Page 15 of Justice II

Justice could hate me forever, but I wasn’t done fighting for them.

I climbed behind the wheel and drove away before I could run back to the door.

I made it about ten minutes away, before saliva flooded my mouth. I pulled onto the shoulder, shoved the door open and leaned out as my lunch came rushing back up.

It had to be my nerves. Storie had been tormenting me for a week, and Justice had just erased me from his life in less than twenty minutes.

Once my stomach calmed down, I rinsed my mouth with the bottle of water in my cupholder. Then I drove to the only place I had left.

The downstairs lights were still on when I pulled up to Aubrey’s house. I could hear Jodi and Chrissy screaming over each other before I even reached the door. They were the only real family I had left.

I dragged my suitcase to the front step and rang the bell.

Aubrey opened the door wearing a T-shirt and leggings. Her smile disappeared when she saw my face. Then she looked down at my suitcase.

“Skye, what happened?”

“The jig is up. Just call me Melody now. Because he knows.”

My suitcase tipped over as Aubrey reached for me. Without fighting it, I fell into her arms and bawled against her shoulder.

What was I gonna do next?

6

Justice

What the hell did I do? How could I make such a grave mistake by hiring this stranger and bringing her into my home without fully vetting her? I trusted that damn agency to do a background check, but I should’ve known better.

And what was that shit about trying to blame Storie for Monica’s death and Midnite’s? She was crazier than I thought. I never even saw that shit coming.

Embarrassment was an understatement. I was not supposed to get played like this. I’d been in the game too long to get the wool pulled over my eyes, yet here I was. She made a fool of me.

The crazy thing was, I felt terrible about kicking her out. Guilt tugged at my heartstrings as I forced her away from my home. I still felt bonded and drawn to her. I still wanted her. But who did I want? Skye? Melody? Who the fuck was she really? Was it all just a lie?

The thoughts were coming in from every direction, and I couldn’t make heads or tails of them. I was stunned that I allowed myself to get played like this. Then there was that shit about Storie.

Baby girl definitely had her issues, but a murderer? Killing her sister’s horse? That was out of the question.

Or was it?

Was Storie capable of that shit? Nah. She was only fifteen and still mourning the loss of her mother.

Skye, Melody or whoever the fuck she was, was just a troubled woman who got caught in a lie. Rather than own up to her bullshit, she slandered a little girl.

I went to the kitchen and took a shot of Banks Reserve while I contemplated talking to the girls.

As I sipped the strong liquor, I heard Dream’s feet pitter patter down the hall to Storie’s room. I laughed thinking that maybe Rita kicked her out.

Once the liquor settled into my bloodstream I made my way upstairs to Storie’s room, where Dream was sitting on the floor coloring. Storie was leaning back on her bed, reading The Bad Seed by William March. I remembered seeing that movie when I was a kid. I watched it with Rita, but the book was strange.

“Where’d you get that?” I asked Storie.

“The school library. It was written so long ago, and I have to reread some of the sentences over and over. They spoke funny back then,” she laughed.

“What made you want to read it?”

“Rita mentioned it one day,” she replied while continuing to flip through the pages.