She nodded. “That one.”
“Bullshit. You were a pain in my ass sometimes, but you’re not the kind of woman to slaughter her loved ones.”
“Thank you! I was framed. I don’t even know by whom or why.”
Logan’s expression turned flat. “Why should I believe you’re her?”
Good question. The only thing she had of her former life was her mother’s Fabergé egg, but Logan had no clue it had been Cecilia Howe’s pride and joy before ovarian cancer had quickly snuffed out the bright light of her smile. With no way to corroborate the egg’s authenticity at the moment, Callie had left it in her backpack, shoved in the trunk of her car.
“I’ve got nothing but the truth. I’ll tell you what really happened and hope that you’ll believe me so that when I beg you to make me disappear for good, you will.”
“I’m listening.” He tossed his forearm over the steering wheel and stared, looking like an immovable mountain.
Callie swallowed nervously. “What you know is that nine years ago, my father and sister were shot in our house and that the gun was found in my room, wiped clean.”
“Your boyfriend told everyone that you killed them for the money the night you ran off together.”
Holden had been gorgeous, defiant, wild, and full of grand ideas. In retrospect, planning to run off with him had been stupid, but her sixteen-year-old heart had believed in the concept of soul mates. She’d talked herself into believing that he was hers. If she’d had any idea that he would end up betraying her for money, she would have never accepted that first ride in his car or given him her virginity.
“He was willing to say anything for the big bounty on my head.” She snorted. “I was young and naïve not to realize that.
“We’d been planning to run away together for a few weeks. His family had no money, and he had a crappy home life. When he said that he wanted me to be his new family, my young heart fluttered. Besides, I didn’t want to be Callindra Howe anymore. I felt like a freak. Most girls my age took dance classes and worked a summer job to buy a beat-up car. I had riding lessons. I spoke fluent French. By the time I was ten, I’d visited every continent except Antarctica. I had a trust fund and got a Porsche the day I got my driver’s license.”
“It doesn’t sound that bad,” Logan drawled.
“In retrospect, it wasn’t. At the time, I felt isolated. I worshipped my dad, but he’d been remote since my mother’s death. And my younger sister, Charlotte, had turned rebellious.”
“So when your boyfriend paid attention to you in order to get laid and get closer to your money, you thought he was the answer to your problems?”
“Pretty much.” And her stupidity still stung. “Anyway, the night my father and sister were killed, I was late for our family dinner. The second the meal ended, I told my dad that I had to finish studying for a test. I ran back upstairs to call Holden and give him the green light. At a little after ten, I pretended to go to bed like all was normal. I’d packed the night before and I was ready to leave. I grabbed my backpack and was shoving in a few last-minute items when I heard the first shot downstairs, in my father’s room. I thought I had to be mistaken or my sister had turned the TV up really loud. Who would be in our house shooting? I heard Charlotte head down the hall and for the stairs.” Callie clenched her fists. “She screamed suddenly. I heard another gunshot, this one much closer. She didn’t scream again. I peeked out the door to see if I could help her, but the blood . . .” Callie pressed her lips together. “She was only fourteen.”
Her throat closed up and tears threatened, but Logan squeezed her hand. “Go on.”
“I wanted to run to her, but the killer started charging down my hall. So I grabbed my pack and climbed out my window, down the big tree to the ground. I’d done it a thousand times.
“He shot me just before I made it to the ground. Flesh wound to my hip. It stung like a bitch, and I bled off and on for days, but I kept running for my life. Holden was waiting for me in his car one street over. I got in, sobbing. I called the police and told them everything. They immediately suspected me when I told them I’d fled the scene. They wanted me to come in for ‘questioning’ and swore I was just ‘a person of interest,’ but within an hour, the media had me labeled a suspect. I was too dazed and scared to face interrogation. The whole thing was a blur, and I had no witnesses who could say I hadn’t killed anyone. I didn’t want to face the fact that my family was gone. So I ran.”
“No one suspected Holden? After all, if your father died, you stood to inherit a lot of money.”
She shook her head. “He parked in front of an elderly couple’s house. They spied on the teen ‘vagrant’ slouched in his beat-up Mustang for twenty minutes because he was blasting Usher in their very white upper-crust neighborhood. They were sure they’d be horrifically murdered any second.”
Logan’s mouth flattened in a grim line. “Then?”
“Within an hour, we traded vehicles with a drunk guy in a bar’s parking lot, Holden’s car for his old truck. The guy was wasted enough to say yes. After that, we headed from Illinois to Indiana.”
Callie hadn’t told any of this to a single soul—ever. Hell, she’d barely let herself think about it in years. Just saying the words hurt like peeling off the layers of her skin one at a time until she was a bleeding, oozing mass. The worst part was, she could spill her guts, and Logan might not believe her. He could call the police because it was the right thing to do. They would take her to jail. And who knew what would happen then . . . except that it wouldn’t be good.
“Then a few days later, your boyfriend ratted you out?” he asked.
“Yeah. I was still bleeding, my hip infected. Holden heard about the reward for turning me in and he called.” And damn if she wasn’t still bitter about that. “When I stepped out of the shower for my shampoo and overheard him on the phone, I threw on my clothes, took the truck, and split.”
“Keep going,” Logan demanded.
“From there, I dashed to the next town over and paid cash for a little sedan. I had about thirty grand with me, money I’d taken from my father over a few months so Holden and I could start a new life. My dad never missed it.
“Since it was winter, I bolted south. Spent some time in Kentucky. When people there got suspicious, I adopted another name, colored my hair, and slipped over the border into Tennessee. Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma . . . Any place I could find a rent-by-the week motel and a transient job, that’s where I went, at least until I thought someone might be onto me. Then I’d be gone again.”
“How did you find Thorpe?”