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We pulled up to the gate, and I gave him a warning look before I got out to unlock it. “Don’t confront her Mom. Seriously.” He shrugged, but that wasn’t an agreement. I scowled. “I mean it, Lucas.”
“Okay, okay,” he said. When I still didn’t move, he motioned towards the gate as Jojo began to whine. “Come on, the dogs are gonna piss in here if we don’t let them out soon.”
He still hadn’t really agreed, but he was being stubborn. Rolling my eyes, I went to unlock the gate so he could pull into the yard. He parked, and I opened the back hatch to allow the dogs to jump out. They ran around the yard, sniffing everything. It didn’t take Jojo long to find a ball and bring it to my feet, demanding I play with her.
“We’ll play tomorrow,” I told her, wrapping my arms around her chunky body and giving her a squeeze. She licked my face in understanding, her tale whipping from side to side.
The garage was still locked, exactly as we’d left it. A cynical part of my brain had expected to find it broken into again, but fortunately we weren’t so unlucky. We trudged inside the house, flicking on the lights and dumping our bags in the living room. It would probably be a few days before we bothered to unpack.
“Can I bum a cigarette off you?” I said, before Lucas could make his way upstairs.
“I thought you were quitting?” he said, holding back the pack as if he wanted to be sure I meant it.
“I’m working on it.” I hadn’t bought another pack since my last one ran out; I’d been cutting back. But every time I thought I was ready to go cold turkey, stress reared its ugly head and demanded I light up again.
My answer was good enough for Lucas. He tossed me the pack with a smirk, saying, “It’ll cost you.”
“Yeah?” I took one out of the pack, shoving the remainder in my pocket. “What’s the price?”
He stopped at the top of the stairway. “Hurry up and smoke it, fucker. Then come upstairs and find out.”
I was going to make it a quick smoke break then. The screen door slammed behind me as I walked out onto the back porch, taking a deep breath of the cool night air. Leaning against the railing as I smoked, I could faintly hear the music Lucas turned on upstairs. The pipes groaned as he started the shower, and I imagined the bathroom filling with steam as the water heated. It had been a long day, and a hot shower sounded heavenly.
Putting down the cigarette for a moment, I curiously sniffed the air. Something smelled strangely minty — no, it wasn’t mint. It was menthol.
We had an ashtray out here, and we were always careful about not leaving discarded cigarette butts around the yard. But as I looked toward the far side of the porch, I spotted three stubbed-out cigarettes on the railing. They had been crushed against the wood, leaving circular burns on the white paint.
One of them still had a thin trail of white smoke streaming from it.
Dread knotted my stomach and made my limbs go cold. The porch suddenly felt too vulnerable, as if I was being watched from all sides. My father could have been standing right there in the shadows and I wouldn’t have been able to see him.
No sooner had I stumbled through the back door, than Jason and Vincent were coming in the front.
“Hey, you’re still lit,” Jason said, when he noticed I still had my cigarette. But then he saw my face, and his expression fell. “Are you okay?”
“Pull the cameras,” I choked out. “Lock the —” My lungs felt like they were closing. Christ, I couldn’t panic, not now. I had to hold it together. I braced my hand against the wall, and forced out the words, “Someone was here. Someone was on the property.”
Someone.I knew exactly who it was.
It only took Jason a few minutes to pull up the camera feeds on his laptop. Vincent and I gathered close behind him, watching over his shoulder as he rewound the tapes.
“There,” Jason said grimly, pausing the video. My father stood on our back porch, gazing across the yard as he smoked. Occasionally, he’d glance up and look directly into the camera. He didn’t seem nervous; even when the Bronco pulled up to the gate, he didn’t show any alarm. He just put down the cigarette and walked out of the camera’s view.
“You barely missed him,” Vincent said. “Holy shit, Manson. He could still be out there.”
“We need to search the yard,” I said. “Get some flashlights. I’ll tell Lucas.”
Our search was fruitless. After wandering around the dark for half an hour, all we found was fresh shoeprints near the fence. There was no relief in coming up empty-handed. Even once we were back inside with the doors locked, I couldn’t make myself relax.
This wasn’t just a violation of our space. My father was sending a message. He knew the cameras were there, and he’d left the cigarettes in plain sight. He wanted me to feel threatened. He wanted me to be afraid.
“You’ve got to try to get some sleep,” Lucas said, when our search was over and I was still sitting on the couch, staring at the camera feed on Jason’s laptop. The slightest movement on screen made me flinch: a fluttering bug, a leaf tumbling in the wind.
I shook my head. “I’m going to stay up for a while. I need to keep an eye on —”
Lucas closed the laptop, grabbing my hand before I could wrench it open again.
“You’re shaking,” he said, but I couldn’t stop. I was sweating, but I was so damn cold. “Your fingers are freezing.”
