I shoot him a harsh glare and he mumbles a halfhearted sorry. Since when did he feel so comfortable cursing like that in front of me? What happened to the whiny little brother who followed me everywhere as if he worshipped me?

“And what sort of special job pays you so much money for such a short amount of time?” The sarcasm in his voice is clear. He’s too young—no, not really, I’m just fooling myself—but I hope he doesn’t think I’m off prostituting myself.

I sure feel like I am.

My brain scrambles as I try to come up with an excuse. I can’t tell Owen what I’m really doing. I didn’t tell him how much money I was making. He just knows it’s a lot. Didn’t tell my mom either, not that she cares. I haven’t seen her in well over twenty-four hours, but she has a new boyfriend so I’m sure she’s with him. “I’m going to be a nanny for a family while they go on vacation for Thanksgiving break. They have three kids.”

The lie falls easily from my lips and that scares me.

Owen starts to laugh, the jerk. “You’re going to be a nanny? You hate kids!”

“I do not.” I so do. “The family’s really nice.” I have no idea if the Callahans are nice. “And I get to stay in a huge mansion.”

Drew told me his family lives in Carmel. I’ve never been there, but I’ve heard of it. I did a little Google research at the library and saw photos. The place looks amazing. Expensive.

Scary.

“You won’t want to leave, I guess.” Owen sits up, runs his finger across the top of the duffel bag, leaving a streak in the dust. “You’re going to look like a broke bitch, showing up with this shitty bag.”

“Did you just call me a broke bitch?” I can’t be offended because what he says is the truth. I’m going to look ridiculous with my meager wardrobe and my torn and dusty duffel bag. His family will laugh at me. Drew will probably laugh at me. Then he’ll press a fifty in the palm of my hand and drop me off at the bus station because he’ll realize quick I make the shittiest fake girlfriend ever.

“Maybe.” Owen smirks. “I hope you leaving is worth it.”

Dread consumes me for the quickest moment, but I shove it away. “It will be, I promise.”

“What if Mom disappears?” For a second, I get a glimpse of the old Owen. The little boy who depends on me, who treats me like his mom since ours is so unreliable.

“She won’t.” I already talked to her and I’ll talk to her again before I leave. She needs constant hounding, like I’m the mother and she’s the kid. “I’ll make her swear to come home every night.”

“You better. Or I’ll be calling you and begging you to come home.” The smirk is back. “I might call you a broke bitch again and you’ll get so mad, you have to come here just to kick my ass.”

That’s it. Reaching for him, I start tickling his sides, my fingers digging into his ribs, the sound of his laughter filling me with happiness. “Stop,” he pants between fits of laughter. “Get off me!”

I can almost forget how crappy our life is in this one single, silly moment.

Almost.

Drew

“You’re bringing someone home.” My dad puts his hand over the receiver but I can still hear him. “Adele, Drew is bringing someone home for Thanksgiving.”

I wince. No way did I want my dad to blab to my stepmom, especially when I’m still on the phone with him. She’d find out sooner or later but I hoped for later.

“What’s her name?” I hear her voice. She doesn’t sound pleased. That makes everything inside me clench up.

“Fable,” I tell my dad without being prompted.

My dad is quiet for so long I think he’s hung up, but then I hear Adele whispering in the background. “Well, Andy? What’s her name?”

She sounds like a jealous shrew. She probably is.

“Is that a nickname or what?” my dad asks me.

“It’s her real name.” I have no explanation for it either. Hell, I hardly know Fable Maguire. She’s a townie. She’s twenty years old, she has a little brother and she works at a bar.

Fable also has pretty pale blonde hair, green eyes and nice tits. But I’m not going to tell my dad that. I’m sure he’ll figure it out on his own.

Muffled tones come across again and I know he’s telling Adele Fable’s name. I hear her laugh. She’s such a bitch. I hate Adele. My mom died when I was like two. I don’t remember her and I wish I did. My dad started dating Adele when I was eight and married her when I was eleven.

Adele is really the only mom I’ve ever had, and I don’t want her. She knows it too.

“Well, bring your little Fable to stay with us, she’s more than welcome.” Dad pauses, and I tense up, afraid of what he might ask next. “You’re not one to have a steady girlfriend.”

“This one’s different.” More like the opposite of any girl they expect me to be with. In my eyes, this makes Fable just about as perfect as can be.

“Are you in love with her?” Dad lowers his voice. “Adele wants to know.”

Anger boils inside me. Like it’s any of her business. “I don’t know. What’s love anyway?”

“You sound like a complete cynic.”

Learning from the best did that to a person. My dad’s pretty standoffish. I can’t remember the last time I’ve seen him kiss or hug Adele. He certainly doesn’t kiss or hug me, not that I’d let him.

“Yeah well, we’ve been dating for a while, but I don’t know.” I shrug, remember he can’t see me and I feel like an idiot.

“You’ve never mentioned her before.”

“What is this, the third degree?” I’m starting to sweat only because I’m lying. I haven’t talked to Fable all day and it’s Thursday night. We leave Saturday afternoon. We need to get together and get our stories straight, though I suppose we’ll have plenty of time during the four hour drive to get the details hammered in.

My throat goes dry at the idea of being with Fable in my truck alone for four hours. What will we talk about? I don’t know her and I’m going to take her to my dad’s house and pretend that we’re together. We have to act like we’re a real couple.

What the hell did I set myself up for?

“I’m just curious. We’ll find out all the details when you two get here, I’m sure. Saturday night, right?”

“Yeah.” I swallow hard. “Saturday night.”

“We should be out at yet another country club function. You still have your key?”

“I do.” Damn it, I really don’t want to go back. Bad shit happened there. I’ve avoided that place like the plague for a while now. We’ve gone out of town for the holidays the last couple of years, spending Thanksgiving or Christmas in Hawaii at my dad’s timeshare. Or I stay at school because of football practice or whatever lie I can come up with that keeps me away from them for a little bit longer.

Tough life, I know. From the outside, my family looks perfect. Well, as perfect as a family can be with one dead mother and one dead sister. A f**ked up stepmother and a cold as hell father.

Yeah. Real perfect.

That my dad insisted I come home this Thanksgiving sucks. Last time we talked, he told me he’s tired of all of us avoiding the house during the holidays. We need to make new memories.

I don’t want to make any memories. Not there. Not with Adele.

“We’ll see you then.” I can hear my dad walking, his feet echoing against the tile floor, as if he was getting out of earshot of Adele. “This Thanksgiving will be good, son. You’ll see. The weather’s supposed to be nice and your mother seems much healthier.”

“She’s not my mother,” I say through clenched teeth.

“What?”

“Adele’s not my mom.”

“She’s the only mother you’ve ever really had.” Great. Now he’s offended. “Why can’t you just accept her? My God, she’s been part of your life for so long.”

The most f**ked up part of my life, not that I can reveal that to my dad. If he didn’t figure everything out then, he sure as hell couldn’t conceive of it now.

“I don’t like how easily you forget my real mom. I don’t ever want to forget her,” I say vehemently.

He remains silent for a while and I stare out the window but see nothing. It’s dark, raining lightly and the wind is at it again, whipping the bare branches of the trees that dot the open courtyard of the apartment complex I live in back and forth. I can see them swaying in the darkness.

People think my life is so amazing. It’s f**king not. I study hard and play harder because it helps me forget. I have friends, but not really. Most of the time, I’m alone. Like now. I’m sitting in my room in the dark. Talking to my dad and wishing like hell I could tell him the truth.

But I can’t. I’m trapped. I need a buffer to get me through what could end up being one of the worst weeks of my life. Thank God for Fable. She has no clue how much she’s helping me.

She can never know either.

~* Chapter Three *~

Travel Day (doesn’t count)

Only a fool trips on what’s behind him. – Unknown

Fable

His truck is nice. Like, the newest vehicle I’ve ever had the privilege to ride in. He looks good in it too, as much as I hate to admit that, even to myself. But the dark blue Toyota Tacoma fits him perfectly.

Everything about Drew is perfect. The way he dresses—his ass looks great in those jeans and I’m not even going to mention how that black T-shirt he’s wearing clings to all his chest muscles. How he behaves—always polite, always looks me in the eye and doesn’t make rude comments about my boobs or my ass. And the sound of his voice—deep and sexy, the sort of voice I wouldn’t mind just sitting around listening to while he talks all day. He’s got perfection down pat.

He called me yesterday before I went to work to go over a few minor things. What time he would pick me up, how we needed to draw up a plan on the drive to his parents’ house.

Then I threw it out there. The money. How was I supposed to get my payment? I felt sorta whorish, asking for it point blank like that, but I had to. I wanted that check before I left town so I could leave some money for Owen in case of an emergency.

So I met Drew downtown by my bank fifteen minutes to closing and before I headed to the bar. We chatted for a few minutes, nothing major, and then he handed over the check. He was all nonchalant and stuff, like a guy gives a girl a three thousand dollar check every damn day of his life.

The check was written out of his personal bank account. Signed by him and everything. He has sloppy handwriting. I couldn’t really read his signature. And his name is Andrew D. Callahan.

As I walked into the bank by myself and approached the teller, I wondered what that D stood for.

Now here I sit in Andrew D. Callahan’s truck, the engine purring smoothly and not chugging and choking as if it might die at any moment like my mom’s crappy ’91 Honda. I told my mom the same nanny story that I gave Owen. Told my boss at La Salle’s the same thing too. Considering my leaving is during a slow time for business, my boss was fine with it. He knows our financial situation is in the toilet and he was happy I found such a short, high paying job.

My mom hardly acknowledged me when I said I was leaving.

I really don’t know what I did to make her hate me so much. Well. Hate is a strong word. That means she actually feels something toward me. She’s so indifferent, it’s like I don’t matter to her. At all.

“Four hours, huh?” My voice breaks the silence and startles him. I saw it in the way he jumped in his seat. Big bad football player scared of me?

Weird.

“Yeah, four hours.” He drums his fingers against the steering wheel, drawing my attention to them. They’re long, his nails are blunt with no dirt beneath them. Strong, clean hands with wide palms. They look…kind.

Scowling, I shake my head. I’m thinking stupid when I need to think clear.

“I’ve never been to Carmel before.” I’m trying to make conversation because the thought of driving this long and not talking sort of freaks me out.

“It’s pretty. Expensive.” He shrugs, turning my attention to his shoulders. He’s wearing a blue and dark gray flannel shirt over a black T-shirt and it’s a good look for him.

God. I turn away, keep my eyes glued on the window as the scenery passes by. I need to stop looking at him. He’s distracting as hell.

“So, we probably need to come up with some sort of story, right?” I sneak a glance at him like I can’t help myself. With my luck, this four hour car ride is gonna fly and then the next thing I know, I’m coming face to face with his polished parents and I won’t know what to say.

In other words, I need as much time as I can get to come up with a thorough plan with Drew so we sound like a real couple.

“Yeah. A history would be good.” He nods, never taking his eyes off the road.

Which is a good thing, I tell myself. He’s a safe driver, aware of everything going on around him.

But really I wish he would look at me. Offer a smile of reassurance. Hell, even a fake, ‘it’s going to be all right’ would make me happy right about now.

I get none of that. No thank you either.

Bogus.

“Well.” I clear my throat, because I’m plunging into the cold water despite his wanting to linger safely on the shore. “How long have we been dating?”

“Start of school sounds good, I think.”