Always Us (The Jade Series #8) (14 page)

I go home and change into my bikini and grab my beach towel and suntan lotion and find a spot on the sand. Since moving here, Garret and I haven’t taken full advantage of living on the beach. I never run on it because Garret still thinks it’s too dangerous for me to run alone. And he can’t surf because of his shoulder.

As I lie on the beach, the warm sun and the sound of the waves make me sleepy and I feel myself drifting off. If I do, Garret will wake me up. He’ll be home from class soon.

“I finally found you.” I hear a man’s voice and open my eyes to see someone standing above me. I’m looking right in the sun and it’s so bright I can’t see his face.

“Who are you?” I grab my beach towel and pull it around me, tossing sand everywhere.

“Don’t you recognize me? We were friends all last semester.” He takes his sunglasses off. “I even drove you home for spring break.”

“Carson?” I look closer. Holy crap! It
is
him! What is he doing here?

“It’s Justin.”

“What are you talking about?” I stand up, wrapping the towel around me, keeping my eyes on him. “Your name is Carson. Unless Carson has a twin.”

He smiles. “Carson was a fake name. My real name is Justin.”

Justin. That’s the name of the guy Sara said was trying to find me. But it wasn’t Justin. It was Carson.

I stare at him. He looks different. Older. He’s wearing dress pants and a shirt and tie, and his hair is shorter, cut close to his head.
 

Why is he here? Why was he trying to find me? And why the hell was he using a fake name?

“What are you doing here?” I back away from him toward the house.

“Jade, you don’t have to be scared of me.”

“I don’t know why you’re here but you need to leave.”

“I just want to talk.”

“We have nothing to talk about. Just go, Carson. I mean it.”

“My name’s Justin.” He motions to the deck behind me. “Why don’t we go sit down? I don’t need to go inside.”

“Tell me why you’re here.”

“I need your help.”

“For what?”

“Let’s go sit down and I’ll explain.”

“No. Explain right here. Right now. Why aren’t you at Moorhurst anymore?”

“Because I’m done with college. I’m 24.”

“What? So you were just pretending to be a student? Why?”

“So I could get to know you and some of the other students there.”

Okay, that’s really strange. Like psycho strange. I shiver as a chill runs down my spine.

“I can’t help you, Carson. You need to leave.”

“I heard you married Garret. A little young, aren’t you? And weren’t you two broken up last semester? Or was that all for show?”

“What are you talking about? You’re not making any sense.” I feel like it’s last semester all over again. Listening to Carson’s conspiracy theories and trying to steer him off track. And just like last semester, his theories aren’t that far off.

“What’s going on, Jade? You broke up with Garret in March and now you’re married to him? After he slept with all those girls and did drugs and destroyed hotel rooms and cars? Doesn’t seem to add up.”

“Garret’s changed. He doesn’t do that stuff anymore. And I forgave him, so yeah, we got married.”

“I’m not stupid. I know something’s going on here.”

“Garret will be home any second, and if he sees you here it’s not going to be good. He has a gun, so you really should leave.” Now I’m making up lies. That’s just great.

“Is it the same gun he shot himself with last year? You said that was a shotgun. Are you saying he’s going to show up here with a shotgun? Does he take it to class with him?” He laughs a little.

“It’s not a shotgun. It’s a handgun and he’s not afraid to use it. So you need to get out of here.”

His expression turns serious. “What happened to you, Jade? Why are you involved in this? I told you to get out while you still could and now you’re married into his family. Why didn’t you get away from him when I told you to?”

“Why would I listen to you? You really think I’d believe your crazy conspiracy theories? You’re the only one who believes that stuff. Even your dad thought your theories were crazy.”

“That wasn’t my dad. And that woman wasn’t my mom.”

I stare at him, trying to see if maybe this is some kind of joke. But why would he joke about that? He doesn’t look like he’s joking. And this isn’t funny. Just having him here is freaking me out and the things he’s saying are just plain eerie. Why would he say those people weren’t his parents? I met them. They told me stories about his childhood. Is he saying he was adopted? But they’d still be his parents.

He continues. “The people you met were actors. They’re good at playing parents, don’t you think? Very realistic.”

More chills run down my spine and I shudder. “Why would you do that? Why would you hire actors to play your parents?”

“Because I had to get you to believe my story. I never thought you’d actually take me up on my offer to drive you across the country like that. So when you did, I had to come through on my story about living in small-town Illinois and my dad being a doctor and my mom being a nurse.”

“What about that house? Who did it belong to?”

“Nobody. It was just a model home that real estate agents show people who are looking to build a house in that neighborhood. They let us rent it for the day. We hung some fake family photos on the wall to make it look like we really lived there.”

“You’re saying everything you told me was a lie? Even that stuff about your sister dying from cancer?” I’m getting really angry now. He lied to me for months. Made up those stories. Made me feel sorry for him.

“My sister
did
die. But not from cancer.” His eyes fix on mine. “She was murdered. She was killed because she knew too much.” He pauses, then says, “She was the reporter, Jade. The reporter who discovered the election fraud in Ohio and Florida. She was killed before she could tell people.”

“You said the reporter was a guy.”

“It wasn’t a guy. It was my sister.”

“You’re lying. You admitted to lying about everything else, so why would I believe this story about your sister?”

“Because it’s the truth. I wouldn’t lie about that. My sister was everything to me. Our parents died years ago in a car crash. She’s all I had left.”

“What about your uncle in Chicago? The one you said got you into all this conspiracy stuff?”

“There was no uncle. I was talking about myself. I’m a reporter in Chicago. Well, I was until I started doing this.”

“Doing what?”

“Can we just sit down and talk?”

I glance back at the deck. Maybe it would be better to be closer to the house. My phone is on the kitchen counter. I could run in and get it if I needed to. Or I could get a knife from the drawer.

“Fine. We’ll sit on the deck. You first.” I don’t want to walk in front of him, so I let him lead the way. We go up the short set of stairs and sit at the table.

“I’m listening,” I say. “Start talking.”

“I know for a fact that election fraud is going on. My sister proved it happened during the presidential election four years ago. She told me all about it, but she didn’t give me her evidence and they took it when they killed her. She said that a powerful secret society is behind the election fraud, along with some people planted inside the government. We just don’t know who those people are. We haven’t been able to identify the members of this secret society, other than Pearce Kensington and his father, Holton, who I know is now in a coma.”

“Pearce is not a member of a secret society. I promise you, he’s not.”

Carson watches me as I say it. I swear he’s one of those body language experts that can tell when you’re lying by your eye movements or nose scratching or whatever the signs are that someone is lying.

“We’ve been watching Pearce and we’re almost certain he’s a member. Now we need to find the others.”

“Who’s ‘we’?”

“I work for a very wealthy businessman who ran for president four years ago. Aston Hanniford.”

“Yes, I know him. He almost won.”

“He
should’ve
won. But he didn’t because this secret group rigged the election to make sure their candidate won. Mr. Hanniford is determined to expose what they’re doing and take these people down.”

I roll my eyes. “Some rich guy is mad that he didn’t win the election so now he’s making up stories that people cheated? Why? Does he think if he gets enough people to believe his made-up story he’ll somehow end up being president someday?”

“It’s not a made-up story. It’s the truth. And he wants to expose the people who did this. Not only because rigging elections is illegal and wrong, but also because in their efforts to keep it hidden, they hurt innocent people. Like my sister.”

I sit back in my chair, my arms crossed. I can’t believe this is happening. That Carson is here. That he tracked me down and that he’s not the person I thought he was. He’s not a college student. He’s a reporter. Someone who knows way more than he should and someone who could get Pearce in some serious trouble. Maybe even killed.

Garret needs to get home. Fast.

GARRET

I’ve been checking my phone all day to see if it’s happened yet. I just checked again and it hasn’t. He’s still in a coma. It’s Wednesday, so it’s been four days now. I didn’t think he’d make it this long. I talked to my dad earlier, and he, too, is surprised. Maybe this will go on longer than we thought. Some people are in comas for months, or years. But at least if he’s in a coma, he can’t hurt Jade.

As bad as it sounds, I’d rather have him dead than in a coma. I want this to be over so I can stop worrying about this and focus on my future. Today, during my afternoon class, I began thinking about my career, and by the time class was over I was all fired up, wanting to start my business.

It’s an entrepreneurship class and today we had a speaker as part of the ongoing lecture series my dad started here at Camsburg. Today’s speaker was Luke Canfield. He opened a sporting goods store about five years ago and the business has really taken off. He started with just one store in San Diego, a surf shop, and it did so well that he opened another store but added other sporting goods, not just stuff for surfing. Now he’s got stores all over California and he’s started to expand east into Nevada and Arizona.

The guy’s only 29, which means he opened his first store when he was only 24. Hearing that made me feel like I need to get my ass in gear and get to work on creating my business. I’m just not sure what business I want to be in. I didn’t think I’d want to be in retail, but after hearing this guy’s story I think I want to look into it.
 

After class, I talked to the guy and told him who I was. I don’t usually use my last name to impress people, but this time I did because I wanted to get his attention. And it worked. He asked me if I wanted to visit the company headquarters in LA and spend a day shadowing him. Then he offered to be my mentor, answering any questions I had about starting a retail business. He gave me his email address and phone number.

He wouldn’t be doing any of this if it weren’t for my dad. I’m nobody, other than a former reality TV star, which is embarrassing. I’m sure he heard about the bad shit I—or the fake me—did last spring, but he didn’t mention it. He seemed impressed that I was going to Camsburg, which is known for academics, not partying. And I told him I was married, which makes me seem even more responsible.

But despite all that, I know the only reason Luke offered to be my mentor is because of my dad. My dad is a rock star in the business world and this guy thinks if he spends time with me he’ll eventually get to meet my dad. I know how it works. Luke’s trying to grow his company and being connected to powerful people will help him do that. Or just getting advice from someone like my dad could be very valuable. I usually don’t like it when people use me like that, but in this case, I’m using him, too, hoping to learn from him just like he wants to learn from my dad.
 

I should also be learning from my dad. I need to start asking him for business advice. I didn’t before because he’s my dad and I don’t see him the same way everyone else does; as a great businessman with a ton of knowledge to share. But he
is
a great businessman and I need to start seeing him that way. He’d be happy to teach me whatever I want to know.

My dad is actually a really good teacher. When I asked him to teach me about the stock market, he did, and he didn’t make it overly complicated. He taught me the basics, then gave me some companies to research and asked me which ones I’d invest in.
 

It was like a school assignment, but I didn’t mind. It was way more useful than just reading a book about investing. My dad wanted me to apply what he’d taught me using real world examples, and by doing that, I learned much faster. Then he let me invest some of my money. He purposely let me pick some bad stocks so I would know what it feels like to lose money, because you have to be willing to accept losses when you’re investing. After a few bad stock picks that cost me a lot of money, my dad went over my research and showed me why I shouldn’t have chosen those stocks. That’s when it hit me that he really knows what he’s doing. And he’s not just good with investing. He knows how to successfully run a company. I’m amazed at what he’s done with Kensington Chemical, and so is everyone in the business world. That’s why my dad’s always being asked to speak at conferences and being interviewed for magazines.

So yeah, I piqued Luke’s interest when I dropped the Kensington name. I told him I’d love to shadow him for a day and I accepted and thanked him for his mentorship offer. I like the guy and I could see us being friends. He likes a challenge and he goes after what he wants, just like me. He also loves surfing and football and basically all sports, which makes sense given that he owns a sporting goods store. But what I like is that he still does all that stuff even though he runs a business. He still makes time to surf. He’s on a flag football team and a basketball league. Doing all that shows his passion for his business and makes him more like his customers. That’s why he’s so successful. He knows what his customers want because he’s just like them.