Pretty in the Dark (Dark and Wild #2)

Chapter 1

1

JUNIPER

“ I think I just got an invitation…” I whispered the words, my hands shaking as I held the crisp, white parchment between my fingers.

The delicate scrawl of letters and numbers sent chills racing down my spine, and suddenly the delicious breakfast Cade had made for me sat like a bowling ball in my stomach. I was going to be sick, and it wasn’t because of my migraine.

“An invitation to what?” I flinched at the sound of Dean’s voice and quickly tucked the card back into the envelope it had come in.

“Just someone who wants to meet with me, probably for the Emporium.” The lie rolled off my tongue and I felt a twinge of guilt. I was becoming too used to keeping secrets from my brother. Just like I’d become too used to keeping secrets from Cade. But Dean didn’t need to know what was happening. At least not yet. Not until I could find out more about why Edmund had faked his death. And why my mother had kept me in the dark about my half-brother and my real father.

Dean’s eyes narrowed in suspicion like every disbelieving pre-teen boy was prone to do at his age. He turned back to Cade. “I thought you hated her.” Apparently, Cade’s answer wasn’t enough to satisfy his curiosity, and he wasn’t going to let it go like I’d hoped he would.

My mouth gaped open in shock. “Dean!” He turned a baleful eye on me.

“What? It’s true.”

I watched Cade’s face for a reaction, a confirmation of Dean’s words—or denial. Of all the things we’d said to each other in the past several days, not once had he said he’d forgiven me. My father had pinned a crime on him he didn’t commit and used me to do it. Cade had every right to want payback.

But his face gave nothing away. He just shook his head and ignored Dean like he was used to his bluntness, and instead of answering, he dropped the kitchen towel onto the counter that he’d so casually draped over his shoulder, then he turned back to me.

“I have to go, but I’ll be back. Don’t leave the house without telling me.”

I glared at him. “I’m not under house arrest, and you’re not my jailer.”

A shadow passed over his face and I realized too late just how callous my words sounded. But before I could say anything else, he brushed past Dean and walked out the door. Maybe it was better this way. After overhearing his conversation with my apparent brother and realizing that the only reason Cade had been getting close to me was to keep tabs on me, I wasn’t so sure I wanted to hop on the back of a bike and ride off into the sunset with him. I wasn’t even sure there would be a sunset to ride off into.

Dean started to turn and walk away, but I stopped him.

“Where have you been?”

He blinked, his face going as impassive as the man who’d just walked out the door.

“Out with friends.”

I frowned. “What friends? Do I know them?”

Dean’s eyes narrowed, glinting with anger and stubbornness. “You’re not my mom, Juniper. So why don’t you stop pretending and go back to Denver? It’s not like you want to be here, anyway.”

I wanted to flinch at the way his sharp words slapped at me. “Dean, that’s not true. I came back for you.”

My hand itched with the urge to reach out and run my fingers through the sandy blonde mess of hair that curled around his eyes. Eyes that were almost the same hue as mine, with just a tad more green to them. But I kept them at my side, knowing he wouldn’t appreciate the touch. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here for you D. I wanted to be. You have no idea how badly I wanted to be here. But you don’t understand. It was safer if I was gone.”

“Well, it wasn’t safe, Juniper. It wasn’t safe at all.” With that, Dean spun on his heel and marched down the hall to the stairs that led up to his room. The entire house shook with the sound of his door slamming and in the next instant, I heard the sounds of Bad Omen’s “Concrete Jungle” thumping through the house. Bone-weary tiredness fell over me as I returned to the island counter and stared at the invitation.

I had no clue what I was doing.

Nothing was going the way I’d thought it would once I came back to Wild. It felt like someone had cursed the place. Or maybe it was just my family that was cursed.

Anger and frustration flushed through me, my skin prickling hot and then cold, and before I knew it, I snatched the envelope up and marched toward my father’s study. If our family’s past was involved in whatever was happening now, then I knew the answers would be in there.

I keyed in the code that would unlock the doors and pushed them open, pausing in the entryway as memories and feelings came flooding back to me. It was like taking a step back in time. Dark paneled walls gave the room an ominous feeling. Heavy curtains framed either side of a large, executive-style desk, drawn shut as if to permanently block out the sun. Edmund’s presence still filled the room. I could see the couch where my brother had lain, sleeping so quietly, so peacefully, with a gun pointed at his head while I’d been kneeling on the floor, begging Edmund to spare him.

Telling him I would do anything he wanted. Anything at all. Scared to even raise my voice above a whisper for fear of waking Dean.

I bit my lip and tore my gaze away from the couch to the fireplace, lying cold and dark now. But it had blazed brightly during the cold, winter nights. And often during the summer as well.

If I breathed deeply enough, I could almost smell the scent of his favorite cigar and see him sitting in front of the fireplace in his leather chair, watching the flames.

He’d done that more and more as I got older. Watched the flames, and sometimes when he thought I wasn’t paying attention, I could feel him watching me. Observing me. His eyes glinting with thoughts I didn’t want to know.

Once when I’d been planting new herbs in our garden for Bess, I’d caught him staring at me over the fence. And when I’d asked him if everything was okay, he’d just approached me as if in a trance, lifting a lock of my hair and letting it slide between his fingers. His voice had whispered my mother’s name like a prayer. “ Blaire… ” Then whatever memory he’d been lost in slipped away, and he’d come back to the present with a cold sneer on his lips. A look I was more familiar with. “You’re so much like your mother.”

It wasn’t a compliment.

Chills ran down my spine at the memory. Had Edmund realized then that I wasn’t his daughter? What had he done to my mother when he’d found out?

I moved toward the large, cherry wood desk that sat in the center of the room. It was ornate and still had papers and notes organized on top of it, as if Edmund had gotten up in the middle of a task and walked away, never to return.

When the solicitor had been here to handle the reading of the will and deal with the remains of the estate, I hadn’t paid any attention to what had been on the desk. But now I did.

Notes from a case he’d been working on. Phone numbers and names to other attorneys. Some of them I recognized as colleagues he spoke about. I ignored all of those and pulled open the drawers.

They were filled with organized file folders and documents, most of them to do with the house or various businesses he’d been interested in at one point.

One file caught my attention. It was labeled with just two initials, D.B. My heart clenched as I pulled it free and realized it was the bank documents from David Black’s business loan. I flipped through the pages and gasped. No, it was more than that. It was David’s entire criminal history.

As I scanned through the records, one particular arrest caught my attention. A date just a few months before my birth. They had arrested David for criminal trespassing. But it was where that shocked me. This house. My home.

I scanned through the remains of the report, but all it stated was that they apprehended David for breaking and entering with another accomplice, who was shot and killed in self-defense. They had redacted the name of the person who David had been with, as well as the name of the person who had shot him.

Could this have been the cause of the hatred Edmund felt toward Cade’s family? Edmund had never really told me why he hated the Blacks so much. He’d only ridiculed them for their lack of class and made them out to be the worst of enemies. I set the file aside to think about later.

Everything else was boring and mundane. Nothing that would have given me any sign that he had been planning to fake his death, or the reason why.

Frustrated with how little I knew, I shoved the chair away and then winced in pain as my knee banged hard against the underside of the desk. Rubbing the sore spot, I glared at the offending drawer and then felt a small thrill as something caught my eye. The placement of the drawer didn't match up with where my knee hit.

Frowning, I ran my fingers along the underside of the wood until something caught my fingernail.. “Come on baby…” I coaxed, until my nail slid in between the sliver of space and a grin spread across my face. A false bottom!

Excitement built as I emptied the contents of the drawer, searching for the release that would open the secret compartment. With a slight gasp, I felt the drawer give way. Carefully reaching inside the tiny space, I felt around until I pulled out a few faded pictures, my heart clenching as I realized they were of my mother.

But not just my mother.

Edmund was there too. They weren’t together, however. Between the two of them, there were two other men. One of them surprised me. David Black, Cade’s father, was grinning from ear to ear with his arm slung around Edmund’s shoulders as though they were close friends.

And my mother was gripping the arm of another man. Her head leaned against his shoulder as if she was melting into him. There was a soft, secretive smile playing around her lips.

I studied the face of the unknown man, not recognizing him and yet, feeling as if he was so familiar somehow. His hair was dark and long, pulled back in a ponytail. Despite the faded photo, it appeared that he had dark eyes and a dark complexion.

I glanced over Edmund’s face again and noticed that he was the only one not smiling in the photo. Instead, his head was tilted away from the camera and his gaze was fixed on my mother. There was an intensity in the way he was looking at her that made me shiver. I recognized that look.

Setting the photos down, I felt around again for anything else, until my fingers touched the edge of something that seemed to be caught in the back. Giving it a tug, I felt it snap as I pulled free a tarnished silver necklace, with a key dangling from the end. I held the key up to the light and frowned.

Pushing away from the desk, I stood and did a slow circle around the room, as if something might jump out at me and scream, “Here I am! I’m the secret your mom and family have been hiding all these years. So glad you found me!”

But the bookcases were silent, with only a thick coat of dust blanketing them. The fireplace just looked cold, and it was filled with dark ashes. I looked at the tiny key in my hand for clues, but nothing about it stood out to me, and I gritted my teeth in frustration. I was close to finding out something—I could feel it. And yet, the truth was still just out of my reach. The dull thud of my headache came back to me, pounding against my temple as frustration and exhaustion took over.

I was so tired of feeling like I was alone and in the dark.