Fragmented (31 page)

I nodded my head and thanked her, but her answer had done nothing to get me closer to the truth. Ruby wasn’t real, but the person hiding behind her was.

+ + +
 

If Damien refused to respond to my repeated voicemails, texts, and e-mails, I would just have to go over to his house and confront him face-to-face. In addition to the inheritance, I now had something else to badger him about.

The driveway was empty when I parked Olive and Jerret’s station wagon in front of my brother’s house. When I knocked on the front door and rang the doorbell, I couldn’t detect any noises coming from inside the house. I found the extra house key in a hollow, plastic rock mixed in with the landscaping and let myself in.

“Hello?” I called out as I stepped through the threshold, although I didn’t really expect anyone to respond. The whole family was probably Black Friday shopping at the mall.

Days-old mail was stuck in the front door’s built-in mail slot. I wrenched the bundle free and began thumbing through credit card statements and overdue utility bills. It looked like Riverside Estates wasn’t the only place my brother owed money to.

I turned on the TV and passed through nearly four hundred channels of nothing before turning the home theater system off again. With nothing else to preoccupy me until Damien and his brood returned, I sat at the kitchen island. It was eerie being by myself in such a silent house. Olive and Jerret’s home was always loud and filled with life and laughter. Damien’s place was a tomb in comparison.

The landline tangled loudly, startling me as it shattered the foreign silence. I contemplated answering the call, but I decided to let the answering machine get it. I was here to confront Damien about our father’s death and my mother’s hospital bills, not play secretary.

The machine clicked on the countertop, and Sandra’s recorded voice let the caller know they’d call them back at their earliest convenience. The next voice I heard coming through the tiny, built-in speakers was strangely familiar, and when I realized who was calling my brother’s house, my blood ran cold.

“You shady mother fucker,” the voice growled. “You never wired me the second half of my money. I did what you asked, and now the cops are up my ass. I’m no rat, so you don’t have to worry about me giving you up to the police, but when I get out of here I’m coming after you and everyone you love. You think you can just disappear on me when things get too hot?” he snarled. “Think again.”

The phone call ended abruptly, and I continued to sit at the kitchen island, dumbfounded. Blindsided. I played the message again, sure that I’d misheard or had misinterpreted something. After the third replaying, I felt nauseous. I didn’t have to listen to it a fourth time; I had the entire voicemail memorized.

I heard a mechanical noise that seemed to be coming from outside of the house and realized it was the electric garage door opening. Someone was home. I stayed in my seat, too angry and sick to move. The door to the attached garage opened, and Damien appeared with his son Austin in tow.

“Jesus, Harper!” he exclaimed. “You scared me half to death. What are you doing here?” The startled look on Damien’s face would have been comical if I didn’t know what I now knew thanks to the old answering machine my brother had been too lazy or cheap to update.

“Happy Thanksgiving,” I said, my voice flat. “You’ve been avoiding my phone calls, brother.”

“I know,” he grimaced. “It’s gotten so busy at work because of the holidays.”

“It seems like I’m not the only one whose calls you’ve been avoiding.” I pressed the play button on the answering machine. Any color in Damien’s skin tone drained as August Moreland’s voice came through the speakers.

“Austin,” Damien’s eyes never left my face, but he addressed the small boy standing behind him. “Go up to your room and watch a movie or something.”

“But, Dad—”

“Do what I say.”

The boy looked like he wanted to continue to protest, but Damien spoke in a tone that demanded compliance. I watched Austin trudge noisily up the staircase, his sneakered feet stomping on the wooden stairs until he completely disappeared upstairs.

I returned my attention to my brother. “Why did you do it?”

“You’re a smart girl, Harper. I’d thought you’d have it all figured out by now.”

I worked the muscles in my jaw. “Half a million dollars.”

“He wasn’t going to hurt you. His job was to make you think you were getting sick. If you were hospitalized, all the money went to me.”

“You’d really do that to me? Just for money?”

“You have no idea how hard it is to make ends meet when I’m paying mom’s bills, plus trying to run a household and keep my family happy.”

“You should have talked to me. I could have helped with mom’s bills.”

Damien held his head in his hands. “God. What have I done? It’s all ruined.” He continued to ignore me, muttering unintelligently under his breath.

I stood awkwardly, not sure what to do. Should I call the police? Or was this something we could move on from? I was angry, but I also felt a seed of guilt and empathy because he’d been dealing with this financial burden for so long on his own.

When he finally looked up from his hands, a peculiar smile was scrawled across his bloated features. He lunged across the kitchen island without warning, and I screamed at the sudden movement. I jerked backwards, out of his reach, and my lower back smashed into the handles of the kitchen cabinets behind me, leaving me momentarily paralyzed with pain.

Damien opened a cabinet drawer and pulled out an oversized knife.

“For fuck’s sake, Damien!” I held my hands in front of myself as a shield. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“If you’re dead,” he said without emotion, “the money goes to me.”

“If I’m
dead
?” I shrieked incredulously. “You think you can kill me in your kitchen and get away with it?”

“I’m going to prison either way,” he admitted slowly. It was as if his brain was only now working everything out, and he was reacting accordingly. “But in this scenario, you’ll be dead and my family will be provided for.”

I yanked open the closest drawer in search of a weapon. I clattered around among cookie cutters and wine corks. Nothing.

“Our father never provided for us.” Damien stalked closer, wielding the gleaming knife. “He abandoned us, left us with a crazy woman to raise us. I won’t do that to my family. I won’t leave them penniless.”

“
I’m
your family, Damien.”

“Let’s be honest, Harp. You were kind of a mistake.” He thrust his arm towards me, and the knife narrowly missed piercing my shoulder. “Think of this as me doing you a favor.”

“A favor?” I yelled. “By stabbing me to death?” I threw whatever was within reach to keep Damien at a distance, but he easily deflected every object I aimed at his head.

He wiped his sweaty brow and transferred the knife from his right hand to his left. “Yeah. Now you’ll never have a chance to go crazy.”

We continued to circle around the kitchen. As long as I had the island between us, I was out of his range, but I knew I needed to get away. We couldn’t continue like this for much longer. Damien was more than twice my size even without wielding a knife, but he stood blocking my only exit out the front door.

“Did you only want me to visit Mom so I’d find out about Ruby?” I accused.

His aggressive stance faltered momentarily. “Ruby? Who’s Ruby?”

“Don’t play dumb.” I couldn’t trust him. I knew he’d hired August Moreland to mess with me so he would inherit our dead father’s fortune. This could all be another trick to make me second-guess myself. Those text messages from Ruby had been real, right?

The letter opener was in a shallow basket next to the answering machine. It fit snugly in the palm of my hand like it belonged there. I let loose a wild yell and surged forward. Damien wasn’t expecting me to charge him, which made the strategy effective. If nothing else, maybe a neighbor would hear my cry.

I cried out when I felt the knife slice across my forearm, but I pushed through the pain. I held the letter opener in both hands and shoved hard. The sound the metal made as it pierced his skin and slid between his ribs was nauseating. Ill-timed, I thought about my anatomy class. The thoracic cage is composed of twenty-four ribs, divided into three groups: true ribs, false ribs, and floating ribs. The cartilage portions meet in the middle at the sternum. The ribcage protects the heart, lungs, and major blood vessels in the chest.

Damien dropped the butcher knife and staggered backwards. The letter opener looked tiny compared to his broad chest, and I was now weaponless. His hand circled the letter opener, and he pulled it from his chest. A stream of red liquid followed, splattering a crimson arc across a nearby wall.

There was so much blood. So much blood.

Damien breathed in deeply, and I heard the wet rattle in his throat. He dropped to his knees and doubled over. He coughed once, sounding more like a bark, and I saw the blood at the corners of his mouth. “I can’t breath. I can’t breath,” he wheezed, clutching his chest.

I grabbed the wall phone and pushed three buttons. The phone rang once before someone picked up.

“9-1-1. What’s your emergency?”

“Hello? I need an ambulance. I just stabbed my brother.”

CHAPTER TWENTY

The doorbell wasn’t working, so I knocked on the door instead. It took awhile, but I heard someone moving behind the door after a while. The door opened and Raleigh’s aunt stood on the other side. She used to make me nervous, but after what I’d just gone through, I could confront anyone, any situation.

“Hi, Ms. Crockett. Is Raleigh home?”

“Who?”

“Raleigh.” I wondered if Raleigh’s aunt had a strange sense of humor or if this was her attempt to mess around with me. “Anna?” I tried instead.

“There’s no one here by that name.”

What a weirdo. I probably should have called beforehand to make sure she wasn’t out. It would have saved me an unnecessary trip to the suburbs. “Do you know where she went or when she’ll be back?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about or who you think lives here, but I think it’s time for you to leave.”

“Where is your niece?”

“I have no niece.” The door began to close, and I reacted without thinking. I thrust my foot between the closing door and the doorframe. It pressed hard against the sides of my foot, and I was thankful I’d chosen to wear thick boots.

The door slammed against my foot and popped open. I burst through the narrow opening before Raleigh’s aunt had the opportunity to shut the door again on me.

“Where is she?” I demanded. “What have you done with her?”

Not waiting for an answer, I ran down the long hallway, past the dining room, the kitchen, the laundry room, and the bathroom, all the way to the third door on the right.

The door was shut. I shoved it open, half-afraid of what I might find on the other side. The room was empty except for a bed, a quilt, and a tattered copy of
To Kill a Mockingbird
on the bedside table.

“Where is she?” I repeated my demand.

“I’m calling the police!” I heard Raleigh’s aunt holler back.

I started to dig around in the dresser drawers in search of evidence that Raleigh lived there. Each drawer I opened was empty, or if it contained anything, it was clear that it belonged to her aunt.

I started to feel the wet heat of sweat trickle down the center of my back, and my hands began to shake. I sat at the bottom of the bed and cradled my head in my hands. What was happening? Where was Raleigh, and where was all of her stuff?

I heard the distinct sound of heavy boots parading down the hallway. Thick, rubber-soled shoes sank into the aged carpeting.

“She’s in there,” I heard Raleigh’s aunt say.

The door pushed all the way open, and Mr. Henderson stood in the hallway.

I leapt to my feet. “Mr. Henderson! Thank God you’re here. I can’t find my girlfriend. I think something bad has happened to her.”

I didn’t have time to dwell on the fact that I’d called Raleigh my girlfriend. There would be time later to freak out that I’d Outed myself to my employer.

His face was unreadable. “Harper, I need you to come with me.”

“No,” I resisted. “You need to listen. Something’s happened to Raleigh—the girl I brought with me to babysit Sasha that one time.”

“She keeps ranting about this girl,” her aunt’s disembodied voice said. “I didn’t know what to do, so I called you.”

Mr. Henderson turned his head to address the woman who remained in the hallway. “You did the right thing. She’s not normally like this, but Harper’s been through a serious trauma recently. We’ll take it from here.”

I couldn’t understand what was going on. Where was Raleigh? Why wouldn’t anyone listen to me? I felt like I was screaming in the center of Union Station but nobody was noticing.