Page 103 of After All The Wreckage

I weaved through the streets of D.C., anxious to get to the freeway so I could really put my foot down. When I glanced back at her computer, it showed us interrogating Walden.

“What are you doing?”

“Getting ready to send this to Sheila. I was going to edit us out and just leave his confession, but this proves we left the room. That we weren’t the ones to shoot him.”

My heart fell to my stomach.

I was going to jail.

I was going to jail, and Monte and Ivy were going to grow up thinking I was a murderer and their mother had abandoned them. They’d hate all of us.

“Won’t they just think we went back into the room?”

“We’re on cameras leaving the hotel and in the parking garage. I’m going to grab those videos as well just in case they get deleted before the FBI asks for them. I wish I’d had time to clone his phone before they called so I could have recorded it.”

Her hands trembled, but she was still thinking. So damn smart. My brain was frozen on the simple act of getting to my siblings.

“Rory? This is Sheila? What’s going on?” A woman’s voice asked through the phone.

Rory explained what had happened. The conversation with Walden as well as what she thought had happened to him. The agent swore, told Rory to send her the videos, and said she would get a team over to the Willard. She told us not to go anywhere because agents would be coming to talk to us as well.

My mind flashed to memories of the FBI tearing our apartment apart after the train bomb fiasco. My heart fell. I didn’t want to put Monte through that again. To put Ivy through it when she might actually remember it.

Even though the traffic was no more of a bear than it normally was leaving D.C., my skin crawled. I wanted to scream and ram cars out of my way so I could hurry home. I called River and told him to close the bar and go back to his house because people might be coming for my family. He swore under his breath using worse, more violent words than the FBI agent had.

“God, Gage… I’m so sorry…” Rory’s voice cracked, and she turned her eyes away from me.

“I don’t see how this is your fault.”

“I should have done more research before I confronted Walden. Fuck, fuck, fuck!” She banged her hand on the seat. “I knew there was something funny about the amount of money Walden had. Knew there was something off about West being the silent partner Casada had suggested. If I’d slowed down, I could have put it together that they were tied to the Lovatos. I’m sure my mom did.”

Rory pulled a day planner out of her bag. Old school. She flipped through it, reading what looked like a bunch of doodles to me. Things you made when you were bored in class.

Her phone rang, and she picked it up. “Hey, Nan. Are you at Harriet’s?”

Her voice was an attempt at calm, but I heard the edge beneath it.

“Nan… Slow down… I can’t understand you…”

Rory’s face went pale and a guttural cry ripped from the depths of her. She folded over on herself.

“No! No! I didn’t! God, no!”

I swerved to the side of the road, horns honking, people flipping me off. But I needed to help her. Hold her. Do something other than just fucking drive.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

Rory

KEEP YOUR EYES ON ME

Performed by Tim McGraw and Faith Hill

Pain tookover as the aftershock of Nan’s words rolled through me. She was sobbing, crying on the other end. I’d barely understood her, and even when the words finally hit home, I still didn’t want to believe them. I squeezed the phone so tightly I thought I might break a finger.

“I’m coming, Nan. I’m on my way. Tell them I didn’t sign it. Tell them…” God. My words were as choked as Nan’s. I could barely understand myself.

Tears welled and poured down my face.