Page 48 of We Already Dug the Grave

Is this how Frances felt? Even misguided, so wrong, is this what she was wrestling with? What she thought I was taking from her?

I pushed away the thought. No, it’s fine. Frances will be fine and better for being away from that scum.

Enjoying myself wasn’t a betrayal of my sister.

Soon she’d go away to her new smart-kid school and meet a genius boy and realize how much better off she was. Hell, she’d probably even thank me for not letting her screw up her life with our old-ass teacher.

Everything would work out. For now, I got to be with Casey.

Minutes later, footsteps approached, and I bit my lip as I waited. I didn’t risk sitting up.

I held my breath as the footsteps continued past the truck bed. Not Casey.

My breath escaped in a whoosh.

That’s when the driver’s side door opened, and the Rust Bucket rumbled to life.

Chapter 18

Now

“Milly? Open up.”

A day ago she’d ordered me out of her life. Now she was begging to be let in.

As I listened to her knock, there was a whisper against the internal door. Sister, sister, sister. A gentle rattling of hinges. An uncurling. A yawn.

“Please, Milly. I can’t blame you for being mad at me, but I can explain!”

I shook my head, clearing away the overwhelm. I unlocked the apartment door and swung it open.

“Milly,” Frances gasped. “Oh thank God I have the right place. Let me in.” Frances glanced over her shoulder. “Please.”

I shuffled backward, and Frances stumbled past me into the living room.

“Close it. Please.” Her eyes were frantic. “Lock it.” She looked around, and I saw it, the slightest flicker of her judgment before she wiped it from her face.

I did as she asked and locked the door, then faced her. “What are you doing here?” I asked at the same moment she said, “Why did you ask me about Blake? About the girl?”

We studied each other a moment. This woman was a far cry from the perfect country-club housewife I stalked on social media, the woman who, only yesterday, stood on the front porch of her farmhouse McMansion in two-hundred-dollar leggings and laughed in my face when I suggested she come with me. Who’d ordered me out of her life and out of her fate.

The version of Frances who stood before me now wore a frizzy ponytail and a cut along her lip. Her cheeks were tear-streaked, and her collarbones jutted like knives from the scooped neck of her linen blouse. My sister looked both expensive and pitiful.

“You first,” she said, as if she weren’t standing in my living room after begging to be let inside. But her voice packed so much confidence that I found myself talking.

“I tried to tell you yesterday.” I shook my head, scraping a hand down my face. “You wouldn’t listen.”

“I know. I wanted to. I promise I did. Tell me now, okay?” She bit her bottom lip. “Please?”

I swallowed. Nodded. “I’ve been getting calls saying things—pretending to be Shane, and—”

“Pretending to be Shane?” Frances’s watery eyes widened. “What do you mean? How?”

“Like, calling the diner where I work, saying crazy things…saying he knows everything.” I shook my head as Frances’s pale face slackened.

“Fuck,” she whispered.

“It gets worse. The first time it happened was the same day I heard about the body found near you in Moss Grove. Then I made the connection between Blake and our past. How he’s Shane’s stepson.”