Safe Harbor (The Lake Trilogy, Book 3) (14 page)

It does seem that my life just keeps getting better.

With everyone occupied, now is my chance to go see Holly and make sure she tells Will the truth. Now that Meyer is dead, and Will has come face to face with Holly’s mother, I don’t see why he can’t know the truth, so I’m anticipating this being an easy conversation. I just have to keep myself in check and not let my hatred for what she did to Will in the first place influence my approach. My mom used to say “You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.” She was very wise that way.

I park a few blocks away in a residential area and walk up McDowell Street to Jail Central on Fourth Street. It’s a crowded time of day,
early lunchtime, and I can’t decide if that’s good or bad. Will anyone recognize me from the press conference the other day? Or will I shuffle in with the other nameless, faceless people on the street? I’m hoping the latter is the case, and when I round the corner onto Fourth Street to the entrance of Jail Central I can see that I should be in the clear. There are no reporters camped out, no one holding signs to release Holly Reynolds and thank her for her service to our community. The coast is clear.

I approach the security
checkpoint, taking my sunglasses off and stuffing them into my purse along with my keys. I keep my head down because the last thing I need is for a mouthy security guard to call the media and tell them I’m here, all for a little extra green in his pocket. They’d be all over me, asking me why I was here, what I said to Holly, what she said to me, and how I felt about Will having been romantically involved with the woman who ended up killing his father.

Apparently I didn’t warrant much more than a once over from the security guards and
I pass through with ease. Collecting my purse I follow the signage that takes me to the visitor check-in.

I didn’t think I’d be this nervous, but I am. The last time I saw Holly she came to say goodbye after identifying Marcus’ body.
I think about how she tried to talk Marcus down from the ledge that day, how her call bought Luke and Wes time in getting to me before Marcus…

I shake my head to clear the memory of that awful day from my mind. I need to
stay focused on my objective to convince Holly that telling Will the truth about their relationship is the right thing to do.

I sign in and wait uncomfortably for Holly to be brought to her side of our windowed desk area. When she appears she’s surprised to see me, but smiles.
I smile back at her tentatively and we both pick up the payphone-looking receivers on our sides of the glass. For a second I feel like I’m in an episode of Law and Order.

“Layla,” she says. “I’m surprised to see you.”

“Hi, Holly. How are you?” I ask.

“I’m ok, I guess.
I’d be doing worse if not for Luke.”

“I think everyone who knows him feels that way.” I look down, searching for how to begin this conversation. I remind myself not to let my anger with her lead, but to be practical about it, and let her know that Will is going to understand.

“I saw the press conference. I’m really happy for you. What he did for you…that’s really something,” she says softly.

“Yes. It was amazing.” I don’t know how to read her. I don’t remember her as being one who shows a lot of emotion when she speaks, but something seems off.

“My mother said she met you the other day,” Holly tells me. “I’m sorry if she was rude to you.”

“Did she tell you what she said?” I ask.

“No, but she told me what you said. I can only imagine what she did to get that kind of response from
you
. She can be, well…I’ve already told you how she can be.”

I consider telling her what her mother said about Marcus but decide against it. Holly only gets 30 minute
s to visit and I don’t want to waste time discussing her mother any further.

“I want to ask you to do something for me, Holly,” I begin. She looks at me with an understandably quizzical expression. “Will is coming to see you
soon, and I want you to tell him the truth about your relationship.”

Holly is
silent and emotionless.

“Please, Holly. He’s coming to apologize to you. He feels responsible for what his father did to your family. He needs to know what really happened,” I plead. I try hard not to let m
y voice give too much of my desperation away. In some, sad way, I have to maintain the upper hand.

“I can’t do that,” she says.

“Yes, you can,” I respond, not hiding my irritation at her immediate refusal. “He needs to know, and he’ll understand. So, when he gets here, before he can begin even one word of apology to you, cut him off…tell him about your mother’s plot…tell him that you felt like you had no choice…explain that…”

“Layla, Will’s already apologized to me.”

“What? When?” I feel my face contort into a squishy mess of confusion and I hate that I’ve shown my emotions this clearly.

“Will came to see me a few weeks before he disappeared.
He told me things were going to change for him and he wanted to make sure he apologized while he had the chance.” Her delivery continues to be emotionless.

“That can’t be true. Will…Will
would have told me,” I stammer. I hate that she has so obviously caught me off guard, but unlike her in this moment, I can’t lie.

“So he didn’t tell you. Huh.” At first her face reveals nothing of what she’s thinking. I search her eyes in hopes of seeing something, but…nothing.
And then…she smiles almost sinisterly. “I believe he said he had just been at prom with you the night before.”

“Did you tell him then that your relationship was a fraud?” I ask, not addressing the
creepy display of her smile. I work to push away the thoughts that are infiltrating my mind that Holly was not an innocent pawn in her mother’s game, but an agreeable part of the plan. It’s difficult when her face is finally showing emotion, and that emotion is disturbing.

“Why would I do that? What Will and I had was…amazing.
” She closes her eyes for a moment as if reliving these
amazing
times.

“This isn’t exactly the same story I got
from you in Tallahassee,” I challenge.

“Will was dead. I wasn’t going to flaunt our passion in front of his grieving girlfriend. I’m not
that
big of a bitch.” And there it is: the thing that wasn’t sitting right with me. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and I see now just what a co-conspirator she was with her mother. The same slithering tone that I got from her mother is the same one she’s giving to me now. It was all a front and I fell for it.

“Passion?” I can’t squeeze out more than one word right now for fear I might start crying.

“Will’s too much of a gentleman to tell you about his past conquest, I’m sure. It was…
incredible
. But then Will got all chivalrous and I missed my chance to have a Meyer baby.”

“You…slept with Will?” I stutter.
Meyer baby?
She was going to
try
to get pregnant?

“I’m guessing by your question that he’s still playing the white knight. Don’t worry. He’ll be worth the wait,” she smirks.
She’s loving every minute of torturing me with her lies.

That’s it!
Get out of your head, Layla, and deal with her! Stop letting her lies distract you.

“You know…I liked you. I thought after everything you told me about your mother that it was by some miracle that you and Marcus escaped relatively unscathed. But I was wrong. You were in on the whole plan to deceive Will from the start, weren’t you?”

“Gregory Meyer screwed over my mother, and then my brother. We deserved every penny we got from him!” Holly raises her voice and gets a stern look from one of the guards.

“Why involve Will? He never did anything to you! He genuinely cared about you.”

“Will…Will was a casualty of war. In another
life, he and I could have been good together. But, our mission to take down the Meyer Empire came first. Gregory Meyer kicked his other wives to the curb. What made Eliana and Will so special?” The real Holly has emerged. Her face has twisted into an expression of hatred and disgust. I have to give it to her. She put on a pretty good show in Tallahassee.

“It wasn’t their decision to be kept any more than it was you
r mother’s decision to be left,” I say in defense of Will and Eliana.

“C’mon now, Layla. Let’s not fight. I’ve done you a favor.
In fact, I’ve done you a few favors. My call to Marcus is just what was needed to buy Luke and Furtick time to get to you. And now, Gregory Meyer is dead and you’ve got your happily ever after. Most of the people in Davidson think I’m a hero, and chances are the judge is so happy to not be in Meyer’s back pocket anymore that I’m going to be charged with manslaughter and serve less than five years. It’ll be worth it, though. Will feels so bad for all the exes that we’re all getting a piece of the Meyer fortune. Luke’s already discussed it with him, and Will thinks five million dollars to each ex will be more than fair compensation.”

“That’s what this is about? Money?
I still have no clue why Meyer cut your mother loose. She is just like him, and apparently so are you. Greedy and soulless.” I’m so disgusted by her that I can hardly stand to look at her. The once attractive woman is now revolting, having shown what she’s really made of. “I don’t care what Will does with the money, but I’ll be damned if you’re going to see a penny of it.”

“I don’t think you have any say in that, dear.”

“See this ring?” I say holding up my left hand. “It says
I do
. By the time your trial comes and goes Will and I will be married.”

“
You better check your pre-nup on that.”

“Times up,” a guard says to Holly.

“Gotta go. It’s been fun. You
will
drop by again, won’t you, Layla?” Her expression is so sadistically flat that I feel the pain of unquenchable rage welling up in me.

Pre-nup
. I hadn’t thought of that. What if Will wants me to sign a pre-nup? I don’t really care, at least I didn’t until now, and that’s only because I want to have some control over keeping Holly and her mother from getting their dirty hands on a single penny of Will’s money.

“Of course I’ll come back…with Will.
”

“No you won’t. And you won’t tell him a word of this
either because you don’t want to hurt him or for him to know just how used he was. It would kill him and you would never do anything to hurt him. Beside, everything he knows about me is going to make anything
you
tell him look like the desperate pleas of a jealous fiancée,” she says smugly.

“Jealous…of his ex-girlfriend…who’s in jail. Yeah.”

“I’ll always be in his head. The girl who got run off by his manipulative father. The girl he’d still be with. His
first
.”

“I could never be jealous of you. All you are is a memory.
And I don’t believe for one second that you slept with Will. His standards are too high for him to even consider giving himself to someone like you.” I start to hang up the phone when I realize I have one more thing to say. “Oh, and just so we’re clear, you
are
that big of a bitch.” I slam the phone down and make my way out of the building the same way I came in.

With every step I take I question every word that I just said to Holly. Maybe Will did sleep with Holly. He told me he hasn’t been with anyone, but that was in response to my question about the girls his father made him entertain. Perhaps I should have been more specific in my questioning.

I don’t think about the possibility of reporters or news trucks as I did when I arrived, but I wish I had. It would seem that my assumption about one of the guards making a quick buck by ratting me out to the press wasn’t totally off base. As I push through the door out into the courtyard, I’m bombarded by flashing lights and microphones and people shouting questions at me. I manage to turn around go back into the building where the security guards seem unfazed by my predicament.

“Thanks,” I snort out to them. They just shrug their shoulders like they have no idea what I’m talking about. I pull out my cell phone and call the only person I know who can get me out of this mess safe and sound: Wes.

*****

“You need to tell them, Layla,” Wes says after I relay my conversation with Holly. “They need to know, especially Will.”

“I know, but how do I tell him without it sounding like the crazed fiancée? I already went to see her without telling him.” My head is in my hands and I feel so hopeless.

“Suck it up,” he says brashly.

“What?”

“Suck. It. Up.
He needs to know what she’s claiming…and it sounds like you need to know if it’s true.

“Where did you tell them you were going?” I ask, shifting the subject as we pull into the residential area where I left my car.
I don’t want to talk about my need to know if Will did or did not have sex with Holly. Despite my statement to her about not believing it, I haven’t been able to stop entertaining the idea that she may have been telling the truth.