Lies I Told(14)

Even a queen needed some kind of consensus if she wanted to avoid an uprising.

I was pulled from my thoughts when my mom entered the kitchen wearing slim black pants and a jade-green blouse that accentuated her eyes. Her hair was pulled back, a more conservative style than the one she usually wore, and her legs looked extra long in four-inch heels.

“Hey,” I said, putting a bite of waffle into my mouth.

“Hi, honey.” She walked to the window and looked outside. “The flowers around the pool are pretty. The landscapers are doing a good job. Fast, too.”

“You look nice.” I couldn’t have cared less about the backyard. “Where are you going?”

She turned around. “Leslie Fairchild sits on the board of the Playa Hermosa Community Theater. They’re having a committee meeting today. I’m going to volunteer, see if I can get to know her. Turns out she’s a bit of a homebody.”

“How do you know?”

“I got some of the women at the salon talking. Seems taking care of Warren, staying on top of his meds and appointments and all the other things that go along with being married to someone with his condition, is a full-time job.”

“But he goes golfing and stuff . . .” I wanted to believe that Warren Fairchild’s condition wasn’t that bad. That we wouldn’t be stealing from someone so mentally ill that it took all of his family’s resources to take care of him.

My mom laughed. “He’s not paralyzed, Gracie. They just have to control his environment. From what I understand, he can handle familiar places and situations as long as he’s on his meds. They just have to keep an eye on him, that’s all.” She didn’t sound at all concerned as she grabbed her handbag off the counter. “Anyway, I have to go. Have fun at the bonfire tonight.”

“Thanks.” I watched her leave, her words echoing through my mind: He can handle familiar places and situations as long as he’s on his meds.

What about unfamiliar situations? What happened to Logan’s dad then? I pushed the thought away. What happened to Warren Fairchild after we took his gold wasn’t our problem.

I took my plate to the sink and ran water over it as I looked out the window, scanning the trees for parrots.

“I thought you were going to the mall?”

I jumped at the sound of the voice behind me. It was Parker, standing there in swim trunks and flip-flops, a blue knapsack in his hands.

“God! You scared me!” I took a deep breath. “I’m picking Selena up in half an hour. You don’t need the car, do you?”

He shook his head. “I’m getting a ride with the guys.”

“The guys?”

“Logan, David, and Liam. They’re teaching me how to surf today.”

“Oh, wow . . . you got in before me,” I said with a twinge of jealousy.

“Not really. I’m about where you are. They invited me surfing when we won our basketball game in gym, but I wouldn’t say I’m in yet.” He grabbed a beach towel off one of the hooks on the wall by the kitchen door. “The bonfire should help, though.”

“The bonfire?”

“Logan invited me. I heard you were going, too.”

Guilt heated my face. “I forgot to mention it. I’m sorry. I would have invited you when I remembered.”

Even as I said it, I wondered if it was true. If the slip had been intentional. Parker was good at a lot of things: running recon, cracking locks, and finding ways around alarm systems, working the hottest—and richest—girls in any school. But he was also a little too good at being my slightly older brother. And while I appreciated the concern, I wasn’t exactly thrilled with the idea of tiptoeing around his protective gaze.

He looked at me for a minute, like he wasn’t quite sure what to say.

Finally, he sighed. “I’m just trying to look out for you.”

My heart softened. “I know that.”

“I hope so,” he said. “Because not everybody who says they care is going to do right by you. It sucks, but it’s true.”

A car honked out front. For a moment, Parker didn’t move. When he spoke again, there was something heavy and sad in his eyes.

“I haven’t always done the right thing, Grace. But I’m trying to do it now.”

He left me standing there, wondering what he meant.





Twelve


Selena’s father was a somber man, dressed in a suit despite the fact that it was Saturday. We made small talk for a few minutes and then Selena and I were off, following the winding road down the peninsula until it picked up the Pacific Coast Highway in Redondo Beach.

Selena teased me about staying on the highway that ran parallel to the ocean. We could get to the Galleria faster through town. But I’d learned to take advantage of the good things my strange life had to offer. I’d moved more times in sixteen years than most people would in a lifetime. I’d said too many good-byes, lied so much I sometimes forgot the truth. But I’d also watched the sun set over the desert. I’d walked the streets of New York City in the fall, felt the bite of cold air, smelled the food from the street carts mingling with hot metal from the subway and the earthy scent of leaves blowing across the sidewalk. In DC, I’d seen the cherry blossoms in bloom. In Seattle, I’d raced across Puget Sound in a speedboat, staring into the depths of a sea so green it was almost surreal.