruel and unusual torture. Fox apparently forgot his place, and reminding him of it—with prejudice—would be par for the course as far as my demented brother is concerned. As his partner, Arlo was likely already doomed by association even before he inevitably failed to produce the missing cash. The only thing I can’t quite figure out yet is why Hayden would burn down the Whitneys’ empty home on top of killing Fox.
A superfluous house fire, however, is exactly the sort of thing you might expect from a pissed-off drug lord who needs to make an example of someone who’s tried to scam him. I admittedly don’t know a whole lot about drug runners, but it seems a pretty safe bet that any self-respecting kingpin would maintain a zero-tolerance policy about being cheated by his underlings. A bit of scorched earth—both literal and figurative, in this case—might go a long way toward encouraging the rest of the gang to keep in line.