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Fuck. The ringing in my head makes a lot more sense now. I think a part of me knew from the moment I woke up what had happened. I just didn’t want to believe it. Only now do I let the grief of the situation get to me.
With a trembling hand, I throw the chip across the table at him.
“What a waste of five years,” I say surprisingly evenly.
I grab the wine bottle and pour myself a drink as he picks up the chip to examine it.
“You’re sober?”
“Was,” I correct him as I take a long gulp. Hoping the alcohol will smooth over the bitter disappointment and anger brewing within me. If I have any chance of escaping this place, there is no point losing my head.
“You’re drinking,” he points out, although the way he chews at the corner of his mouth tells me he’s deflecting from his own guilt.
I finish my glass before bothering to respond.
I smirk. “I pick my vices.”
“You shouldn’t drink.”
“And who are you to tell me what I should and shouldn’t do?” I snap, letting some of my anger slip into my tone.
“Your brother—”
“My brother sat by and did nothing as I overdosed.” I can feel my voice getting louder and louder. So much for keeping a level head. “Connor can go to hell for all I care.”
Silence falls across the table. Arnie at least has enough respect to look horrified as I attempt to regain my composure. While he looks away, I swipe a knife from the table and fold it into my napkin.
“Five years…” Arnie says more to himself than anyone else. “You were only seventeen?”
I do the math in my head. “Fifteen when I started.”
Arnie pales even more as he absorbs this information. I suppose to anyone looking in, that sounds pretty awful. But it wasn’t like I was alone. After my mother died, I merely followed my father’s lead.
I stab another piece of chicken onto my plate. I can feel Arnie’s eyes on me as I take a bite, then another. Not the first time someone has been lost for words, won’t be the last.
That’s me, tragic little Roisin. Poor little rich girl. If I’m stuck with it, I might as well use it.
After a moment, Arnie seems to gather himself to ask another carefully formulated question. “Did… did you ever wonder how you were able to get access to those drugs?”
“My dad had a friend, a dealer.”
But Arnie is already shaking his head. “Roisin… Your father worked with the cartel.”
“Back to this? Seriously?” I say, throwing my cutlery back down on the table in exasperation.
“Your brother, Connor,” Arnie continues, ignoring me completely. “He still does business with them sometimes.”
“That’s not true.”
“You were fifteen, Roisin. Can you really trust your own memories?”
“That’s not…”
The locked box in my brain rattles uncomfortably. A flash of memory escapes through the hole of the padlock.
Cars, black with tinted windows, pull up to the mansion. Men and women, lots of them, storm my father’s office. Aimee takes my hand and guides me to our bedroom, tugging me past our brother as she whispers, “Thecartel is here, Connor.”
When I snap back to reality, my fingers are digging into the table so hard I’ve lost feeling in them. My breaths are coming out in short pants. Sweat drips down the back of my neck. It was real. The memory was too real.
