Rebel Revenge: Chapter 28

I got home from my shift at Psychos just after one in the morning to find Kian’s truck missing from its usual spot at the side of the house. I instantly wondered if he was with a woman and then berated myself over the twinge of jealousy that panged inside me at the thought.

Vaughn’s bike and his dad’s car were both there, though the house was dark, so he was likely asleep. I let myself in quietly and trudged up the stairs, looking forward to bed.

Vaughn’s room was dark and empty, the door open enough that I could see straight in at his bed. There was no annoyingly attractive stepbrother inside it.

But a soft light came from beneath the door of his father’s room.

The one room of the house I thought none of us had entered since it had happened.

I hadn’t been ready to go through my mom’s things, and I’d thought Vaughn wasn’t either. He hadn’t brought it up. I’d clearly been stupid to think it was something we should have done together.

I twisted the handle on the door and let myself in.

Vaughn looked up when I entered, and for half a second, I thought I saw guilt flash in his eyes. But then it cleared and changed into something colder. Harder.

“What are you doing in here at one in the morning?” I asked, rubbing my bare arms in the drafty house. I caught sight of something in his hand and gasped, storming over to take it from him. “What are you doing with that? It was my mom’s.”

I ran my fingers over the familiar necklace. It was one I’d bought her not long after I first started working at Psychos a decade ago. It had been her birthday, and I’d been excited to finally be able to buy her a proper gift. Something nice, though in hindsight, I realized the eighty bucks I’d spent on it probably didn’t actually qualify as something precious.

But she’d acted like it had been.

“I think you were right about Kian.” Vaughn’s voice was hoarse.

I racked my brain, trying to think what he was referring to. “Unless you’re talking about the fact he definitely should have gone with the pig costume, you’re going to have to explain better.”

Vaughn turned around a framed photo on his lap.

It was of Mom and Kian, the two of them dressed to the nines, faces pressed together, both beaming at the camera.

“I found it on a shelf in her side of the wardrobe.”

That was surprising. It seemed a bit odd that she would have a framed photo of her and another man in her bedroom. But I shrugged it off. “It’s hardly the two of them writhing around in bed naked together, Vaughn. Men and women can be friends, you know?”

He side-eyed me. “Like us?”

I scoffed, while heat threatened behind my cheeks. “We’re barely acquaintances. I don’t see any photos of us together in my bedroom.”

“I watched a man eat your pussy ’til you came all over his face.”

I glared at him. “Keep bringing that up, and I’ll assume you were jealous.”

“I was.”

Oh, sweet Jesus. I turned around before he could notice the blush creeping across my cheeks. “That has nothing to do with Kian and my mom.”

He pointed to the bed and the array of photos on top of it. “They’re all variations of your mom, my dad, and Kian.”

“He does work here.”

“You love your friends at Psychos, right? You said they were your family.”

“They are.”

“How many photos of them do you have printed out in your room?”

There was one of me, Bliss, and Nash. But that was all. There definitely wasn’t anywhere near the number of photos Vaughn currently had spread out on the bed. I swallowed, the desire to protect my mom still strong. “I haven’t finished unpacking yet.”

“Bullshit. You see my point. This is weird.”

“Or you’re jealous.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Already told you I was.”

I wondered if he’d been drinking or if it was the late hour that had his tongue loosening. “Not about that.” I pointed at a photo of Kian and Bart. “Vaughn, there’s nothing in these photos that indicates anything weird going on. Why would Mom frame a photo of her and her lover and keep it in her bedroom for her husband to find? Why would there be just as many photos of Kian and your dad? Were they having an affair too?”

“Kian’s bi.”

“You don’t say. Picked up on that the day I met him. My point still stands. Just because he’s bi, doesn’t mean they were having some sort of polyamorous relationship.” I picked up a photo of all three of them. Kian was holding some sort of award, and my mom and Bart stood either side like proud parents. “This looks like a family.”

A twinge of pain flashed across Vaughn’s face, and his shoulders slumped. “He replaced me with Kian. I was the asshole son who ran off to another state and never came back. So he found someone to take my place.”

I put my hand on his arm. “Or, your dad was just a good guy. He loved you even if you were a Douchey McDoucheface, but maybe he saw Kian needed someone to love him too. If he’s lived in this house since you two were boys, he probably thought of Kian as a son even before his dad died. And probably before you left.”

Vaughn pushed to his feet and stalked across the other side of the room, leaning on the wall. He rubbed at his forehead, eyes all squinty like he was developing a headache. “Fuck. You’re right. I’m being a paranoid prick.” His gaze met mine. “Sorry for implying your mom wasn’t being faithful. That was a dick move.” He dropped his gaze to the floor. “I don’t know why I’m like this. I can’t just fucking trust people. I always assume the worst. I hate that I do that.”

I bit my lip. The man looked miserable. I hated that. I knew all too well how bad it felt and I couldn’t handle watching anyone else go through it without trying to help. It was why I’d always been there for my mom, when any other sane person would have given up and left her to lie in the bed she’d made for herself. “Vaughn.”

“Yeah?”

“At the risk of potentially becoming friends, can I hug you?”

He cocked his head to one side. “What on earth for?”

“Has anyone even hugged you since your dad died? I saw your stepdad consoling your mom. Your wife isn’t here. You and Kian have some weird history thing going on where you can barely be in the same room as each other. I just thought maybe you needed a hug.”

“You’re tiny. Your hugs are probably the equivalent of a mouse trying to hug an elephant.”

My mouth dropped open at the audacity. “I’ll have you know I give BEAR hugs, Vaughn. Big, grizzly, king-of-the-wilderness type of hugs. I’ll show you.”

I strode toward him, arms out.

He dodged. “No, thanks.”

I kept going. “No, you definitely want a hug. I can see it in your eyes.”

He shook his head, but a smile was pulling at the edges of his mouth. “No. I definitely do not.”

“Let me hug you, Vaughn.”

“Get away from me, Roach. I don’t hug.” He edged his way around the room like I was a wild animal ready to strike at any moment, keeping the bed between us.

But he’d lied. He’d hugged me in the courthouse after my mom had died. I was sure he needed the favor returned right now. “You will take my cuddles and love them!” I launched onto the bed and ran across it, jumping off on his side and cutting off his path of escape.

I wrapped my arms around his middle and squeezed him tight.

He held his arms out at the sides, stiff and uncomfortable. “What is happening right now?”

“It’s called affection, Vaughn. Learn to like it.”

Slowly, the stiffness went out of him, and his arms came tentatively around me.

I grinned triumphantly into his chest. “See? Not so bad, is it?”

“You’re a pipsqueak.”

“Maybe so, but my hugs are good.”

He mumbled something.

“What was that?” I teased. “Did I hear you say ‘You’re so warm and cuddly, Rebel. I do indeed declare you the Saint View Snuggler!’”

“That’s not a thing,” he grumbled.

I laughed.

But I did notice neither of us let go and this hug was dragging on a long time. His arms were strong around me. His heat radiated into me, warming my chilled limbs.

Slowly, moment by moment, something changed in the air between us. I became all too aware of just how hard his chest and abs were. How despite our height difference, we fit perfectly together. How I’d been fighting an attraction to him since the moment I’d met him.

“What did you actually say?” I whispered.

His thumb stroked across the back of my neck in a way that was well beyond friendly. “I said I was glad you weren’t flinching away from me anymore. You know, after your attack…”

And just like that, the spell was broken. For a minute I’d felt like my old self, but now Vaughn’s touch was too much. Too tight. Too restrictive.

I went to step away, but he held me tighter. “You don’t have to go. I give in to the power of your arms.” He was joking, good humor in his voice, matching the energy I’d been putting out there before he’d brought up my attack.

Only now, everything felt wrong. The room was too small, the walls closing in. Panic lit up inside me, coursing through my veins. I managed to get my hands up in between us and push hard on his chest. “No!”

He let go of me instantly, watching wide-eyed as I stumbled back toward the door. “Rebel, wait. What’s wrong?”

Tears pricked the backs of my eyes, mostly because of the look on his face. The regret. The confusion. It was all my fault, but I couldn’t say it. Couldn’t voice that in my head I was back there, locked in a room with men intent on hurting me.

I ran to my room and slid the latch on the door before getting in beneath the blankets. Outside, Vaughn called to me, and sometime later, he and Kian had a worried conversation about me not being ready to go back into the lion’s den that weekend.

But it was the complete opposite. I needed to go to this party. I needed to face my enemies head-on.

Because I wasn’t this scared little dormouse, too afraid of my own shadow to even function.

I needed to put an end to the panic. To the fear. I needed to face it. Stare it in the eye and tell it I was Rebel freaking Kemp.

And I would not be intimidated any longer.

I couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned all night, exhausted, but sleep never came.

I was still awake when Kian and Vaughn both got up and showered. Kian knocked quietly on my door and asked if I was okay and did I need anything? I called back in a scratchy voice that I was fine on both counts.

“Call me if that changes, okay? I’m just putting it out there that you do not have to go to this thing tonight. No one will think you’re any less of a badass.”

I smiled into my pillow at that. Maybe that was true, but I would think less of me.

Vaughn didn’t come to my door before they left. I couldn’t blame him. After last night, I wouldn’t have either. I got up and got dressed, but my hands trembled the entire time.

I went into the bathroom to put some makeup on and stared at myself in the mirror. “Get it together. You aren’t a scared little girl. You’ve been through worse.”

I lifted my chin and pulled my shoulders back, but my damn traitorous hands wouldn’t stop. I needed a distraction. Pre-attack, I probably would have called Fang. He was the best at keeping my mind off my problems, with his lips and tongue and cock. But that wasn’t going to work today. He would be here later to go to the party with us, but until then I needed something to do to fill the hours, so I wasn’t constantly thinking about coming face-to-face with the men who’d attacked me.

I could clean, but Kian was a bit of a neat freak and took his duties seriously. Though I had no idea who was even paying him at the moment. I guessed it was Vaughn’s dad’s business. At least I hoped it was. I really didn’t want him picking up after me and Vaughn and scrubbing every surface of the house for free.

I wandered around the big empty kitchen and decided to bake something for when they got back. Maybe a ‘sorry for freaking out on you’ apology cake for Vaughn. I walked into the pantry and searched for a box of cake mix or something similar but came up empty-handed. Of course, because Kian was a great cook who had probably never baked a cake from a box. I trailed a finger along a shelf with four different types of flour and marveled that there were so many options. I didn’t even know there was anything other than all purpose flour.

But that was fine. I was resourceful. How hard could baking a cake be when I had the internet on my side?

With an online radio station blaring punk rock from the early two thousands and a recipe for carrot cake displayed on my phone, I started combining ingredients. Flour. Milk. Butter… They all went into a big mixing bowl, and I stirred them together, feeling like Martha freaking Stewart.

Eggs were next. I yanked open the refrigerator and pulled down the carton of eggs, only to find it suspiciously light. “Ugh,” I groaned to the empty kitchen. “Whyyyyy.”

That had to have been Vaughn, putting an empty container back in. Kian was too OCD about his kitchen. I called Kian.

He picked up on the first ring. “Hey! You’re on speaker in the car. Vaughn’s here. Did you think of something you need?”

“I’m baking a cake.”

“Uh, okay? Did you already burn it and want me to just buy one while we’re out?”

My mouth dropped open. “No, I did not burn it! You ass. You remember how little faith you had in me when you’re orgasming over how freaking good it tastes.”

He chuckled at my fiery, riled-up answer. “But there is a problem, right? Or else you wouldn’t have called.”

He had me there. “There’s no eggs.”

“I know. I’m getting some at the store.”

“How long until you get home?”

“A couple of hours.”

I crinkled my nose at the thought of sitting around for a few hours waiting for him to show. My ADHD knew no such thing. “Is there some sort of egg substitute I can use?”

“In a cake? Sure, if you want it to taste like shit.”

“Not exactly my aim.”

“You could run to the store yourself?”

“Sounds like more effort than I can currently muster. Ooh shit! The oven is smoking!”

“Oh Lord,” Vaughn said in the background with a groan. “Will the house even be standing when we get back? Please don’t burn the place down. I don’t even know if the insurance is still current.”

It was almost a relief to hear him putting me down. It was a lot safer than the way he’d been talking in the early hours of the morning with his arms wrapped around me.

Kian ignored him. “Turn the oven down. Something probably spilled over last time I cooked and is just burning in the bottom. I’ll clean it out later. Then go next door to Kathleen and Paul’s place. Kathleen is the sweetest. She’ll loan you an egg or two. Tell her I’ll replenish her stock when I get home.”

I brightened at that idea. I liked the idea of not having to wait or go down to the store myself. “Thanks, Kian. You’re a good guy. Can’t believe Vaughn ever thought you might have killed our parents.”

“What?” Kian demanded.

Vaughn groaned.

I grinned, enjoying the payback for him dissing my baking skills. “Discuss that amongst yourselves. I’ve got eggs to hunt down.”

I hung up to the tune of their squabbling. I was a shit stirrer, and I knew it, but someone had to get the two of them talking.

At the front door, I slipped on a pair of slides and strode up to the road. It was only then that I realized I hadn’t asked Kian which side sweet old Kathleen with the plentiful supply of eggs lived on. I shrugged and gave it a shot, heading for the house to the left of ours.

The house was quiet as I approached, and I knocked on the door while admiring the shiny black paint and gold door knocker. When our house was officially mine, maybe I could ask Kian to do the same to ours.

From inside, sprightly footsteps thundered downstairs. I frowned at the noise, because Kian had made out that Kathleen and Paul were older. I wasn’t sure how many people in their sixties or seventies could run down a staircase without rolling an ankle or breaking a hip. I was only thirty and I’d had a few dicey moments on the extravagant staircases the houses in this town seemed to favor.

I wasn’t all that surprised when a young woman in her twenties answered the door.

What was surprising was the bikini she had on. “Hey. You aren’t the pizza guy.”

Pizza Guy was gonna be real disappointed he hadn’t been on time if he liked tall, athletic brunettes.

I shook my head. “No. I’m not. I’m guessing you aren’t Kathleen or Paul?”

The woman smiled and pointed back toward my place. “Oh no, you have the wrong house. Kathleen and Paul are two doors down that way.”

“Ah. The other side of my place then. Gotcha. Thank you. Sorry for interrupting.”

I turned to leave, but she grabbed my arm.

“Wait, you live next door? With Kian?”

“I do. Just moved in a few days ago. My mom lived there before she…”

The woman clapped a hand over her mouth. “Oh! You’re Rebel? Miranda’s daughter? Of course you are! You look just like her!” Her face fell. “I really liked your mom. She was a lot of fun.”

Sounded about right. Mom had always liked to party. It seemed like she’d done a lot of it with people who weren’t me. That hurt a bit, but I knew it was me who’d put distance between us. Once I’d been old enough to realize I was the daughter and I shouldn’t have to take care of my mother, it had been easier to draw some boundaries. We’d both benefited from them. She’d had to stand on her own two feet more, and I’d gotten some breathing space.

But after the photos last night, I was really beginning to realize my mom had a whole life I knew almost nothing about.

“I was so sorry to hear about what happened to them.” The woman leaned on the doorframe. “You must be so sad.”

I forced a smile. “Thank you. It’s been difficult.” That was the truth. I didn’t need to see my mother daily to miss her now. I’d loved her. That was why her death hurt so much, not because we’d lived in each other’s pockets.

The woman crossed her arms beneath her barely covered boobs. I wondered how she wasn’t freezing to death and figured I’d better get on with it before she turned blue.

“I only came over to see if I could borrow an egg. I’m baking. I didn’t mean to keep you from…whatever you were doing.”

“Oh! Sorry, I should have grabbed a coverup when I heard you knock, but I’m on my way to the hot tub out back. She winked at me. “Got a guy waiting for me. But quick, come in and grab an egg.” She smiled over her shoulder at me. “I’m Sasha by the way.”

“Nice to meet you, Sasha.”

I followed her through the house and into the kitchen where she pulled open the refrigerator.

“Do you live here alone?” I asked curiously. I was assuming the guy in the hot tub didn’t because of the way she’d introduced him.

“Yep. My parents died in a car crash a couple years back, and now it’s mine.”

“Oh gosh. I’m so sorry.”

She smiled, taking out an egg carton and handing it over the countertop to me. “Take as many as you need. You can come over here for eggs anytime. Kathleen is a bit of an old biddy. She loves Kian, of course, because every time he waves at her she practically swoons at his feet. Completely different person to me. She isn’t one for the ladies.”

“Thanks for the heads-up and the eggs.”

She leaned her elbows on the countertop. “Before you go… Can I ask you something?”

“Sure. I owe you for the eggs.”

She gazed at me with awestruck eyes. “Do they have any suspects in your mom and Bart’s murders? I know it’s poor form to ask, but I love true crime and I’m so interested. I have so many theories.”

I frowned at that. “You do?”

She nodded, and her long dark waves bounced around her face. “Oh, yeah. I mean obviously, Bart’s son. Never met the guy, but the heir to the throne who never bothers to visit and the one time he does, his dad kicks the bucket? So suspicious. Then there’s Bart’s business partner. Also a dick from what I’ve seen of him at parties. The first wife, of course. Her husband. And don’t tell him I said this, but Kian is also on my list.”

“Really?” I’d been the one to put Kian on the suspect list in the first place, but I hadn’t really been serious. My conversation with Vaughn last night had really only confirmed that Kian was what you saw. He was all sunshine and smiles and golden retriever energy.

He didn’t have a dark bone in his body.

But I could humor Sasha.

Her eyes lit up, like she’d just been waiting for someone to discuss all of this with. “Well first, he had means, motive, and opportunity.”

I held my hands up. “Slow down. Why does he have means?”

“Oxyanedride was the main substance found in their bodies, right?”

Warning bells rang in the back of my mind. “Where did you hear that?”

“Nowhere reliable, which is why I’m trying to confirm it with you.”

I shook my head slowly. “I don’t know. I haven’t seen the autopsy report.”

“You should be able to get that now. My sources say they found a copy online.”

“You have sources?” I blinked at the woman, half in awe, half in disbelief. She couldn’t have been older than twenty-one.

She ignored my questions and went on. “Anyway, Oxyanedride is found in pool chemicals. In concentrated form, it can be lethal. Kian does clean that big-ass pool over there. My guess is he has access to it.”

A sinking feeling started up in the pit of my stomach, but Sasha carried on like she was reporting on some fictional case she’d seen on CSI, getting more and more excited with every fact she listed off.

“Next, opportunity. Well, he lives with them. Easy access to all their foods and drinks. Hell, he could have even stabbed them with an injection in their sleep.”

“That seems unlikely.”

She waved her hands around, too hyped up for my skepticism. “Whatever. It’s always someone the victim knows. Kian knew Bart and Miranda better than anyone.”

It made me think of the photos again. How many there were, and how Vaughn had thought it strange. I’d talked him out of it, but maybe it was? Sasha certainly seemed to be implying that more was going on than met the eye.

“Surely not better than Vaughn’s mom and stepdad? I forget their names…I did meet them at the wedding…”

“Riva and Karmichael. And for the record, I think Kian knew them much better than Riva and Karmichael, if you know what I mean. The three of them did live together. All alone. In that big house. You can’t tell me that’s not a weird situation. Good-looking guy like Kian. Your mom and Bart were the hot older couple, searching for a third…”

I tried to stem the anger flooding in at her implying there was something scandalous happening between the three of them. It was nothing more than pure gossip. But Sasha lived right next door. If anyone was going to know what had happened in that house over the last few months, maybe it would be her. I could at least listen and keep an open mind.

She leaned forward, her voice dropping low like she was telling scary stories. “But here’s the kicker. The night before they left for their wedding, I heard screams. And not the, ‘Oh, Daddy, fuck me harder,’ sort of screams. The bad kind.”

“Masculine or feminine?”

“Unless there was another female there that night, it was definitely your mom. I was outside putting my trash out, and I heard it clear as day. They must have had a window open, because I was standing there eavesdropping, as you do, and then they slammed the window closed.” She sighed dreamily. “I would have given anything to be a fly on the wall in there that night. If I’d known it was going to end in murder, I would have snuck over with a glass to press up against the wall.”

“Did you tell the cops any of this?”

“They didn’t question me. And I’ve watched enough crime shows to know I have no proof. But it’s fun to hypothesize, don’t you think?”

I gave her a tight smile. “Probably more fun when it’s not your roommate accused of murdering your mother, but sure. Fun.”

Sasha cringed, suitably ashamed. “Shit. I’m sorry. I got carried away.”

The doorbell rang, pinging through the otherwise quiet house.

Sasha glanced over. “That probably is the pizza guy.”

“I’ll let him in on my way out.”

Sasha trailed me to the door and collected her pizza while I trudged home with the eggs. But when I got inside, I just switched the oven off and sat at the kitchen counter, staring into space.

I’d just convinced Vaughn that Kian was harmless, but now maybe I wasn’t so sure.

I pulled out my suspect list and put an asterisk next to Kian’s name.