Page 14 of The Revenge Plan

Me: Nothing.

The phone rang. I thought of ignoring and letting it go to voicemail. He called again. And again. The fourth time I pressed the answer button at the last second, “I said I found nothing.”

“Are you even looking?” There was some background noise that sounded like a bunch of people in a room talking over each other, phones ringing and papers being shuffled. He was at the office.

“Can you give me time? He leaves nothing at home.” That was a lie.

“What about the office?”

“I haven’t gone there.”

“Fuck, Hailey,” his breathing was getting heavier. Oh shit. Here it comes, “You know that’s your one job, right? That’s the only reason you’re there! I fucking don’t get why you won’t bother yourself with something so important!”

“Oh my god, calm down already. It’s still early days. He doesn’t even like me, let alone trust me.”

I could hear him taking a deep breath, but he didn’t respond.

“I don’t even understand why he agreed to marry me.”

“Probably some high school hangover. Wants to fulfill some fantasy. Remember, he was obsessed with you back then. They all were.” Bryce was probably talking about the boys in my class. Yes, I was popular back then, but that popularity didn’t extend to Caiden.

“I think you mean Liam.” Bryce always confused the twins.

“Whatever. Get that stuff H. Dad’s counting on you.”

“Is he now?”

“The faster you get those papers, the faster you get your inheritance. That’s what he said.” The line went dead. Fuck him. I felt like hurling the phone to the wall. But he was right, though. Dad will not give me anything unless I produce results. Tangible ones at that. An uneasy feeling settled within me as I thought of the next course of action. I looked around the apartment. Caiden had an office upstairs at the end of the hall. I made my way there. The door was closed, but when I twisted the handle, it opened. That was a surprise I was sure it was locked. I dragged my feet into the room.

I had never been in here before. The act of trespassing made me feel icky.The inheritance, Hailey. Think about the inheritance.The office looked exactly like the rest of the apartment. There was one black oak desk at the end. The gray walls were lined with a neatly organized black bookshelf. Caiden was a reader, even back in high school. That was one thing we had in common. I enjoyed discovering peculiar books I wouldn’t otherwise find on a common bookshelf and it looked like Caiden had varied interests, if his library was anything to go by. I made a mental note to visit the bookshelves later. The office was freakishly clean and organized. Nothing was out of place. A maid, Julie, came here to clean every day. She was efficient and had an uncanny ability of making herself invisible. Maybe I could ask her the next time she came. But what could I ask exactly? Hey, do you have any idea where my husband kept his potentially secret company documents?

I went to the desk drawers. Most of them barely had anything. One had a few pens. Another had a legal pad. The rest had nothing, except for a small top drawer that was locked. Locked drawers usually hid stuff not meant to be seen. I searched everywhere for a key and couldn’t find it. I gave up on the tiny drawer. It was curious, but maybe it had nothing I wanted. There was one other place I could search.

???

If rummaging through his office felt like trespassing, going through his bedroom felt sacrilegious. The enormous bed in the middle of the room was intimidating. A thought drifted into my head. Him and I on that bed. Kissing. His lips trailing down my body until they reached my—I shook my head. Now was not the time. I plodded further in and looked around. I doubt I could find anything here, but I tried anyway. Any small sound, and any perceived sound, made me jolt. This did not feel right. I shouldn’t be here.

I went to the bedside table drawer and opened it. I was greeted with a box of condoms. My face flushed, and I closed it with a bang. I opened the one below. It was deeper and heavier. In it was a worn shoe-box that looked out of place in the sophisticated room. What attracted me, though, was not the oddity of it. It was its familiarity. I had seen it before. I took it out and placed it on the table. It felt heavy on one end. I took a deep sigh and opened it.

Inside it was a Polaroid camera I had seen before. Lots of times. My hands shook at the sight. Beneath it were photos. Photos of Caiden that looked like he didn’t know he was being photographed. I smiled. He looked so young and cute in them. My eyes welled. I picked up one. It was of Caiden with a comic book. I flipped it around, knowing there would be a caption. He always captioned his photos with things like, “In this photo, we see Caiden engrossed in a picture book for loser teenagers.” There were other photos of him like this. Some were of him caught mid protest or trying to wave off the photographer. Suddenly I felt like I was transported back to when I was fifteen and innocent. Nothing had happened yet, andhewas still alive.

There were others of me as well. Most of them were of me, I noticed. I happily posed in most of them. Some were of all three of us, but those were rare. I rummaged deeper, my earlier trepidation dissipating. Then one that caught my attention. It was of Caiden and I. We were in a library, our school library. He was reading. I had a book in my hand, but I wasn’t reading it. My gaze was focused on Caiden. I clearly looked infatuated with him; you could draw heart-eyes in my irises. Even though they were twins and were literally identical, I always had a thing for Caiden. My heart had beaten for Caiden. I flipped the photo. The caption read. ‘In this photo, we see Hailey likes Caiden. Photographer likes Hailey.’

My hands were trembling so much, holding the photo was difficult. This was the first time I had seen this. He had never told me anything before. I had an inkling that he liked me. I knew that, but I never thought he liked me like that.

Suddenly I saw a hand snaking out of nowhere and it snatched the box away from me. Startled, I turned and stood face to face with the owner of the room standing in front of me.

He looked livid. His eyes glowed with what could only be an urge to kill me. I couldn’t think of any way I could get myself out of this. I wasn’t thinking of that. My attention was focused on what I had a moment ago, found. And to discover this on today of all days.

“Get out.” His voice was low and dangerously calm. He sounded like he was about to strangle me, and he was barely reining it in.

“I’m sorry. I saw—”

“I said get out and never come in here again.”

I wanted to apologize. But even the real reason I was in here was not satisfactory. I dropped the photo and ran out there as fast as I could.

7

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