The Secret Sister by M. DeLuca (leveled readers txt) 📗

do was hitch myself up onto the parapet. No problem. Wipe myself out.

I was done with everyone.

With every careless person who’d treated me as less than human.

I hoisted my body upwards and leaned over the parapet, when a hand clamped down on my shoulder. I froze.

“Don’t move,” said a soft voice. “Stay absolutely still.”

I turned round to see a gray-haired man with a silver goatee. A hand with pink, manicured nails grasped my arm so tightly I couldn’t move.

“You might think things are so bad you don’t have a choice, but you can’t throw your life away.”

My head swam. The man’s face blurred in and out of focus, like a picture taken too closely. I jumped down and for a split second he loosened his grip. That’s all I needed to yank myself away from him and sprint away in the opposite direction.

“Are you okay, ma’am?” said an urgent voice. Someone was shaking my arm. I blinked my eyes and focused on the crushed coffee cup lying on the table. I glanced up at the red-haired barista. I was still at the outlet mall. At the coffee shop. I’d sat down at one of their tables after spotting Rafferty’s henchman, Jimmy. A puddle of brownish foam leaked over the edge of the table and soaked into my jeans.

“I-I’m okay,” I said, grabbing a handful of napkins and dabbing at the mess. Then I stuffed the whole lot into the garbage as I left, slamming the exit door open so fast I almost took out a middle-aged woman on the other side.

I could barely remember driving home, but somehow I got back to the empty condo, stripped off my coffee-stained clothes and poured myself a stiff shot of brandy. Afterwards I lay back on the sofa, trying to collect my thoughts and orient myself.

Guy was late because he’d gone to some stag party with Gord. I glanced at the pile of bags arranged in front of me. I’d been buying clothes for my new career with Gord’s company. And somehow Gord was connected with Peter Karrass, the man I’d remembered from the bridge the terrible night Birdie left me at the Flatts’ place. I hadn’t imagined his face glowing like a half moon in the darkness. Karrass. The man who stopped me from jumping into the raging waters. He was at the wedding celebration at Gord’s house. Now memories of places and people were melting into each other, blurring the lines of what was real. The past was bleeding into the present.

My phone buzzed with a text from Guy.

Rescue me. I’m too drunk to drive.

The address followed. Some swish area, about three miles away. I texted back.

Be there in 20.

Traffic would be light so it shouldn’t take me long.

To calm myself I unpacked all my new clothes and threw them onto hangers, slotting them into place among the silks, cashmeres and fine cottons. From the back of the closet I extracted a stretchy red and black dress. It was tiny, with a plunging neckline. Strange how small items from the past kept reappearing. Like Birdie’s ring.

I shuddered and snapped off the closet light.

The dress fit like a second skin, hugged at my hips and ass even though I hadn’t worn it in years. But the underwear had to go. Panty lines were a no-no in micro-dresses like this. A pair of red strappy sandals and a slick of scarlet lipstick and I was ready to deliver Guy from the bachelor party.

29

I drove along the tree-lined shore of Lake Calhoun. On the other side, the downtown towers twinkled like magic boxes, their lights reflected in the calm waters. The house Guy had directed me to was a grand three-story detached mansion, partially obscured by trees at the top of a sweeping driveway. Every light in the place was blazing. Silhouetted figures moved back and forth across the windows.

My stomach gurgled. I couldn’t remember when I’d eaten last, so I texted Guy, told him I was waiting outside and asked him to grab me some food on the way out. I waited a few minutes. No response. Texted again and still nothing. Either he was too drunk to reply or he’d lost his phone. Neither were great options. I didn’t want to drag him out in front of Gord and a bunch of leering revelers and I also didn’t relish the idea of rooting through someone else’s furniture looking for his phone.

The air was cool and goosebumps prickled my arms and legs. Why the hell had I worn this skimpy dress? Some logic had directed me to unearth it from my old suitcase. Had the address jogged some lost memory? Some association with this house?

I edged around a vine-covered wall and peeked in through a side window to a circular white vestibule. Inside, a speckled marble floor and a sweeping oak staircase led upstairs to a darkened space from which the swell of laughter, chatter and voices rose and fell. A small sitting room lined with white couches was off the hallway. Inside I made out the shapes of couples embracing.

A tall man in tan slacks and a white shirt open to the navel, padded down the stairs holding the hand of a thin slip of a girl. She couldn’t have been more than fifteen, her eyes ringed with dark liner, her feet bare. She stopped for a moment to take in the crystal chandelier, the Baroque mirror and the white Rodin knockoff on the walnut occasional table, but the man tugged her towards him and led her to the room beyond where the other couples writhed and squirmed on couches and chairs.

I knew there’d be girls there. This was Gord’s kind of place. Alpha males on the prowl for tail. Young tail. As young as you could get. Younger than your botoxed wife sleeping soundly under her goose down duvet.

Slipping through an open side door, I padded into the vestibule, my shoes dangling from my hands. The lights were dimmed