Page 50 of Everyone Is Lying to You
“Willow is here. Downstairs. The others are out in the fields with Kiki. I told everyone you’re working.”
I hated that she was lying for me.
It had to end. But I already knew that. Plans had already been made to get us all out from under his grip, but I worried it wouldn’t be enough. I needed more help to be able to end things once and for all.
Chapter Fourteen
Lizzie
I’m not okay.
It’s the first question Olivia asks me when she meets me in the gas station parking lot. She was apparently close to the ranch, circling around and trying to find me. By the time I was able to power my phone on and see all of her messages she’d driven back out this way and now we’re sitting in the front seat of my rental car.
“Are you okay?” she asks again, reaching over to pat my hand.
I shake my head. “Who the hell was in that house with me?”
“Well, they probably think the same about you. If they know you were in there at all. Let’s not forget you were trespassing.”
“I had a key.”
“Semantics.”
“I think they saw me.”
“Describe the truck again.”
“Pickup truck. Huge. Massive tires. Sparkling white.”
“Sounds like the kind of asshole truck every asshole guy around here drives. I’ve always said I think the size of a man’s truck must inversely correlate to his dick size.”
Olivia manages to be wry and funny even in the worst of times and I can see why Bex must like her. Today she’s in a yellow suit and somehow her hair now matches it perfectly again. I reach over to touch a strand. I can’t help myself. She bats my hand away.
“Never touch a Black woman’s hair. Where were you raised?”
“Sorry. Wasn’t this purple before?”
“They’re clip-ins. Just a little bit of flair to make my day more exciting. Don’t underestimate flair. So what did you find in that big gorgeous monstrosity of a house?”
I hesitate, unsure how much to trust her. Does she know about the shadow house? She must. Maybe she even helped Bex plan and construct it. But I can’t be sure. Instead, I turn the tables slightly and ask her a question.
“What do you know about Gray and Rebecca’s relationship?”
She doesn’t miss a beat with her answer. “I know that Gray Sommers was a bona fide asshole who wanted to control his wife and her business. I know that the ways he did that were toxic and often abusive. What do you know?”
Touché.
I gnaw on my lower lip as I pull the Polaroids from my bag.
“Asshole, indeed,” I say.
I wait for surprise to flicker across Olivia’s face as she glances at the photos, but it doesn’t. She knew, or she assumed. But from the curiosity in her gaze, I don’t think she’s seen these before. I don’t think anyone but Bex has seen these until now. Until me.
“One of these is much older,” she says.
“Fourteen years.”
“Where were they in the house? Just sitting around? Wouldn’t the police have found them?”
