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Reese raises a brow. “Oh?”
“I want to confront Holly at her place. Tell her to her face I know what she’s up to and that I’m not afraid of her.”
He’s shaking his head before I even finish. “I don’t know if that’s a good idea, Olivia.”
“It doesn’t matter. Those are my terms. You made choices without me? Well, now this is my choice. I want her to know that she’s not as clever as she thinks she is.”
“There’s no getting you out of this, is there?”
I fix him with the hardest glare I can. “There’s not a snowball’s chance in hell.”
38
OLIVIA
Reese—reluctantly—agrees to my terms. After separate showers and getting dressed, we’re on our way to Holly’s place.
I still don’t know how to feel about the fact he met with her. My insecurities about her place as Violet’s biological mother rear their ugly head. I wonder if this is why it’s so hard for people with blended families to get along. There’s that innate competitive nature that has me wanting to fight her to stay away.
When we roll up to her place, I’m surprised that it’s an apartment. With how glamorously she’d presented herself, I almost expected an opulent mansion like Reese’s.
“Here?” I look over to Reese, perplexed.
“Yeah.” Reese doesn’t sound too pleased about today’s little field trip. I hum, steel myself, and slip out of the car. He follows behind, quietly leading me up a set of stairs. I can feel his discomfort wafting off him, but I can’t find it in me to feel sorry for him. This isn’t about his comfort.
We’re both quiet as he brings us to the door. I can’t help but feel a shock of anticipation run through me. It’ll be the first time I’ve confronted Holly since the day she ruined our lives. The last time I saw her was Violet’s birthday party.
That wasn’t a confrontation so much as an ambush.
“You sure about this?” Reese asks one last time.
Rather than answer, I knock on the door. This is it. This is the moment. This is?—
Nothing happens.
My brows furrow. I wait. Then, after a few moments, I knock again, harder. She’s going to come out and come out now, or she’s not going to like what I’ll do next.
“Y’all lookin’ for the li’l Hollywood gal?”
Reese and I both turn to see a stooped old woman peeking out of her door. She smiles at us warmly.
“Hollywood girl?” I ask, puzzled.
“That glamorous-lookin’ redhead that lived here,” the woman explains. “She packed up a couple of days ago. Just up and left. Heard the property managers talking out here the other morning how it was so sudden. She didn’t even give no warning.” The woman looks Reese and me up and down. It’s like she’s searching for her own answers or maybe just some juicy new gossip for her friends. “She wasn’t too nice. I didn’t realize she had friends.”
“We’re not her friends,” Reese and I chorus simultaneously. Then Reese says, “So you don’t know where she went?”
The old woman shakes her head. “’Fraid not. Like I said, she wasn’t very nice. Just very… peculiar. I’m glad she’s gone. That man of hers looked like trouble.”
That piques my interest. “Man?”
The woman nods. “Oh, yes. Odd fellow. Too nice, you know. The kind that’s fake.”
Reese pulls out his phone. He pulls something up, and then shows the woman. “This guy?”
The woman glances down to Reese’s phone. Her eyes squint a little and she does the head-scooting-forward-and-backward thing that old folks who don’t have their glasses do while they calibrate their vision, but eventually, she nods enthusiastically.
“Yes! The very one.”
