Envy

chapter 27

THE WOOD-FIRED PIZZERIA in Poulsbo was one of those strange restaurants in that its appearance didn’t match its cuisine—like a sushi bar in a log cabin. The tiny building on Front Street was like a lot of the themed edifices there, a Norwegian-style facade with stucco and exposed beams. The Ryans didn’t care how the restaurant looked as long as the pizza was good, which, thankfully, it usually was.

The outing was supposed to help cheer everyone up. Hedda still had not returned, and Valerie in particular thought a change of scenery was in order. However, Hedda was just one item on the twins’ growing list of worries.

Hayley texted Taylor in the car on the way over.

HAYLEY: YOU BRING IT UP.

TAYLOR: CAN’T U?

Kevin, Valerie, and Hayley shared the spicy Portuguese sausage, the Linguica, while vegetarian flip-flopper Taylor ordered a small Herbivore. While they waited for the pizzas to bake, all melty and crispy in the woodfired oven, Kevin and Valerie talked about the events of the day over a couple of beers. Ordinarily the girls didn’t mind hearing such updates. Their mother was very discreet about the patients at the institution. She never mentioned a name or any specifics that anyone could use to positively identify who it was she was talking about. She dropped a few words, however, that usually ensured that the interest meter was going at full speed.

“A screamer today stabbed a student nurse with a plastic fork,” she said. “Other than that it was the same crazy, just a different day.”

Kevin set down his beer and surveyed the quiet restaurant. A couple two tables away sat side-by-side, a seating arrangement that was meant to be cozy but always looked like another party had stood them up.

“Mine wasn’t much better,” he said. “Except my crazy is my editor who thinks my book is going to be done on time. Still can’t get the perp to give me an interview. Now she wants the questions in advance.”

“You’ll charm your way around that,” Valerie said. “You always do.”

With her sister engrossed in texting Colton, Taylor saw a break in the conversation and she went for it.

“Mom, Dad, we need to talk about something.” Her tone came off as a little strange and she worried for a second that her parents would think she was going to drop some major bomb on them—that she was pregnant, gay, or both.

“What is it?” Valerie asked, clearly anxious as she reached for her drink.

Kevin didn’t say a word. This was Valerie’s territory.

“Wait, it isn’t anything about me or Hayley.”

Both parents deflated a little and relaxed in their chairs.

“Of course not,” Kevin said. “Didn’t think anything was up, not at all.”

Our parents are such dorks! Cool sometimes, but dorks! Taylor thought.

“We need your help. We think—” Taylor said, noticing that Hayley had finally put down her phone. She thought Hayley’s thumbs must need a good soaking after they’d had such a workout texting. “We think,” she repeated, “it’s really only a hunch …”

Kevin narrowed his focus on the girls, looking at one, then the other, ping-pong style. “What is it?”

It popped into Hayley’s mind right then that they could say Katelyn was gay and pregnant, just as a way of getting out of a conversation that didn’t seem to be going as they’d planned. But she didn’t.

Taylor took up the slack. “Dad, Mom, we think that someone was playing Katelyn. Messing with her. Mindf—” She wisely cut herself short.

The waiter brought their pies and the family sat in silence for a beat.

“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that,” Valerie said. She wasn’t mad, but a slight reprimand went with the business of being the mother of a teenager. In her case, times two.

“I didn’t say the entire word,” Taylor said, passing napkins around the table.

“You have a better vocabulary than that,” Valerie said.

Taylor nodded emphatically. “Someone was scamming her, playing her.”

“So what’s up with Katelyn, besides the fact that she’s dead?” Kevin asked, a remark far more flippant than he’d meant it to be.

Valerie shot him a look, and then looked over at her girls. “Tell us. We’re listening.”

Taylor told them about the note she’d found in Katelyn’s coat, and how she and Hayley had gone to see Starla and what she’d said about Katelyn’s supposed rendezvous in Seattle with her mystery boyfriend.

“You don’t think there was a boyfriend at all,” Kevin said.

“No, we don’t,” Taylor confirmed, picking at the crust of her slice.

“I think she thought she had one,” Hayley added.

Taylor nodded emphatically. “Someone was playing her.”

Kevin swallowed a big bite of pizza. He’d been taking in the conversation, watching his girls and wife as they circled around what had happened to Katelyn and, if, just if, there was some reason behind it. He was a little skeptical.

“All right, I know we run on feelings around here quite a bit, but what proof do you have that something like that was going on?”

“We don’t have any proof,” Hayley said. “I mean none that would hold up in court, if that’s what you’re asking.”

It was kind of a dig, but he let it slide.

“If you think someone had been pushing her, abusing her,” he said, “then we need to know who. And we need proof.”

“Not everything has to end up in court,” Valerie said, eyeing her husband. She’d have preferred a more supportive approach with the girls.

“Who would play a cruel game like that?” he asked.

Neither girl had an answer.

“No idea,” Taylor said.

“But we want to find out. It isn’t right, Dad,” Hayley added.

He nodded.

No, it wasn’t.

“But you need proof. Something more than a feeling,” he said.

Neither girl said so, but both knew that the answer to their father’s challenge rested back with Starla Larsen. She had been close to Katelyn and she had to know what Katelyn’s state of mind was at the time of her death. She’d also be the best bet for knowing the source of the taunts, but if she knew, she wasn’t talking. Indeed, she’d blown them off at the pink beanbag interrogation in her bedroom.

Just as the family was leaving, Kevin excused himself to talk to a pretty young woman with red hair who’d been sipping wine of the same hue all night at another table.

“A fan,” he said, exchanging looks with Valerie. “Give me a minute.”

Valerie and the girls headed out the door. As they crossed the parking lot, Taylor caught a glimpse of her dad and the woman through the restaurant’s window.

Kevin was animated, but not in a happy way. He was moving his hands to make a point. Even from that distance, Taylor could see the vein that popped in his temple whenever he was angry. It looked like he was scolding the young woman. She didn’t seem the least bit put off by whatever he was saying.

When he returned to the car, he had a worried look on his face.

“What was that about, Dad?” Taylor asked.

Kevin exhaled—a sure sign that he was angry—and turned the key to start the car.

“Nothing,” he said.

“You look really upset,” Taylor said.

“People always expect you to give them a free book, and when you don’t, they get mad,” he said.

Valerie exchanged a quick look with Kevin and turned on the car radio, a not-so-subtle signal that the conversation was over.

From their places in the backseat, Hayley turned to Taylor, pointed to her phone, and started to text.

HAYLEY: WHO WAS DAD TALKING 2?

TAYLOR: THAT WZ NO FAN. 2 YOUNG 4 DAD’S BKS. WNDR WAT PISSED HIM OFF SO MUCH?