Laced (Pillbillies Book 2) Read online

The few bandages that were left on her face couldn’t hide the few tears that drifted down her cheeks and she exhaled a breath of mango air. When she turned to him he felt guilty for even asking what could have made her upset.

  “Have you seen me?” Hailey asked.

  She didn’t need to explain. The surgeries and damage to her face were extreme and for a while in the hospital when there was so much swelling there was no resemblance to the Hailey he once knew. Over time the careful tools of the plastic surgeons sculpted and enhanced what had once been there. There were still more surgeries to consider, thousands of dollars worth, but anything she needed he wanted to give her. Hailey was not vain; she never used to spend time worrying about her appearance. She was also at a crossroads, relearning who she was from the tiny patches of memory she had remaining from the attack while not even recognizing her own face in the mirror every day. He could see how scared she was, and he didn’t know how to ease that for her.

  “Yes, I see you every day, each morning. And every day I am so thankful that I get to spend one more day with you. You know this is temporary,” he said, touching the bandage on her chin and moving his hand to take hers, squeezing it lightly. “This is forever though and I’m here until this is all over.”

  “I’m broken.”

  “You’re breathtaking.”

  He wasn’t lying. Considering the level of damage that he had first seen she really did have many of her old features back. The bone structure over her left eyebrow needed to be built upon again and there was a cheek implant the surgeon had recommended during their last visit. Other than that, she was healing perfectly and even more radiantly than Jared ever thought possible.

  “You know I wouldn’t care if you had your face wrapped like a mummy for the rest of our lives. I love you, Hailey. I need you to know that. Your face will heal, and I’ll make sure that we fix whatever you want so that you can feel like yourself again. Whatever you need.”

  “I know. I don’t want to sound selfish saying anything about how I look. How many people don’t even survive what I did? And here I am complaining that I don’t feel attractive enough to want to be with my boyfriend.”

  “You don’t need to justify any of that to me,” Jared said sternly. “You’ve been through more trauma than anyone I know. It’s okay to want things to go back to normal. And it will, I promise we’ll get there.”

  He wiped a tear from her cheek and considered what he was saying. He was so used to not bearing responsibility for anyone else that he almost forgot how calming it was to be needed. There was a part of him that wanted to keep her safe by leaving. The dangers of his lifestyle would ultimately boil over into his personal life; he knew that, especially if she started to regain any of her long-term memories.

  He watched her sigh and tug on the cords of her white hoodie uneasily. There was a life with Hailey waiting for him that he didn’t want to miss out on. Her attack, regardless of the circumstances, was the ultimate second chance. He didn’t need to explain his past or his mistakes. He was a fresh slate, a charming and supportive man who was by her side every day in the hospital. There was a bank account in his name that was heavily padded from the trust fund of a deceased relative—as far as she needed to know—and his parent’s supposed involvement in her attack was the only smudge on his otherwise flawless record.

  There was also a part of him that desperately wondered if this was the calm before the storm. Since he was working so hard to keep his lies from foreshadowing the rest of their lives together it was possible that there would be a slipup, an unintentional lapse of character that would show Hailey that there was more to his past than he wanted her to see. When the honeymoon phase dried up he would venture onward and upward as a new version of himself.

  So he hoped.

  “Have they found your dad yet?” Hailey asked. “Any more police updates on that? It’s so weird that they just sold their house and moved. Do you think he’s still in town?” She eyed the new deadbolt on the front door.

  “He’s not getting to you. And I’m not sure if he’s still around. He’d be stupid to hang around where the police could find him but obviously here’s to hoping he is that dumb.” Jared raised his own glass and let the refreshing rush of mango fill his belly. Hailey was under the impression that the police were handling the investigation into his dad. Technically, Jared thought smiling, they were.

  “There’s so many unanswered questions,” Hailey said sadly. “I just wish we knew why he did this to me.”

  “I know it’s been some time since it happened, but you’re still sure it was him?”

  Her tone deepened. “I would never forget something like that, Jared. It was him. I know it.”

  He kissed her forehead and poured the rest of his wine into her glass. “I believe you. Don’t worry, they’ll find him.”

  The TV hummed to life as Hailey clicked it back on. He watched her innocently tuck a strand of hair behind a maimed earlobe and felt his heart sink, nodding to himself.

  Dex and his dad were now on his hit list. No more games.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  “You know I looked up the side effects of these pills on that Google thing they have on the internet?” Larry said, passing a tray of Lace to Jared.

  “Yeah?” Jared answered, half paying attention.

  “Oh yeah. This crap has more side effects than my ex-wife’s chili if you know what I mean. Seizures, constipation, clay-colored stools. Hey man you ever have a clay-colored stool? Who the hell reports that to their doctor anyway.”

  “Can’t say that I have Larry,” Jared said.

  “Ain’t no percs to taking this stuff if you ask me. You get it? Cause…cause they’re Percocets,” Larry laughed.

  “Har har.”

  “Aw come on man. If we’re going to be working together might as well get along, say?” He picked up a tray of Lace, adorning the last row across the bottom with the signature red specks.

  He’s thorough, I’ll give him that, Jared thought watching him work. Larry wasn’t much to look at but his attention to detail was admirable. He took direction better than most runners he supervised over the years, double-checking his work and taking extra precautions to make sure no product was wasted.

  “Double dippin’, that’s what I call it,” Larry said. “If you don’t do it right the first time you have to start all over and use extra product just to make it look right. Doesn’t make sense to not do it right the first time.”

  “Agreed. Hey Lar, you want to finish up that batch or do you want to start stuffing VHS tapes? I don’t mind either one.”

  “Ah I’ll do the stuffing around here, don’t strain your pretty little fingers boss I got it,” Larry said. He pulled a barstool next to the gleaming stainless steel countertop of their new lab, grabbing a box of VHS tapes as he sat and grunting in the process. “Got a real nice set up here, huh?”

  “Yeah, pretty damn nice,” Jared agreed. The lab was triple the square footage of the basement lab at the farmhouse. There was no short supply of freezers or storage containers that could easily sock away sixty or so cookie sheets worth of Lace at a time. Someone on Flick’s payroll owned the warehouse and there were several guards stationed throughout the building and on the premises to ensure that they could work uninterrupted throughout the day and night if they chose.

  Larry wound up taking on a bulk of the responsibility for production. Even though Jared only expected him to come in a few hours a day he often found him hunched over a spray bottle or pulling trays out of the freezer around the clock.

  “So what made you turn into a snitch?” Jared asked.

  Larry looked up from the cookie sheet and glared. “I’m an informant. And what does it matter? I’m here ain’t I?”

  “Sure, just wanted to know what would push you to join the other side of the law.”

  “It look like I’m on the right side of the law here?” Larry asked, pointing into his lap at a pile of VHS tapes.

  Jared smirked.

/>   “It’s not what I thought I’d be doing when my high school counselor asked where I saw myself in twenty years but it sure does pay the bills. Plus it’s not like I got anyone I need to care for.”

  “No kids? Family?”

  “Nope. Have some family but they’re bouncing around between jail and Texas and Lord knows what else. We don’t exactly get together for Christmas dinners if you know what I mean.”

  “So how long have you worked for Flick?” Jared asked.

  “Too long,” Larry replied, almost too eagerly. The moment of silence that followed seemed uncomfortable and he tapped his boot to fill the void. “I mean don’t get me wrong. I love my job, but I’d like to take my money and maybe go sit somewhere warmer. Get a hot bikini-type girl to give me drinks maybe and rub that coconut stuff on me, you know?”

  Jared laughed. “Yeah, sounds like a solid start to the good life.”

  “What about you, any kids?” Larry asked.

  “None yet,” Jared said. “Lucky to have the perfect woman to make them with though. No rush, I’d like to enjoy her for a few years. I’m selfish like that.”

  “Nothing selfish about it.”

  “I don’t think so either. So can I ask you something? How’d you wind up in jail like that? I know Flick has her ties but damn… she must have strings being pulled all over the place to set up a scheme like that,” Jared said.

  “Don’t you forget it,” Larry said seriously. “She’s got more than strings. There are governors, politicians and magicians too.”

  “Magicians?”

  “Sure. They make people disappear.” Larry winked.

  “Oh…right.”

  “Usually when she needs me on the inside we set up some kind of arrest that’ll put me in county for a while or wherever she needs me. It helps that I’m on the payroll at the police station as an actual informant, less questions when she wants to move me around or request special favors. I hop in and out as she needs me. I haven’t had to pay living costs in over seven years between her picking up the tab on my out-of-jail housing and actually being in jail so it’s not so bad. She just needs to watch who’s approving paperwork that particular week so she don’t wind up in hot water is all.”

  “Not everyone’s in with her?”

  “Of course not. You have your straight arrows just like you have your crooked ones. Only difference is Flick knows how to spot the crooked ones pretty easy so she uses that to her advantage. Like the one Marshal that’s got it out for her. He’s been tailing her since she graduated the police academy, some guy named Price. Swears she’s up to no good, files a complaint every now and then with the higher ups but she’s smarter than that to get caught. It’s all about who you know.”

  “Apparently,” Jared said, shaking his head in admiration.

  “Speaking of being higher up, you hear what people are doing to the Lace out on the street? They’re snorting it.”

  “Huh? Why?”

  “Gets em’ a longer high apparently. Well that’s a lie, the high part comes and goes quicker but for some reason the sedative metabolizes differently when it’s shot up the blow hole,” Larry said, placing an index finger on his left nostril. “You ever try it?”

  “No,” Jared said.

  “Not even—?”

  “No, not even once.”

  Larry whistled. “Well ain’t that something then. You’re a first.”

  Jared nodded. He was sure Larry knew all about his rehab stints and what happened to Lacey, Flick’s job was to fill him in on the people he’d be working with. Taking care of Hailey over the past several weeks and months kept him grounded. It was tiring and hectic running back and forth to doctors and surgeons and it gave Jared something else to think about besides using.

  The possibility of his dad’s involvement in what happened to Hailey made his stomach turn and the curiosity was starting to eat at him. He wondered how loyal Larry was to Flick and if he would be tricked easily. If he could be, then maybe he would divulge information about Dex or his dad being found that Flick was maybe not mentioning.

  There was only one way to find out.

  “So Flick told me about Dex,” Jared said, purposely keeping it vague. It was a generalized statement, meant to stir up any new information that might be harbored within the Intel Larry knew. If he knew anything at all.

  “Oh? She did huh?” Larry said.

  “Yeah.”

  Larry sorted the last of the Lace, carefully sliding each pill into the holding container in front of him. He snapped the lid closed when it was stuffed to the top and marked the side with a dry erase pen to indicate the date. “Well, hopefully they catch up to him soon, right?” he said finally, wiping his hands on his jeans and turning the barstool to face Jared. “It’s a mess out there. Everyone’s either hurting for Lace or dipping into meth or some other cocktail of pills they think is going to get them the same high. Dex is AWOL and you’ve the weight of the world on your shoulders with your girl at home. I know all about your dad too, that’s some shit, but at the end of the day you need to remember that everyone in this has a place. I’ve got mine, just like you have yours. Flick’s got me by the balls. I can’t so much as sneeze before letting her know about it or I go back to jail for real. I need to watch myself if all of this falls apart at my feet, I don’t have anything else.”

  Jared’s face flushed. He hadn’t meant to make Larry feel like a moron but he was clearly smart enough to know when cards were being played against him.

  “I just want a simpler life than this,” Larry sighed.

  Jared nodded. “I think we all do.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “Do you remember when I wrote this one?” Hailey asked, pushing another love note in Jared’s direction. The blue lined paper was yellowed from years of hiding in the darkness of a shoebox in her closet, but the loopy handwriting served as a reminder that everything Jared had told her was true. She had fallen head over heels for him in high school. They wrote sappy love notes back and forth, all of which she had kept, and she even found a random journal here and there with doodles of hearts and their initials inside.

  The pictures they uncovered in the boxes sprawled before them were the winning prize in their lazy Sunday afternoon. They sat together, sorting through the memories in front of the wood burning stove. Twice Jared had threatened to rip one or two pictures apart but Hailey insisted they keep them. She wanted to prove to their future children that their dad was not, in fact, always all that and a bag of chips.

  “That’s sweet,” Jared said, rolling his eyes as he read his own handwriting. “Love you more than all the planets? What the hell were we learning at the time, Shakespeare?”

  “Maybe I was. You were too busy skipping class apparently.” Hailey held up a dated report card.

  “This is true. Do you remember Mrs. Parson? The round lady with the thing?” Jared asked, pointing to his upper lip. He tried not to use the words do you remember when speaking to Hailey. Sometimes she did remember odds and ends, but often she didn’t. When she did remember, her face would radiate with pride in winning a small victory with her mind.

  “Ah yes! The thing! Didn’t some kids call her Thing? That poor woman.”

  “She deserved it. I can’t believe they’d hire someone to work at a school who hated children so much.”

  “Maybe she only hated you because I’m sure you disrupted her class on a daily basis?”

  “I would never do such a thing. Besides, that’s not the point.”

  “It’s completely the point! I wouldn’t have put up with your crap either,” Hailey said, nudging his shoulder. In an instant she was pinned beneath him, his hand behind her head as he kissed her neck. “This is why it’s taken us forever to get this place unpacked,” she said, straining her neck to see all of the unpacking that still had to be done.

  “I don’t mind the boxes.”

  “I’m sure you don’t, you’re barely home,” Hailey said. She used her elbows as a lever and sat
upright, pulling a half empty box in front of her.

  “I’m home,” Jared said. He had been leaving her alone more than he would have liked but the mess that had evolved from his work absence was just starting to become manageable. Production was up and running again and Flick had some new leads on the whereabouts of his dad. He was frustrated that someone with so many open avenues of resources couldn’t pinpoint the location of someone as simple as his dad, but if he didn’t trust in Flick he couldn’t trust in anyone. He couldn’t utilize the mainstream police to locate the two people he needed to confront, given the circumstances.

  Hailey sighed. “Sometimes. And sometimes you’re gone for hours and can’t even find a minute to text me back.”

  Jared nodded. “You’re right. I can try to be better at that.”

  “Try?” Hailey asked, picking up another picture and studying the front of it. “Why would you need to try and keep in touch with me if that’s what you wanted to do?”

  “Not how I meant it,” Jared said, narrowing his eyes. “You okay?”

  Hailey’s face had changed. She lowered a small picture from in front of her face, a round O where her mouth was. When she looked up her eyes could throw daggers. “When the hell were you going to tell me that Tina was pregnant?” Hailey asked.

  The question stunned Jared. He hadn’t thought of her in such a long time. He couldn’t possibly tell Hailey about a pregnancy he knew nothing about. “She’s what?” he asked.

  “Were you ever going to tell me? Or was it something you wanted me to forget in my delicate position.”

  “Hailey I have no idea—”

  She flung the photograph at him. It landed facedown a few inches from his left leg and he scrambled to pick it up. At first he had no idea what he was even looking at. It was a black and white photograph with random circles and lines splattered around. It wasn’t until he looked at the top that he realized that he was looking at a sonogram.

  Jared stared.

  He had no idea that Hailey had kept a sonogram from when she was pregnant. She told him about her father making her move and how he ‘took care of things’ but she never mentioned that she had any pictures. He stared at the blob on the paper, tracing over the darkened sac in the middle and wondering how she managed to sneak the picture out of the office without her father seeing.