Page 32 of Wicked Promises

Turns out, all he had to do was mastermind a car accident, a kidnapping, and steal my phone. Oh, and put my foster father in the hospital.

Caleb could very well be the bad guy in my situation, pulling the strings. It’s what he’s wanted from day one: to break me. Destroy me.

He’s not my knight in shining armor. While I’ve been falling for him all over again, he never stopped playing the game.

He’s the villain. I’ve known this from the beginning. And villains…

They’ll do anything to win.

Chapter 10

Caleb

Past

Mom was gone. She didn’t say where she was going before she left. One minute she was standing with me in the foyer of my uncle’s house, kissing the top of my head, and the next…

I kept thinking she would come back. But it’s been two days. Two days of moping, staring out the window, and avoiding my uncle’s gaze. He was relentless, though. I couldn’t seem to hide from him for long.

“You look like your father.” Uncle David filled my bedroom doorway.

He was in slacks and an olive-green sweater. The collar of a white dress shirt was visible around his neck. He was even wearing loafers in the house, which struck me as odd. His expression was stoic. Not good or bad.

I slowly turned on the bed and faced him.

“I’m sure that’s why she hasn’t come back,” he added.

I flinched. I’d been trying to stop but hadn’t mastered my face yet. He liked it when I reacted to his words. He came out with these awful thoughts. He spoke them into existence andthen watched the damage they inflicted. That happened before my dad died. But now…?

“Ben and I looked alike, too.” He came closer and sat on the bed beside me. “Lydia… she’s troubled.”

“Mom?” I asked. “Troubled?”

“Always up to her ears in mischief.” He grimaced. “It was what attracted Ben to her in the first place. Like a moth to a flame…”

“Mom was the flame?”

“Indeed,” Uncle said. “Still is.”

I didn’t know what to make of that.

“Stand in front of me,” he said softly.

Hesitation hurt. I learned that this morning. Now, I jump off the bed and stand before him. Uncle did look like Dad. He had the same mean glint in his eyes, too. But that meanness only came out in Dad after a few drinks. It was ever-present on Uncle’s face. He was like a supermodel in the magazines Margo used to flip through. Beautiful and ice-cold.

There was no chair in front of him, but I already knew what he meant. We’d done this a few times—lessons, he called them.

I sank to my knees, keeping my eyes on Uncle’s shoes. They were polished.

“Tell me again how it happened,” Uncle urged.

“We were playing hide and seek.” I glanced up. “Margo was hiding. She saw…”

“Your father fucking her mom.”

I blinked. Mom never let me swear. She practically vibrated with anger whenhellslipped out of my mouth. To say thefword seemed wrong on so many levels.

“She saw Dad…”