The Line That Binds
Copyright © 2013
J. M. Miller
Stained with heartache and cursed with vengeance, a stone well lies on a nineteenth-century estate, waiting for the Stockton line to wish again.
When seventeen-year-old Lila Wayde's father loses his high-paying job in Las Vegas, the family relocates to a Pennsylvania estate bequeathed by an estranged aunt. Lila begins a new life there, one not corrupted by wealth and fake friends. She soon meets Ben, the groundskeeper's gritty grandson, and experiences the kind of happiness her life's been missing. But as she settles into the ancient house, she learns information about her ancestors and the old stone well that may make her wish she'd never come.
Ben Shadows has lost enough in life. So when Stockton Estate's owner, Janine, wills the land to her great-niece Lila, Ben fears for the fate of the property. He decides to find out Lila's intentions as the new owner, but his grandfather wants him to protect her from Stockton Estate's alleged curse. As Ben helps Lila dig through the estate's history, they grow closer than he ever intended. Now, along with concerns about the property and the reality of the curse, he struggles with feelings he can't ignore.
Will the secrets of Stockton Estate bring them together or will knowing the truth rip them apart?
Zoe
Never wait for the magic.
Make your own.
No light shines the same.
No shadow conceals the ache.
Once was passion, now is pain.
The touch of skin, the smell of rain.
Eyes like fire have burnt to ash.
Vacant.
Gone.
Cold and frail.
The secrets, the whispers,
a broken trust.
Forever it will stay,
crippling until I break.
Prologue
Cursed
September, 1864
Chilly night air breezed through the bedroom window. Dahlia slid the patched quilt she'd stitched together years ago from her body, welcoming the cool draft. A wooden lantern hung beside the door, its flame weak and dim. But the moon's hazy glow compensated for the dull flame nicely, brightening the otherwise darkened room. The soft light pressed into a crack in the window's pane, projecting sparkles along the wall like hundreds of brilliant diamonds. She watched them for a while, wishing she was staring at a real one upon her finger.
Dahlia turned onto her side and ran her hand along the curve of Charles' back, spreading her fingers over his relaxed muscles. He groaned in his sleep, a sound she'd heard many times before. She pressed her lips to the narrow line between his shoulder blades and smiled against his skin. She wanted to hear his sleepy sighs again; she longed to hear them forever. With him in her bed this night, the possibility remained.
Charles stirred, rolling onto his back, stretching his arms wide. She took advantage and pressed her body to him, draping her arm over his chest and nuzzling into his side. His arm folded around her, stroking her skin with his calloused fingers, sending shivers through her body.
"I love you," Dahlia whispered and pressed tiny kisses down his chest.
Charles' body jerked, waking fully and taking in his surroundings. He glanced down at Dahlia tucked under his arm. His eyes softened and the corners of his lips tipped down. "I have to go," he said, sitting up and moving to the edge of the bed to don his pants.
Dahlia tucked the quilt around her, feeling the night air's bite for the first time without Charles' warmth beside her. But the air wasn't the only reason for the chill. She now had his final answer.
He was leaving.
"Please," she begged softly. "If it's about your father, we can flee. We can go together to the north, or out west."
"And you'd leave your mother alone to care for my family?" Charles asked, buttoning his pants while he peered out the open window. The moon's fragile light glinted over the strands of his dark black hair. She noticed its growth and remembered the last time she'd cut if for him.
"She'll call upon my aunt so she won't be alone for long. She loves your family," Dahlia replied, wrapping the quilt around her body as she stood behind him.
Charles' gaze moved around the property. No one was awake yet to tend the gardens or work the fields. All was quiet─maybe quiet enough for him to forget. Dahlia watched his eyes look to the well, recalling last year when he'd returned to her after the war. She'd helped him set the very stones now shadowed by the night. She ran her hand up his shoulder, thinking back to that time when his promise was for forever.
Charles' shoulders fell with a sigh as he shifted his view to the new mansion his father had built as a wedding gift. He turned back to the bed and grabbed his shirt. "You know I can't do this, Lia. I'm to wed Sarah tomorrow. It's expected of me." Charles pulled his shirt on and stepped into his boots.
"Stop," Dahlia said as Charles moved to the door. She tightened the quilt around her body, aching to go back an hour before when her body was covered only by him. Careful not to make a noise that would wake her mother down the hall, she moved closer and tugged his shirt. "You love me. Not her."
Charles slid out of her grasp and removed the lantern from its peg then traveled down the stairs.
Dahlia followed, the quilt dragging at her feet as she stepped onto the dirt floor of the cellar. "You can't do this, Charles. I love you. I want to be with you."
"We can't be together, Lia." His eyes darted back to her, narrowed with pain and fear. He slid a long lock of her wavy brown hair off her shoulder and mumbled, "I shouldn't have come tonight. I was mistaken and I'm sorry." He pushed the wooden door open, holding the lantern toward the tunnel that led to the main house─Stockton House. "We can never do this again. I love her. Not you," he said. His green eyes went cold then, like they'd never told the truth before, like they'd never see the truth again.
Dahlia freed one hand from the quilt and slapped it hard against his cheek. The sting echoed up her arm, returning all the pain to her heart. "You're lying. I know you love me!" she cried and stepped closer to him.
She turned his body with one hand and pulled his face to hers with the other, dropping the quilt to her feet. Charles remained still as Dahlia pressed her lips to his wounded cheek. Her gentle kisses traveled along his face until they met his lips, where the kiss grew urgent with want, with love.
He responded, gripping her waist with his empty hand and pressing her between himself and the earthen wall. His hand clung to her bare skin as his mouth claimed hers with enough desire to haunt her for a lifetime.
Tears flowed from Dahlia's dark eyes as his kiss began to fade. Charles looked down at her and backed away. "Wait!" Dahlia demanded, thrusting her body against his and looping her arms around his neck.
"No, Dahlia," Charles replied sternly, shoving her body away.
"I will not let you leave me," she said and moved close to him again, running her hands up his chest, her eyes pleading with his.
He scowled and whipped the back of his hand across her soft face. "You will know your place from here on, Dahlia."
She crumpled to her knees in front of him, cradling her cheek. "My place is no longer here," she said, her voice a mere whimper.
"Whether you stay or go, I will be married. And this will never happen again," Charles said gruffly, turning toward the door.
"I will never forget you," she said as she wept. It was not a pledge to him, but a harsh reality. She knew the memory would be the curse that lived with her forever.
The light of the room faded as the lantern's halo disappeared down the passageway. Darkness consumed the room, accompanied by the sound of quiet sobs and the smell of wood and soil. And when her tears ran dry, no longer burning misery into her skin, Dahlia rose up. She vowed her curse wouldn't be alone. She knew she would never forget, but she would make sure his family never remembered.
Chapter 1
Ben
Present Day
"Are you ready?" I asked Pop, stepping beside him on the slate steps outside Janine's house. More people were arriving, tramping through the lawn and shuffling past us to the door. As expected, I recognized some as employees from years ago.
"As I'll ever be," he replied when we stepped inside.
The house was dark and empty. Not in a physical sense. There was plenty of crap in this place: depressing paintings on the walls, coat racks and tables cluttering the hallways, and pieces of antique junk stacked on any flat surface available. Everything displayed a thick layer of dust due to the housekeeper's recent neglect. Nope, it wasn't physical. The dark emptiness was all about feeling. A void of existence. It was the cold, hard truth about the last years of Janine's life, and her mind. It was sad to think about really, living in the dark with nothing to hold on to, no memories to cling to in the end. People say dying in your sleep is the most peaceful way to go. That's the way she went, though I know it wasn't peaceful. I doubted anyone would want to go the way she had, whether a normal sleep, Morphine induced, or even a coma. That sleepy peace couldn't have applied to her because her mind was never at ease. She was lost and couldn't remember any of it. Beginning, middle, or end. No good, no bad. Just confused emptiness.
I straightened my tie as we walked into Janine's grand office. Actually, it was Pop's tie, my grandfather. He'd lent it to me for the funeral last month. I'd also bought a button-down shirt and pants specifically for the occasion since I hadn't been to a funeral in close to three years and had outgrown everything I'd worn as a skinny freshman. Of course, there were other, less depressing, dress-up opportunities in between that I'd never bothered with. I'd watched the revolving weddings and parties at the event house─commonly referred to as Stockton Mansion─every week since I was ten, but there was no good reason for the groundskeeper's grandson to attend. Then there were school dances. To me, going to an after-school function was like going to detention while wearing some lame-ass suit. I'd rather break both legs attempting a double back flip on my bike than sit through the agony of a school dance. Despite my affliction, my girlfriend at the time, Harper, persuaded me to attend one freshman year. The suit I'd worn that night was the same one I was forced to wear to her funeral the following week. That solidified my hatred of suits and school dances.
Today's clothes weren't a complete suit, though the tie strangled me over an uneasy edge, adding to the silent chokehold of this already bitter morning. "Here?" I asked Pop, pointing at the set of chairs closest to the double doors, planning for the quickest escape possible. I didn't want to hang out in this house any longer than necessary. It was no longer welcoming, just depressing.
Pop nodded his bald head and took a seat beside me. The buttons on his suit jacket pointed their rims outward, threads straining under the pressure of his bulging stomach. His pudgy, calloused fingers twitched anxiously in his lap. Sitting here was torture for him. He'd been Janine's closest friend for years, even before she'd lost her mind. She'd given him the old servant house on Stockton Estate decades ago, along with the lead groundskeeper position. They were close enough to make this day uncomfortable, and it was obvious because he sat stiffly on the edge of his seat, refusing to even unbutton his jacket for a little relief.
"Why are you so worried? She had to have left this place to you or Simone. Or maybe to both of you," I whispered to him as I watched more people take their seats.
"I'm not so sure," he mumbled to keep his rough voice from carrying. "Being that she's the manager, Simone would be the best choice. But I'm more concerned the state will get a hold of this place." He stared at the empty seat in front of him as his voice faded.
We both cared for Stockton Estate. Years after Janine hired Pop, he brought me here and it became my home so I understood his concerns. The state would add the property to their protected park, which enclosed most of the grounds already. They'd make Stockton Estate a historical landmark, and we'd be fired and replaced with state employees who'd read the history to tourists from placards; they wouldn't care for the property the way Pop had all of these years. We'd also have to find a new home.
This week had been filled with apprehension, and today was the finale. With all of our worries and all of the possibilities, somehow we overlooked the conventional line of inheritance.
Family.
"Well, more shit decided to hit our fan," I whispered to Pop as I watched a family walk through the double doors behind us.
After years away, and after skipping her funeral, any thought of Janine's remaining relatives showing up today was laughable. Yet, here they were, recognizable because of their unfamiliarity. The man of the family escorted a teenaged daughter with bleach-blonde hair and a short son who couldn't have been much older than twelve. Janine's niece, Rina, wasn't with them. The last time they visited Janine was the year I'd moved in. I'd spied on their short reunion from behind the event house's gazebo. Janine and Rina yelled at each other inside her kitchen while Rina's husband occupied the kids outside.
Pop waited until they passed our seats to speak. "I guess they were contacted about Janine's death after all."
The father had grayed since the last visit and the daughter obviously covered her jet-black hair that matched Janine's with bleach. They took their seats in front of the ornate cherry desk where Janine's lawyer stood sorting papers with his glasses tipped down.
"Guess so," I mumbled, watching the backside of the teenage girl before she sat down. She wore one of those long, skin-hugging skirts that reminded me of a sexy teacher or librarian. Not that I'd ever seen a sexy teacher or librarian, except in a few movies that only used wardrobe as props. Her gear was definitely not prop material. It was designer, and it probably cost more than I made in a year gardening and maintaining Stockton Estate.
"Is it being held in the office?" a woman's voice called from the hallway.
The voice was so loud everyone shifted in their seats to locate the source. Rina entered the office after a few moments. Her hair was also bleached now, though not as sleek or as kept as her daughter's long strands. She stumbled toward the front of the office with a dark, greasy-haired man lagging behind her. They took a couple of empty seats on the opposite side of the room's divide, separated from her family. I understood why the kids were with their dad even before Rina nearly toppled over her chair. I'd seen the same jacked-up symptoms with my own mother, too often to count. Rina and her boyfriend were strung out on something. I caught a glimpse of her wild eyes as she looked around the room, observing her aunt's employees with a blankness that lacked all sympathy for the situation.
The lawyer stopped sorting papers and stood straighter as the final person entered the office and the doors were closed. "Hello, everyone, I'm Reynold Upton and I've been Janine's lawyer for many years." He cleared his voice and straightened his suit jacket uneasily, which made me wonder if her death affected him beyond professional bounds. "Most of you are familiar with me from the funeral or from my notice to appear here today. Janine chose to have a will reading to disperse her possessions to cherished friends and family. Keep in mind that the will hasn't been altered for a few years, as Janine lived with Alzheimer's and was unable to coherently change many details after that time." He picked up the first stack of papers and said, "If no one has any questions, we'll get started."
He began with ex-employees, who looked the most confused about attending. As soon as he read what Janine had left to them, he directed them into the hall where they were met by Simone with their new belongings. Paintings and statuettes were among some of the common items given. There were some odd items, too, like kitchen spatulas and garden hoses, causing several people to break the respectful silence with bursts of involuntary laughter. I guessed the items linked to inside jokes shared between them and Janine, memories that she had unfortunately lost long before her death.
Pop and I waited silently. His hands fidgeted, my eyes wandered. The room slowly emptied, leaving a clear view of the family up front. Rina sat with her limbs indecently tangled with her intoxicated beau despite her ex-husband and children's close proximity. The son showed little interest in his surroundings. He kept his clipped head down, staring into his lap with the glow from his hand-held game system beaming back into his eyes. The husband kept his slender face forward, though the side that faced Rina had a hardened edge. His mouth was pressed tight and his eyes neared a squint. The daughter's face was much the same, though her eyes shifted nervously to her brother every so often, checking on him. A narrow strip of light peeked through one of the office's curtained double windows and fell on her bleached hair, highlighting its perfection in the dim room. Her lips remained tensed, but they were still full, like some glammed-up magazine model.
Pop coughed beside me and she turned our way, catching my stare. Her eyes scrunched, evaluating me, then darted to her giggly mother with a gaze that spit both sadness and hatred. In the next second, her focus swept back to the front as Upton finished with one of the seasonal groundskeepers.
Upton walked the final person from the office before he spoke again. "Now, about the remaining assets." His voice lengthened each word as his stubby legs returned him to the desk. His wire frames slipped down the bridge of his nose while he peered at the documents in his hands. "Even with custody changes, there shouldn't be cause for concern. The entitlements are specific enough."
For a moment, I wondered why Pop and I were still in the room when we clearly weren't part of this conversation. No one else seemed worried about our presence, or even acknowledged it, except the girl. She threw me a head tilt and a quick glance that sliced through my fake monkey-suited appearance, straight to the dirtbag hiding beneath. It was a silent judgment that happened often enough to recognize. I went to school with the usual bunch of cliques, some more well-off than others. I didn't care. In the same two seconds it took her eyes to tear me down, I couldn't keep mine from sizing her up. Her skin looked soft, even with an unusual springtime tan, and I wondered how it would feel pressed against me. Damn. I was at Janine's will reading and I was thinking about groping her niece's uptight daughter. I guess that made her Janine's great-niece, technically. Janine's smoking hot, uptight great-niece.
Mr. Upton spread some papers around on the desk and cleared his throat. "To my niece Rina," he began, looking up from beneath his frames as Rina's minimal attention zeroed in on him for the first true time since he'd introduced himself. He continued, "I, Janine Stockton, leave my niece Rina Wayde the contents of my personal bank account and safety deposit box." He motioned her to the desk, and she stood, pulling down her frilly skirt that curved high under her butt and left little to my─or any other man in the room's─imagination. Rina squinted at the pages and her lax body swayed as she signed. Her daughter watched her; her ex-husband did not. She rushed back to her boyfriend with an excited smile and snatched his hand. They hurried out of the office without speaking a word to her kids. She seemed happy enough not to question the property at all, even though she was the closest surviving relative.
"Janine struggled over this last decision for months, years before her memory loss was incapacitating," Upton spoke to all five of us remaining in the room. "She called the proper surveyors and had the land divided. Keep in mind that these first pages are preliminary paperwork. I'll need the packets signed and returned to me as soon as possible. First, to Mr. Lloyd Shadows." Pop stood in front of his chair, waiting for more. "I, Janine 'Genie' Stockton, wish you a long, memorable life in the house that will be forever yours."
"Oh, Genie," Pop sighed through his white mustache and let his bald head fall for a moment. He wiped a hand beneath his eyes before he moved to the desk. Upton slid paperwork in front of him to sign and handed him a stack to keep. When he returned to his chair, we both stared at each other. Pop's heavy eyes were glassed with conflict. I saw the relief hanging in them, knowing the house that had become our home would remain ours. But there was more there. His eyes dropped to the paper outlining the small portion of property now declared his. It was not all of Stockton Estate. "The curse," he said with a sigh.
Pop and Janine believed the property's stone well was responsible for her Alzheimer's. "It's cursed," he'd said years ago, shortly after I'd moved in. As a kid, it was easy enough to believe. I'd gone to the well several times with my own wishes, my own desperate cries. Wished my mother and father loved me enough to stop their addictions. Wished for Harper's life the night she overdosed. But even though I was willing to take my chances with the curse, Pop told me later that the only person the well wanted was Janine and that somehow her blood was forever linked to it. "The Stockton curse runs deep and transcends time," he'd said. The rumor was thatit gave Janine the power to grant other people's wishes. In return, the curse supposedly claimed her memories. That's why Pop was worried now. Janine may be gone, but her blood was back. Family blood.
It was evident the people left in this room would get the remaining property, the business, and, in his eyes, the possibility of an alleged curse.
I patted his back, showing him that my heart was as heavy as his. Even if I didn't believe the curse, I knew this day could lead to more concerns with our jobs on the property.
"Hold on a moment, Mr. Shadows," Mr. Upton called as we turned to leave.
"Yes?" Pop croaked in response.
Mr. Upton shook his head. "I'm sorry. I suppose you should come back also, but I was referring to Mr. Benjamin Shadows."
"Me?" I replied automatically. The girl was looking at me now. All of them were looking at me, actually, but I felt the intensity of her eyes more than anyone else's as I willed mine to keep focused on Upton.
"You're included here also." He slid more papers around on the desk then proceeded to read from the sheet in front of him. "To Mr. Benjamin Shadows and Ms. Lila Janine Wayde, I, Janine Stockton, leave in trust the remainder of Stockton Estate's land, divided accordingly, to be granted on their eighteenth birthdays, respectively."
"Oh, no. Genie," Pop whispered beside me, tenderly scolding Janine's spirit.
I didn't move until Pop shoved me toward the desk. Upton handed me a pen and pointed to the signature line on the page. Without reading, I scrawled a barely legible signature. Then he handed me a stack of paperwork with land surveyor notes and raised notarized seals, which I ran my coarse fingers over while I tried to understand what was happening.
"You can sign here," Upton told Lila, pointing to another stack of papers.
The clicking of her heels echoed in the silent room as she closed the distance to the desk. The shoes set her at eye level with my six-foot frame, but her eyes remained focused on the papers Upton was pointing to. She stopped just shy of touching the desk with her thigh then leaned over to sign. Her thin legs remained propped straight and tall, creating a curve in her back and ass that kick-started my pulse. I inhaled, catching a soft hint of almond instead of some pungent designer perfume I'd expected to surround her. It was oddly appealing, reminding me of the almond muffins I'd loved as a kid. I kept my eyes down on my own paperwork, carefully stealing glances of her under my half-closed lids. It was almost impossible to tell she was under eighteen. Black liner encased her green eyes, aging her a few long years past legality. Up close, she was too thin. She had no muscle tone to speak of, and the bones of her elbows jutted out so far they looked broken. She wore a tidy white blouse with the thin black skirt, like some professional business associate. I pictured her being class president or homecoming queen at whatever high-end high school she attended. Rich and popular.
Pop waved a hand from the back of the room and I walked back to him as Lila's father joined her at the desk to look over the paperwork.
"This last bit is going to take some more time," Upton said to them as Pop and I walked through the doors. "The business side of the Stockton Estate will still continue under the usual supervision of Ms. Simone Platt even though you will be owner after your birthday. You can discuss matters further with her─" We cut off Upton's coarse voice when we closed the doors behind us.
No one met us in the hall. Simone and all of the other employees had already dispersed. Pop and I stepped through the carved oak door and into the cloudless afternoon. I loosened the tie immediately and unbuttoned the top buttons of my shirt, happy this ordeal was finished. As we walked across the lawn, I glanced down the sloped hill toward the event house. Simone's petite body was dwarfed by the large stone archway as she greeted a rehearsal group who had rented the mansion for their wedding tomorrow.
"Do you think all of this will change without Janine?" I asked.
Pop released a slow sigh. "I think it will be much of the same." He tilted his head toward the bright sky for a moment. "I fear that it will be all too much the same, in fact," he whispered, his voice pained with all of the sorrow he'd endured over the last several years.
I watched a tear run from his eye before I turned toward the event house again, giving him a quiet moment as we continued to walk. The rehearsal group was already inside, somewhere behind the mansion's rugged stone exterior or the enormous paneled windows of its ballroom. They were happy, at least. The rest of us had the chance to be happy again soon, though now all of our happiness depended on the intentions of an unfamiliar family. "Do you think they'll come here to live?"
"That's my greatest fear. I can't believe Janine would do this. She should've just left it all to Simone instead of dragging her family back here. She was too good of a person to do this to them." He paused with a soft breath. "We'll have to talk to Simone and find out the family's plans. They haven't been here in ages so I don't see them having any interest in this place, especially since Rina isn't involved anymore. This was her family, not her ex-husband's. Besides, the kids are of that age where they'd be hesitant to move. I'm sure they are established wherever they currently live. With any luck in the world, they'll stay away and sell their portion to Simone when LJ turns eighteen."
LJ? Even in Janine's last years, when she was mostly incoherent, she often said those initials. I'd never asked Pop what they meant, and now I understood. LJ. Lila Janine. She was a partial namesake. "Let's hope that's what happens," I muttered, agreeing with all of the excuses he'd come up with for them to stay away. I stared past the stone gazebo as we made our way back to our house. The well was hidden somewhere behind it, through yards of trees and tangles of brush left purposely unkempt. "I guess it would be in bad taste to wish for it," I said, giving Pop a sideways look.
"Maybe," he replied without looking back. "But the scary thing is, if I could, I most certainly would."
Chapter 2
Lila
Four Months Later
"I wish you would just shut up about the paintings, Gav," I screamed as I climbed the enormous wooden staircase. "I have eyes, too." Perfect vision, in fact. Not that my vision needed to be perfect to see all of the paintings in this place, they were everywhere. I'd lived here for ten minutes and I already despised them. It might've been different if they were interesting abstracts, even if they were prints of interesting abstracts. Instead, they were nearly identical originals with varied shades of gray dried onto their canvases, scattered all around this freaking house. The main difference was the dark red numbers smeared onto the bottom corners. It was all so bizarre.
I looked at the painting at the top of the stairs, sliding my finger along the edge of the canvas─this one numbered fifty-six. Its gray hues muddled the same way as the other twenty I'd seen since I left the normalcy of the main hallway. The landscape was almost identical, though the trees' branches were thin and bare, already past the fall transition, well into the dormant stages of winter. Nevertheless, they held the same position around the well, the focal point, which appeared the same in each painting. Its blurred stones and roof fell somewhere between reality and a dream. I stared at it, waiting for a revenge-seeking little girl to crawl out from its smudgy depths.
I should've taken a full tour of this house before agreeing to move, I thought, my eyes still trapped in the well.
I'd only visited this house a few times when I was younger. The first couple, I was a toddler. The last time was the only one I truly remembered. Mom needed to talk to Aunt Janine during our spontaneous trip back east, but Dad, Gavin, and I remained outside during the visit. The house was so beautiful. Vines sprawled up the sides of its unending walls, which spanned so high they seemed to end inside the clouds. I decided it couldn't be a normal house; it had to be a castle. I begged to go in. I wanted to explore the stone castle and look down upon the grounds from its enchanted windows. But I was not permitted, so I contented myself by daydreaming about the castle's history while we played outside. It was an hour before Mom returned and we said goodbye to Aunt Janine. Her teary eyes wet my cheeks when she squeezed my face to hers. She hugged me like she'd known me every day of my life. But I barely knew her.
The next trip was the will reading, where the main hallway and the office were the only areas I'd seen─not an accurate representation of the rest of the house. The hallway had less terrifying still-life paintings. They weren't the quality I'd seen in the casinos and in some friends' houses back in Summerlin, Nevada, but they also weren't mentally disturbing or in duplicate, triplicate, or infinite forms. And the office where I'd signed the property paperwork was apparently the only room without any paintings. How deceiving.
"There's more, Lila. There's more in the kitchen!" Gavin's yell traveled through the main hall and up the wooden staircase to me. "This is like the start of a cheap horror movie. It's a freak show," he said, a little quieter.
I heard the last part, even if he didn't want me to. I knew exactly what he meant; this whole house was chilling, creepy, and old. If it weren't for the upgraded interior─obviously required to meet regulation building codes after the dawn of the new millennium─I could probably reach my hand through some large cracks to the stone exterior. I could probably dump my chamber pot outside, too, after I lit a lantern to see where I was going. Yes, this place was ancient, and cold. Goosebumps pricked every inch of my flesh at the thought. It was September for crying out loud! Was this place immune to late summer heat?
If I had to live here, things would change, soon. Starting with the paintings.
I grabbed number fifty-six and placed it on the floor, leaning it against the wall. I did this to the other ten I passed while searching the rooms upstairs. I stuck my head into each doorway for a quick view, unsure of which space I wanted to call "mine." When I got to the master suite, I wasn't surprised to see a well painting hanging next to an antique four-poster bed. I glanced at the medical equipment crammed alongside the bed, remnants of her final days. I didn't step inside. There was no reason to since there was no way I'd sleep in a dead woman's bed. No way. I didn't care if she left me this place or not. I hardly knew her. I wasn't close to her. There was no way I'd stay in there.
The room I settled with was located at the back of the house, past the hallway to the master suite, another office, and a storage closet. It was a corner room, separated from all of the others, making it the best option. The afternoon sun streamed through two curtainless windows. Their pane divides cast twelve squares onto the bare queen bed and hardwood floor, pressing heat into the room that I welcomed greedily. I could only hope the tall windows would curb the vitamin D deficiency I'd likely endure after moving away from the desert. The first window faced Stockton Mansion, or what the employees here call the event house. The other faced the back of the property. It showed a decent view of the state park beyond the groundskeeper's house and a barn, both built with brown and beige stones that matched all the buildings on the property. The forest stretched to the horizon. I wasn't used to seeing so many trees around my house, so close together, so all-encompassing. The trees behind our old place were bundled in a small group, bordering the sand pit near the seventh green. They were sparse and failed to block stray balls clipped off course, costing Dad a few broken house windows and some blood-pressure-raising dents in his precious Audi.
Another bonus to my new room was the attached bathroom. The vintage footed tub was deep enough to fit five people, with a hand held shower head and a circular curtain rod attached overhead. The whole room was definitely upgraded, possibly for visitors, though I doubted Aunt Janine had many. Maybe she'd dabbled in interior decorating before she'd lost her mind. If so, it had to have been a while ago given the number of tasteless, scary well paintings that now littered the house.
"Dibs," Gavin said, jumping into the room. For once, his hands were detached from his game. The delight of living in a new place was exciting to him. It blazed inside his crystal blue eyes. I wish I shared his enthusiasm. The whole ordeal was bound to be easier for him since he got to keep most of his stuff. Game systems, laptop, eReader, all of it packed nicely in the few boxes stuffed into the back of our new, pre-owned, Ford Escape. Most of my stuff, however, now belonged to a Super Pawn back in Las Vegas. The wad of cash it yielded would feed us for a month. At least, that's what Dad and I were hoping. Other items Dad sold would add another month, as long as we conserved. Before the move, we'd agreed Gavin would keep his stuff no matter what. He needed the material comfort more than us.
"No chance, dork. This one's mine. There are five others that can accommodate all your junk just fine." I hated dealing such a low blow, but there was no chance I'd give up this room.
He dropped his crystal blues to his two-hundred-dollar sneakers and nodded. "It's cool," he replied with a smile, recovering almost immediately. "I think there's one of those dumb waiter things right next to the room at the top of the stairs. I'm gonna go check it out then go over to the mansion. I bet there's some really cool stuff over there. Wanna go?"
"I'll check it out later. I want to get situated first." I turned in a circle. "I've got some cleaning to do before I can call this place habitable."
"Whatever, clean freak. Oh, Dad told me to tell you he'd unload all the boxes in the hallway then he was gonna go to talk to that Simone lady about a job."
"Great," I said to the back of Gavin's scraggly head as he left the room. "You need a haircut!"
He needed a haircut as bad as this place needed cleaning. I told him it looked better short, but the older he got the less he listened to my advice. I wish we could've had a normal sibling relationship for the last four years. Instead, I'd packed his lunch and helped him with his homework because Dad was too busy working, and Mom was too busy doing lines and getting nailed in the guest house by every new pool boy hired at the clubhouse.
So Gavin was stuck with me, whether he liked it or not. After seeing Mom at the reading of Aunt Janine's will, he'd been a bit more appreciative. I'd hoped seeing her wouldn't have affected him, but deep down I knew it would. When a mother doesn't bother slurring a word to her children, whom she hasn't seen in over a year, it would undoubtedly stir some unwanted emotions. It stirred mine plenty. I wanted to punch her in her junked-up face. Unfortunately, it wasn't the right venue for that. Maybe I'd have another chance in the future.
I scoped the room, searching for traces of insects and small mammal droppings, then hauled my boxes upstairs when I felt it was safe. I found some cleaning supplies inside of the storage closet beside my room and got to work. When I turned the silver faucet in the bathroom, only a few drops of water trickled out. I snatched my phone from my backpack. It was one of the only things I kept.
The water isn't working,I texted Dad.
I finished cleaning whatever I could then checked the water again. It spurted hesitantly with pockets of air then finally poured steadily. I gave the bathtub a thorough scrubbing and filled it for a midday bath. Its glamorous size was too tempting to pass up, not to mention I needed to rid my body of the chill from this house.
As the water climbed the slanted porcelain, I rooted though the overstuffed boxes. Someone had left hangers in the walk-in so I grabbed a few and started hanging. The more I unpacked, the more my life started to shift. I stared at the designer clothes draped on the mismatched hangers and the realization of my new life jostled into focus. I couldn't wear this stuff. We'd passed Amish horse and buggies five miles down the road, not fancy high-rise resorts. This was the country. My old self, privileged and private schooled, would not fit in here, especially wearing my old clothes. I should've sold the rest of it in Vegas with everything else: the school uniforms I'd no longer wear, the shoes with new tread, and the bags with price tags. The rest of the clothes could've yielded another month of groceries. Out here, I'd be lucky to make a few bucks over what it's going to cost to restock my closet with low-end or secondhand.
I tore all of the clothes from the hangers and shoved them back into the boxes, unpacking only a few middle-end brands, underwear, pajamas, and socks. I went back into the bathroom and opened the cupboards under the single vanity to stash my toiletries. A box of hair dye was partially hidden behind the pipes. Black. My natural color. I picked it up and stood to face myself in the framed oval mirror. The stylist from the club, Fynn, would punish me with a three-hour touch-up and deep conditioning treatment if he could see the root length and the dullness of my fake-blonde head now. I pictured his frozen face, his forehead struggling to portray the same amount of disapproval deep inside his eyes, losing its ongoing battle to show emotion with Botox.
There would no longer be regularly scheduled trips to Fynn, or any hairstylist for that matter. I wasn't even sure it would be an issue anymore, though, because no matter how much or how little I wanted to be her, I was no longer the blonde who resided in every picture I'd been in since I was fourteen. I was starting over. It was forced, but maybe it would be good to shed that skin, whether it was real or fake. Maybe I'd find the truth. Maybe I'd find myself.
I checked the date on the box and resolved to use it later after I spent some well-deserved time in the tub. Luckily, the cupboard also had a stash of bubble bath. I smelled the contents and poured enough under the water to host my own foam party. When the fluffy bubbles threatened to double the tub's height, I hopped in, inhaled the delicious lavender scent, then leaned back and closed my eyes.
Chapter 3
Ben
"What was the problem?" Pop asked when I stepped through the front door. The permanent scent of pipe tobacco greeted me like always, even though Pop hadn't touched the stuff in two years. It was as if the walls had refused to give up his habit, and that probably made quitting easier for him─he still got to enjoy the smell without the concerns of killing himself.
I unlatched the tool belt from my waist and slid it onto the entry table next to the door, careful not to drop anything. "A PVC elbow cracked under the side garden. I had to shut down one of the main lines so I could fix it. The garden flooded a bit, but I didn't find any other problems," I replied through my wired jaw. After I'd fractured it while riding my bike six weeks ago, I was worried about talking at first but was surprised how clear my voice sounded though clamped teeth. Most people could understand me, if I chose to speak. The whole ordeal made me wonder if it was some form of karmic justice for being a smart ass. If something of a higher power wanted me to shut the hell up, I've obliged. Mostly.
"Good. Simone called from the event house." Pop's eyes shifted automatically to the well painting above the fireplace, contemplating it as he'd done at least once a day for the past seven years. "The Waydes arrived today."
I let his words sink in. They were the words both of us had been wishing we'd never have to say, or hear, and they were as weighty as I'd imagined. They'd arrived. "What did Simone say?" I asked, wondering if there was some normal task she needed me to work on so I could ignore the horrible news. I was still pissed that Janine hadn't left most of the property to Pop or Simone. They were her family, her friends, and her loyal employees. They'd been here for her. The people moving into the main house now weren't her family. They didn't know her.
Pop ran his fingers over his white mustache and sat straighter in the dining chair. "She was at the event house with Mr. Wayde . . . Carson. I believe that's his first name. He inquired about the house's lack of water so she called me." He stared at me for a moment, then took a deep breath. "Look, Ben, I'm grateful that you humored me this summer searching Genie's house. I know this isn't your problem or concern, and you might not even believe it all to be true, but I'm going to need more help. I can't do it by myself." The look in his heavy eyes supported his statement.
I was never sure what to believe, but I loved my grandfather enough to help him. After all, he was the one who helped me escape my alcoholic father. In many ways, I owed him. I owed Janine, too. She allowed me to move here and treated me like family from the start. "I'm not sure what else I can do to help, but I'll do whatever you want."
He sighed and leaned back into the chair, which squeaked under his weight. "It's times like this I wished I still smoked." He snatched a toothpick from the holder in the center of the table and stuck it between his lips. "I know we tore through the house this summer and found nothing to explain why Genie left most of the estate to LJ. She wasn't a cruel woman; she wouldn't have wished her fate on her worst enemies, let alone any part of her family. That means she had a reason. It would have helped if we'd found some information about the well itself. All I know is what she told me, and that's not much."
I nodded, processing all of the information, remembering him saying the same things as we dug though countless journals and loose papers boxed inside the basement, the bedrooms, and the kitchen. We'd also found papers stashed in random places, like above cabinets and inside the bathrooms. Janine had a habit of hiding things, and it was exhaustingly obvious how easy it was to lose stuff in that house, even with a good memory. The housekeeper, Claire, wasn't much help before she'd left. She'd cleaned and moved a lot of the random junk to the basement, which could have buried what we were searching for.
"It's going to be difficult to get back in there now so we'll have to take advantage of any opportunity we get." Pop shifted in his chair as he paused. The wrinkles on his forehead creased with consideration as his eyes settled back on mine. "LJ should be going to your school. Maybe you could befriend her . . . Don't give me that look," he said gruffly when I scowled at him unconsciously. "If she's anything like Genie she'll be really nice. Besides, it covers multiple angles. You could help steer her away from the well and anything she might find regarding it. Just in case."
I growled and gritted my teeth, hard. The pressure shot waves of pain from my jaw down to my neck and up into my skull, each nerve surging with crippling current. I shouldn't have put that much force into it. My appointment for wire removal was scheduled for Monday and I'd hate to screw that up, but in this case I had to make an exception. I needed to feel that pain to cope with what Pop was asking me to do. When I told him I'd help, I thought I'd be digging through more of Janine's stuff, not hanging out with Ms. Uptight Skinnyass. This was not how I'd planned to start senior year. I didn't mingle with the preppy kids. No, that's not exactly true. I no longer mingled with the preppy kids while at school. I mingled with one preppy kid who worked at the event house. Though, I wouldn't call Emily Crimson a kid. She had the body to prove she wasn't, and I'd enjoyed her body enough times to know.
What Pop was asking me to do was definitely foreign territory. If he wanted me to hang out with LJ, I'd have to find another way because once she got into the popular group at school there was no chance I'd speak to her.
"I guess I could try," I mumbled, shrugging as I walked into the kitchen.
"Good," he mumbled back from the dining room, acting as nonchalant as me, though I heard him release a low sigh and the chair squeaked again in response to his relief. "Since the water is back on, you should head up to the house just to make sure everything is working correctly."
I took a swig from a water bottle, letting the water flow between my clamped teeth before swishing it around my mouth. I eyed the beer bottles in the fridge, already predicting how I'd soon spend my nights. This ordeal was bound to give me headaches aspirin couldn't handle. If so, I'd have to raid the event house's refrigerator for any refreshments left behind by careless wedding parties. It was an activity that started fairly innocent. Years ago, Harper would ride her bike over to hang out and we'd steal a few beers to get buzzed out in the barn. Now, it was my last resort to combat stress, but I also indulged when I couldn't get Harper off my mind. It'd been a while since I was pained with either, and that should be a good thing, except it also meant I was thinking of Harper less often.
"The water is already back on so why would I have to go check the main house?"
"Any opportunity we get, remember?"
I pressed my eyes shut and capped the water bottle. "Right," I replied, passing back through the dining room and grabbing the tool belt from the table. "I guess I'll have to wait until tomorrow to mow by the gazebo."
He flicked the toothpick between his teeth, its tip rolling beneath his mustache slow and steady. "Simone has a wedding booked tomorrow so it'll have to wait until Monday."
Great. I shut the door behind me without another word. I wasn't sure what he expected me to find inside that house without him. He was Janine's friend. He had a better chance at finding her secrets. He was with her until the end, even if she didn't remember him. I ran my hand over my head, thinking about the pain he'd experienced in her final years. I felt bad for him and understood his loss. I'd lost Harper three years ago, though her death was entirely different than Janine's. Harper's was quick, painless for her alone, leaving the pain to torture her family and me instead. Janine's was long and torturous for both her and Pop. In either scenario, the pain never really disappeared. It continued on, reappearing with every profound memory, every realistic dream.
I was always willing to help him. I owed him a lot for my life. But he was asking me to get involved, to become some secret agent. Infiltrate the family and search the house. This wasn't me. I'm cumbersome and blunt, not crafty and secretive. Not popular and charming. He knew all of this already. He knew I stayed away from all of the usual, the normal, especially after Harper died. He also knew he wouldn't get many opportunities of his own. I guess that made me the one who could create new opportunities.
Janine's house, LJ's house, looked deserted. After crossing the grounds, I knocked on the back door. No one answered. They were probably still with Simone at the event house. I peeked into the mud room window. No movement or noise. The doorknob turned without hesitation and I walked through the mud room's clutter and into the kitchen. I glanced around as I opened the faucet, testing the water I already knew worked. Nothing seemed important enough to stand out. Though, there were new papers sitting on the farthest corner of the granite countertop. I flipped through them. They were signed legal documents of the trust. I recognized Upton's signature, appearing the same as it did on my own paperwork.
The main entry and hallway were also empty. I took the stairs two at a time and said an aimless "Hello" when I reached the top. No one answered. I glanced down the corridor and noticed that all of the well paintings, including the one at my feet, had been removed from their hooks and left on the floor. It didn't take long for them to hate the twisted paintings. I couldn't blame them. The one in our place was strange enough; I couldn't imagine living in a place with a collection that probably numbered a hundred.
After I tossed my head into all of the other bedrooms, I passed the upstairs office and went to the back bedroom that Claire used to stay in. Pop and I had only searched this room once since Claire left. Simone had insisted Claire stay after Janine died, giving her plenty of time to find a new place to live and work. She finally moved a few weeks ago.
Three cardboard boxes labeled "Lila" sat open in the middle of the floor with clothes spilling from them like they just barfed up designer threads. Some items were glittery enough to hurt my eyes, and others looked like business attire made for fancy offices and private under-the-desk jobs. Doesn't this girl own any jeans? I could see immediately where I would have a problem getting along with her. I was pretty sure even the richest kids at school didn't wear clothes like these.
A soft splashing sound came from the bathroom. I moved around the corner and stepped through the open door. The tub was so full of bubbles that I couldn't see the water. I jerked my head around, half expecting someone to walk in on me standing here like a lunatic staring at the tub. When I turned back, five little toes, with chipped bright pink polish, poked through the bubble layers at the edge of the tub. I jumped back, slamming my tool belt into the vanity with a muted thud. The dull noise left the possibility for escape, until the channel locks fell. They crashed onto the tile floor with a loud enough clank to wake Janine's ghost.
"What the hell, Gav?" LJ's voice came from somewhere inside the bubbles. "I thought we had the talk about invading my privacy years ago. If you recall, some of your stuff disappeared during negotiations."
I froze at her voice─delicate despite its words─afraid to make a move. My feet betrayed me as I screamed at them internally. Finally, I managed to return the channel locks to my belt and slide one foot behind my body, ready to back out.
Her head emerged through the bubbles, only a small portion of her face exposed to the air. Her eyebrows shot up as she locked eyes with me. I raised my hands in a surrendering fashion, hoping this incident wouldn't hurt my chance to start this forced friendship, but knowing it would.
She gasped, pulling a quick breath between her teeth while her green eyes scanned me. "What are you doing in here?" Her voice was calmer than I'd expected. I was prepared to cover my ears to cut down a piercing scream, but it never came. She was different than the girl I saw four months ago. The roots of her hair were grown out dark, and she seemed younger without the heavy eyeliner dragging her light eyes down. Any skin left exposed appeared as soft as it did that day. It took every ounce of my willpower to keep from imagining how sexy the rest of her body looked under the layers of bubbles. What finally snapped me back to reality was the thought of her owning a majority of Stockton Estate. She, someone who barely knew Janine, who had no clue how this place ran, and who didn't deserve to live in this house, would be the one who made all of the business decisions soon enough. She didn't deserve any of it. Pop did. And now, if what Pop believed was true, I'd have to befriend her and possibly protect her? This was a bunch of crap.
Her eyes hardened, pressing me for an answer, for something.
I shook my head and clenched my jaw, feeling it explode from the inside for the second time today. I wanted to walk out of the room and go tell Pop to shove it. I wanted to walk away before there was any chance to be chopped down by this person, whose current stare held enough disdain to make that decision a little less complicated.
I rocked back on my boot, the weight of the "cons" pushing me toward the door.
Her eyes examined me further, replacing shock and anger with a quizzical squint.
"LJ?" I said, finally forcing something through my teeth. My confliction made her initials sound neither friendly nor hated. They came out more like a question and I had no idea why.
Why did I agree to this?
Chapter 4
Lila
"What did you say?" I asked, suddenly realizing how naked I was under a slowly diminishing shield of bubbles. I crossed my legs, folded my arms around them, and gathered more fluffy foam to cover the top of my body as stealthily as I could. When I pulled the bubbles close, they were as high as my neck inside the deep tub, though I felt the tiny pops against my skin as more died, leaving me a little more exposed with each passing second. I hope he can't see anything. I looked back up at him, waiting for him to speak again. Why isn't he saying anything?
I watched his full lips repeat the words. "I said your name. LJ." They pushed far out and wrapped widely around the syllables, revealing specs of silver and several wires behind their exaggerated movements. Is his mouth wired shut? I stared at the soft cleft in his chin while I reprocessed his voice in my head. LJ. That's what he said. LJ.
"Why did you call me that?" I snapped, not meaning for it to tumble out so harshly. No one had used that nickname for me in years. Not even Gavin.
"Um," he replied. His lips pressed together like he was humming, and his eyes darted around the room. He was wearing brown work boots that were caked with dried mud. Flecks of it dropped onto the bathroom tile─that I'd just swept─as he bounced one boot heel rhythmically, nervously. His jeans looked a size too big and his T-shirt wasn't much better. Both were ripped in random places and smeared with grease stains and dirt, and there were streaks of something blue across his left shoulder, like he'd used it to wipe his fingers clean. "That's what Janine called you. Your initials?" he finally answered through his teeth, though he sounded unsure.
Aunt Janine had called me that when I was little, but I hadn't seen the woman for several years before she died. I wondered why she would speak about me to anyone. Then I remembered she was crazy enough to bequeath her house to me.
"And you're Benjamin, right?" I asked, remembering him from the will reading. We'd both stood in front of Janine's lawyer four months ago and signed papers that declared us future owners of this property. He'd worn a cheap pair of dress pants that day and a tie that was too short for his long upper body. I could tell he was uncomfortable wearing them, or maybe just uncomfortable being there. Either way, they were probably the only nice clothes he had, and possibly one of the only times he'd worn them.
He parted his lips to respond, but closed them again and simply nodded with confirmation. There was a thick, vertical gash on the right side of his bottom lip. It was mostly healed, with new, pink scar tissue. It wasn't there during the will reading, and his jaw wasn't wired then either. Had he been in a fight? He looked like a fighting type, rough and rugged, with broad shoulders and thick arms camouflaged partially by his baggy shirt. Guys at Summerlin Prep fought, but those fights usually ended quickly. I think they were too worried they'd mess up their pretty faces or get booted from the country club. Nevertheless, what they lacked in physical fights they made up with ego assaults and head trips: who had the best car, best girl, bigger dick. Who could nail the most chicks. The testosterone flowed from them whether they sparred with their tongues or their fists, and the damage was equally bad. They were as ruthless as us girls when it came to trash talking and could ruin reputations with one well-placed rumor.
"Well, Benjamin, what are you doing in here?"
He lifted the handle of a large wrench attached to his tool belt. "I was told to check the water. I didn't think any of you were here. I mean, I knocked, and no one answered downstairs, so . . ."
His voice was a little clearer this time, clear enough that I didn't need to reprocess his words. I bit my bottom lip and glanced around the room, wondering if he was going to add anything else. He didn't speak again, but he pressed his lips tight like he was contemplating something.
"So . . ." I prompted, deciding to interrupt whatever internal battle he had going on, or kill the possibility of him stalling to wait for more of my bath bubbles to pop.
He turned his back to me, sliding in front of the vanity, and began to check the faucet. He caught my eye in the mirror's reflection and turned the corners of his lips up, revealing soft dimples hovering just above his scruffy jawline. It was like he snapped out of whatever trance he'd been in. He dropped his focus back to the faucet without a word.
Oh, he is being rude. "You already know the water works. The bath is full," I snapped, this time fully intending for my voice to sound harsh.
"Yeah," he replied and squatted in front of vanity. He opened the cabinets and peered at the pipes underneath. "But it's my job to check."
I gathered up more bubbles while he was turned. I didn't want this perv taking advantage of the fact that I couldn't get out of the tub. He was probably enjoying this torturous encounter. I wanted to say something mean, or scream at him to make him leave, but curiosity got the upper hand. "Why is your jaw wired? Did you get into a fight?"
Still crouched, he spun on his toes and slid the vanity doors closed behind him. He was at eye level with me, which was only comforting because he no longer had a bird's-eye view of the tub. His brown eyes were easily the darkest I'd ever seen, and his pupils pulled them deeper still. They laced together, nearly indistinguishable. He reached a hand up to the side of his head, gliding his palm over his shaved hair, which was a lot shorter than it'd been at the will reading. He smirked to himself before looking at me straight. "No, not a fight," he said simply. "I guess I'll see you around, LJ."
"It's Lila," I replied, irritated by his smugness, or downright disrespect. I couldn't read him as quickly as I could some other guys. His mannerisms had literally bounced all over the emotion spectrum within the last few minutes, and it was difficult to keep up.
He stopped at the bathroom door and leaned against its frame. "What, you don't like that nickname, LJ?" His voice was low, hypnotic. I was pretty sure he was teasing me, gauging me.
"Your last name is Shadows, right?" I asked, but I didn't wait for the answer I already knew. "Since you like initials so much, maybe I'll just call you by yours, BS."
He cracked an actual grin, those mischievous dimples highlighting his amusement. "Fair enough. I won't call you LJ anymore. I've got something better anyway." He pushed the words through his teeth, then stood upright and backed out of the room. "I'll see you around, Bubbles."
I dropped my jaw, ready to protest, but he left before I could stutter a word.
***
"Whoa! What did you do to your hair?" Gavin asked when I stepped into the kitchen. He had his game propped steadily on the breakfast bar while his butt worked the swivel chair back and forth, repeatedly.
I scrunched my face at him. "I thought the black dye would make it pretty obvious what I did to it."
"Whatever, but I think you might have a hard time finding new friends to shop with if you're going Emo or Goth for the first day of school on Monday."
"What makes you an expert on making new friends, huh? Besides, maybe I'm not interested in friends."
"You? Not interested in being part of a group of fun-sucking, male-head-decapitating praying manti girls? Yeah, right."
He knew my habits too well. Back in Summerlin, when I wasn't watching out for him, I was shopping with my friends or spending time with my boyfriend, Mark. The same people who hadn't called, sent a text, or emailed in at least two weeks. Most of them dipped out of my life a couple of months ago when Dad gave us the news about losing his job and our money. They wouldn't be caught dead hanging out with someone who was now considered second class. Friends? Yeah, right.
"It's praying mantises. It doesn't have the same plural form as cactus." I shrugged the rest of his words off, not wanting to explore the topic further. I was already tired of thinking about all of it, most of all the parts about starting over. We were lucky Aunt Janine left me this place, and even luckier that Simone, the manager of Stockton Estate, let us move in before my eighteenth birthday in April when I'd legally claim the property. I'd hate to think where we'd be otherwise.
"I got pizza," Dad announced, walking into the kitchen with two boxes stacked in his hands.
Typical. We should've used that money to help stock the refrigerator and pantry with essentials, but his first purchase was a quick pizza.
He set the boxes on the extended breakfast bar then shook his gray head of hair. Tiny droplets of water scattered from the short strands. "It's starting to rain out there. I guess we all need to get used to more of that, huh?"
Gavin snagged a piece of pizza as soon as the box hit the counter. "Thanks," he said, ignoring Dad's latest moving-away-from-the-desert quip.
"No problem," Dad replied with some deflation before he turned to me. "Don't worry," he added when he caught me staring down the pizza box like it was a human head instead of dinner. "I'm going out tomorrow to check up on some online job ads so I'll go to the store and get everything we need before I come back." His brow creased at my silence. "If you don't trust me, make me a list."
Trust you? Right. I should trust you. Just like I trusted you to save our house? Or trusted you to protect the savings accounts from your lovely drug-addicted wife? "I'll make a list."
I ignored his frown as I moved around him to get to the refrigerator. I didn't really need to do an inventory. Everything we had was small enough to fit into the crammed car with us. It basically amounted to a box of cereal, a cooler of drinks, some chips, and trail mix. I usually shopped for the house so I knew he'd have his hands full tomorrow. Even though I'd love to see him stumble around while he searched for all the items on my list, I was sure he'd have no trouble navigating the small-town grocery store.
I grabbed a pen and paper from inside a drawer and started the list, thinking about the things we needed versus the things we'd love to have but could no longer afford. At least he was searching for a job right away. Well, of course he was. That's all he knew. Even if we had the money for him to stay home, he'd search for a job anyway. Before he lost his all-mighty six-figure entertainment management position at The Illusion Hotel/Casino, he was never home. He was foreign to us. Being around him all of the time now was brand new, like a new person entered our family . . . a new person that couldn't wait to get back to work to get away from us.
"Didn't you talk to that Simone lady about working over at the event house?" I asked while turning the corner into the mud room, checking for additional cleaning supplies. Going by what I'd used from the upstairs storage closet, I'd need more soon. I planned to flip the house on its roof and shake it out tomorrow. Then I'd bleach it all, twice over.
"Oh, yes. I had quite a chat with Simone." Dad's voice was snippy.
I traveled back into the kitchen and leaned against the countertop near to the sink while he finished chewing a bite of pizza.
"She's a piece of work. I tried to negotiate with her, but she wouldn't entertain my ideas at all. She didn't even offer me a part-time position. I don't think she likes me much," he said then took another bite of pizza and flipped though the local newspaper's want ads.
"I doubt it's just you," I replied, staring at the well painting perched behind the square dining table. I stepped over to the painting─numbered twenty-four─pulled it off the wall then looked at the groundskeeper's house through the double window. "I'm guessing no one really expected, or wanted us to move here." Benjamin's mannerisms were an indication of that, too. He was offish, but I was also naked so that could've had something to do with it.
"I suppose not," Dad said, rubbing his hands together to rid them of pizza crumbs, effectively spreading the crumbs all over the counter I'd be cleaning tomorrow. "But I explained our situation to her when I arranged for us to move in. Even if she doesn't like us being here, she didn't have to be so discourteous. She didn't even offer a tour. I had to troll around myself, after she basically kicked me out of her office over there in the event house, or whatever they call it."
He was bothered by the whole ordeal. I'd watched him during all the low points─Mom's addictions, Mom leaving, losing his job, losing the house─and usually he kept his feelings to himself, quietly wallowing in a cesspool of misery separate from the one Gavin and I struggled in alone. Either everything was wearing him down or he was opening up to us. If it was strictly the latter, the attempt was a little late. He should've opened up when we needed him the most, not now when he happened to be stuck sharing the same airspace with no job to run away to.
I grabbed a dish towel from the sink and wiped the counter in front of him, irritated by his lack of concern and emotion for the mess he'd created, both in life and with pizza. He lifted his arms and closed his green eyes in a squint, silently questioning me. I ignored him again and wiped up the rest of the counter. One less thing to clean tomorrow.
"The event house is cool, Lila. You gotta go check it out," Gavin said, without tearing his eyes off the game. "It has a huge ballroom and a big kitchen. One of the employees was spying on me so I couldn't really explore anything else. I'm sure it's got some more creepy crap just like this place."
"Did you find the well?" I asked him, finally taking a slice of the pizza. I leaned against the sink and stared at the painting behind the dining table while I chewed. Its gray tones were weirdly captivating like all of the others, blending together in a way that made the painting hazy and surreal. The brush strokes of the surrounding trees were long and fluid, swirling around the well like invitations to peer inside. Thoroughly depressing invitations. I wondered if Aunt Janine had painted them or if she'd bought them all from some hack who took advantage of her illness.
"Nope," Gavin replied before he stuffed the remainder of his pizza slice into his mouth.
"There's a well?" Dad asked. He was partially paying attention to our conversation as he circled some ads inside of the local paper.
"There has to be one on this property," I replied in a snarky tone.
He glanced up toward the painting and smiled. "Yes, you'd think there was. It does seem very odd to have all of the paintings without an actual well. Lucky for you, you'll get to explore outside more on Monday."
I turned to look at him. "What does that mean?"
He straightened up in his chair. "Well, Simone denied me a job, but she said you are to start working on Monday."
"She denied you a job, but she gave me one?" I repeated, somewhat confused.
"Yes. I don't think she has a choice about your employment since you'll own this place soon enough. It'd be a major error on her part not to show you the ropes first. She does get to choose where you start, though."
"And where's that?" I asked, my mind already curious about the woman who had my father, the once assured and pompous casino entertainment manager, irritated.
"She said that any new owner would benefit greatly by learning the basics of the property, which means that you will start at an entry-level groundskeeper position after school on Monday."
"Of course," I said, shaking my head. I could schedule, prioritize, and possibly book events using minimal brain cells, yet I get to go outside and mow the grass and plant some flowers, things I'd never done before.
Gavin laughed toward the screen of his game, but I knew the hack-'em-up game he was playing wasn't a comedy. "Lila's gotta get her hands dirty," he mumbled ever so softly.
"I'm sure they have some work gloves," Dad reassured me with a hesitant smile.
They both knew I leaned toward the obsessive/compulsive whenever cleanliness and order were involved. This would be a new concept, though. I'd never worked outdoors. That was one of the perks of living in a golf club community; they did all of the yard maintenance.
"Sounds fine," I said to shut them both up. At least I'll have a job.
The remainder of The Line That Binds and its sequel, The Line That Breaks, are available on Amazon.