Chapter Fourteen
Don’t cry yet. Tilly listened to her principal explain the terms of her leave. “Yes, sir. No, I understand.” She understood he’d drop her like she was Thor’s hammer if the school got anything more than a whiff of her personal turmoil. If this wasn’t resolved by the time school started, she might not have a job to go back to. And he’d made it clear that if she got arrested for something like child abuse, she’d be terminated.
She’d never said fuck my life after all she’d survived, but it was coming close.
She cruised through the help-wanted ads online. Anything with kids was obviously out. It was like flushing four years of college down the drain.
After the confrontation with Mr. Woods and witnessing the real Flynn Halstengard Tuesday night, she’d come back and cried herself to sleep. Then she’d strapped on her lady balls and searched for work all day yesterday.
Today, she was still unemployed. All her clients had abandoned her, and she wanted to hate them all but couldn’t. They had done what they felt was right for their kids, even though she was perfect for their kids, had helped them in so many ways. School was starting in over a month. Would the kids get set up with more tutoring before then? Or would their skills stagnate until then?
She told herself not to worry, but she couldn’t. She’d invested so much of herself in their futures, it was hard to not even be able to walk away. They were gone to her. If she waited for things to blow over, could she build her business back up, or would rumors circulate and forever tarnish her reputation?
She had a feeling she knew the answer.
Her parents. That asshole had tracked down her parents. Her dad had blamed her for the dead cat, when she’d sobbed over the limp body as her own took the most severe beating of her life.
A car accident? Anyone stupid enough to believe she could break only her jaw in a car accident didn’t deserve a dime, much less a fucking bank.
She wanted to lean on Flynn so badly. Her platinum-haired knight in shining gym wear, coming to chase away the mean girls throwing litter. Why had he helped her all those years ago?
It was before he’d left home. Before he’d left his mom and sister. Was his mom really as bad as he’d said? Or was it like her parents, spreading a different story of hate than what had really happened?
She tapped Flynn’s name into her computer. She sifted through several recent articles about him and his work until she found his dad’s obituary. A plain and simple article that listed his kids Flynn and Lynne as survivors. The cause of death was drowning.
From the year, he would’ve been fourteen, maybe fifteen. Poor kid, losing his dad so young and taking care of his mom and sister.
No. She couldn’t feel sorry for him when she didn’t know his circumstances. He certainly hadn’t told her. Nor had he disputed Mr. Woods’s insinuation that he was paying his mother off to leave him alone and keep quiet about his sister.
She wanted to believe the best. So badly. Yet he wasn’t here. He hadn’t called. He’d let her leave and hadn’t come after her with an explanation. Despite what Mr. Woods had said about Flynn’s mom, his reputation at work meant more.
After all, he hadn’t invited her to bring lunch again. As if that moment in the office had had too much of the feels. As if he’d never put her on his arm and call her his girlfriend.
There was nothing she could do about him. She had to help herself. Tapping around on her keyboard, she eventually spit out Mrs. Woods’s full name. A search turned up nothing. No honors. No top of her class. She’d probably been a spoiled girl who’d gotten her way, then found a man to give her everything she asked for with minimal work.
That hadn’t been Tilly’s future. She’d had to scrape to keep out of the gutter. Yet people suspected her of hitting a child when Mrs. Woods was the one with a Hulk-sized cruel streak.
She pulled up Mrs. Blumenthal’s number and dialed it. When the woman answered, Tilly explained her situation.
“Oh, dear, that’s bad. Yes, thanks to your man friend, I’ll give you two free months of rent. That’s what it would’ve cost if I’d had to pay the deductible.”
Tilly slumped, letting her eyelids fall closed. Finding a place to rent in the cities was hard enough, but a nice and reasonable place was almost impossible. And she had no extra money for a deposit or first and last months’ rent. “Thank you so much. I wasn’t sure what I’d do. I just need to find a temporary job to tide me over.”
“I’ll call my son. He’s always looking for help in his grocery store in Bloomington. What hours can you work?”
“Anything and everything.” For the first time in days, she smiled. Just being able to bring in an income, even save some money, would take a load of stress off her mind.
“Okay, let me call him. Can I give him your number?”
“Of course. And thank you, thank you, thank you.”
“It’s no problem, Tilly. You’re my best tenant, and I don’t believe that load of shit for one second.”
“Between you and me, I think Charlie’s mom beat him.” Tilly snapped her mouth shut. Where had that come from? But it made sense. Mrs. Woods was the only other person with consistent access to Charlie. For all his many, many faults, and no matter how he’d treated Tilly, Mr. Woods seemed to truly care about Charlie’s welfare. “I honestly wouldn’t put it past her to do it when I was working, or when the nanny was there, so she had someone to blame it on.”
“That shouldn’t be between you and me, Tilly. Tell the police.” After a few more encouragements to hang in there, she hung up.
Who’d believe her, with the pull Mr. Woods had?
Mrs. Blumenthal had her back, though. Tilly sighed. Her boyfriend was too concerned about his image to stay by her side, but her landlady believed her. So there was that.
She didn’t want to get too excited after the call, so she cruised more help-wanted ads. Scribbling down her choices from best to worst, she listed all the jobs she thought she’d be competent at and where her potential legal woes wouldn’t be a problem. Basically, a place that wouldn’t vilify her if word reached them about what she’d been accused of.
Her phone rang. For a moment, she fervently hoped it was Flynn checking on her. She didn’t recognize the number.
Foolish girl.
She answered. It was Mrs. Blumenthal’s son, offering her a job. She could start tomorrow, stocking shelves on the graveyard shift.
She clicked her phone off after agreeing to start at eleven p.m. the next night. She’d work all weekend, eleven to seven. It wasn’t like she had lessons to plan all day for the rest of the summer.
There was knock at the door. Her heart leaped into her throat. Flynn?
She sprinted across the room to answer it. Without even checking her peephole, she swung the door open.
Two police officers, a male and a female, waited on her stoop.
“Tilly Johnson?”
***
“Flynn? Dude? Mr. Halstengard, sir?”
Flynn glanced up at the sarcastic tone. Matthew stared at him, one manicured brow raised. “You never call me Mr. Halstengard.”
“Because it’d be a waste of air after two years as your PA. But, dude, you so weren’t listening to me. Do you want your hair appointment after your suit fitting so you don’t shed little stubs all over new threads you haven’t bought yet?”
“Yeah, I don’t care.” And he really didn’t. Usually he did, was very particular about what he wore and when he upgraded his work clothes. Always the best image possible.
“Seriously.” Matthew set his tablet down. “I’m going to step out of bounds here, so fair warning. Now I’m not oblivious. You came back from your bachelor vacation a moody beast. Then you were skiing on rainbows for the last few weeks. I even got home at a decent hour every single night. And you didn’t call or leave messages at all on the weekends. Don’t think I haven’t been dying to know who the cutie is that Mrs. Silverstein was horrified she almost kicked out. What’s her name?”
Flynn stared at the door. How many times since that awful night had he wished Mrs. Silverstein would notify him of a girl who’d brought him lunch and wouldn’t leave?
Tilly had taken the news of Lynne pretty hard. She’d seemed more hurt that he hadn’t been completely honest with her. But the look of total betrayal when he’d chosen his career over her was a knife in the gut every time the image ran through his head. He hadn’t seen it that way at the time; he would’ve been there for her, but every time he came to work and didn’t phone his legal department, he imagined himself stomping the knife in her back even deeper.
He hadn’t heard more from John. Perhaps he could finish the project and sign off on everything without incident. The man must not have found anything on Tilly. Of course, how would Flynn know?
Matthew snapped his fingers. “You’re spacing on me again. Woman problems?”
“You’re right. You’re stepping out of bounds.”
Matthew’s lips pressed together, and he snatched up his tablet like, well then.
Flynn should apologize. His phone rang. Wes. Was he calling for a golf date? Cuz Flynn could get lost in eighteen holes for a while.
“Just a minute,” he told Matthew, then answered.
“What. The hell. Is going on?” Wes’s voice shook. He was livid.
“What the fuck are you talking about? Wait.” Flynn sat forward. “Is Tilly okay? Did that bastard get to her?”
“No, Tilly’s not okay, fuckwad. Mara just bailed her out.”
Flynn slammed his hand on the table. Matthew jumped but stayed where he was. “Where is she?”
“Not Arkham anymore, no thanks to you. Mara and I barely got the story out of her in the first place. Then she was incoherent when Mara and I didn’t know you two were seeing each other. Why the hell would you keep that secret?”
Flynn sank his face into his free hand. “We haven’t talked much in the last few weeks. I’ve been busy.”
“Yeah, with Tilly, I hear. How is all this shit connected?”
“Where is she?” The only thing pushing to the front of his mind was Tilly’s well-being. She’d been arrested and thrown in jail. For how long?
Wes let out a breath of frustration. “She’s home. She only called because she was frantic to make the first shift of her new job since that asshole blasted her career.”
His Tilly wasn’t going to sit at home and lose hope. “When does she leave for work?”
It was four o’clock on a Friday. Where would she be working?
“Not till tonight. I guess it’s some night-shift job stocking shelves.”
Flynn shot up. Matthew’s eyes widened. He’d been riveted to Flynn’s side of the conversation. Tilly was going to be working herself into the ground all night long?
Meanwhile, who the fuck beat that kid and was getting away with it?
“Wes, you helped out Mara with some legal issues, right?”
“No. Oh, you mean the sleazy professor. I did that whether she wanted me to or not.”
Flynn caught Matthew’s gaze. “Your partner’s a cop, right?”
“Yup.”
“Does he know legal shit?”
Matthew rolled his eyes. “Please, half his job is pleasing or pissing off lawyers.”
“What about cases of child abuse? Does he deal with that?”
Matthew sobered. “More than anyone would realize.”
Flynn hit the speaker on his phone. “Okay, guys. I need some help.”