Torn. Part 7

This guy? In my house? The thought made me panicky. Had I left any underwear out? Bras drying on the shower rod? That issue of Cosmo with the article about seven ways to drive your man wild?

Colin pulled the gun out of the glove compartment and tucked it under his s.h.i.+rt again. He wore some kind of holster, the black leather at the small of his back flas.h.i.+ng into view momentarily.

"Keys?" He brushed past me toward the front steps.

I pulled the jumble of keys out of my bag, and he plucked them out of my hand.

"Who else has a set?" He ignored my squeak of protest as he let himself in.

"Me. Mom. Uncle Billy, probably." I paused. "Verity."

He looked around, his body blocking my view of the living room. "New locks. Alarm system," he muttered as he prowled through the house. "Exits?"

"Well, the front door. You came in there, so you knew that one, obviously. . . ." I trailed off as he turned to me and frowned, making a "get-on-with-it" motion with his hand. "There's a back door through the kitchen. We don't need an alarm system. We barely have anything worth stealing."

"You want me to move in?"

My toe caught on the faded Oriental rug. "No!"

"Then you're getting an alarm." He continued his tour through the house as if I wasn't there, examining windows and shaking his head in obvious disappointment.

I tried to see my home through his eyes, an unsettling feeling. I'd lived here since I was born. The rooms were so familiar I could walk through them in the dark without banging into the furniture-quite a feat for a klutz like me. I didn't even see it anymore, really. Nothing here ever changed. I trailed behind him and fingered the hairline crack in one of the windows.

The house was clean, of course. My mom was h.e.l.l on dust bunnies. School pictures of me were lined up precisely above the fireplace we never used. They never varied-school uniform, brown hair held back in a ponytail or headband, the fake smile and slight head tilt everyone does. There was only one of my father, pushed toward the back. In it, he held me on his lap as we went down a slide at the park. I was about three, and my expression was half terror, half glee.

Colin glanced at the pictures briefly, then back at me. "Your old man?"

I nodded. He looked again, more closely. "You look like him, a little. Same eyes."

That's where the similarity ended, I wanted to a.s.sure him. But he'd moved on already, and I tilted the picture toward me, seeing it for the first time in years. My face was toddler round, my eyes scrunched up, but my dad's were perfectly visible, hazel colored and wide set. I'd never spotted the resemblance before.

Our couch had seen better days, the worn spots on the faded blue brocade carefully hidden by my great-grandmother's needlepoint pillows and the neatly folded yellow afghan my mother knitted when I was a baby.

Along one wall were bookshelves filled with ancient encyclopedias, books about Ireland, back issues of National Geographic, and cookbooks galore, crowding around the TV. Potted plants and African violets were tucked in at careful intervals.

It was all ruthlessly neat and just this side of shabby, and I wondered what Colin thought of it. His careful inventory of the house seemed to note every detail-nothing escaped his attention-but other than his comment about the picture, he had no outward reaction.

He walked back to the kitchen, taking in the Formica counters so thoroughly scrubbed they'd lost their s.h.i.+ne, the cross-st.i.tch sampler hanging over the kitchen table, and the small font of holy water next to the back door.

"Do you want something to drink?" I asked, moving to the fridge. "We've got water, lemonade . . . iced tea . . . milk? Diet c.o.ke?"

He shook his head no and continued prowling the room. He stepped out the back door onto the screened porch, with its ancient wicker furniture and porch swing. It was my favorite place in the house. The ceiling was sky blue, the floor a glossy green. Verity and I had painted it ourselves the summer before high school. Even with just a single box fan instead of air-conditioning, it was cool and restful. I could still see Verity there, stretched out across the swing, one leg hooked over the back of the seat and the other rocking her gently. She'd be reading the latest issue of People, dissecting celebrity haircuts and which former child star had publicly melted down this week. The pain was so sudden and fierce I had to grab the door frame for support, fighting to get the tears under control.

After a few minutes, Colin returned.

"Your room upstairs?" Without waiting for an answer, he headed for the staircase.

I let go of the door. "Yes. But . . . wait. Can you wait a minute?"

"A minute," he said, but I was already das.h.i.+ng past him, my sandals slapping against the wood.

I flung open the door. For seventeen years, my mother had warned me to keep my room picked up in case someone dropped by, and I'd ignored her. Now, as she predicted, my room looked like a tornado had hit.

I scooped up armfuls of clothing and shoved them into my closet, not caring if they were dirty or clean, then leaned against the closet door until it finally clicked shut. I kicked the incriminating pile of Cosmo and Teen Vogue under my bed, swept all of the makeup and hair doodads and zit cream into an open drawer with my good arm, and hastily tugged up my pink and green quilt.

"Mo!" Colin called. "Jesus, kid. Are you repainting up there?" His feet were heavy on the stairs.

"Just a second!" On my nightstand was Bogart, my childhood teddy bear with the fur rubbed off and one eye missing. No wonder he thought I was a kid. With a silent apology, I stuffed poor Bogart behind my pillow and settled back on the bed, trying to look nonchalant.

Colin filled up the doorway, and when he stepped into the room, everything looked small and toylike. The white and gilt bedroom set that had been my mom's seemed spindly and flimsy next to his solid, masculine presence.

He checked the window latch, studying the view.

"You sneak out a lot?"

"What? No!" For once, I was telling the truth.

"Let's keep it that way. Give me your cell." He stretched out a hand toward me expectantly.

So much for a getting-to-know-you chat. I sighed. The first nonrelated guy in my bedroom in seventeen years, and all I wanted was for him to leave.

He flipped open the phone and started keying in numbers. "What time do you leave for school?"

"Quarter to seven." I antic.i.p.ated his next question. "I get out at three, but there's usually stuff going on afterward. It's kind of unpredictable."

He frowned at the phone and shrugged. "Fine. I'll be at the school at three. Don't leave the building until you see me. Anything changes, you call." He turned the phone to face me. "See? Speed dial one."

"That was-" Verity. I shut my mouth with an audible snap.

How could it be so easy to erase her? I sank back down on the bed, my breath wheezing in my chest.

Colin held the phone out, but I waved at the desk and kept my face turned away from him.

I didn't need to bother hiding my reaction, though. He continued to ignore me, studying the room. "Anything changes, you call. Anything weird, you call. If there's trouble, if you need help-"

"I get it. What if you're on a job, though?"

He finally looked at me. "You are my job."

"What about-"

"I'll go back to building when we decide you're safe."

"Well, I've decided."

He chuckled, the sound low and warm. "Not for you to decide, kid."

Okay, enough. "Stop calling me kid!" He was infuriating-the phone, and the porch, how he hadn't even noticed how special it was, and the way he thought he could just decide for me what was safe and what wasn't. Like I didn't have enough people in my life doing that already? But explaining would take energy I didn't have. The stupid nickname was easier to fight over. Besides, nothing about my life these days was remotely childlike.

He paused, looked at me squarely. "Sorry."

It seemed genuine, but I didn't feel any better. The problem wasn't just that having a babysitter-even one like Colin, all dangerous, capable, and easy on the eyes-was a totally humiliating way to start senior year. Finding out who killed Verity was going to be almost impossible without tipping him off, and he'd turn around and tell Uncle Billy.

"So you're supposed to tell my uncle everything I do, huh?" I fiddled with the walnut jewelry box on my dresser, neatening the trinkets cluttering the top. It was an effort not to stare at the hamper, where I'd buried the snow globe.

"I'm supposed to protect you."

"So the spying's a bonus?"

"Are you trying to hide something?"

The opposite, actually. I'm trying to find something. I turned and gave Colin my best Sunday smile, dutiful and bland and a credit to my mother. "Do I look like my life is superinteresting? Up until last week, I had a very boring life." I paused, thinking back to my perfectly uneventful summer. "I miss it."

The collage on the wall, a gift from Verity for my sixteenth birthday, caught his gaze. He studied it with the same intensity he did everything else. I was relieved to have his focus off me. It was easier to breathe.

"I'm sorry about your friend," he said.

"Do you think the police will find her killers?"

His eyes held mine for a moment more, and then broke away, taking in the room. He hesitated for a moment, looking back at the collage. There was a picture of Verity and me at one of our Friday sleepovers, hair and makeup to the nines, wearing ratty T-s.h.i.+rts and flannel pajama pants. Verity vamped for the camera, cheeks sucked in, lips in a pinup girl pout, eyes laughing at the ridiculousness of it all. We were twelve, maybe thirteen, and behind the goofiness, Verity was already showing hints of how gorgeous she'd be in a few years. I held the same pose, and looked like a little girl playing dress-up.

"They'll try," he said. "Your uncle's working on it."

I started to ask about Uncle Billy, about why everyone was falling over themselves to prove he wasn't involved when the idea was ludicrous to begin with. Then I thought better of it and concentrated on untangling the chain of a necklace.

"Do you have a boyfriend?" he asked.

I dropped the jewelry. "No. I mean, I've had boyfriends. Dates, anyway. I'm not a nun. But they weren't serious, either." I was babbling. Colin raised an eyebrow and watched, eyes dark and amused. "I'm not really good at that sort of thing. Dating. And high school boys are . . . well, you were one, right? You know what they're like. They're . . ."

He held up his hand. "No was enough."

"Oh."

He checked the room one last time and headed out toward the landing. I trailed after him.

"School stuff, the diner. Newspaper stuff," he said over his shoulder. "Anything else you're up to?"

I swallowed and studied the line where the baseboard met the wall. "Nope. Very boring. How about you? Babysitting, carpentry, anything else? Girlfriend?"

He jiggled the latch on the bathroom window and started back down the stairs. The inspection was over. "No."

"You don't have to stick around, you know. I'm not going anywhere tonight."

His eyes, iron gray, crinkled a tiny bit at the corners. "You trying to get rid of me? Until the alarm's installed, I stay here. You want me in the truck or the living room?"

"Truck," I said. Nothing good could come from him staying that close by. The idea made my stomach pitch. "Definitely the truck."

"Okay. See you in the morning."

I stared as he jogged down the wide cement steps and back to the truck. He seemed to settle in, leaning the seat back and pulling out the Steinbeck I'd seen earlier.

Great. It was enough to make a girl claustrophobic.

I went back to my room. Colin's truck was directly in front of my window, and as I peered out, he raised one hand in greeting, his eyes never seeming to move from the book.

If he was watching the front, I reasoned, he couldn't see the back. I'd avoided the porch since the attack. It was too hard, and too lonely, and increased my mother's opportunities to hover. It wasn't a refuge anymore, but a grim reminder. I stepped onto the worn floorboards anyway, careful not to look at the jumble of magazines and memories scattered around the room. After easing the screen door shut behind me, I slipped into the alley behind our house, not even sure where I was headed. All I wanted was to be out of Colin's view and away from all the ghosts in my house.

My feet had barely touched the street when my cell rang, unnaturally loud in the still, humid afternoon.

"h.e.l.lo?"

"Tell me again how you're not trying to get rid of me?" Colin's voice seemed more amused than irritated. Which was fine. I was irritated enough for both of us.

"How did you . . ."

"Next time, pull the shades first. Better yet, let's not have a next time."

Yeah. Colin was going to be a problem.

CHAPTER 8.

Stomping past Colin to my bedroom and slamming the door was very satisfying-for all of five seconds. Then I realized I was stuck in my room for the rest of the night. There was nothing to do but study Verity's snow globe.

Under the light of my desk lamp, the dome was perfectly smooth-no seams where it had been cut open, no holes near the base where the water had been drained out and refilled. I shook it again. It must have had snow once, right?

So many secrets. So many lies. I'd always thought there was a difference between the two, but now they seemed to blur into each other. Why hadn't Verity told me the truth about New Orleans? It was clear she'd only been giving me the tourist's version. And the grinning, sloppily painted harlequin wasn't ready to give me any answers.

I could hear my mother as she came up the stairs, her voice cheerful on the surface, but more clipped than usual.

"Mo? Are you up here?"

I shoved the snow globe into my bag. Mom opened the door, not bothering to knock. She was still wearing her usual workday outfit, a knee-length khaki skirt, a cotton blouse sprigged with blue and white flowers, sensible Aerosoles flats. She'd worked the early s.h.i.+ft and come home in time to check my homework and start dinner for as long as I could remember. I wasn't sure when the pattern had changed from routine to suffocating.

"We have a guest."

"He's not a guest. He works for Uncle Billy."

Her mouth thinned. "That young man is here as a favor to me. Which makes him a guest."

With my foot, I nudged the bag farther under the desk. I considered pointing out that a favor wasn't something you typically paid for, but it wasn't worth the fight. When it came to my mom, not many things were.