Lies I Told(69)

My phone lit up a second later. No word. Stand by.

I tapped my toes against the tile floor, trying not to read too much into the delay. I don’t know if it was instinct or paranoia, but I was suddenly sure something was wrong, and a burst of energy forced me to my feet as adrenaline flooded my body. I paced the floor, forcing myself to take steady, even breaths.

I was getting ready to text my dad again when a muted buzzing sounded from my hand. I looked down, surprised to see that Parker was calling.

“What’s going on?” I asked as soon as I picked up.

“Listen carefully, Grace.” Everything seemed to slow down when I heard Parker’s labored breathing, the sound of distant sirens in the background. “The guard didn’t come out like he was supposed to. Someone called the cops instead, and they’re on my tail. I’m—”

“Where are you?” I demanded. “I’ll send Mom and Dad to pick you up.”

“You have to listen!” he shouted, panting. I could picture him running, trying to put some distance between him and the police. “I’m going to ditch this phone in the water and hope for the best. I’ll be back in touch with you later if I can.”

“Parker . . .” I paced the floor, barely able to breathe. “We’ll come get you. We’ll come right now!”

“No, you won’t.” His voice was strangely calm, like he had known this would happen all along. I could hear the roar of the ocean on the other end of the phone. He was trying to lose the police at the cliffs. It was what I would have done. “Everything is in place. You have to move. Make sure Cormac and Renee save my share. And Grace?”

“Yeah?” I could barely get the word out.

“It’s you and me. No matter what.”

The call dropped, and I looked down at the screen, not wanting to believe it. I fought the urge to throw my phone, to scream, to run. Then I called Cormac.

“We’re still waiting, Grace.”

“Parker’s on the run,” I said. “The police came instead of the guard. He’s going to ditch the phone and try to lose them.”

There was a moment of silence on the other end of the phone. “I’ll call you back in one minute.”

I dropped onto the bench in the Fairchilds’ foyer. “Let him be okay,” I whispered to the silent house. “Please let him be okay.”

The phone buzzed in my hand. “We’re heading to Allied,” my dad said, his voice even. “We’ll be back in half an hour. Sit tight.”

“But I—” I didn’t have time to finish. The phone was dead.





Fifty-Four


I spent the next hour and a half pacing the house, listening carefully for any sound, worried that Logan would wake up earlier than planned, that whatever had happened at Allied had alerted the guards to a potential problem at the Fairchild house.

By the time my phone buzzed, I was a nervous wreck. The text was from my dad.

Open gates. Proceed as planned.

I wanted to ask him about Parker, about what had happened at Allied. But this wasn’t the time. They were outside, exposed as they waited for me to open the gate.

I went to the keypad and pressed the Gate Entry button. Then I walked to the big window in the living room, watching for the truck. A few seconds later, headlights bounced through the trees along the driveway. I hit the button to close the gate and disarmed the alarm before picking up my bag.

I headed into the kitchen, stopping at the terrace doors. The lawn was dark and quiet, no sign of the drama playing out elsewhere on the peninsula. Was it still okay to cross the lawn in full view of the cameras? Had my dad put them on a loop in Parker’s absence? There was no way to know for sure, but he had said to proceed as planned. I reached into my bag and pulled out the mask he’d given me that morning.

Opening the terrace door, I stepped out into the cold night and hurried across the lawn. I couldn’t see the carriage house, but a visual of the property was imprinted on my mind, and I made my way down the footpath and over to the driveway.

The truck was just a shadow in the darkness, the headlights off. The doors opened as I moved toward it. My dad emerged first, duffel bag in hand, and my mom stepped down from the passenger side a moment later. They wore masks identical to mine, and I felt a thrill of fear, like we were all unwitting participants in some kind of horror movie.

We didn’t speak. Voices carried in unpredictable ways outside, bouncing off buildings, drifting on breezes. I was dying to know what had happened at Allied, if they’d heard anything about Parker, but I followed them silently to the carriage house and helped them ease open the doors as quietly as possible.

Cormac waited until we were inside to take off his mask and turn on one of the flashlights. Working with anything brighter would be too dangerous. Light, like sound, had a way of bouncing where you didn’t want it to.

He dropped the duffel bag on the floor and unzipped it, rifling through its contents.

I shook my head. “What are we doing?” My voice rose in panic. “We have to find Parker!”

My mom grabbed ahold of my arm, her grip a little too tight. Her eyes were bright, her blond hair pulled back into a sleek ponytail. “Parker knows what he’s doing. He’s probably holed up in some cave at the cliffs, waiting for it all to blow over. We continue as planned and get Parker later. It’s how he would want it.”