The Girls I've Been(80)

She shakes her head like she’s trying to shake out the guilt. Lee gave her a hot-water bottle for her stomach, and she curls up around it like one of those roly-poly bugs.

“Don’t think about it,” I say, because that’s my motto. “Lock it away.”

“Or talk about it if you want,” Wes says, staring hard—admonishingly—at me. It dawns on me that I’m not reacting the right way. She’s not normal. It echoes in my head. Those words, like Raymond himself, will haunt me forever.

“What are we going to tell the sheriff tomorrow?” Iris asks.

“The truth,” I say. “That we stayed quiet until we saw an opportunity to act when they left us alone in the bathroom. We took it, but they got the better of us. Then we got the better of him in the barn.”

“So just the highlights. What happens if he says something?”

I shake my head. “I don’t think he will. He’s got a record already, so he knows he’s going away for a long time, no matter what information he hands over. Knowing who I am . . . that’s much more valuable where he’s going.”

“Will you run?”

It’s not Iris who asks it. It’s Wes.

I look across the lounge at him, the depth of all he knows and all we’ve endured together and separately almost swallowing me.

“No,” I say. “But that’s why we need to be careful. Because of Lee. No. Don’t look over at her,” I say as Wes instinctively starts to turn toward the house where she’s probably still checking on us.

“Lee can’t know,” I continue. “She thinks my cover is intact. It needs to stay that way.”

“And if it doesn’t?” Iris asks.

“She’s gone,” Wes says, and I shrug helplessly when Iris looks at me like she expects disagreement.

“If she thought Raymond might find out that Ashley Keane became Nora O’Malley, Lee would knock me out and have me on a plane before I came to.”

“How long do you think it’ll take for him to figure it out?” Wes asks. He’s playing it so casual, but there’s an undercurrent to his voice, to the shine in his eyes. He’s had years of not just being in the know, but living with the results. He’s been across the hall, listening to me yell in my sleep, just as much as I’ve been across that same hall, listening to his pacing and late-night stirring that’s part insomnia, part avoiding his own nightmares.

I understand that shine in his eyes. I got to metaphorically throttle the bad man who hurt the only boy I loved in this world. And Wes wants to actually throttle the bad man who hurt me. But he’ll have to wait in line.

“Yes, how much time is there to prepare?” Iris sits up straighter, like she’s going to whip out a notebook from the pocket of her PJs or something.

I shrug again. “Raymond could know already. He could find out in six months. It just depends on who Duane knows and how fast they can get the news to him in prison.”

I’ll be surprised if it takes more than a month, though. Duane will be determined. Raymond will be eager. They’ll probably bond with a big ol’ Ashley Bested Me party. And then Duane will tell, and Raymond will finally know, and I’ll be the thing my sister fears the most: a sitting duck.

“We can talk more about the consequences after we give our statements to the sheriff,” I say. “But before we make any plans, let’s make sure we get through tomorrow.”

We go through our story three times until we have it perfect. Wes walks into the house for a few minutes as Iris stretches out on the lounge, tucking one of the pillows under her head. When he comes back, he has a fresh hot-water bottle for her, blankets for all of us, and Iris is already half asleep. Her lashes touch the dark smudges of purple under her eyes, and I reach out and tuck a lock of hair behind her ear. She twitches under the touch and then settles, dropping off into sleep as Wes and I stretch out on either side of her.

“Sleep?” he asks me.

“No way.” The numbness is starting to set in; it’ll power me through until tomorrow. I’ll crash after I talk with the sheriff.

He hands me a bottle of water. “I told Lee I’d make you drink that.”

“Because being hydrated is going to fix things.” I take the bottle from him, setting it on my lap.

“It won’t hurt.” He shrugs.

His phone buzzes. It’s been going off every few minutes since he left the hospital with me instead of his parents.

“Him or her?”

“Her,” he says, and I feel a twinge of guilt. Mrs. Prentiss is not a bad person. She loves Wes. But she doesn’t leave the mayor, and I’ve tried hard not to resent her for it, and a lot of the time, I fail. I’ve wondered why, and I’ve raged against her in my mind shamefully, like this is her fault, when there is only one person to blame.

She’s a victim, too. A part of me understands that.

But a bigger part of me will choose her son’s well-being over hers, because someone needs to.

“Do you need to go?”

“I’m not going anywhere,” he says. He looks down at Iris, his eyes crinkling as he smiles. “I wish I could’ve seen her throw that flaming petticoat over that asshole’s head.”

“It was amazing.”

“She’s amazing,” he says, and his eyes catch mine, suddenly serious. “You made me feel like a jerk last month when I said I thought she liked you.”