Beneath Her Skin by Gregg Olsen (ebook reader for manga txt) 📗

“Your pregnancy started the whole thing,” he said.

Mindee gasped.

Starla shook her head. “I’m not pregnant.”

Teagan shrugged; it was a dismissive gesture and it brought a smile to his face. It wasn’t often that Starla squirmed.

“Maybe you’re not now,” he said. “But you thought you were.”

Starla looked at her mother before glowering at Teagan.

“You’d better not be,” Mindee finally said.

“Oh, shut up, Mom,” Starla said. “I wasn’t pregnant. And I’m not pregnant.”

Annie steered the conversation away from the mini family feud.

“What about the pregnancy, Teagan? What did that have to do with anything?” she asked.

Teagan grinned a little more. In that, the worst moment of his life, he’d found something that brought a smile. “I found that gross pregnancy test kit in the trash. Mom makes me take out the garbage because I’m a boy, and the garbage is too nasty a job for a princess like Starla. Like she ever lifts a finger around the house anyway. And Jake? He never does anything but come over to hook up with my mom, so I guess he’s too beat to do anything.”

“Don’t talk about Jake like that,” Mindee said.

“Mom, do you ever hear yourself? You put Jake, Starla, anybody ahead of me,” Teagan said.

Mindee, heeding some of her own advice, kept her lips zipped.

Annie pushed a can of soda in front of Teagan and the boy took a sip.

“That’s interesting, Teagan, but what about the pregnancy test?” Annie asked. “What did Katelyn have to do with it? I thought you said you found it in Starla’s trash.”

“I did,” Teagan said. “I thought it was funny. I thought if I took it over to Katelyn’s she and I could, I don’t know, get closer because we could share something nasty about Starla. I logged on to the account and read the emails and chats that Jake… I mean, my mom was doing. By the way, Mom, you’re really twisted to do that to her.”

Mindee’s face turned a deeper shade of red. It was a harsh statement and she’d deserved it.

“I know,” she said, stumbling over her monosyllables. “I went a little Mama Grizzly that night.”

She didn’t want to say she was a little drunk on boxed wine when she’d started the emailing. That would make her sound even more pathetic than she was.

“Go on, Teagan,” Annie prodded.

Teagan swallowed the rest of his drink and asked for another. His mom would never let him have two cans of pop at home, but this was the police station and she wasn’t in charge.

“My mom spent all her money for Christmas on Jake and Starla, and I was pissed off.”

Mindee unzipped her lips. “That’s not true! I got you several wonderful things.”

Apparently, it was difficult to keep them closed.

“Do you mind, Mindee?” Annie said, cutting her off once more. “This isn’t about how fair you are to your kids, but I suspect if you were fair in your attention to them none of us would be sitting here right now.”

“Yeah, Mom,” Teagan said, clearly enjoying the focus on his mother’s child-rearing expertise—or lack thereof.

“What happened next, Teagan?”

“I pretended to be Cullen Anthony and messaged Katelyn and told her I wanted to come see her. That I promised to come and I had a surprise Christmas present for her.”

“The pregnancy test kit?” Annie asked.

“Right. I didn’t tell her that because I didn’t want to ruin the surprise. She said her grandparents were going to leave early and I should come over at about nine. She’d leave the window unlocked. She told me how to climb up the trellis, which I already knew, because I had done it before. She didn’t know it. But I did. I guess that makes me sound like a perv, but I never spied on her. I only looked in her window when she was gone. You know, to see what she was reading or whatever so I could be a better boyfriend.”

“A secret boyfriend,” Annie said.

“Yeah, secret until I guess she realized that I cared about her.”

“So you went over there that night…”

Chapter Forty-Six

Teagan Larsen put on his coat, gloves, and stocking cap (which in his mind was spelled stalking cap). He stashed the pregnancy wand inside his pocket, a little grossed out that his sister had actually peed on it, and said goodbye to his mom. Apparently enthralled by Jake, who was poking the log in the fire, she didn’t seem to care that her son was going out in the darkness on Christmas night.

Teagan told himself repeatedly that Katelyn would revel in the idea that Starla was pregnant, or thought she was, and when he pretended that he was the one who had been messaging her, well, he was sure Katelyn would forgive him. She’d see him as more than the boy next door. She’d see him as a true friend, and maybe, he hoped, as something more.

The only cars in the alleyway were Harper’s and Sandra’s; the grandparents had come and gone. A dog barked from the woods, and Teagan could hear one of the neighbors from across the road calling a cat.

“Here, kitty, kitty,” the woman’s voice said in a voice that easily carried over the cold Port Gamble night.

Maybe some coyote found your stupid cat, Teagan thought.

Teagan was grateful for the gloves as he climbed hand over hand up the trellis, hoping that the ancient wood structure would still support his wiry frame. He wasn’t afraid of heights, but he was afraid of falling, making a lot of noise and looking like an idiot.

He hoisted himself up and worked his way over to Katelyn’s window, the only one of several on the second floor emitting any light. It was ajar. He pushed it, and in a second, was inside.

Her room. Katelyn’s beautiful, almost magical room. He’d never been in there before—except in his imagination when he pictured her typing answers to his messages. That was a fantasy. That was a dream. This was all very, very real. It smelled like Katelyn—pretty, light,