The Masked Truth Part 25

"I need to see Brienne."

"She's in a coma."

"Which means it'll be a short visit. And that you don't need to accompany me."

"Fifth floor," she says. "Move it."

CHAPTER 26.

Brienne is still comatose. The bullet grazed her spine and there's swelling and the possibility of lifelong damage. Hence the coma, to give her body time to rest.

There's no sneaking into her room, not in the ICU unit, but I'm glad of that. She's the only "real" witnessthe only one whose account the police might respect. If the killers realize that, they could come back to finish the job.

I worry that I might not be allowed to visit, but when I tell the nurses who I am, they let me go in with Sloane. We stand by Brienne's bed. She looks as pale as the sheet pulled up around her. Machines hum and beep, but it's a steady and rea.s.suring sound as I hold her cool hand. Then I hear a voice in the hall.

"Brienne's my sister," a guy says.

I go still. The news said Brienne only has one brother, which means the guy out there is the one who sent her into that therapy sleepover. The guy who played lookout for the Porters' killers.

I can't move. I'm still holding Brienne's hand, but I can't even feel that. Sloane doesn't notice. She's busy listening as the nurse explains that Brienne already has visitors.

"Who?" her brother asks.

I grip the bedside with my free hand, fingers digging in, gaze tripping around the room for an escape.

How about hiding under the bed, Riley?

That snaps me back to myself. I can't hide. I have to face him. I should face him, because now I know the truth, and as much as I might want to help Brienne, if this guy can lead me to the Porters' killers, then I'm going to turn him in. Which means, eventually, I will need to face him. Might as well do it now.

"What the h.e.l.l?" he says when the nurse tells him who's in the room. "The girl who almost got my sister killed? You know what that crazy freak did, right? Her and her psycho boyfriend?"

Too late, I realize Sloane is on the move. She's stalking out of the room, and I jump to pull her back, but she's already in the hall, her heels clicking across the linoleum.

"h.e.l.lo," Sloane says. "Let me introduce myself. I'm the big sister of the freak you were just talking about." A moment's pause, then, "Hey, a.s.shole, my eyes are up here. You can stop checking me out. You didn't have a s...o...b..ll's chance in h.e.l.l even before you insulted my sister."

"You little border-bunny"

"Do I sound like I crossed a border recently? Do I look like a g.a.n.g.b.a.n.ger? d.a.m.n, you are one dumba.s.s, white-trash trailer-park cracker. Okay, your turn."

"My turn for what?"

"Insulting me. That's what we're doing, right? Exchanging slurs? Or maybe you're just dumba.s.s enough to think I was complimenting you."

Stop, Sloane. Please stop.

Of course, she doesn't. She's just building up steam.

"You want to call my sister a freak? I can d.a.m.ned well guarantee that when your sister wakes up, she'll tell you that mine did everything she could to save her a.s.s. And that's not because Riley claims she did. She hasn't said a single word about what happened to Brienne. It's because I know my sister. She did her best, and they both got shot, and maybe my sister was the one Max got out of there, but it's not because he's her boyfriend, you moron. It's because your sister had been shot in the spine and couldn't move or be moved. I don't know what my sister did for yours, but I do know what Max didhe made sure the police got paramedics in there for Brienne. How does that make sense if he's the one who shot her?"

"Because he's crazy. He doesn't have to make sense. All I know is my sister is in that hospital bed while yours is up and walking around."

"Barely up and walking around, and only because she's worried about Brienne."

"Or maybe she was trying to finish what her boyfriend started."

One of the nurses protests.

Sloane says, "I'd smack you for that, if you wouldn't claim it as proof that Riley comes from a violent family. So I'll settle for saying that the opinion of anyone who wears a wife-beater is universally considered invalid. Next time you want to be taken seriously, dress like a grown-up."

"You stuck-up little b.i.t.c.h."

"Oh, so I've gone from a chola to a fresa? Excellent. Not entirely accurate, but much closer."

I step from the room. "Sloane? Can we go, please?"

I try not to look at Brienne's brother. Of course, that's impossible, given that he's standing two feet from my sister. He's average height, his blond hair cut short, dressed in jeans and a tank topthe wife-beater Sloane mentioned. Even without looking his way, I can feel his gaze on me. He was there. When the Porters died, he was there, and I have to stop thinking that before my knees give away and I fall into a whimpering puddle.

"Sure, let's do that." Sloane quick-steps over and takes my arm. "We're done here. Time for you to get some rest."

She starts leading me away. Brienne's brother steps into our path, and I do a scared-cat jump. I recover fast, but he's seen it, and he doesn't say a word, he just stands there, his eyes narrowing as he studies me. I try to erase any expression. I try so d.a.m.ned hard, but reactions whip through my head at breakneck speedHe was there. He knows the people who killed the Porters. And Oh G.o.d, I can't let him see that I'm scared of him. I can't let him suspect Brienne told me anything.

Stop thinking about the Porters. Stop, stop, stop.

As Sloane pulls me away, I say, "I didn't do anything. Whatever you think of meof Maxit wasn't like that. It really wasn't."

Does he buy the excuse? Come to the conclusion that I'm cowering because of his insults and insinuations? I don't know. And the longer I look at him, the more suspicious he'll become, so I let Sloane lead me away.

When we get to my room, she says, "What was that all about, Riley? And don't tell me his bulls.h.i.+t freaked you out. I hear you nearly bit the detectives' heads off for suggesting Max did it. You're not going to let a swaggering wannabe like that spook you."

"I ..." I look over at her before I climb back into bed. "Can I talk to you about it tomorrow?"

"Why not now?"

"Because I need to work through a few things first."

She sits in silence for a minute. Then she says, her voice uncharacteristically quiet, "Maybe it would help if you worked through them with me."

"No, that's okay."

She settles into the chair, pulling her knees up, then says, as nonchalantly as possible, "It's because I'm not as smart as you, right?"

"No, I"

"I'm not. Hardly a big secret. Everyone worries about your grades sliding to B's and C's, and that's what I got on a good day. You're hardly going to brainstorm with the sister who couldn't get into college."

"You didn't apply to college. You're taking a year off to consider your options."

"Which is shorthand for 'I knew I wouldn't get in, so I didn't try,' and the options I'm considering aren't Yale versus Harvard. It's whether I go to the local college or take more high school cla.s.ses to boost my average. But this isn't a pity party. You work hard in school. I didn't. So I don't blame you for not wanting my help on the thinking part."

I turn to face her. "I honestly need to work it through first, Sloane. Brienne told me some things, and I need to figure out what I can say, and whether her secrets can get anyone in troubleincluding you."

"You don't need to worry about me. I'm the big sister, remember?"

"By fourteen months."

"And a whole lotta extra life experience, kiddo. Fine. You think it through. Just ... don't think too hard."

I give her a look.

"I mean it," she says. "You think too much, Riley. Something gets in your head and you just can't get it out, and you go around and around with it. Maybe you think you're working it through. But you're just worrying more and feeling worse. What you need most right now is a good night's sleep. I can ask the nurses to give you something if that will help shut your brain off."

I shake my head. "I need to look up a few things."

She sighs. "Of course you do."

I hesitate. "We were going to talk about Max. About schizophrenia. Do you still want to hear it?"

She looks up and meets my gaze. "I do."

So I explain, and I can see her taking it in, considering, a.s.sessing. She might say she's not as smart as me, but she isn't stupid. I tell her about Max and try to explain what he's going through, and she listens, and then she says, "Okay, I won't call him crazy anymore. Even if I suspect he'd still be a little nuts without the mental illness."

I smile and shake my head. Then I take out my laptop to do some research.

CHAPTER 27.

I find Brienne's brother online. Not on Facebook or any other social media site. River Ruskin really doesn't strike me as the type to tweet selfies.

Yes, as Brienne said, his name is River. Since I doubt his parents are hippies, I'm guessing he's named after the actor. I'm not one to talk, though. My dad wanted to name me Ripley, after Sigourney Weaver's character in Alien. Mom insisted on dropping the p to make it more mainstream. We are all victims of our parents' tastes.

With that name, though, it's easy to search for him online, and I find several references to an incident the year before, when he was arrested on drug charges. The case wasn't big enough to make the paper, but in the age where most of us are on social media, that doesn't matter. A handful of his former school peers heard the rumor and commented on it, and I put together enough of those comments to get a snapshot of River Ruskin.

He dropped out of high school three years ago, after having spent more time smoking up than attending cla.s.ses. No known occupation these days, though his peers suspected he was doing the same thing he had been in school: selling dope. Last year's charges had been dropped. After that, River apparently moved on to bigger and badder things, working with the guy who murdered the Porters.

So River plays lookout for the Porters' killers. Brienne overhears. Brienne promises to join the weekend therapy session to find out what I know. Brienne and I are both taken hostage at that session. We're both shot and almost killed. I'd be crazy not to look for my link here. The problem? I can't see it. The obvious answer is crazy. That the guys who killed the Porters wanted to finish the job. Eliminate the witness. But it's been four months, and I haven't exactly been in hiding. The hostage plan was far too elaborate for a simple a.s.sa.s.sination. And why the h.e.l.l would River let his sister go in to talk to me if I was about to be killed?

Also, presuming everything that happened that night was about eliminating me seems ... well, weirdly egotistical. Also paranoid. I'd also like to say it's preposterousthat kind of thing doesn't happen, right? But I'm a cop's daughter, and the night I overheard my dad and his coworkers talking at their poker game was far from the firstor lasttime. I was a curious girl who, admittedly, had a macabre turn of mind. I'd listened in often enough to know that people committed murder for the slimmest of motives and rarely had an excuse like schizophrenia.

Murdering potential witnesses is actually common in certain circles. Which is why, for the first month, Mom wouldn't let me leave the house alone. Oh, sure, she'd find an excuseSloane has to drive past the school anyway; I want to go to the bookstore toobut I knew the reason. She'd been worried.

I don't want to think this could have been about me, and it's not just because that sounds self-centered. If it is about me, that means I'm responsible for six deaths. They all died because of me. Yet that's crazy, isn't it? To think these guys would murder six people to get to me? But what if they'd planned to kill only me, and then everything went wrong, and they panicked and ...

I'll stop there. As Sloane says, you can overthink thingsget trapped on the hamster wheel of your own thoughts and fears. I'll stick this in my mental back pocket: River could have been involved.

I dig deeper on Brienne. From what I see on social media, she's an average teen. Sixteen years old. A former cheerleader, having quit the squad in the past year to focus on her grades, much to her friends' dismay and befuddlement. She's stayed on the track team, though, and has an active social life. A normal kid. Someone I could be friends with. No, strike thatsomeone I will be friends with, if she'll have me, when she recovers.

When I dig into Brienne, though, I discover something I should have thought of, and I'll blame the oversight on the fact that I have way too much on my mind. It's been thirty-six hours since we escaped that warehouse, meaning our case is all over the news. Brienne isn't named in most articlesshe's an "unnamed sixteen-year-old in critical condition." A few of the online sources identify her, though. And they all identify me, because I guess I lost my right to underage anonymity when I was outed in the Porter case.

Our story is everywhere. It's the perfect news for a slow week: teenage girl survives babysitting slaughter to be hunted by psycho killer during therapy weekend. Except the "psycho killer" isn't Gray. It's Max.

He's eighteen, which means there's no issue with identifying him. Which they do. With particular glee, a few point out he made the news in Britain a year ago, in "another violent incident." They don't elaborate, and when I search on his name, I get nothing, likely because he'd been a minor at the time. But this too makes a great story: the crazy British teen who flees his country only to murder six people here and, really, what has our immigration system come to that they can't keep out guys like this?

Three of the articles hint at a stronger link between Max and the tragedy in the warehouse. More than the fact he has schizophrenia and there is "forensic evidence linking him to the crimes." They mention something found on his computer. A manifesto. That's all they say. I think I know what the word means. I've heard it before, in cases like school shootings. The killer writes a blog or records a video in which he explains his motive. But there is no way in h.e.l.l Max wrote such a thing, so I think maybe I'm misunderstanding the word. My dictionary app insists I'm not, though.

"Do you know anything about a manifesto found on Max's computer?" I ask Sloane.

She looks up from the magazine she's been reading. "What?"

"A manifesto. It's"

"It's a declaration. Why someone plans to do something."

"Right. Sorry. I found references to one on Max's computer."

She sets down the magazine. "I didn't hear anything about that. Must be a mistake. You know how journalists are. Dad always said if they can't break a story, they make a story."

"I guess so."

"Time to shut off that laptop yet?"

"I want to make notes while they're fresh in my mind."

She sighs. "I don't know how they won't be fresh in your mind tomorrow, when you won't stop thinking about them all night. Thirty minutes. Then lights out."

"Yes, Mom."

CHAPTER 28.