Set You Free (10 page)
“What’s going on with your window?” Grady says, shutting off the engine.
“I don’t know.”
“It wasn’t like that before?”
I stare at him. “Yeah, this is how we leave our place all the time.”
“Want me to come in with you?”
I consider saying no.
“Yes,” I say. “Yeah, that’d be good.” I open the door and say, “Mom?”
“I flick the living room light on and stand in the hallway, listening. Grady is right behind me.
“Should she be here?” he asks.
“She is. But she takes these pills for her migraines that totally knock her out.”
I step into the living room and find a brick on the floor, lying amid the broken glass. I bend over to pick it up, and Grady stops me.
“Leave it. In case there are fingerprints. Look, there’s a note.” He bends down, pulls a pen out of his pocket and flicks a piece of paper that is tied to the brick.
Tell us where he is
, it reads.
“Any idea who would have done this?” Grady asks.
I say, “Ben’s stepbrother JJ is convinced Tom took Ben.”
“If that app on your phone means anything, that’s what the police believe as well.”
“As well as the news reports, which mention Tom by name.”
“Yeah, those don’t help.”
“Did you turn off the misdirection for that app?”
“It reverts back to the phone’s true location eventually.”
“Let me check on my mom, and then I’ll call the police.”
Grady rubs at the back of his head and inhales deeply.
“Don’t worry,” I tell him. “You can leave before they get here.”
“It’s not like I’m a criminal or anything. But with the car and the plates and…”
“Don’t worry, I understand.” I walk down the hall to my mom’s room and open the door. She’s fallen asleep with her light on. I get close enough to listen to her slow, shallow breathing.
“Okay,” I say to Grady when I return to the living room. “You’re free.” I pull out my cell. “But you’d better get going. I have a feeling it won’t be long before the good detective arrives.”
“Yeah, for sure,” Grady says. He gives me another genuine smile. It’s adorable.
“Well done,” I say.
“What?”
“That was an awesome smile. It felt real.”
“Oh, thanks.” He steps out the door. “I’ll text you if I can think of anywhere else your brother might be.”
“Won’t you need my number for that?”
“I already have it,” he says. “Be careful where you go with that app on.”
“What if I need to get a hold of you?” Suddenly, I don’t want him to leave. I’ve only just met him, but I feel somehow safer with him in my life.
Grady reaches into his pocket, pulls his phone out and hits a few numbers. A moment later my cell buzzes.
The text reads
Grade-D
.
“Nerd,” I say.
“For life,” he replies, making some kind of hand gesture I don’t understand.
I call 9-1-1 as I watch him drive away.
Detective Evans arrives within ten minutes, with a uniformed officer in tow.
“Do you have any idea who would do this?” she asks, kneeling beside the brick. The army of crickets camped in our front garden is chirping. The noise is eerie as it floats in the broken window. The officer looks around the room like he’s come to an open-house showing.
“By the note, I guess it would be someone who believes Tom has something to do with Benny’s disappearance.” I sit on the couch and cross my arms. Detective Evans removes an evidence bag from her pocket and hands it to the officer.
“Get the lab to check for fingerprints.” The officer bags the brick, then stands there as if more evidence is suddenly going to jump out at him.
“I’ll go take a look outside,” he eventually says, leaving Detective Evans and me alone.
“Was there anyone home when this occurred?”
“My mother.”
“Where is she now?”
“Sleeping,” I say.
Detective Evans raises an eyebrow and leans to look down the hall. “Through all of this?”
“She takes medication for severe migraines, and it totally knocks her out.”
She opens her notepad. “And where were you?”
“Out,” I say. “Are there any leads on Benny?”
“Not at the moment, no. Where did you say you were tonight?”
“I didn’t.” I can tell she’s waiting for me to lie to her. “Have you considered letting the public know that Tom had nothing to do with Ben’s disappearance? Maybe he’s just scared because he figures the police are out to get him.”
“We need to talk to him, Lauren.”
“Then stop putting his picture on
TV
next to Ben’s. You know how it looks. And other people have obviously gotten the wrong idea as well.”
“That decision is out of my hands.”
The door opens and the officer steps back in. “Detective, I have some footprints out here. Should I get
CSI
to come and take some molds?”
Detective Evans stares at me. “You have no idea who could have thrown that brick through your window?”
“No,” I lie.
Detective Evans inhales slowly. “No one has spoken to you about this situation?”
I could tell her I think it’s JJ. But I know it won’t do any good. She already showed her allegiance to the Carters
when she didn’t step in between JJ and me earlier. I would look petty, I’m certain, and if she ever approached JJ with this accusation, he would make up some lie about me. Something I’d said or done that proves I’m not to be trusted. So I just shake my head.
“Okay,” she says to the officer. “Let’s get a mold.” The officer tips his hat and closes the door. “Maybe we should go over this again, Lauren. When did you last see your brother?”
“Saturday.”
“And where was that?”
“He stopped by the park where Ben and I were playing.”
“Did he say anything to Benjamin Carter?”
“He would have said hello. I don’t remember anything else.”
“Think, Lauren. Think about where you were standing when your brother approached. Where Benjamin was.”
No one calls him Benjamin. I want to scream at Detective Evans every time she does. “Benny was on the platform of the play structure,” I say. “I was at the bottom of the slide. Tom came from the road and walked across the sand.”
“Okay. And what did he say?”
I close my eyes. “
Hi
.”
“And then?”
“We talked about—”
“No, tell me what he said. Exactly,” she says sharply.
“How am I supposed to remember that? It was days ago. It was just a conversation.”
“Try for me, Lauren. It could be very important. If you have to, put yourself above the scene. Try and see it like it’s a movie playing. Or you’re a bird looking down on it.”
I give that a shot. It feels ridiculous.
“He said,
How long have you guys been here?
and I said,
Half an hour
. Then Ben came down the slide and Tom said,
Hi, Benny, how are you doing today?
And Ben said,
I’m well. Thank you for asking
.”
“That’s exactly what he said?”
“Yes.”
“Does Benjamin always talk like that?”
“Yes. His mother is crazy about his manners. In a good way.”
“And your brother calls him Benny?”
“Anyone who really knows him does,” I say, feeling a sense of familiarity with Ben that Detective Evans will never have. “His friends.”
“Okay. Go on. What happened next?”
“Benny went back to the structure.”
“And what did your brother do?”
“He asked me—”
“What were his words, Lauren? Exactly what he asked,” she says, way too sharply.
“I don’t know!” I yell. “I can’t remember everything
exactly
. This is like a nothing moment in my life. Tom was walking by, he saw us, he came to say hi. He asked what I was doing that night, and then he left. He kept walking.”
“Why did he ask what you were doing that night?”
“Because he’s my brother? Because that’s what people do?”
“You told me before that you two were not close. That you didn’t have much to do with one another. That you ran in different circles. You said all these things.”
“Oh my god, that doesn’t mean he wouldn’t stop and talk to me.”
“Where was he coming from?” Detective Evans asks.
“I don’t know. I didn’t ask.”
“Where was he going?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know any of this. That was the entire encounter!”
“Okay, Lauren. Okay. I’m sorry you are so upset.”
“Sorry? Really? You think my brother has, like, abducted a kid. That he’s some sick pervert who—”
“We don’t necessarily…”
“—is going to do weird things to him. You think he’s this giant freak. Why? Because he was in the neighborhood that night? Because he once asked some kid about a sand castle? Because he doesn’t have a cell phone? You think you have him all figured out, but you don’t know him at all. You have no idea.”
“You’re right, Lauren, I don’t know your brother. I’ve never met him. I’m going on what I have. There’s some kind of a connection here between Tom and Benjamin Carter. The closed-circuit videos from the grocery store have us
asking a lot of questions. What was Tom doing there? Why was he connecting with Benjamin? Why not talk to Erin? But the biggest question remains, what was Tom doing outside the mayor’s house the night Benjamin disappeared, and where did he go? We need to talk to your brother about all of this. Just talk, Lauren. Nothing more.”
“You don’t know Tom,” I say. “He wouldn’t ever do anything. You don’t know him at all.”
Detective Evans stands. “I think you need to ask yourself, Lauren, how well do
you
know your brother?”
“Better than…”
Detective Evans holds her hand up, and for some reason I stop speaking. Like it’s not my house. Like I’m not in the right. Like I’m nothing but a stupid kid who has no idea what is going on in the big bad world.
“
Really
know him, Lauren. Stand outside of everything you think you know about your brother. All the memories and time spent together. Stand outside all of that and look at him as we are. And then tell me, how well do you know him right now?”
“I know him,” I say. “I can’t step outside all of that because he’s my brother and I know him.”
“So where is he?” Detective Evans opens the door. “Please call us if you think of anything about Benjamin, or if Tom contacts you.”
As she’s closing the door, I yell, “No one calls him Benjamin!”
I’m halfway to school on Tuesday morning when I notice what looks like an unmarked police car following me. There’s every chance I’m being paranoid. With reason, of course. But I turn down an alley anyway and pop out on the street behind the school rather than in front of it. I sit down on a bench and pretend to be looking at my phone. Sure enough, half a minute later the same car rolls past, sporting tinted windows and those little police-issued hubcaps.
I stand as it passes, my head still down. I text Grady:
Need to meet with you.
I begin walking back around to the front of the school. I’m almost at the side door when my phone buzzes. There’s a text from a number I don’t recognize.
Starbucks, 5th and Main, twenty min? G.
K, L.
, I text back, then slip my phone into a pocket and enter the school.
“I thought I could do it,” I tell the school office administrator, Mrs. Rankin. “But after all that’s happened…”
“Oh, I know, dear,” Mrs. Rankin replies. Of course she knows. Everyone knows everything. My family is an open book as far as people are concerned. The freak son. The daughter who used to be so good, but now…
“And last night someone threw a brick through my window. I think I should be home with my mom.”
“Of course you should,” Mrs. Rankin says. “I’ll inform your teachers. You go home. Be with your family.”
“Thank you.”
As I’m leaving, I spot JJ Carter. Luckily, he doesn’t see me. He has his hand on a locker, blocking in Katie White. Katie is smiling, but I’ve heard her talk about how JJ scares her. How he’s too aggressive sometimes, and even though she
likes him and everything
, she can’t see herself ever dating him.