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He makes a noise at the back of his throat. One I can’t read. I’m unsure whether he believes me, but if I had to guess, I’d say no with a capital N.
The light turns green. Trent starts to drive again.
This time, as the car moves, neither of us speaks, and this time, I’m completely okay with it.
I’m not going to say anything to break the silence.
I have no desire to hear what this man has to say.
He’s vile . . .
But . . .
I shake my head.
No, don’t read into it.
Don’t read into the depth I see in his eyes when they aren’t filled with hate toward me. When he makes other people smile, and it brings one to his face in return.
The thing is, no matter how hard I try not to, deep down, I can hear the hurt that lives inside his voice, and I wonder more about how it got there.
I need to find my sister.
There is so much more to Ronald than I know, and I’m starting to wonder if she knew the real him or not.
And I’m afraid of the answer.
Chapter
Twenty-Two
PAYTON
I’m not going to class today.
I should go, but no matter how much I try, I can’t get past the mystery and drama surrounding Ronald Aldridge. I need to know how much my sister knew.
Did she know about what he did to his daughter?
Why he was in jail?
Did she even talk to him about anything of substance?
The only thing she told me came the day before the funeral and will reading. She admitted, point blank, with no remorse, that Ronald Aldridge had a family. It sounded like she’d known about them for a long time. That I was the only one left in the dark.
Instead of taking the train to where I normally get off to go to school, I take it one extra exit to where my sister’s house is located.
This is the house she moved into after Ronnie stopped paying her bills a few months before he died.
I haven’t been here since he died, come to think of it. I haven’t really been here very much since I found out the new scumbag showed up.
He was in prison for his hand in some scheme, and God knows what that was really all about because Erin won’t talk. Finding out she had known him through her ex?Tony?is enough for me to never want to get to know him, though.
Seems like a pattern . . .
I walk up the driveway to the door and knock. It swings open.
My sister looks like a mess.
