Page 56 of The Lies You Love
“I might have befriended Auden and worked to get you together so I would have more knowledge about you, but what you feel for her has nothing to do with me.”
I laugh meanly. “Are you trying to be a good friend right now?”
Coughing, I take a few steps back toward her door and unlock it without turning around. “Burn in hell, Ramsey. I hope you get everything you deserve.”
“Don’t worry. I will.” Her face looks pale and scared the moment I close the door behind me.
There was no training program for this, no article I can read to discern how to proceed, only confusion, fury and a blind hatred for wasting so much life. Ramsey has made an idiot out of me, and there’s no way to fix this. Grey texts me as I step off the elevator to go into my apartment.
The message reads, Are you okay, man? How is everything going? I can step in for you if you need some time. Griffin is worried about you.
I text back a simple, back off, I’m fine. Let me work.
Grey reads the message but doesn’t reply back. I lock the door when I’m safely inside my work apartment and pace the living room.
“Fuck,” I roar, picking up a warm beer from last night and throwing the brown bottle against the wall. Beer goes everywhere, and as I stare at the liquid, I contemplate my options. The right thing for the world or the right thing for me. I love Auden, but this stretches far past the both of us. If Ramsey isn’t stopped more people like Maisey will be killed. The dominoes will keep falling and she’ll win.
Still, I can’t stop thinking about Auden. I shower, ignoring the urge to be listening to Ramsey’s feed to check in. it doesn’t matter, I remind myself. She’ll be gone by morning, I’m sure of it. I waste time, trying and failing to think about anything. I call my parents to check in. I even call Griffin to waste time. Neither helps because all they want to talk about is Auden and if I’m going to try to correct my mistake. I wish I could tell them about making the biggest mistake of my life by taking on Ramsey’s case. How didn’t the Charge Men know? This seems like an enormous breach of security. They even gave Ramsey everything she wanted from the start of this. An idea flutters through my mind and I hate that it makes sense. Hate that the Charge Men could be dirty. That they could be in on this and in cahoots with the Taerpietiers in this laundering scheme. The new boss is a former felon. He was a bad man, and he changed everything when he took control. Was that a red herring so we wouldn’t see the underhanded things going on around us?
Pulling open the balcony door, I adjust the telescope to hone in on the rooftop of Auden’s building. As planned, Ramsey is over there after I’m sure, another shower. They’re sitting on the side closest to this building where Auden was talking to her too interested neighbor. She knows I can see her. Ramsey knows. My breathing speeds when I see Ramsey pull a necklace out of a box. She stands from her seat at the two-seater table and rounds the small patio table. She’s giving Auden a gift. Auden smiles, but when Ramsey grasps the two sides of the necklace and puts it around her neck, her gaze flicks directly to my apartment.
Ramsey pulls the necklace so tight that Auden grasps the front of it to make space before laughing and looking up at her friend, assuming the tightness is on accident or a joke. The threat is clear as day. Ramsey fastens it and smiles viciously before taking her seat again. Auden’s happiness makes me feel like lowlife sludge. She needs me and this is her best option. A man approaches Ramsey and I can see Auden’s smile shift into a straight line of fear. Frantic, because I know her, and she seems terrified, I scramble to grab my listening device. Would Ramsey bring her phone after she told me everything? I’m not watching and she’s released herself from my protection.
I turn it on just in time to hear an Australian accent say, “Hello lovelies. Let’s take a drive. I want to buy you a drink.”
After that, muffled cries fill my earpiece.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Auden
the present…
My mom’s voice lulls me to consciousness. She’s singing low and sweet, a lullaby I recall as a child. I’m sure I don’t actually remember her singing it, but there are so many home movies as an only child that I feel like those videos became my most vivid memories.
“Mom,” I say and regret it when I feel the scratch against my throat.
“Oh, thank God,” she says, her lips against my forehead, a warm sensation in the cool air. “She’s awake. Get the doctor, find the nurse, tell them she’s awake.”
I try and fail to open my eyes. “I can’t see,” I say.
“Shh, shh, it’s okay, sweetie. Your eyes are swollen shut. They have bandages on your face to get the swelling down. Just relax. I’m here.” She puts her hand on my arm and slides it down to hold my hand. “Just breathe. You’re fine. You’re going to be okay.”
The last time I woke in a hospital bed, my life was never the same. “What happened?”
“I think they’re hoping you can fill in some of the holes, sweetie,” Mom says.
A woman asks if I have any pain as she removes the bandages from my face. She tells me she’s my nurse. “The detectives will come now that they know she’s awake,” the nurse says.
Light hits my eyelids as I struggle to open my eyes. They only open a bit, but I can see how awful my mom looks and the serious concerned face the nurse makes.
“I remember being with Ramsey on the rooftop. Where is Pork?” I yell, trying to sit up but hands push me back down to a laying position.
“Your dog is fine, Auden. He was found on the rooftop and one of your neighbors took him in. A very handsome neighbor, might I add.” Mom grins, but I can tell it’s forced and she’s trying to distract me. “His name is Peter. He’s been checking in with me daily to let me know how Pork is. He hired a dog walker to take him out while he’s at work.”
I swallow hard. “He must think I’m a trouble magnet.” My throat is scratchy, and the nurse must know because she hands me a plastic mug filled with water and a straw. I drink down half while I try to recall what happened. “A man, the Australian man,” I say, correcting myself when I remember his voice.
Betty’s sneaky link. It comes then, flooding back. All the times Beck told me to be careful because that man and those he was connected to were bad news, and then another realization dawns as I assess my injuries that seem mostly superficial. “Ramsey. Where is Ramsey?”
