Red wished for the sound of static, to cover the awful silence in the RV, and that high-pitched ringing in her ears, two-tone, like the doorbell. Could anyone else hear it? Was anyone else struggling to breathe?
“What are you talking about?” Oliver asked her, brows drawing together, a shadow across his eyes, hiding the fire in them.
“She was th-there,” Red stammered. “I heard her. Maybe you don’t know this, but my mom called me, only ten minutes before she was killed, that’s what the police told me.” Her breath was too loud, like a windstorm trapped in her head, pushing at the backs of her eyes. She hadn’t said any of this out loud for years, she’d lived alone in the guilt and the shame ever since. “My mom tried to tell me something on that phone call, she asked me to tell my dad something. But we were in a fight, I was mad at her, I was so mad at her, and I can’t even really remember why now. But I hung up on her. I told her I hated her and I hung up on her. That’s the last thing I ever said to her, to Mom, and then she died. It was my fault, because maybe the thing she needed to tell me, maybe that would have been the thing that saved her. She’d still be alive if I hadn’t…”
And it wasn’t the part of the story Red was supposed to be telling, but she couldn’t not, it had sat inside her for so long, festering, a new organ that she
needed to keep on living, to remind her every day what she did. Hers and hers alone, her responsibility. But now the rest of them knew too, all eyes on her, and the world couldn’t break any more than it already had. No more secrets, not even this, the worst thing she’d ever done.
Red blinked and one tear escaped before she could catch it. “And on that last phone call, I heard a doorbell sound in the background. Twice, before it stopped.” She sniffed. “The police told me it was impossible, because my mom was found in that abandoned power station on the waterfront, nowhere near any houses. But I always knew I heard it. It was this.” She gestured with her phone, raising it up. “It was a ringtone, your mom’s ringtone for Maddy. She was there, behind my mom. My mom said ‘Hello’ to her, and then I hung up before she could tell me what she needed to.” Red’s eyes fell to Maddy, her face rearranging. “Your mom was there. You must have called her when she was there. Why did she never say she was there? Mom was dead within ten minutes, so your mom, I don’t…”
Simon’s head dropped into his hands, sucking at the air between his fingers.
Arthur looked across at Red, eyes wide behind his glasses, arm shifting at his side like he might reach out to wrap it around her, hide her away.
“What?” Oliver snorted, shattering the teeming silence, the wicked smile back on his face. Did Catherine ever smile like that, Red tried to think. “Now you’re trying to tell me that my mom is the one who killed your mom? They were best friends, Red. Don’t be so stupid. And on what evidence? A sound you think you heard when you were thirteen, a child? You’re wrong. The police told you you were wrong. My mom wasn’t there.”
“Mom was investigating the organized crime group when she died,” Red said, the words coming out as she thought them. “Your family, Arthur. Maybe she realized there was a leak from the DA’s office, maybe she figured out that it was Cather—”
“Do you hear yourself?” Oliver roared, and yes she did, and she wasn’t going to tiptoe around that look in his eyes anymore. Because if she was right, if she was right…“My mom wasn’t there!” he shouted.
Red was about to speak, to push back, the words right there in her throat, wrestling past her out-of-place heart. But a new sound stopped her before she could. A howl, wretched and raw, from Maddy, her face cracking in two as tears slipped from her eyes, fast and free.
“What is it?” Reyna asked, keeping the pressure on the wound. “Does it hurt?”
But Maddy wasn’t looking at her, she was looking at Red. She shrieked again, shoulders buckling with it, teeth bared, tears trickling into her open mouth.
Oliver stared blankly at his sister. “Maddy?” Red said, stepping toward her.
“It was her,” Maddy cried, her head nodding in minute movements against the refrigerator. “I—I, she…she wasn’t home that evening. That’s why I called her. I called her but she didn’t pick up, went to voicemail after two rings.” Her hand shuddered as she raised it to wipe one side of her face, leaving a new smear of blood there, mixing with the tears. “Dad and Oliver were out of town, away for one of Oliver’s chess tournaments. I got home after my violin lesson and Mom wasn’t there. She wasn’t. She didn’t get home until past eight-thirty, said she’d been working late. I’d already eaten, leftovers from the weekend.” Maddy cried even harder, the words thick and misshapen in her mouth.
Red couldn’t move. What did Maddy mean, it was her? She watched her best friend and she couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, in case that made it true or not true, and Red didn’t know which was worse.
“And I remember, Mom said she hadn’t eaten, but I remember, I remember, I said to her, ‘But you’ve got sauce there, on your shirt.’ ” Maddy choked on the words. “It was tiny, but she went and got changed as soon as I said it. I never saw that shirt again, she must have thrown it away.” She stopped, spluttering over the tears that just kept coming as she told her story, five years’ worth of un-cried tears. “And then the next day, I found out what happened to your mom, Red. That she’d been killed. Shot. I’m so, so sorry. And then…” Her voice cracked. “It was all so confusing. Because Mom was saying that she was home at seven that night, that she made dinner for both of
us. She didn’t, it’s not what happened, but she kept saying it, to me, to Dad. But that’s not what happened. I called her. The unanswered call was right there in my call log. Why would I have called her around seven if she was at home with me?” Maddy shuddered, wiping the other side of her face. “But I checked again a few days later and the call had been deleted from my log. It wasn’t there. And Mom just kept saying the same thing over and over. She got home at seven, right around the time I got in from violin. She made dinner for us both and we watched TV. It was a normal evening. And I couldn’t understand why she was lying. But then I started to think that maybe I was wrong, maybe I was confused about which day it was, because she seemed so sure, and why would she lie? And the call wasn’t there on my phone anymore. She confused me, Red.” Maddy blinked, trying to look at her through swollen, red eyes. “I wasn’t sure. I wasn’t sure, but I’ve had this bad, bad feeling all along that something happened that evening. But maybe I was wrong, confused. Half of me wanted to believe her. I’m so sorry, Red. I’m so, so sorry.”
The last word broke apart as Maddy bawled, an awful end-of-the-world sound, her face folding in half, eyes pressed shut against the tears.
Red watched her. She didn’t move, held in place by the too-hot air, thickening around her in this metal can.
It was Catherine Lavoy. Catherine Lavoy murdered her mom. Made her get on her knees. Shot her twice in the back of the head with her own service weapon. It was Catherine. Mom’s best friend.
Red felt fingers on her shoulder, squeezing hard, but there was no one there, because it was Catherine, dressed in black, gripping onto her as the rifles boomed around them at the funeral, splitting the sky in half.
Catherine.
And Maddy…Maddy knew. This whole time. Since the day it had happened, the day the world ended around her, February 6, 2017. Maddy knew and she never said anything, in five long years.
It all made sense now, all of it. The way Maddy flinched whenever the word mom was said in front of Red. Because she knew what had happened to her. She might have had doubts, but she knew, deep down, she knew who had
taken Red’s mom away. Maddy always took care of Red, paid for her lunch when Red couldn’t, found her lost things, so many lost things over the years, mothered her, all because she knew. Her job, her responsibility.
That was the strange look in Maddy’s eyes from before, the one Red couldn’t recognize. And this was her secret, the one she thought someone might kill for.
Maddy knew.
“I’m so sorry,” Maddy sobbed, repeating the words over and over, until Reyna had to hold her down. “I’m so sorry.”
The rifle must have gone off, because there was a hole there in Red’s chest, blood pooling through her dark red shirt. But there wasn’t. She looked down. There wasn’t. But her body didn’t believe her, caving in around the wound, rib by rib. Red bent double, agony as her bones cracked in half, cutting through her skin, every piece of the puzzle coming undone. Maddy was howling again, but no, it was closer than that. It was her. A red, guttural sound in her throat, pushing out her eyes.
“No!” Red cried, and it was happening all over again, Mom dying a thousand times in every half second, the world blowing apart and stitching up wrong. “No!”
Red screamed, her hands balling into fists, the hard ridge of her knuckles pressing into her face, marking her skin. Five years of not knowing, not knowing who killed her mom so it could only have been Red, murdering her with those last words. But now she knew. She had the answer. And she was coming undone with it.
Red staggered sideways, one leg buckling beneath her. Someone caught her.
Arthur.
His hands under her elbows, keeping her on her feet. He looked her in the eyes, blinking slowly, twin tears chasing down his face.
“Red,” he said, low, soft, almost too soft to cut through the air in this RV. “Look at me.”
She was looking at him. “It’s not your fault,” he said.
“What?” Red sniffed.
“It’s not your fault your mom died.” Red paused, held her breath.
“I know,” she said flatly. It wasn’t her, it was Catherine Lavoy. They’d all just learned that together.
“Red,” Arthur said, fingers gentle against all her broken bones and skin. “It’s not your fault.”
Red blinked. “I know,” she said slowly, the words shaking because she tried too hard. What could Arthur see? What could he read in her eyes?
“Red,” he said gently, not looking away.
So Red did, she looked away, anywhere but at him. At the pattern in the curtains over there, please, could she finally work out what it was. Think. Or at someone else, but not Maddy, or Oliver, or Simon or Reyna. A distraction, anything, so she didn’t think about all that guilt and all that shame, so she didn’t bring them out, right here in front of everyone.
“Red,” he said again, bringing her eyes back to his. “Stop, Arthur,” she whispered.
“It’s not your fault.”
That last one did it. Red felt a shift in her gut, something untwisting, something finally letting go. Her face cracked and the tears came. She cried, the sound shuddering in her throat. She stumbled forward, into Arthur’s waiting arms, her head against his chest, and Red cried and she let it all go.
It wasn’t her fault.
She didn’t know what would happen after that phone call. She didn’t hate her mom and Mom must have known that, there on her knees at the end of all things, as Catherine aimed the gun at the back of her head. Mom was Red’s world, her whole world, and she must have known that, she must have felt it somehow, because that was how love worked.
It wasn’t Red’s fault.
She’d replaced her mom with the guilt and the shame and the blame. They’d become part of her, a limb, an organ, a chain around her neck. Red thought she needed them to live, but she didn’t, because it wasn’t her fault and she didn’t need them anymore. She cried and it wasn’t all because of Maddy
or because of Catherine and the truth. She cried because she could finally forgive her mom for dying, and forgive herself too. Enough to go around.
Arthur stroked his hand down the back of her hair, to the ends of her ponytail.
“It’s not true.” Oliver’s voice broke through. “None of that is true. Maddy, what the fuck are you saying?!”
Red pulled away from Arthur, wiping her face. Oliver emerged out of the blur, stepping toward her.
“My mom didn’t do any of that!” he shouted. “It’s all lies! All of them. I don’t know what game you two think you’re playing.” He glared at Red, and then his sister, dying over there on the floor. “Mom didn’t do anything.”
“Yes she did,” Red said, straightening up to look Oliver in the eye. “She did all of it. And I hope she dies on her knees, scared and alone, like she did to my mom.”
“You shut the fuck up!” Oliver screamed. He lunged forward, but he wasn’t coming for her, he was going for the table, grabbing for something. He thrashed back around, the knife gripped in one hand, Zippo lighter in the other. A gleam across the metal of both, matching the one on his bared teeth. “Stop, Oliver, it’s over,” Arthur said, raising his hands, backing up. “It’s over. I have the answer we came for. Red won’t testify in court for the woman who killed her own mother. I can use that to convince my brother, he’ll listen to me. We were supposed to get the answer and then kill Red, that’s what we were told to do, but no one has to get hurt here. No one else.” He glanced at Maddy, shivering now, vibrating against Reyna’s hands. “I don’t have any way of communicating with my brother now, because you threw the remote outside, and the walkie-talkie is broken. But I can go outside.” He sniffed. “I’ll walk over to him and explain that it’s over, tell him to stand down. I’ll make sure he does, I promise. Then the rest of you can get in that truck and drive Maddy to a hospital. She needs to get to a hospital. It’s over, Oliver.
Please, let it be over.”
“You’re not going anywhere,” Oliver growled. “Not with all those lies about my mom. I know what you people do, you’re animals. I won’t let you kill my mom! None of it’s true. You’re not going out there and telling your
brother her name. It’s not happening.” He raised the knife, pointed it at Arthur. “You’re staying right here.”
“Oliver,” Reyna pleaded, the towel stained red in her hands. “We need to get Maddy to a hospital. She won’t make it. Please, let’s do what Arthur says.” “No,” he barked, knife swinging in her direction now. “I can’t let him
leave. I can’t let him tell his brother.”
“Maddy won’t survive, Oliver.” Red pushed forward. “She’s bleeding out.
Arthur is giving us a way out of here. Now.”
“I’m not fucking listening to you,” Oliver said, voice dark and rasping. “You’re a liar! You’re going to get my mom killed.”
“And you’re going to get Maddy killed! We have to go!”
His eyes darted side to side. Because it was a choice, in a way, between his mom and his little sister. That was what this came down to. A life for another. But Oliver Lavoy didn’t like making hard decisions. He had everything and more.
“Maybe the people on the walkie-talkies heard you, Red,” Simon said, his eyes wide and panicked, sliding up the knife in Oliver’s hands. It was over, but it wasn’t, because the danger was standing right here, trapped inside with them, and they all knew it, Simon too. “Maybe they called the police, maybe they’re on the way.”
Red exhaled. “There’s no way of knowing for sure,” she said. “If one of them was talking at the same time, my interference wouldn’t have come through.”
“What about if some of us go out the other side?” Reyna suggested, gesturing with her head out the left side of the RV, through the driver’s-side window. “We know there’s not a second sniper out that side now. Some of us can leave that way and go get help. I’ll stay here with Maddy.”
“No one leaves!” Oliver roared. “No one leaves until I work out what to do.”
What to do. A plan. Oliver was trying to think up a plan, one where he could save both his mom and his sister. A win-win. So like his mom. But Red couldn’t see a win-win for him here, and she didn’t want him to win, because Oliver winning meant Catherine would win, and Red couldn’t let that happen.
“The sniper,” Simon said, turning to Arthur. “He’s your brother?” Arthur gave him a small nod.
“Do you have any other way of communicating with him?”
Arthur reversed his head, shaking it instead. “Just the remote for the light and the walkie-talkie.”
“Shit,” Simon hissed. “I was just thinking, if you had a way of communicating with him, you could tell him to stand down, that we’re all getting in the truck. Oliver, would you let us leave that way? If Arthur had to come with us, before he could tell his brother everything. Then you could think about your plan while we’re on the way, getting Maddy to a hospital to save her.”
Oliver narrowed his eyes, thinking it through. He raised his chin, nodding his head just once. He would allow that.
“But I don’t have a way of communicating with him,” Arthur said. “I could go outside and look for the remote but I’d never find it in the dark.”
“No.” Oliver’s chin dropped again, eyes flashing. “Arthur does not leave this RV.”
“Oliver!” Reyna was crying now, her arms shaking at the elbows. “We have to save Maddy!”
Maddy’s eyes were closed now, they hadn’t reopened since the last time Red checked.
“Maddy?” Red shrieked, stepping toward her, shoes cracking against something.
“I’m awake,” Maddy croaked, and her lips were so pale, blending in with the rest of her face. “I’m awake,” she said. “Just resting them, I promise.”
The knot loosened in Red’s chest, but not all the way. Maddy was dying, Red was going to watch her die if she couldn’t get her out of here. Maddy knew, she’d known all along what happened to Red’s mom, but she was her best friend, her Maddy, and Red had had enough of guilt and blame. She had to save her.
Her eyes trailed over to Oliver. Could they overpower him? Could she, Simon and Arthur get that knife out of his hands, restrain him? The knife flashed in the overhead lights, pulling in her eyes. It was so sharp. So jagged
and sharp. That knife could make someone bleed out too, another person dying on the floor beside Maddy. And Red had no doubt that Oliver would use it; he was backed up against a wall, fight or flight, and she knew which choice he would make there.
Oliver Lavoy was the danger, he had been all along. And now he wouldn’t let them save Maddy, not unless they found a way to communicate with the sniper, here, from the RV.
Red shifted and something crunched beneath her shoe, Maddy’s shoe. She looked down. It was the walkie-talkie. Smashed to pieces. Plastic and metal and wires. Red’s eyes narrowed, skipping over the pieces, slotting them together in her mind, fixing them. Her job, her responsibility.
“I can do it,” she said, and she knew she could now, no room for doubt, no time for it. She’d done it so many times before, it was etched there, in the pathways of her mind. Useless, like a lot of things in her head, but not now, right now it might save a life.
“What?” Simon asked her.
“I can rebuild the walkie-talkie.”
