Chapter 14 - Cracks in the Foundation
I drove straight to Ryan’s apartment on the west side of town. The speed limit signs blurred past in an angry streak of yellow and white. My hands shook so violently against the steering wheel that I had to bite the inside of my cheek until I tasted copper just to keep my focus on the road.
I parked on the curb outside his brick four-plex, slammed the car door, and took the exterior stairs two at a time. I pounded on his door with the flat of my fist.
“Ryan! Open the damn door!”
Silence met my shouts. I banged again, the sound echoing down the narrow hallway. “Ryan, I know about Julian! Open up!”
The lock clicked. The door creaked open two inches, chained from the inside. Ryan peered through the gap. The calm, grounded brother who had brought me lavender forty-eight hours ago was gone. His eyes were bloodshot, surrounded by dark, purple hollows. His unshaven jaw twitched, and his chest heaved in rapid, shallow breaths.
“Clare,” he whispered, his voice trembling. “Go away. Please. You shouldn't be here.”
“Unchain the door, Ryan, or I swear to God I will call the police to do a welfare check.”
He stared at me, terror flickering across his pale features, before sliding the chain off and stepping backward into the shadowed room.
I pushed the door open and stopped dead.
The apartment was in complete disarray. Couch cushions were ripped open, drawers hung empty from the sideboard, and sheets of paper were scattered across the floor like autumn leaves. In the middle of the kitchen table sat a cheap burner phone and a handwritten note scrawled in black marker: *The deadline is midnight Thursday. Fifty grand or the unedited tape hits every local news outlet in the state.*
“He’s back,” Ryan muttered, sinking onto the edge of a bare mattress in the corner, clutching his head in both hands. “Julian ran through the money Mom gave him. He found out Bennett Mechanical sold the patents. He thinks I’m sitting on cash.”
“Ryan,” I said, stepping across the debris, kneeling in front of him so he had to look at me. “Look at me. What did you do to me after I blacked out?”
Ryan looked up, tears spilling freely down his hollow cheeks. “I didn't do anything else, Clare! I swear to God Almighty, I swear on my soul! When you went limp, I dropped you. I panicked. I thought I killed you. I fell to my knees and I couldn't move.”
“Then what is on the tape?”
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“It's not what I did,” Ryan sobbed, his shoulders shaking convulsively. “It's what Mom did.”
***
