Riley’s ears were ringing. “You’re not—”
Tim whirled and stamped his feet. “Do not say that!” He looked like a child, his apple cheeks flushed a deep red, his eyes wild and unfocused.
He’s crazy, Riley thought.
She swallowed hard. “I was just going to ask you, how am I supposed to know you’re my brother? Where have you been all my life?”
Tim’s nostrils flared. “They left me. They left me like garbage, just like they’re planning on leaving you.”
“I—”
“I’ll prove it!” Tim raged.
He yanked her up and plopped her down in one of the aluminum chairs then wound a length of duct tape around Riley’s torso and arms. He held his finger to her. “Once you believe me, I’ll take that off. If you’re good.”
Riley blinked. Tim’s cadence and behavior swung from normal to almost childlike in a matter of seconds, and the switch was chilling—both sides Mr. Hyde.
She heard Tim tinker with some things behind her, and her mind started spinning. He was behind her with a knife. She couldn’t see what he was doing, had no idea what he was thinking.
She had to get him to free her. She had to find a way to get loose. Her eyes went to the rectangle of window that wasn’t covered by a sheet. She squinted, seeing nothing but darkness and the foot-sized hole she kicked through. Where were they? How long had they traveled—how long had she slept?
“There!” Tim dropped a large manila envelope on the table in front of Riley. He snatched it up again then upturned it. “Proof.”
Riley watched as pictures floated out of the envelope. “I don’t understand, Tim. What are these?”
One of the photos worked itself free from the envelope and floated down. It landed face up directly in front of her—an answer to her question.
The bottom fell out of Riley’s world.
She recognized the scene immediately—the birthday party from the postcard she received. But in this one, everyone was ready, grinning and facing the camera. The boy, dead center, eyes round and focused on his cake.
And Riley’s mother next to him.
SIXTEEN
Everything was a blur. Every thought, image, or memory she had shaken, false, wrong.
“That’s my mother,” Riley whispered.
Tim shuffled a few more pictures around then dropped another in front of Riley. It was the same scene, and he jabbed at it. “Dad.” His eyes cut to Riley and there was a crazed, pleased look in them. He jabbed again. “You.”
Riley leaned closer, scrutinizing the photo. She, her mother, and her father were all in this one. She, a toddler in a fluffy pink party dress, sitting on her father’s arm.
And Tim was right between them.
“That’s you?”
He nodded. “That was my ninth birthday. Mom made a coconut cake. You threw it up on your dress.”
Riley felt exposed, the intimate details of a past she didn’t even know laid out for her on a cheap aluminum table by a complete stranger.
“This is when you were smaller. We were all at the zoo.”
Another picture of this unknown happy family. Riley, a bald-headed infant, was reclining in a stroller. Tim, younger, but very much the same kid, grinning a toothless grin, his hand firmly held by Riley’s father while giraffes stood in the background.
“Do you remember this Christmas?” Tim pushed another snapshot in front of her. “You got a tricycle. I got a fire truck.”
A vague memory unhinged itself. Riley, small, being placed on a shiny red tricycle. She felt her father’s hand on the small of her back, giving her a gentle push. She could smell the fresh pine, and somehow knew that her mother was making noise in the kitchen, just off to her right.
Riley swung her head, her eyes scanning the debris pile then trailing back to what remained of the kitchen. “This was our house.”
Tim did a little happy jump. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you, silly!”
Riley’s head started to throb. This was the house Jane Elizabeth O’Leary came home to after she was born at Granite Cay Hospital. They were in Granite Cay! It was a little more than a six-hour drive from Crescent City. Riley’s eyes ticked with moisture. Who was going to find her now? Would Gail, Hempstead—would her parents even think to look here?
“You’re surprised, aren’t you? I knew you would be.”
“What happened to it?”
Tim looked away, his shoulders slumping. “I tried to fix it up nice for you. But when you left, there was no one to take care of it. Homeless people came and tried to stay here, and the city tried to tear it down. I tried to make it nice though.”
“Wh—what happened to you?”
His eyes were hard again. “They took me away.”
“Who’s ‘they’?”