“I…don’t know.”
I tamp down a jolt of panic. “Damn, Hartley. What the hell happened with you guys? Why does he ha—” I stop before the word hate pops out. I don’t think she’d appreciate me saying her father hates her. “Why is he so pissed at you?”
Her gaze stays fixed on the pebble-covered bank. “It’s a long story.”
I hold out my arms and gesture to the open air. “We’ve got nothing but time.”
She stares in silence for a long time. I want to fidget, kick some rocks, bellow at the ocean. Nah, what I really want to do is drive over to Hartley’s house and kick her dad and bellow in his face. I do neither, and my patience is finally rewarded.
“Four years ago—I guess maybe it’s almost five now—I was having trouble sleeping one night, so I went downstairs to get a glass of water. My dad was in the living room, talking to some woman. They were quiet, but she sounded mad and she was crying in between sentences. I think that’s why I didn’t interrupt or let him know I was there.”
“What were they talking about?”
“He was telling her he could take care of the problem but that it would cost her. The woman said she’d pay whatever he asked as long as he helped her son.”
I frown. “What did he say to that?”
“I don’t know. I snuck back upstairs because I didn’t want him to know I was eavesdropping. He’s got a temper, so we all try not to make him angry if we can help it.” She scowls. “Anyway, two days later I heard him arguing on the phone with his boss that he’d used ‘prosecutorial discretion’—whatever the hell that is—in dismissing the charges against the Roquet kid.”
“Who’s the Roquet kid?”
“Do you know Drew Roquet?”
“No.”
“He’s older than us. He was nineteen at the time and got busted for heroin possession. It was his third offense, and they were going to charge him with trafficking because of the amount he had on him. That’s five to twenty-three years in prison.” Hartley’s tone fills with disgust. “But what do you know—the heroin he had on him was lost in the evidence room, so my dad dismissed the charges.”
“I don’t like where this is going.”
“I didn’t either, but I tried to forget about it. At the time, I didn’t think my dad would do anything wrong. He was a DA and he hated drug offenders. Called them lowlifes who didn’t contribute to society, and he said drugs were the reason for everything wrong in this country. Murders, domestic abuse, theft. All of it could be traced back to drugs, according to him.”
“Okay. So you let it go.”
“Yes, and everything seemed fine, but…it bugged me. So I started nosing around where I shouldn’t. I went on his computer one time. He always uses the same password, but he changes the last number every month or so, so it was pretty easy to guess. And when I was on there, I found this anonymous account where people would email him requesting a special favor and they’d say who referred them. There weren’t any details and no responses other than ‘Let’s meet.’”
My eyebrows shoot up. “They came to the house?” That seems risky as hell.
“No. He usually met them in public places. I think the house thing was rare and that’s why he was so angry with that woman. I have no idea how many cases he ‘fixed,’ but there were so many emails, Easton. Like, a lot of them.” She bites her lip, looking miserable.
“Did you confront him?”
“No. I went to Parker instead. She told me to stop making up stories and to keep my mouth shut and not say a word about it to anyone.”
“Parker knew what your dad was doing?”
“I don’t know.”
I think she does know but doesn’t want to believe it. I wait for her to continue, but she doesn’t. She bends down and picks up a few rocks and throws them in the ocean. I join her and say nothing for a minute. But then I have to ask the one question that’s been bugging me since we first met. “How’d you break your wrist?”
The question startles her. She drops the little rock and it hits the water with a splat.
“Hartley,” I press. “How’d you break your wrist?”
“How did you know I broke it?”
“You have a surgical scar on the inside of your wrist.”
“Oh, that.” She rubs a hand over the scar. After a moment of hesitation, she exhales an unsteady breath. “A few months after I talked to my sister, Dad announced he was running for mayor. We got lots of lectures on how to behave in public. Some woman even came to the house and actually showed us how to stand, smile, and wave.”
“Yeah, we had one of those, too,” I admit. “PR’s important down here in the South.”
She gives a scornful laugh. “I can’t believe how anxious I was to be the perfect daughter. I actually videotaped myself in the mirror. Anyway, right before my freshman year, I broke a string on my violin and ordered a new one online. I’d been tracking it and saw that it was going to be delivered, so I ran down to the end of the street to ask the postman if he had it. That’s when I saw Dad sitting with a woman in a car.”
Hartley stops abruptly. I can tell it’s hard for her to talk about this stuff. I don’t blame her. Learning what kind of man Steve is still haunts me. I looked up to him. He flew planes, drank like a fish, had the best cars, the hottest chicks. He was living the best life, and I wanted to be him. But my role model is one of the worst human beings in the world, and now what am I left with?
“I watched them for a long time.” Hartley finally picks up where she left off. “They talked. She handed him a phone and some papers, and then he got out of the car, carrying his briefcase and a backpack. The backpack was weird, you know? He never carried anything like that. I was so busy staring at him that I didn’t realize the car I was hiding behind was leaving. I started running back to the house. He caught me right outside the front door, grabbed my wrist and pulled hard on it. He was so angry. That’s why he didn’t realize how much force he’d used.”
Is she really trying to explain away her father’s violence? That makes me angry. I form a fist and then tuck it against my side so she doesn’t see it. It hurts not to yell or hit something, but now I get why she hates violence. Why she freaked out the night I dragged her to the dock fights.
“He asked me what I saw. I denied it at first, but my wrist hurt so bad that I started yelling about how I’d seen everything and that it was wrong and that he shouldn’t be doing what he was doing and I was going to tell Mom everything.” Her bottom lip trembles. “He slapped me across the face and sent me to my room.”
“What about your wrist?”
Her mouth quivers again, and then her face collapses. “That’s why it didn’t heal right. I didn’t see a doctor right away.”
“What’s right away?”
“Three weeks.”
“What?” I explode.
She gulps. “The next morning, Dad came to my room and told me I was going away. I guess I didn’t really understand what was going on. I was fourteen. Maybe I should’ve stood up to him.”
”You were only fourteen,” I repeat. “And you were scared. Hell, my mom took my pills and said she was going to flush them down the toilet. I handed them over knowing she had a drug problem. We want to make our parents happy, even if we think we hate them.”
“I guess. But…yeah, I was on a plane and in upstate New York before I could really think. When I got to my dorm room, I called home and begged Mom to let me come back, but she said that Dad was the head of our household and you can’t disobey the head of the household.” Sarcasm rings in her voice. “She said that once I learned to be a good daughter, I could return. I didn’t know what that meant, but I said okay. I guess that’s why I didn’t say anything about my wrist right away. It got worse, though, and one of my teachers noticed and took me to the ER. I had to have surgery to fix it.”
“What’d you tell them?”