Page 79 of Behind These Four Walls

Isla would take it without complaint. It was the first time in a long time that Isla had felt a glimmer of hope. At least Myles was giving her the benefit of the doubt. It was more than she could ask for.

“What do you need me to do?” he asked resignedly.

It was all she could do to keep from wrapping him in a bear hug. A weight was lifted from her.

“What do you think about playing double agent?”

Chapter Sixty

The only silver lining from being exposed was that Myles seemed to believe her and had agreed to help her flush out the guilty. So much had happened since she’d arrived at the Corrigans’ doorstep, and especially since Charli, that Isla had forgotten one last lead. She couldn’t hide out the next couple of days at the Red Roof or her studio apartment as the time ticked by until she could expose Bennett and confront Victor. She scrolled through the photos in her phone until she got to the picture of the invoice for Jackson’s storage unit that she’d taken during her noninterview with Jackson. No time like the present.

In the rental car she had to get after being kicked off the estate and having her privileges rescinded, Isla turned off 33 West and carefully maneuvered through Ruckersville, Virginia, along the empty streets toward the storage facility, squinting to make sure she made the right turns while listening to her GPS app calling out directions to her. She got excited when the facility came into view, looming in the darkness. She could already see the rows of brown metal units stretching beyond her line of vision.

As she was about to get out, her phone rang. She considered ignoring it and dealing with whatever issue had now popped up later. But when she glanced down and saw who was calling, she answered, preparing herself for the worst. The first sounds that came through the phone’s speaker were ragged sobs.

“Is it true?” Holland asked without any greetings. She sounded bad, and Isla felt worse, because she already knew why Holland was calling. “Is it true you were lying this whole time? You knew my sister Edie and never told us.”

Isla sighed, resigned to her well-deserved fate. She owed Holland this. She closed her car door. “Who told you?”

“Who do you think?” Holland yelled. “My mother couldn’t wait to call me and tell me the friend I brought home had been using me the entire time.”

Just like in the parlor, when the Corrigans looked at her, expecting excuses or an explanation, Isla had none to give Holland without giving away everything.

She let out a breath to regulate the way her heart ached as Holland cried on the other end, a fierce fencing collegian reduced to tears because of Isla’s betrayal.

“I’m sorry, Holland.” Out of all of them Holland was owed this the most.

“So it really is true? When we met at the shopping center, and you coming to my house with my keys? It was all a setup?”

From the moment Isla had pointed out Holland’s flat and let her phone slip through to its demise, but there was no need to add fuel to the fire.

“Yeah, I knew who you were from the beginning, and it’s why we met,” Isla said. She rushed on, her true purpose for sitting in an unfamiliar town temporarily forgotten. “But our becoming friends, how I was with you, was sincere. Our friendship is real.”

Holland hiccupped. “Was it about our money? Is that what you’re after?”

“No.”

“Then what?” There was silence in the background on Holland’s end, and Isla wondered where she was, if she was in a safe space, but she didn’t dare ask.

“I can’t say right now.”

“Why?”

Isla remained patient. “I can’t say that either.”

Holland laughed dryly. “You’re lying. You can say, but you choose not to. You know, I thought that maybe you would eventually be like my sister Edie. I thought you were so much like her and that maybe I’d finally have a sister again, someone I could talk to, since everyone in my family only thinks about themselves. But I guess I’m just an idiot.”

Isla’s throat constricted. Her eyes burned with tears that threatened to come. She was every bit the asshole that Holland thought she was. She was not a good person, and Holland was too good, just like Eden. But Isla couldn’t let herself fall into her emotions. If she did that, everything would fall apart, and she was already hanging on by a thread.

“I have to go,” Isla said flatly, her voice not betraying her feelings.

“That’s it? That’s all you have to say to me, you fucking liar?” The curse sounded all wrong coming from Holland. Like the word was unfamiliar to her.

Isla nodded, though Holland couldn’t see her. She swallowed the lump in her throat, telling herself to hang on a little bit longer. This was what Rey and Nat had warned her about. Being in too deep and becoming emotionally involved with the people she was supposed to expose.

“When it’s time, I’ll tell you everything. You’ll be at your dad’s reception, right?”

Holland blew her nose. “What do you care?” she said pitifully.