“Not everyone,” he says. “They grabbed us in the woods by the cemetery and took us to the cabin. I managed to escape because Parvati created a diversion, but we’ve got to go back for her.”
Parvati! Preston’s materializing out of the swirling dark like some horror movie phantom almost made me forget that I was on the clock. 11:33. Twenty-seven minutes. “Who? Who grabbed you?”
“DeWitt’s goons.”
“Your dad seriously hired guys to kidnap you?” Even though I’ve been thinking the same thing, it still seems so unreal. “Are you sure? I found cocaine in your room. Can’t that shit make you paranoid?”
“That’s not my coke and DeWitt’s not my dad,” Preston says. “My name isn’t even Preston.”
A pair of headlights appears over the crest of the hill. Both of us turn in unison to watch as the car cruises past. Neither of us speaks. The scarlet taillights dissolve into the night, and we’re alone again.
“What do you mean your name isn’t Preston?”
“Preston’s dead.” At my look he adds, “Don’t be sad. He’s been dead for years. You never met him.”
“Huh? I don’t understand.”
“It’s a long story.” He opens the driver’s side door to the pickup. “You look exhausted. Move over. I’ll drive.”
I want to hear every piece of this long story. I need to figure out what’s happening. But then my eyes catch the clock on the dash. “We have to get to Parvati by midnight.” I quickly fill him in about the phone call.
“Did you call the cops?” he asks.
I shake my head as I scoot over the console and into the passenger seat. “I couldn’t reach the FBI, and it’s not like anyone else would have believed me.”
“Yeah. Half the cops are probably on DeWitt’s payroll anyway. Let’s go get her.” He flips off the emergency flashers and guides the truck back onto the road.
“So if Preston has been dead for years, who the hell have I been hanging out with?” I ask.
The boy formerly known as Preston laughs. “My name’s Adam. The truth is pretty fucked up. We might not get all the way through it before we get back to the cabin, but rest assured I’m still the same guy that you know.” He bumps his fist lightly against his chest. The gesture is so Preston-like that I can’t help but smile. I should be furious. He lied to me about hooking up with Parvati and videotaped us having sex. I should seriously kick his ass right here and now. But somehow all I can do is stare, like he’s magically risen from the grave. Who cares what he did or what his name is? We can hash out all of that bullshit later. My friend is alive. That’s all that matters.
“Adam Lyons,” I say.
“Yeah, watch this.” Adam punches a couple of buttons on a phone and scrolls through a long list of files. After selecting one, he tosses the phone into my lap. A video of Claudia DeWitt starts playing on the screen.
She’s flipping through TV channels in her living room. A phone rings. Claudia mutes the television before answering it.
“What? How is that possible?” she says.
A pause. She turns away from the television. Walks toward the big picture window that looks out onto the lawn.
“You swore all that was in the past. You promised me.” A pause. She lifts one hand to her forehead. “Don’t tell me not to be dramatic. We covered up a death, Rem.”
Rem. As in Remington. She’s talking to her husband.
Her voice cracks. She dabs at her eyes with the back of her left hand.
“You know as well as I do that you’re guilty of child endangerment . . . perhaps more.” A pause. “I’ll never forgive myself for the things we did . . . to both of them.”
The clip ends. The hamster wheel in my brain starts spinning.
“Play the next one,” Adam says.
It’s Preston, or who I always thought was Preston, and his dad.
“I’m tired of pretending to be someone else,” Preston says. He paces back and forth in front of the plasma TV.
“You agreed,” DeWitt says. “You agreed to be the son we want you to be until you’re twenty-one.”
“And what happens then? I just disappear?”
“We’ll figure something out,” DeWitt says.
Preston turns to face his father. His face is red, his hands clenched into fists. “Do you regret it?”
“Forgetting to secure the gun? Every day of my life.”
“I’m not talking about what you did to him,” Preston says. “I’m talking about what you did to me.”
“I like to think Claudia and I gave you a good life. We bought you whatever you wanted, computers, fancy phones, private surfing lessons. We even allowed you to enroll at public school.”
Preston goes back to his pacing. “But you told the doctors I was crazy. The shock treatments, the medicine—you screwed up my brain. Sometimes I think about the past and realize I’m remembering something that never even happened.” His voice cracks. “You tried to erase me.”
The screen goes dark. Adam reaches over and lifts the phone out of my hand before I can even begin to process what I’ve seen. Shock treatments? Medicine? What the hell?
“So you know how DeWitt is CEO of DeWitt Firearms, right?” he asks.
I nod. “Yeah.”
The truck swerves hard to the left as Adam dodges a pothole I don’t even see until we’re right on top of it. “So of course he’s always been politically aligned with gun nuts, the NRA, etc.”
“Yeah?” I don’t really get where Pres—er—Adam is going with this.
“When he was nine, the real Preston DeWitt accidentally shot himself with his father’s gun.”
“Holy shit!” If I were driving I probably would have rammed the truck into a tree. We covered up a death, Rem. “Now that is some news that never made the LA Times.”
“Exactly,” Adam says. “Daddy’s close advisors told him if the news got out his political career would be finished. Not to mention DeWitt Firearms. Not only would he be arrested, the press would destroy him and his company. Pro-gun politician’s kid shoots himself with Dad’s gun. Can you imagine the headlines?”
“So . . .” Maybe I’m thick, but I still don’t get it. “Where do you come in?”
“Apparently the senator covered up Preston’s death and then sent his goons looking for a suitable replacement. They found me in a boys’ home. I was about the right size and shape, with hair and eyes that could be fixed.”