All the Secrets We Keep (Quarry Book 2)

  “Other nights?” Ilya grabbed the front of Barry’s shirt and yanked him closer. “If you ever put your fucking hands on her—”

  “Just once, just the once!” Barry shouted, cringing away from Ilya. “She came on to me—”

  “Jenni would never have come on to you,” Ilya said, disgusted and recoiling from the idea. “She thought you were a creep, and she was right.”

  “You think I don’t know that? You think I believed a girl like her would have the hots for me, for real? It was because of the money she owed me,” Barry said. “She owed me a lot. She told me that instead of paying me back, she’d . . . do things. Stuff she learned from that trucker she went with.”

  Ilya went cold first, then hot, then cold again. “The fuck you say?”

  “Yeah. Bet you didn’t know that, did you?” Ilya’s clear shock seemed to give Barry courage. His sneer twisted. “Your girl was no angel.”

  That’s when Ilya finally punched him in the mouth. He pulled it at the last second, so at least the old man would be able to keep his rotten teeth, but the blow still landed with enough force to send Barry tottering back against the counter. It split one of Ilya’s knuckles, and a few fat drops of blood spattered onto the stained linoleum.

  “You shut up,” Ilya said.

  Barry smeared his palm across his lips, spreading the crimson stain. “You said you wanted to know what happened? Are you really sure? Because it’s not something you can forget about, you little punk. Once you know it, you’re going to have to know it for the rest of your life.”

  Ilya had always known Jennilynn was no angel, but Barry’s words still hit him hard. He’d spent decades without knowing what had happened to Jenni in the months leading up to the night she died. He’d spent as many years being uncertain of what had caused her death.

  “Tell me,” he said.

  Before he answered, Barry went to the cupboard and pulled out a bottle of wine, the screw-top kind, and filled two mugs. He handed one to Ilya, who took it but didn’t drink. The other, Barry held in both his hands as though he was afraid their shaking would spill the liquid. Barry also didn’t drink, although he looked into the mug’s depths as though he wanted to drown inside them.

  “She was the perfect salesgirl. She wanted the money, was crazy for it—”

  “She had a job at the diner,” Ilya cut in.

  Barry frowned. “Yeah? So? You know women. Always needed money for new shoes, get their hair done, whatever. Once she told me she needed cash so she could run away.”

  Ilya flinched at that, not because he hated the words but because immediately upon hearing them, he knew they were true. “So you got her pushing your pills. What then?”

  “She took to it. I figured she liked getting the guys hooked. She had that way about her, you know? Like she really got off on making people want something she had, just so she could keep it from you.” Barry tipped the mug to his lips but then took it away without drinking. “Shit. I promised Theresa I wouldn’t. Dammit.”

  Yes. Jenni had been that way. Holding out the promise of something always forever slightly out of reach. Shaking, Ilya turned away from the old man.

  “That night,” he said.

  Barry was quiet for so long Ilya became convinced he wasn’t going to speak. In that moment, it would have been so easy for Ilya to walk away. More of his life had been haunted by the memories of Jennilynn Harrison than he’d ever spent making them. She’d become a fantasy. He didn’t want that anymore.

  “That night,” he repeated when Barry still said nothing. “Tell me what happened.”

  “She was working her shift at the diner. She was supposed to be making a payment to me that night, but I was suspicious that she was going to run off with the cash and the pills.”

  Ilya remembered that night. Watching Jenni and the trucker. The fight Ilya’d had with her, after, in the parking lot.

  “So you picked her up?”

  Barry looked surprised. “No.”

  “Who did?”

  “I don’t know.” Barry shrugged and tipped the mug to his lips again. “One of her boyfriends, if you can call a guy twenty years older than her a boyfriend.”

  Ilya frowned. “I saw her at the diner that night. She got picked up by somebody.”

  “Well, whoever it was, she ended up with a black eye and a bloody nose,” Barry said in a clipped tone. “And she didn’t seem to mind it, if you know what I mean.”

  Ilya’s lip curled. “I don’t know what you mean, and if you don’t stop fucking around with me, you’re going to get the same as she had. And you will fucking mind.”

  “It means she was into rough trade,” Barry said. “She liked it.”

  Ilya shook his head. “What are you talking about?”

  “She liked it when guys hurt her.” As soon as he said it, Barry put up a hand as though Ilya was going to hit him again.

  “No . . .” Ilya shook his head again. “That’s . . .”

  “Look, you don’t have to believe it. I didn’t want to. But the time she was . . . with . . . me . . .” Barry paused. “She wanted me to choke her.”

  Sickness flooded him. “Did you?”

  “No!” Barry shouted, but weakly. “Hell, no. Hey, there’s no doubt I was enough of a piece of shit to cheat on your mother with a teenage girl who came on to me, yeah, but me and a hundred other middle-aged guys would do the same thing.”

  “You were the piece of shit who got her hooked on pills—”

  “She was never,” Barry put in, “supposed to be taking them. Only selling.”

  Ilya paced in Barry’s narrow galley kitchen, clenching and unclenching his fists to keep himself from hitting something. Anything. Punching a hole in the damned wall or beating Barry to a pulp. Hitting himself in the face so he wouldn’t have to listen to this anymore.

  “She came to the house. What then?”

  “We met at the old equipment shed, not the house. There was no way I could risk that. I demanded my money. She said she didn’t have it, or the pills, and she wasn’t going to give it to me anyway. She threatened to tell Galina about us if I tried to come after her for it. She told me she was only a few days away from running off. I asked her with who, but she wouldn’t tell me.”

  Ilya’s shoulders hunched, and he spun on one heel to face Barry. “You’re lying.”

  “I’m not. She was already drunk when we were in the shed. High, too. She said otherwise, but . . .” Barry looked truly shamefaced for the first time as he lifted the mug. “I knew. I could tell.”

  “So you left her there?”

  “What did you want me to do? She was threatening to ruin the rest of my life! And shit,” Barry added, “she did. Didn’t she? She ruined all our lives.”

  “Do you think . . . whoever it was she was with . . . do you think he killed her?”

  Barry put the mug on the counter and linked his hands together in front of him. Again, he didn’t speak right away, and when he finally did, his voice was low and rasping. “I’ve wondered. If maybe, yeah. All I can tell you for sure is she was totally shitfaced when I left her, and it makes total sense that she might’ve tried to go swimming and fallen by accident. She didn’t say anything about meeting anyone else there. So far as I know, she had no reason to. I don’t know, Ilya. I’ve thought over the years about it, if I could go to the police and tell them what I knew, see if they could connect anything. Because, sure, yeah, I wanted to know what happened, the way all of you did. If it was somebody who did it, wouldn’t it be a relief to know, so they could be punished?”

  Yes. So they could be punished the way Ilya had come here tonight in order to bring some justice down on Barry. “But you never said anything. You never went to the police.”

  Barry frowned. “I’d have been implicated.”

  “You’re a hypocrite and a coward,” Ilya said with a sneer.

  “Yes.” Barry nodded. “Yeah, I am.”

  “I should still go. Tell them what I know.”

&
nbsp; “You won’t,” Barry said. “Because of Theresa.”

  It was Ilya’s turn for silence.

  “I’ve put her through a lot. I know it. I’ve been a shit father, and I want to change that, but it doesn’t seem like she’s going to give me the chance. Can’t say I blame her. But you don’t want to do anything that’s going to cause her more pain, do you? If it gets out that I was in any way tied up in your sister’s death, think about what that would do to Theresa.”

  “She already knows.”

  “But nobody else does in this buttstain of a town,” Barry said. “Think of what it would do to her, now when she’s trying to make something of herself . . .”

  “Theresa doesn’t have to make something of herself. She’s already something. She’s good at what she does, and she’s going to continue to be a success, because that’s who she is. She doesn’t need you in her life,” Ilya retorted.

  Barry gave him a weary smile. “Like I said, she doesn’t need to be caught up in any of that drama, either.”

  “You’re a self-serving son of a bitch, you know that?”

  “Yes,” Barry said. “But if you love my daughter the way I think you do, you’re going to keep letting me be.”

  Ilya’s invitation to meet at the diner had taken Alicia by surprise, but she’d agreed. She probably always would, she thought as she slid into the booth in the back, with him across from her. They had a history that could never be erased.

  It didn’t have to be, she realized as she looked him over. The tie, the pressed shirt, his face freshly shaved, and his hair combed. They could both have their own futures, and nothing in their shared past had to keep them from it.

  “I wanted to tell you that I’m sorry,” Ilya said without bothering to start off with small talk. “For everything.”

  Alicia chewed on her answer before she gave it, wanting to be certain of her words. “I’m not sure I need you to apologize, Ilya. But thanks.”

  “I was not a good husband,” he said. “I could lie and tell you that I wanted to be or that I tried, but the truth was I never really did. You deserved better than I ever gave you, Alicia. So I’m sorry for that.”

  Her throat closed. She warmed her hands on the mug of coffee. “You deserved better, too, Ilya, than being my reason to never leave. I held on to that for a long time, making you the bad guy, even if I didn’t say it out loud—”

  “Oh,” he interrupted, “I think there were plenty of times you said it out loud.”

  They both laughed. Loud. She covered her mouth with her hand and shook her head but looked at him fondly.

  “I’m proud of you, Ilya. You know I want nothing but the best for you. And for Theresa.”

  He smiled, but it faded into a more serious expression. “I want you to know something. I confronted Barry about what happened that night.”

  Her stomach fell. The coffee she’d drunk threatened to come back up. “Oh God. Oh God, please don’t tell me he did something to her—”

  “He says no—”

  “I can’t bear to think she was murdered,” Alicia blurted. “It’s bad enough it was an accident. Worse to find out she was into the pills, and that whole business with Theresa’s father—it’s so gross, Ilya. I loved my sister, but I knew she wasn’t perfect. Still, I just don’t think I could handle knowing that something that bad happened to her.”

  Ilya’s lips pressed together, and his brow furrowed. He looked away from her in his classic manner. He was about to be untruthful with her.

  “Was it Barry?” she whispered, horrified, waiting to learn the worst.

  “He says no, and I believe him,” Ilya told her and met her gaze. “He’s an addict and an asshole, but I believe what he told me. It matches what Galina said, and besides that, I just . . . I believe him.”

  Relief flooded her, even as she wondered what he’d been lying to her about. It didn’t matter, Alicia decided as Ilya sat back in the diner booth. The truth about Jenni’s death wouldn’t change the fact she was gone and would never come back.

  “I already started making my peace with it,” Alicia said. “For the first time since it happened, maybe, I think I’ve started finding a way to put it to rest.”

  “I’m glad,” Ilya answered. “Good. We all need that.”

  She reached across the table to take his hand. Their fingers linked. She squeezed. He squeezed back.

  “Yeah,” Alicia said. “We all do.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  There’d been no further confrontation with her father. Theresa had refused to see him or to answer his calls, and he’d left close to a dozen. She hadn’t bothered to listen to the messages. They’d all be the same, she thought. First, he’d beg her to forgive him. Eventually he’d start to accuse her of being in the wrong, and finally, at the end, he would cry that she hated him, and there would be no good answer for that. She probably did hate him.

  She had not spoken to Ilya for two days. She had left him a single voice mail, which he hadn’t answered, and one text he hadn’t replied to. She’d been careful to spend as much time away from the house as possible, leaving Alicia and Niko their space. In the aftermath of the huge reveal, Theresa had tried to talk to her, but Alicia had refused. Politely, with tears thick in her throat, but making it clear she was not going to discuss anything with Theresa, at least not right away. Theresa wasn’t sure where it left their friendship, but she could respect Alicia’s reluctance.

  Today was the B’s Diner grand opening, and Theresa could not miss it. No matter what had happened, or how terrible she was at apologies and trust, or that Ilya had broken his promise to her, she had to be there. Not because she’d put her time and effort and, yes, her future financial security into it. She had to be there because this was the work they’d done together, and she believed in him, and she wasn’t going to give up.

  Not on him.

  Not on them.

  By the time she got to the diner, the lot was full. A good sign, but one that gave her an anxious stomach and sweaty palms. The soft opening had gone off basically without more than a few hitches, but today was full staff, regular operating hours, and all the problems that could come along with it. She took the time to check her lipstick and hair in the rearview mirror and smoothed the front of her summer dress.

  The back door was unlocked, and she went inside to be greeted with the delicious smells of breakfast and the bustle of a kitchen running at top speed. She wasn’t too worried—a number of the full-time staff they’d hired had worked for the Zimmermans and had a lot of experience. Even so, new menu items, new policies . . . she greeted everyone, making sure to stay out of the way and leave them to their work.

  She found Ilya in the tiny office, where he was fixing his tie in a small mirror. He didn’t turn when she came in, but he looked at her in the reflection. For a moment, Theresa froze, waiting for him to tell her to get out.

  Ilya smiled.

  “You made it,” he said.

  Then he faced her, and she was crossing the room to push his hands gently away from the mess he’d made of his tie. She fixed it for him, loosening the knot first, then smoothing and tightening it. She ran her hands over the front of his suit.

  “There,” Theresa said. “Gorgeous.”

  Ilya put his hands on her hips and waited until she was looking into his eyes before he said, “Let’s do this thing.”

  “A lot of people showed up,” she said.

  He shook his head. “Not the diner. Let’s face it. We’re still going to screw up some things, but we hired good people, and you’re smart and organized, and I come up with crazy, brilliant ideas. But I don’t mean the diner. I mean us. Let’s do this thing, Theresa. Okay? No more back and forth, no more keeping secrets.”

  “You think it’ll be that easy, huh?” She let her hands slide up his chest to rest on his shoulders so she could curl her fingers around the back of his neck.

  “Hell, no. I think it’s going to be harder than anything I’ve ever done, that’s
for sure. But if you’ll let me, I’ll try. I can’t promise you I won’t be an asshole sometimes—”

  She kissed him. “I wouldn’t expect anything else. And I’ll do my best, but I’m sure there are times when it will be hard for me to share things with you, because that’s my damage.”

  “I have no idea what I’m doing. You know that, right?” His hands anchored on her hips, pulling her a little closer.

  “Oh, believe me, I know.”

  This time, he kissed her. A knock on the door interrupted them. They both turned.

  “Hey,” Betty said, “I have a customer out here who wants to know about catering. Can you come talk to her?”

  “Sure. Be right there.” Ilya waited until Betty had closed the door, then added, “You ready for this?”

  Theresa drew in a deep breath. “Yeah. Let’s do it.”

  ‘‘What a day.” Ilya couldn’t remember ever being so exhausted or exhilarated in his life.

  Theresa yawned and stretched as she kicked off her shoes and fell onto the couch. “No kidding. I’m not sure my feet will ever recover.”

  They’d left B’s Diner in the hopefully capable hands of Matt, the night manager. With takeout packages of liver pudding, potato salad, matzoh-ball soup, roasted chicken, and challah so they could test out the kitchen’s prowess in reproducing Babulya’s recipes, as well as feed themselves after a day of nonstop working, they’d come back to Ilya’s house. The food was warming in the oven. He had some other things on his mind.

  “Hey.” He slid onto the couch next to her. “We made it.”

  She chuckled and leaned against him. “Yeah. The first day. You know how many days we still have to get through?”

  “All of them, I’d say.” He grinned.

  “If we’re lucky.” Theresa’s expression turned solemn. “It was a good day, wasn’t it? Tell me I’m not just imagining it. People were having a good time, right? They liked the food.”

  “Patty said she’d never had a better day, with tips,” Ilya said. “I think that says a lot, doesn’t it?”

  Theresa shifted to sit up straighter, facing him. “I had fun, too. Did you?”