Page 134 of Always Us

She smiles and puts the box back. “Those generic ones always leak. I’ll try these.” She puts a box in the cart.

“Seriously?” I shake my head at her. “One box?”

“Sorry.” She giggles and adds another box.

I sigh and grab three more boxes and throw them in the cart. Jade’s laughing.

We make our way through the store, filling the cart with baby clothes, baby food, a few toys, the portable crib, and some food and clothes for Sara. I fill the trunk of her car with as much as I can fit in there and put the rest of the stuff in my car. Then we get a pizza and go back to our place.

I really needed to study for finals tonight, but this was more important. We had to get Sara and Caleb out of that place. And as for that fake foundation I told Sara about? I’ve decided to make it real. I’m going to give money anonymously to people like Sara, who work hard but still need a little help to pay their bills. It felt good to do that for her and Caleb, and I know there are a lot more people out there who are just like her.

The next morning, Sara leaves early for work and takes Caleb to day care. Jade left, too, because she has a final this morning at eight.

Jade’s picking Sara up during Sara’s lunch break and they’re going to see if they can find an apartment. They went online last night and found one that looks decent and is in a better part of town and doesn’t cost too much. It’s the middle of the month so I’m not sure if they’ll let her move in right away, but there’s no way she’s staying at her current apartment over Christmas. I’m sure Alex would let her stay with him or she can stay here. She’d have the place to herself while Jade and I are gone.

My next final isn’t for an hour so I call my dad to see if he’s around.

“Yes, Garret.” He sounds rushed.

“Can you talk? It’s important.”

“Just a minute.” I hear him telling someone to leave and the door closing. “Okay, go ahead.”

“Kiefer showed up on campus yesterday. I tried to get him to leave but he wouldn’t. He followed me all the way to the parking lot.”

“Garret, if someone was following him and saw him talking to you—”

“There was nobody around. I checked.”

“They don’t stand out in plain sight. You wouldn’t know if they were there.”

“Well, what was I supposed to do? Kiefer wouldn’t leave me alone. And then he told me this stuff about Harper and—”

“Garret, I know Harper is your friend but you can’t let your feelings get in the way of your safety.”

“Yeah, I got it. I’ll stay out of it.”

“So what was the purpose of Kiefer’s visit?”

“He told me he doesn’t want to join. He wanted me to ask you for help. He thinks you can get him out of this.”

“I can’t. It’s too late now.”

“I thought the initiation isn’t until January.”

“Yes, but this process started months ago and Kiefer’s been given information only members are allowed to have. He doesn’t know everything, but he knows more than he should as an outsider.”

“If he doesn’t agree to be a member, what do you think they’ll do to him?”

“I don’t know. This is all new territory for us, accepting outsiders like this. He’ll face punishment of some kind. But that’s not your concern, so I don’t want you asking about it and I don’t want you talking to Kiefer. If he shows up there again, just walk away.” He pauses and I hear him typing on his computer. “Oh, I wanted to tell you that I just signed the paperwork for the divorce.”

“Really? I thought you two would spend months fighting over everything.”

“We’d already discussed the terms, so there was nothing left to fight over.”

“What about Lilly?”

“I’m getting full custody.”

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