Question of Trust. Laura Caldwell

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ playing now?“ I asked him.

      “Yeah, I just need to blow off a little steam.” Theo scrolled through the Xbox menu, trying to find an opponent at his level.

      I sat in my favorite yellow-and-white chair, yet it failed to comfort me as it often did. “Did you have fun with your dad?”

      After Sam had left, I’d spent an hour trying to listen to LaBree and Brad, who were talking about the patent LaBree was working on and that Brad was helping her with—some kind of invention to hold bra straps in random places. The product actually sounded rather smart, but I couldn’t focus. Kept replaying over and over my run-in with Sam. Then Theo and his dad began having what looked like a serious discussion, and soon after that he had been ready to leave.

      “Fun probably isn’t the word for it,” Theo said now.

      “Right,” I said. Then, “What is the word for it?”

      He didn’t reply, just clicked a button to enter a game.

      I put my head against the back of the chair for a minute. Then I lifted it again. “Hey, have you ever given anyone the code for the door?” I asked him. “Talking to Vaughn yesterday made me think about it.”

      “I haven’t given it to anyone.” Theo mashed a few buttons. “If you think about it, anyone from the street could watch and see us using the code, then use it to get in when we’re not around.”

      “But why not steal something if you’re going to all that trouble?”

      Theo stayed silent, his jawline set.

      “What about people you’re with when you come in the front door?” I asked.

      “Like who?”

      “Well, didn’t you meet Eric here before that show at the Congress the other night?”

      “Yeah, that’s true.”

      “Did you come here from work together?”

      Theo nodded, tucked a lank of light brown hair behind his ear.

      “So he could have seen you entering the code downstairs.”

      “What about people who’ve been here with you?” Theo said leaning toward the TV.

      “Spence was with me a few months ago. Other than that …” I gave a one-shouldered shrug. “My mom was with me once, too, but she already has the code.”

      “What about Sam?” There was a little something bristly in Theo’s tone.

      “What about him?”

      “Does he have the code?”

      “No, I’m sure I changed it since we broke up. But wait … There was that time that we hung out.” I shook my head. “But no, that wasn’t here.”

      “What do you mean, you hung out?”

      My stomach clenched, as if I had something to hide. And I guess I did. “Last summer. We met up. He’d gotten engaged …”

      “And he said he’d get back together with you if you wanted.”

      “Yeah.”

      He focused on his game.

      “What?” I said to his back. “What’s wrong?”

      He kept playing for a moment or two, then paused the Xbox. He turned around from his seat on the ottoman, and now we faced each other. “There’s something between you guys,” he said.

      “Oh, is there?” I started thinking about it. He was right. Even though we’d hugged like fishing buddies, I’d seen the way Sam looked at me. “I mean, there will always be something, right? We were sorta family, you know? Almost sorta married.” It sounded sorta brainless and deranged.

      “When’s the last time you saw each other?” Theo asked. “Before tonight.”

      “Hmm.” I thought to myself. “Maybe at the hotel? No, no, it was after that. In court.” I focused back in on Theo. “Yeah, in court during Valerie’s trial.”

      “What hotel are you talking about?”

      “Oh, you know. What’s it called? The one right off of Michigan Avenue? The Peninsula, that’s what it is!” I sounded way too enthusiastic, and I was talking faster than normal.

      “So you guys went to the bar at the hotel, right?”

      “Yes,” I said with assuredness. So far I hadn’t lied. I just hoped he didn’t ask any more questions.

      “And then did you go upstairs?” The hope got shot out of the sky. “Like, did you get a room?”

      Oh, this was not good. Not good. Not good. “Here’s the thing …” How to explain this?

      Theo crossed his arms and looked at me with something approaching disappointment on his face.

      “Here’s the thing …” I tried again. “We did get a room, but we didn’t use it, if you know what I mean. We didn’t sleep together.”

      We had, in fact, made out in a major way, and there was some nudity, but no sex.

      “You never told me that,” Theo said, the disappointment apparent.

      “There was nothing to tell. We wanted to see if there was anything left between us to rekindle. There wasn’t. We weren’t right for each other.”

      Silence.

      “We aren’t,” I said, liking the present tense of that word better. “We aren’t right for each other.”

      “Whatever.” Theo turned and picked up the game controller.

      “Are you mad?”

      Nothing.

      “Jealous?” I was oddly flattered at the thought, but I didn’t want him to feel bad. I stepped behind him and began to rub his shoulders. He shrugged me off.

      “Look,” Theo said without stopping his game, “we’re not married. You can do what you want…. And so can I.” He started mashing the buttons harder and harder until he growled in frustration and tossed the controller to the floor. “Damn it,” he blurted as Game Over flashed across the screen.

      “I’m going to bed,” he mumbled with a gruffness I wasn’t ready for. Then he strode purposefully to the bedroom and slammed the door.

      14

      If I thought that once I joined Bristol & Associates my life would be one big, rollicking murder trial after another, I was wrong.

      “Your Honor,” I said, “the defense requests supervision on this matter. As you know, Mr. Hemphill—” I gestured to the fourteen-year-old СКАЧАТЬ