Page 117 of Trust Me

He tells her about his family’s tradition.

“Grilled cheese is one of my favorites!”

He pulls out a chair for her to sit. And then, he does the unthinkable, and pulls out a chair for me. I hesitate because this feels too right. It’s wrong though.

“Are you going to sit, Aunt Ry?” Eve’s sweet voice invades my thoughts.

I nod. “Thank you,” I tell Kyle as I sit.

He resumes the seat directly across from me.

We eat dinners of delicious grilled cheese and tomato soup while Kyle tells Eve about all of the times when he screwed up in the kitchen when his mother tried to teach him to cook.

CHAPTER28

Kyle

“Set the meeting for tomorrow at ten a.m.,” I tell the person on the other end of the phone.

“Absolutely, Mr. Townsend. Will you be in attendance as well?” the Vice Principal of Excelor Academy asks me.

I peer down the hall, deliberating.

“Yes.”

“Our staff will be ready.”

With his assurance, I hang up the phone. Excelor Academy is the most prestigious private school in the state. Myself, my siblings, and all of my cousins attended the school from elementary level through high school.

Now, so will Eve.

I overheard part of her conversation with Riley before they came back up the hall. There’s no way in hell she’s going back to that boarding school. I don’t give a shit how accomplished it is. Excelor is just as good, and she’ll be closer to home. Which is what she needs.

With that settled, I start down to the bedroom where Riley is to tell her about the appointment. I pause in the doorway of the bedroom. She’s sitting on the bed, her back facing me, her shoulders curved inwards. Riley looks utterly defeated.

I enter and quietly close the door before making my way over to her. I sit so close that our thighs touch. She doesn’t move.

In her hand is a photo of her and Eve. Eve looks no older than four or five years old, and all around her mouth is melted ice cream. She’s holding the cone up for the camera. Riley’s smile is wide as she takes the selfie of them.

“This was the day I knew she had to come with me,” Riley starts talking.

I reach over and take the photo from her hands.

“How old is she here?”

“Five and a half. She was little for her age.” Riley laughs a little, but it’s strained. “She would proudly announce her age to anyone who asked. I’d only met her two weeks earlier.”

“How is that possible?”

Riley snorts. She turns to me, her face a mask of seriousness. “You know what I am. I’m a con artist, the daughter of a con artist, the sister of a con artist. Wallace Jr. learned everything he knows from our father. I left my father the day I turned eighteen. That’s how I ended up at a homeless shelter.

“Wallace Jr. is ten years older than me. I only heard from him when he needed something. I met Eve’s mom once. She was one of my brother’s victims. She was the daughter of a wealthy, Italian businessman. He’d left all of his estate to her. But she didn’t exactly fit the L.A. look. Wallace saw her as lonely. He got her to fall for him.”

Riley looks away, lowering her eyelids, shielding her gaze from me. I want to cup her face, to make her look at me when she’s speaking. I want to see every emotion in those damn eyes. But I keep my hands where they are.

“She had a heart condition Wallace didn’t know about. It worsened when she got pregnant. But by then it’d been a few years and Wallace had completely drained her account. She died shortly after Eve was born, too much strain on her heart. Wallace Jr. raised Eve for the first five years of her life.

“I never saw him. He was too busy finding other victims and using Eve to help him. But he eventually made his way back to L.A. He called me out of the blue one day. I had just gotten out of the homeless shelter a month earlier. I had a tiny apartment with a roommate. I met up with him, and that’s when he introduced me to my niece.”

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