Page 8 of Love Over Time

“I need to see my sister. Could you help with that? For some reason, her visitation privileges were revoked or something.”

“You got it, doll. Give me an hour. Just text me the info.”

“Thank you, darling. You’re the best. Ciao.” I hung up.

Three hours later I was at the state penitentiary in Phoenix, holding a special pass to see Lisa. I’d even had time to stop by a dealership and talk the sales guy into letting me test-drive a Tesla for a few days.

I sat in the beat-up chair facing the glass panel, waiting for Lisa to appear on the other side. The last time I’d visited her was ten years ago. I’d just turned fifteen. After five years of bouncing around in the system, I’d decided to run away to Paris. Lisa had been twenty-three at the time and fully supportive of my crazy decision. She’d been at the peak of her youth, wasting away in a jail cell.

That day she’d asked me to never come back to this place. “Go enjoy life. For the both of us. Write to me every day,” she’d said.

Over the years we wrote letters, but after a while she stopped writing back. I kept at it for a few more years and eventually gave up too. I swallowed my tears and wiped my nose. We should’ve stuck together. She was the only family I had left. It wasn’t fair that she’d spent fifteen years of her life paying for something she didn’t do.

I glanced up as she appeared on the other side of the glass, looking as if she’d aged thirty years. We burst into tears. Neither one of us had the strength to pretend anymore. We sat there and cried for what felt like hours. I mouthed anI’m sorry, and she shook her head.

She pointed at her phone and picked it up. I did the same. “Please no apologies. And no more tears,” she said.

“Done.” I wiped both cheeks with the back of my hand, forcing a small laugh.

“How’s the hotel? Did you get in the tunnels?”

My stomach hit the nasty jail floor. “Paradise Creek is not what we remembered. It’s not what it was when we were kids. The hotel is in ruins. The door is gone.”

“What? That can’t be. How is that possible? It’s only been…”

I winced. More tears scurried down my face. “I know a very good lawyer. Top notch from New York, not the sorry excuse for a man the state appointed you. He can get you out. We can go away together. Remember how we always talked about moving to Paris? We could do it now. I have a place there.” Lisa shook her head. “No,” I said. “Listen, I have money now. We can go anywhere we want. Be a family.”

I’d spent years doing job after job, saving my money so that one day we could afford a good lawyer to get Lisa out of jail. Then I’d met Dom Moretti on my last con, and I knew Lisa’s time had come. Of course, she had to beat me to the punch. A few weeks back, she’d sent me a letter asking for two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. I lived well, but I didn’t have that kind of cash just lying around.

Loans were out of the question. Con artist wasn’t really a profession banks were impressed with. To say I’d had to lie, steal, and cheat to get the money we needed was an understatement. I’d been pissed when Lisa finally told me what the money was really for. She hadn’t used the money to hire a lawyer but to buy a boutique hotel in our hometown. I’d always thought that once we had money, all our problems would be solved. But I was wrong. I had money, influential friends, but nothing had changed. My only family was still in this hellhole.

Lisa shook her head again, lips pursed, and her eyes full of longing. “I’ve wasted my life in here. When I leave, I want everyone to know that I was innocent. I don’t want some fancy lawyer to prove I’ve done my time. I want to prove my innocence. I want to go home with my head held high. I want Mrs. Blaine to bring me a casserole and tell me how sorry she is for what happened to us. For how mean she was to us. I don’t want Paris. I want Paradise Creek. Please. The proof we need is in that tunnel. Find it. Tell me you’ll do it.”

My heart twisted and knotted in my chest. I hadn’t considered what all this meant for Lisa. She hadn’t spent the last fifteen years wondering what it’d be like to be out in the world. Her entire plan wasn’t to leave this place. She wanted true freedom, the freedom to go home and be accepted again. The way we’d been when our parents were still alive. The Morrow girls weren’t bad seeds. We’d just been dealt pretty fucked-up cards when we were young. The town had to know that. Lisa was right. Her plan was the only plan. Fuck her parole hearing.

I nodded, leaning forward in my seat. “I will do this for you. I will find the tunnel again and get the evidence you need. I promise.”

Her eyes filled with tears. “We’re going home, sister.”

We were two women on a mission. Yeah, it had taken us a long-ass time to get here, but we were ready to get our lives back.

I’m sorry, Henry. Whether you want it or not, you’ve got yourself a roommate.

The Cavalier Hotel was mine as much as his. Though I still had to deal with the small issue of me agreeing to sell him my half of the property. No, we hadn’t signed any agreement papers or shaken on it, but there was a code amongst thieves—or thief and poker player. Henry and I understood that well. If I wanted to earn his trust—and I needed to earn his trust so he could help me with my blocked-tunnel situation—I had to honor our deal. According to said deal, he had to deliver payment in two days. Right. All I had to do was make sure he didn’t get the money he needed.

Chapter Four

The Great Wall

Henry

I shut off the water, stepped out of the shower, and grabbed a towel off the rack on the way out the bathroom. This place was coming along just fine. Who knew? Maybe after all this was over, I could make a home here and restore this place to its former glory, the way it had been when I was little. But first, I needed to get Nikki’s money. She needed to be out of my life, the sooner the better. I rubbed the palm of my hand on my cheek, feeling the clean-shaven skin. Bankers liked that sort of thing, and I needed them to like me. They were my last hope.

I donned a white, collared shirt and dress pants. Running a hand through my hair to comb it back, I sat on the bed and ignored the empty feeling in my stomach. Yesterday, after Nikki had left, the hotel had gone eerily quiet. My heart sank as I watched her leave. Heck, my entire world sank all over again, just as it had the first time she left me ten years ago.

She had changed her name and her clothes, but it was her. I’d been so distracted by all that long blonde hair and her tight jeans I hadn’t recognized her out on the construction site. Not until I had her in my arms again, clinging to me as she’d done that day in the tunnels. Dammit. Why was she back? Why now?

No, she wasn’t back, and to make sure it stayed that way, I needed to find two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. I stood and headed for the door. The hotel would be all mine soon, and then I could continue digging to find the tunnel and reclaim what my uncle had stolen from me. I let the small burn in my stomach remind me why I’d returned. After all these years, my uncle thought he’d won, sitting in the mayor’s office as if he owned this town. But this war wasn’t over. I wasn’t the gullible, stupid kid he’d easily manipulated. Jonathan Cavalier would pay for everything he’d done to my family.

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