Page 119 of The Five Year Lie

The question just sits there between us for a long couple of seconds. But it feels like a year. Our eyes meet. His are the same light brown shade as mine. It’s the Cafferty family color. And I can see confusion in them.

I’ve never asked Ray for his phone before. It’s a pushy thing to do. He can’t decide whether to just hand it over or to make it weird by telling me to get my own damn phone from my desk.

“Please?” I say, and then I summon a sweet smile. The kind my father never would have fallen for in a hundred million years.

My heartbeat glugs two more times at least. It’s awkward now. But I don’t back down.

“Sure,” he finally says. He grabs the phone and unlocks it. He taps something and hands it to me—the weather app is already loading. “Be right back.”

“Thanks,” I say lightly. And a half second later—as his backside clears the door frame—I’m swiping up to look at his texts. I scroll through them as fast as I dare, hoping I’ll know what I’m looking for when I see it.

In the first place, I can’t find anything from the Bagel Tree. It’s Hester who usually orders his lunch there two or three times a week.

But Ray loves a good story. If he wanted to tell us the story of a five-year-old text without revealing who it was actually from, it might have been the first thing that came to mind.

My uncle has corresponded with dozens of people in the three weeks since that text, though. I’m scrolling as fast as I can.

Come on, come on.

When Bryan Zarkey’s face slides into view, I nearly jump. It takes me two tries to open up the thread, because my hand is shaking. But there it is, and the text is terse and even more ominous than I’d expected.The job is done just the way you wanted.

The job.What job were they discussing on the morning my father died?

I scroll up to see texts prior to that, and they’re all old, and mostly automated updates.Network report August 12 2017: 0 minutes downtime.Etc.

The seconds tick by, and I’m sweating. It doesn’t take very long to brew two cups of coffee in the new machine. And if Ray decides to take a couple of steps back from the coffee bar, he can probably see me in his office.

The job is done just the way you wanted.I shiver. Then I close the texts and reopen the weather app. It’s going to be a gorgeous week in Portland, Maine. A high of 74 tomorrow.

I place Ray’s phone on his blotter, like a good girl. And when he returns a minute later, I’m taking a bite of bagel and looking as bored as a girl can look when she’s just realized her uncle is hiding something. Possibly something terrible.

He could have told us that he got a text from an employee who doesn’t work with us anymore. The story would have been just as interesting. But he didn’t want to mention Zarkey.

What the hell did theydo?

My bagel tastes like wet cardboard. I need a sip of coffee just to choke it down. Then I stand up just as my uncle sits down. “Look, I’m sorry about the dead camera. I promise to hook it back up again tonight. But I’m afraid I have to get a move on. Mom said something about a locksmith.”

He rubs his temples. “Yeah. And your picnic today.”

“Right.” That damn picnic. “In the next ninety minutes, I need to find ten watermelons.”

Ray opens his desk drawer and pulls out a set of keys. “Take my car, honey. I drove because I had another off-site meeting later. But then I canceled it.”

I take the keys, feeling like a teenager asking her daddy for the car. That’s how he must think of me. At the moment, though, I need him to. “Thanks for breakfast.”

He attempts a smile. “Don’t mention it.”

I loop my finger in the key ring and turn toward the door. “If you see Zain, will you tell him I really need a call?”

“Sure,” he says.

“Okay. Hope he’s not sick or something. It was a rough week on the network.”

I leave his office and my eyes go right to Zain’s desk. His chair is still empty.

Hell.

At my own desk, I grab my shoulder bag and toss in Ray’s keys. I drain the coffee but drop the bagel into the trash. Then I walk out of the office and head up the street, toward the nearby parking lot where Ray pays for a monthly spot.