The Real Deal

Until I was busted, and thrown in jail for fourteen days.

Besides my parents dying, those were the worst two weeks of my life. I shared a cell with a crackhead and a former felon nabbed for possessing a firearm. Fun times. They were scary as shit, while I was the budding white collar criminal. Perhaps the justice system figured if they stopped me then, they’d prevent the next Madoff.

Maybe they were right.

When I was released, I quit scams and cons cold turkey.

I stopped because I liked college a hell of a lot better than I liked being locked up. I spent the next five years at university, finally graduating at age twenty-four. We used our con money for my school and then for Heath’s, taking out small loans for the amount we didn’t have. In retrospect, we might have been able to qualify for financial aid for college, but we had no clue when we were younger. After our parents died, we were effectively raised by wolves—ourselves—and neither one of us had a guidance counselor who cared enough to mention aid, and once we applied, we didn’t think about asking for a handout. But even if we’d known, the reality is conning was fast and quick and effective. We were good at it. We didn’t have to fill out endless forms to see if we qualified. We found our marks and we went for it.

Every now and then, I’d think about our marks, the guys we conned out of dough. Some were confused cashiers. Some were drunk frat guys. Some were just average Joes on the beach. A ten-dollar bill here, a twenty there, in some cases a few hundred. I’d like to think my choices didn’t break anyone’s bank, but who was I to know what our tricks did and didn’t do to the marks?

At the very least, I took some solace in knowing I hadn’t scammed anyone out of a retirement, or a home, or a college fund. Like a twelve-stepper, I figured I should make amends in some broader sense of the word. I started donating to a pancreatic cancer research fund, and I still do. Every month, I write a check, and I’ve never missed a single payment. Maybe it’s my small way of restoring order. Maybe it’s my belief in karma. Or maybe it’s just the right thing to do.

By the time I graduated from college, my con artist days were far in the rearview mirror, but Heath had started up again. He’d gotten a taste of big paydays, and he liked them too much. He’d studied computers, and that gave him enough skills to establish his stock-fraud scam when he finished school. He wanted to refill the till, he’d said one evening over drinks as we caught up. “The kitty’s empty. Everything went to the registrar.”

“Everything was supposed to go to the registrar. That’s why we did it,” I’d pointed out. “So we’d be done.”

“And now we can replenish it,” he’d told me.

“Mom wouldn’t approve.”

“Mom’s lack of approval didn’t stop you from cleaning up with me all along the boardwalk.”

“That was different,” I’d said. “We had nothing then. We had a reason and we had no choice.”

“And I have a reason now. I need to get ahead. I need to have my act together when I look up Lacey again.”

That name. A blast from the past. I wrenched back, surprised to hear him mention her. “Your high school girlfriend?”

“Yep. Some girls—you just can’t get them out of your head.”

“Is that so?”

“Sometimes you meet a girl, and she stays here.” He’d tapped his temple. “But that’s because she’s here.” He’d knocked his knuckles against his breastbone. “She’s definitely right here in my heart. I need to see her again.”

“What about Addison?”

He’d shook his head. “Addison is a businesswoman. We liked each other. Hell, maybe it was even love at one point. But it was always first and foremost business for her.”

I wasn’t sure if that meant they were through. I didn’t ask. I didn’t care that much about her. A tactical error on my part, but one I couldn’t have anticipated. “Just be careful.”

“That’s my middle name.”

And that’s when Addison comes back into the story.

It’s always about a girl, isn’t it?

Men will move mountains for women. They’ll burn cities. They’ll rob banks. They’ll live in cells.

Addison had stopped conning and had landed a job as a business consultant, so she was already pulling away from my brother. Someone else was trying to get close to him. Lacey had tracked him down, found out he was back in Boston. She’d missed him, always had, and had never gotten him out of her mind either.

He said see you later to the drifting-away Addison, and started up with the girl he’d probably always loved. Lacey stayed with him when he was cuffed for the stock scam, when he was sent away, and for the eighteen months he was locked up. She waited for him to get out. She vowed to me that she’d make sure he stayed clean. I paid his restitution with my meager savings, even though he chewed me out for doing so. “I was going to take care of that on my own. Don’t do that again,” he’d said one day when I’d visited him.

“Don’t go to prison again, and I won’t have to,” I’d said.

Addison waited for something, too. While he was behind bars, she decided she wanted her money back from their poker games in South Carolina. Maybe she hadn’t been the one drifting away. Maybe Heath had. Perhaps the return of Lacey to the scene meant Addison didn’t feel so generous with her money anymore. That’s my best guess, since soon after he was locked up, she found me, reminded me how our cons had helped the little brother the most. How they’d paid for my school. She’d told me she’d happily shake down Heath when he got out of prison.

“Would you like me to do that, sweetheart?” she’d said in her southern drawl.

That’s where she had me over the barrel.

She knew me. Knew I wanted my brother to stay out of trouble. I don’t know what he’d do to get the money back. That’s what I worry about. That’s why I took on the debt myself and never told him. I don’t mind. My brother put me first when we were younger. Even though he’s older, he made sure we had money for my school before his.

The least I could do was cover for him.

As I walk to the inn, a new text message flashes at me.




I stuff the phone into my jeans pocket and return to the Sunnyside.

Might as well call this place the Flip Side, because that’s what it is compared to my life. When I walk into the homey B and B, a passel of Hamiltons and Moores are drinking coffee and playing a riotous game of Monopoly.

April’s mom calls out to me. “Join us.”

My heart pinches and feels smaller, like it’s caving in.

This is the stuff I don’t know how to do.

April is curled up in a roomy chair, her feet tucked under her. She pats the chair. I cut across the rug, squeeze in with her, and she wraps her arms around me, and kisses my cheek.

Liking her is dangerous. There’s a text message on my phone that’ll remind me just how dangerous it is.

I need the money a lot more than I need a distraction as delicious as her.





Chapter Twenty-four

April

When my cousin Katie lands on Marvin Gardens, I wiggle my fingers and tell her to pay the piper.

“Don’t cross her. She’s one badass landlord,” Theo says with a smile as Katie hands over some pink, yellow, and green bills.

Cory returns home midway through the game and dispenses baked goods like Santa Claus with his bag of toys. He seems to take special care to give Theo the badass seven-layer bar. Cory totally has a man crush on Theo, and it’s adorable.

When Theo finishes, he gives Cory a thumbs-up. “This is indeed a heavenly bar.”

Cory beams, and I bet he wishes his wife were praising him like that. But then, what do I know? Maybe it’s not praise he wants. Maybe he just wants a private moment with her.

I’m not sure what’s going on with my sister and her husband.