want to strip her out of those stupid clothes, wash the shit off of her face, and just be with the person underneath it all―the person who can write lyrics to a song that breaks my heart and puts it back together all at the same time.
“HELLO! EARTH TO BRADY! Did you hang up on me?”
Gwen’s voice bellowing through the phone causes me to blink out of my trance, and I reluctantly look away from Layla before I can’t stop myself from following through with the idea of carrying her out of here.
“I’m here. Christ, stop shouting.” I sigh into the phone.
“I see someone hasn’t had their five cups of coffee yet today,” she replies sweetly, and I can almost see the sarcastic smile on her face through the phone.
“Did you call for a reason or just to bust my balls?”
She tsks me a few times and calls me an ungrateful asshole before finally getting to the point of her phone call.
“Well, I sprayed myself down with Lysol and took a preemptive dose of penicillin and called Austin for a favor. When you said that there weren’t any hits on the brick that came through Layla’s window, I figured we should have our own people do some testing just in case,” Gwen explains.
“Yeah, don’t worry. I already confirmed with the police department. Finn is a lying sack of shit, and the handwriting was a match to the same guy sending her the letters. We’re just waiting for the DNA results.”
“Yes, well, when you have a sister as awesome as me, you don’t need to wait. Austin hacked into the lab’s computer system and got the DNA results,” she states.
“Do I even want to know what you had to promise him so he’d do this favor for you?” I ask reluctantly.
“No, you probably don’t want to know. He lives like three thousand miles away, so it’s not like I’ll ever have to make good on that promise. And thank God for that because I don’t even know where one purchases pomegranate flavored edible underwear.”
Seriously going to kick Austin’s ass the next time I see him.
“Get to the point before I throw up in my mouth. What did the DNA results show?”
I can hear the rustling of papers through the phone as Gwen sorts through the pages looking for what she needs.
“Well, the DNA under Layla’s fingernails was inconclusive, so we didn’t get any hits in CODIS. There just wasn’t enough of a sample there. But there WAS a small trace of blood on the brick. They ran it against both you and Layla since you two were the only ones to handle it after it came through the window. Are you sitting down for this?” Gwen asks mysteriously.
“Get to the point, Gwen. In about two minutes, there are going to be hundreds of screaming fans in this room.” I watch three security guards head for the doors and prepare to unlock them.
“It turns out the total number of shared DNA segments between this person and Layla is high and there are quite a few banding patterns.”
“In English, please.”
Gwen sighs through the phone.
“This means, big brother, that whoever threw that brick through Layla’s window is related to her. They share DNA.”
My eyes immediately shoot to Eve, standing behind Layla and whispering frantically in her ear. Layla is staring straight ahead at nothing while her mother most likely berates her for something stupid like not smiling big enough or not waving properly.
“It’s her mother. It has to be her mother,” I tell Gwen angrily as I clench my jaw and force myself not to walk over there and hit a woman. That wouldn’t look good in front of all of these people no matter how much she deserves it.
“You’re probably right, but even with Austin’s hacking abilities, we’re still going to have to wait for the conclusive results to come in that will show with one hundred percent certainty who the match is. But going by what you’ve shared with me, I’m willing to put money on the fact that the bitch is crazy and wants to scare the shit out of her own daughter for some reason. And here I thought our mother had issues.”
I thank Gwen and disconnect the call, shoving my phone in my back pocket while trying to come up with a subtle way to tell Eve I’m on to her. What in the hell would she possibly have to gain by doing this to Layla? Publicity? Layla is