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“I don’t fucking know. If Skylar’s death really was a murder, I think that the mob had something to do with it. But I don’t think it was him. He wouldn’t try to put the blame on Blaise. They’re related.”
“That doesn’t mean anything,” I said.
From what I had seen, Blaise’s family didn’t care about him at all. All they cared about was their reputation. Everything they did was for their selfish reasons. Not because they cared about their son. They didn’t give a fuck about him.
“That’s all I fucking know and all I’m going to get you. You have to do the rest,” João said, holding out a callous, scarred hand toward me. “Unless you’re going to pay up.”
I stared at him and gritted my teeth. I knew that I wouldn’t be able to get much from him, but at least it was something. I wouldn’t be able to blackmail him with his sister anymore or hang that over his head. Plus, I needed the money from him when I babysat. I didn’t want to push my luck.
“Fine, thank you.”
“I’m surprised you gave her that much for free,” Kai joked.
“Shut the fuck up. She watches Ana for cheap,” João said, and then he turned toward me and jingled his keys. “Let’s go. I’m bringing you home.”
ChapterFifty-Eight
BLAISE
“That little friend of yours can’t come over, Blaise,” Mom said, pulling off her pearl earrings in the middle of my room. She stared at herself in my mirror, then looked at me on the bed through its reflection. “I’d better not find anyone over here. You’re grounded, and this time, I mean it. Your father and I will be home for the next two weeks at least. And nobody—and I mean, fucking nobody—will be over here.”
She had been in a pissy mood all day. This must’ve brought up bad memories of when she found out Dad was cheating on her for the fifteenth time. I didn’t know why she hadn’t left the first time. Probably still wanted his money.
I rolled onto my stomach and stared out my window, suppressing the urge to roll my eyes. Mom thought she had all the fucking control in the world, but really, she had none. She had none with Dad. She had none with me. She had no control over her actual life.
If she wasn’t such a bitch to me, then maybe I would actually feel bad for her.
But I didn’t.
“Okay,” I said, texting Vera to come over. “Nobody is coming over.”
Mom wasn’t going to tell me shit about what I could and couldn’t do. I had spent all fucking day sitting in the damn police station and answering question after question after fucking question about Skylar and my whereabouts on the day she had died. It was non-fucking-stop. The police came at me over and over, trying to do everything and anything that they could to pin this on me.
When she finally fucking left, Vera texted me back.
Vera: I’m already on my way. I need to see you. We need to talk.
Me: Meet me a couple houses down. My mom’s a bitch.
I turned on the music on my iMac to pretend like I wasn’t about to sneak out my window and glared at the broken headphones on my desk. Mom hadn’t let me go back to the mall to get some new ones. Hell, they hadn’t let me out of their own sight since this whole thing had started.
I’d been stuck in this shithole all day.
By myself.
Just waiting for Vera to get out of school. I wanted to see her so badly.
Over the light hum of the music, I could hear Dad and his lawyer speaking loudly with each other. They were talking about me or about Skylar’s death. From the evidence that he’d gathered, Dad’s lawyer thought that she had killed herself.
I didn’t care what had happened to her, but I wanted this to be over.
After opening my window, I slipped out of it and jumped down to the first floor. My feet hit the ground hard, my knees almost buckling. I didn’t know how the fuck I would get back in with Vera and with all the security Mom had ordered for around the house, but I would make it work.
Once I snuck around all the security outside, I walked toward the Stop sign at the end of the road. I pulled my hood up to stop the slight windchill and waited. A sleek black car—João’s car—pulled up a few minutes later, and I gritted my teeth.
“What the fuck is she doing with him?”
She scurried out of the car and waved him off. He did a U-turn in the middle of the street and drove past us, glancing out his driver’s window at me. I glared at him, hurried over to her, and grabbed her hand, snatching it up in mine and feeling its warmth.
