Page 70 of Brenna, Brat

“What can I do except to say no, I’m innocent? My actual defense is that I was too stupid for my dad to trust me and allow my participation. I guess that’s better than being a smart criminal, like him.”

“Maybe it took a while but he did get caught, so how smart is that? I think he’s the idiot. He has two kids who are great or, at least, one definitely is. Instead of appreciating you, he made youfeel like you’re not good enough. You are,” I promised. “You’re so much more than good enough! You may have noticed that I’m a little bit critical so I’m very aware of the flaws in others. Well, I can tell you that your flaws don’t matter at all. You can’t parallel park for crap, but who cares? You’re awful at cooking, but you’ve already learned a ton and you’ll only improve! I think that you’re wrong about why you dad didn’t involve you in his crimes. It isn’t because you’re not smart enough. It’s because he knew that you’re a good person, and you wouldn’t have participated! It’s just like he didn’t tell you about paying off the ref in your hockey tournament when you were a kid.”

“It’s a little bigger than that.”

“It’s the same,” I insisted. “He didn’t admit to it then because you wouldn’t have been ok with it. He doesn’t understand the difference between right and wrong, but you do. Despite himself, he ended up with a wonderful son. A smart, moral, wonderful son.”

“Thank you for saying that.” He paused. “I didn’t realize that you’d noticed how I can’t park.”

“I notice a lot,” I said. I noticed all kinds of things about Campbell but none of them made me love him any less. If anything, I felt even—

Oh, holy Mary. I loved him! I put my hand over my mouth because I’d almost said it out loud, talking to Cleo again. Oh, no.

“My dad explained why I wasn’t in on what happened at the hockey tournament,” he said. “He didn’t tell me about it because he thought I couldn’t keep it secret.”

I removed my hand in order to answer. “He knew you’d tell because you’re a fair, decent person.”

“I don’t know,” Campbell said. “I’d like to think that’s true, but I was so afraid of him at the time that I might have kept my mouth shut.” He seemed to think about it, looking back through the years. “No, I would have told my coach. He was a better father to me than my real dad was.”

“I know you were thinking that Ghregg might take off and run from this. Are you sure that you won’t consider it, too?” I asked. “I’ve heard that Laos is beautiful in the summer.”

“Really?”

“No, I haven’t heard that,” I admitted. “But if there’s a serious possibility of you going to jail, then we are out.”

“We are out,” he repeated, and then he said it again, emphasis on the first word. “Weare out.” It got quiet in the car and it stayed that way for a lot of miles.

I sat there wondering if I should say anything regarding what had happened that morning in our bed. I looked at his hand resting on the gear stick and I thought about how it had caressed my breast, gently but also firmly, and how his fingers had played with my nipple. I started to breathe hard, and I cleared my throat.

“Yes?” Campbell asked.

“Well…” Nicola would have told me to talk it out, and I was going to. “Well.” Here I went.

“Hold on,” he said suddenly, and shifted around as he took his phone from his pocket. “Let me see who’s calling, if it’s Carrington…no, it’s my lawyer.” Rather than put it on speaker so that I could have heard something secret that I didn’t want to know (even if I really did), he pulled off the road into a little clearing among the pine trees. They smelled so good with the windows down.

“Hi, Anett. What’s—” He stopped speaking abruptly and I could hear her voice through the phone, the words sounding urgent. “Ok,” he said in a pause, and he repeated that several times as she talked for a moment longer. Then he said, “See you soon.”

“What?” I asked immediately, when he’d hung up. “No, you don’t have to tell me.”

“I don’t know what I would say. I’m not sure what’s happening except I need to get to her office in Detroit as fast as possible.”

“Then let me drive, because I’m better at it and my name won’t matter to anyone if I speed and get a ticket.”

He looked at me briefly and got out. We switched places and holy Mary, it was a long way back to his house in an almost perfect silence. The beautiful engine hardly made any sound at all, just a well-oiled purr as we went along the roads. We did make a lot better time with me behind the wheel, but those were some of the longest hours of my life. I actually breathed out a sigh of relief when I turned into his driveway, and I noticed that there were no news trucks waiting. Whatever had happened, whatever his lawyer needed to discuss so desperately, the local stations hadn’t gotten word of it yet.

I jumped out and went to the back to get my bag, but then I stopped. “Will you be able to tell me what’s wrong?” I asked. “Because I’m very worried.” I was currently worried about a lot of stuff, but that was the top of the list.

“I don’t want to be like my sister and glue my mouth shut, but I don’t want to put you in a position to get into trouble along with me. I don’t want to drag you down.”

“What?You’re not!”

“Brenna, about this morning—”

“You know, we don’t need to say anything about that.” As the silent miles had rolled past under the wheels, I had lost my nerve. It was too humiliating and it needed to be buried, dead and gone forever.

“We don’t need to say anything?” he asked. “I think we do. I do.”

“No,” I told him. “It’s over and done with now. We were tempting fate by sleeping in the same bed, with you so…virile.”

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