The Ahern Brothers Collection - Claudia Burgoa Page 0,38

comfortable clothes. Business casual sucks. Adulting sucks.

I apply enough makeup to conceal the dark circles, but I skip the contacts. Wes better not start asking questions because I’m not in the mood to avoid him today like I did yesterday. In the past week, he has pumped more information out of me than anyone has in six years.

Where is Shaun?

I wonder what Corbin told the police and social services about his son—or if he ever mentioned him. Unlike me, his children were homeschooled. Was there ever any record of them? I should ask Wes to help me get the police report from that day. What did Corbin say? Why did everyone assume she was my sister? He could’ve made up a story about me and claimed I was Ava, but he didn’t. Why?

When I was younger and in the thick of it, I played the blame game. I blamed myself for what was happening. Now, I understand that the only person to blame was my mother. Mom was impressed by Corbin’s parenting skills—and his money. He was a single dad who not only worked hard, but also homeschooled his own children. The problem about my mother is that she only saw the sparkly wrapping on the outside. She never asked herself what he did for a living. Olga Lyons thought she was smart. I bet she didn’t question anything. Unless, she didn’t do it until it was too late and that’s why she’s gone.

Am I a bad person for not being sad about her death?

I was scared when I heard the news. Even though she didn’t care about me, I was safer when she was alive.

“You ate more than you’re allowed to, Abigail.” Mom’s sweet voice disappeared right after Corbin closed her door and walked away from the car.

Well, Mom, you said I should be nice. Your boyfriend insisted that I had the same as his children.

Honestly that part creeped me out. He ordered for the three of us.

“A steak for Shaun,” he turned to Mom giving her a pleasant smile. “He’s growing up.”

Then he looked at his daughter, who stared at the silverware. “Should I order you a salad, Ava?” She didn’t answer, but rather, remained silent. “I should do that for you girls. You two need to keep your figures.”

“What do you think, Abby? What would you like to eat today?”

“The steak sounds good, but also the salmon, and the enchiladas. We can all have the pasta.” I had no idea what had come over me. I only knew that no matter what I ate, there’d be hell to pay when I got home.

“Steaks for everyone,” he announced looking at Ava. “You better finish it all or you’ll be in trouble.”

I didn’t care about his warning to Ava; my goal was to eat whatever they brought because I might not get to eat anything else for a week or two. It all depended on how Mom felt about this dinner. I’d never had to compete with other children, in fact she’d never cared about my grades or my plans. But that day, it seemed like she was my number one fan.

Corbin seemed pleased when he learned that as a sophomore in high school, I was taking college level math. His daughter wasn’t very smart—his words. Not like Shaun. If they were in school, he bet that Shaun would be taking all advance placement classes. But since he’d homeschooled them, at sixteen they were already finished with high school. Shaun took some online classes while Ava had no plans to continue.

Mom tried to come off as the best mother in the entire metropolitan area. She’d helped me so diligently with math when I was tiny, and it paid off. While she never asked me about my grades, she swore I was a distinguished academic with straight A’s. The woman knew nothing about me. My grades were average, except I excelled in science and math.

“I won’t let your behavior cloud my night,” Mom continued, pulling away from the parking spot. “This was a good beginning, you know. I have to think about my future too since you won’t always be here.”

I’m not going anywhere. You are. The house is mine.

“My lawyer thinks that we can sell the house once you turn eighteen. After that, you’re on your own,” she warned me.

I wouldn’t put it past her to have a plan for how to make it happen without giving me a dime too. Do social services remove children who are treated