Chương 7: The Furtive Foursome

Swimming Pools: Kendrick Lamar

Thick silence clouded the Hamilton's dining room, accompanied with the occasional clanging and clinking of cutlery. Something had happened during the time frame Gisele had been out and it was unsettling.

If she was in trouble, especially with the police, she was sure it wouldn't have taken 20 minutes of dead silence for either of her parents to muster the courage to confront her. At least, that's what she was hoping.

"I'm being investigated."

Gisele dropped her fork, looking up at her father. "Investigated? For what?"

He hastily attended to his potatoes. After cutting a single one into what became essentially mash, he took a breath. "They believe I had something to do with your friend, Rayna. Sutherland."

A second voice cut in before Gisele could react.

"Tell her the rest."

She watched as her mother egged her father on, before taking a bite of her own potatoes.

"Tell me what?"

Another sigh.

"They believe I ran her over."

Someone hastily coughed.

"I ran her over because we had supposedly been...involved, romantically. They're saying that she got pregnant and wouldn't go for an abortion, so I, I...I took it upon myself to get rid of it."

No-one was touching their potatoes now. Two pair of eyes scoured their daughter's face, awaiting a response. As Gisele revelled in her father's words, she took time before asking the default question one has to ask when their father has just been accused of fucking their underage best friend before murdering them.

"What evidence do they have against you?"

The next morning, four students wore pale faces in the left wing of the school library.

"So they're looking into phone records. Good. None of us called her."

"I'm sorry. But Rayna and your dad?"

"How's your mum taking it? Must be real lonely in that big bed-" Bennett whacked Logan's head, "Now's not the time. But really, christ. Not only is it an affair with a minor but murder...fuck."

He squeezed Gisele's hand in reassurance. Carmen was not so taken with this affectionate gesture.

"Uh, have we forgotten the fact that he's being wrongfully accused for murder?"

"Could you be any louder Carmen? We might as well turn ourselves in now."

After shooting a glare at Logan, Carmen leant in, speaking in hushed tones. "Well, unless you're morally fine with letting an innocent man go to jail for our crimes, I suggest we figure out something. Fast."

Bennett scoffed. "Oh so now you want to talk about morals. Didn't seem to be any of yours present that night, were they off on vacation?"

"You do realise that if they clear Gisele's dad due to lack of evidence, they're going to come looking for another suspect. And it won't take long for the clues to lead them to us. So grab a pen, dust off that brain and start thinking."

The quartets' meetups had been incredibly difficult to manoeuvre. Even Bianca was starting to tire of the orgy jokes each time the four had been absent during breaks.

As for Leonard...Gisele knew she didn't have long before he cussed her out (once again) for allowing Bennett completely back into her life. But as of now, letting him believe that seemed the favourable option when faced with the alternative of confessing what the truth actually was.

She knew how much he was willing to do for her, but Gisele wasn't so confident that the terms covered something on a large scale as this.

In the privacy of Logan's basement, finally deciding that the school library brought forward too many risks, the four stared hopelessly at the multiple newspapers all headlining:

NBA SPORTS AGENT NEEDS AN AGENT OF HIS OWN

"Hamilton dabbles in the MINOR league. God, they should arrest whoever is responsible for that headline. Who writes like that? And whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty?" Carmen skimmed through the article, resisting the urge to roll her eyes at every word.

She glanced over at a sullen Gisele, eyes looking down on the massive smiling faces of her parents that covered the front page. Carmen placed the paper down, getting up to sit beside her friend.

From across the room, Logan paced back and forth, pulling on his hair.

"What I don't get, no Benny, not basic geometry. Okay, so there's someone out there right, who knows the truth. So why haven't the police heard anything from them?"

His question had somehow activated a response from the previously motionless Gisele.

"It's so obvious. They're waiting. They're basking in the hunt. They intimidate us, dangling what they know right in front of us, enjoying the fear they incite. Sadist fucks. And then, once they get bored, we're done for."

"So you're saying this is all useless, we're going to get outed regardless?"

Bennett intervened. "It's worth a shot."

With the elephant in the room now addressed, all four individuals shared unsettling glances. Then Bennett stood up.

"Jesus Christ, you're such pessimists. Do we have handcuffs around our wrists? Are we staring at metal bars? Any orange jumpsuits? No. You know why? Because we have time. We know where the police are at through Gisele's dad. And we know exactly what went down, which means we'll know exactly how to cover our tracks. And so long as we cool our heads, we'll be fine." He looked up at his audience.

"So."

"Are you in?"

bình luận bình luận của 0

Bình chọn

GỬI QUÀ TẶNG

Load failed, please RETRY