17

17

Aaron slowly lifted his gaze and locked it on hers.

"No."

Lauren felt her body go weak as a huge sigh of relief whooshed out of her lungs. She studied Aaron's eyes, looking for any tell-tale signs of deception. She slowly shook her head in disbelief at the fact that he had finally, finally spoken the truth.

But why? All this time...

"You've been lying for so long..." she said with a shake of her head. Aaron's jaw clenched.

He hated that word. Lying.

"I have never lied to anybody. Except you, the other day when I said I did it, but I didn' know what else to tell you. The entire town has always assumed I did."

"And you let them!"

"What else was I supposed to do?"

"Tell the truth! You should have fought for yourself so the person who did this could be punished!"

He scoffed out a laugh, running a hand through his hair and Lauren crossed her arms.

"It's not that simple," said Aaron.

She threw her hands up. "You're kidding me! Anything's better than being blamed for a murder that you never committed."

Silently, he began to make the bed, drawing open the curtains.

Lauren watched him, biting on her lip. All the years she'd hated him, despised him for what she believed he'd done. Hated his guts for the painful loss she'd experienced and believed that Aaron Spencer was the devil himself because who, if not the devil, would choose to murder a righteous priest, right?

How wrong she was. How wrong they all were.

And now, no matter what he said, she was determined to prove his innocence. And more importantly, find her mother’s killer.

"We have to let everybody know," she said and he spun around on her.

"No."

"Aaron—"

"No, Lauren! There is a reason why I've kept quiet all these years! You think they'll believe it?" he laughed in bitter mockery of her naivety. "Their holy little priest was a God in their eyes and the only way for me to prove my innocence would be to break down that illusion."

Lauren frowned. "What do you mean?"

It sounded like he was saying her grandfather wasn't as good and noble as everyone thought, but Lauren knew that couldn't be true. He was a saint, which was even more of a reason why his true murderer must be brought to justice.

Aaron shook his head and turned away. "Listen..." he said quietly. "The truth will come out, but not now. I need to do this slowly and in my way." He turned back to her. "Lauren, when... when the truth comes out...you won't like it."

She shivered, turned speechless by the darkness in his tone. What was he talking about?

She didn't ask him, only watched him go about his business. She had to get out of there. Last night, they'd let themselves go. Had forgotten that the world was made up of more than just the two of them and their desires. That out there, Aaron Spencer was still a murderer.

Remembering this, Lauren began to quickly get dressed. She had work to do. She refused to regret the previous night because it was amazing, but she knew it couldn't happen again.

She couldn't let herself become distracted by Aaron.

Something was going on in Woodfair and she would find out what it was, if Aaron had something to do with it, he would only be too glad to distract her. He disappeared into the bathroom for a moment and Lauren took her chance to leave.

She quickly made her way to the front door, feeling startled when Selena came out of nowhere and blocked her path. The woman wore a long white nightdress and had her hair falling in thick waves of golden blonde over her shoulders. She looked nothing short of an angel, despite the dazed look in her eyes.

She gasped at Lauren, making her take a cautious step back.

"H-hello, Selena," Lauren stuttered.

"Dearie!" gasped Selena. "Are you alright? You come now, you're safe here," she cooed, wrapping Lauren in a hug. Understanding that the lady was having an episode, Lauren let herself be hugged. "Me and my Aaron, we'll take care of you, honey. That bastard ain't touchin' you again, sweetie."

Lauren frowned as the lady patted her back comfortingly. She thought Lauren was somebody else. Who? Lauren bit her lip. There must have been some girl that Selena had helped in the past and for some reason, that girl was stuck on a loop in her memory.

She sighed, her mind running through all the things she had to do. She was going to find out what happened twenty years ago and the first step was getting that Journal and going through it, then she was going to try and talk with Selena. If Aaron let her... or maybe she’d sneak in when he was gone to work?

She gently rubbed Selena's back, drawing away from the hug.

"I have to go now, Selena. I'll be back later."

Selena looked at her with eyes of worry. "But... but you can't! They're lookin' for you, darlin'. And if they find you... oh, dear if they find you! No, stay!"

She wrapped her hands around Lauren's wrist. Lauren quickly laid a gentle hand on her cheek, trying to calm her.

"It's alright, calm down. They're... they're not looking for me no more, I'll be alright."

Selena looked confused at this but soon the mist cleared from her eyes and when she looked up, Lauren felt like Selena recognized her for herself. Selena blinked at Lauren and slowly nodded. "Oh. Okay."

Lauren gave her a quick warm hug, before darting out of the house before Aaron made his appearance and caught her trying to leave.

As she walked, she thought about what Selena had said. "They're looking for you." "That bastard ain't touchin' you no more."

She grimaced. What in the confusion was that?

Lauren bit her lip, a thought niggling at her brain. Could it be that what Selena said was important and it somehow was connected to what was written in her mother's journal? She didn't have proof of it, it was just... a feeling. If she could only fit the pieces together and make a damn whole.

She walked quickly and soon came to the mayor's house, hesitating before she walked into the yard. The place gave her a panicky feeling after last night. Knowing that that man who had attacked her was sent by Martin, that really didn't ease her racing heart.

She tried to push the door open as quietly as possible but was intercepted by Martha almost immediately after she'd closed the door.

"Lauren! There you are!" exclaimed Martha with a hand to her heart. "Are you alright?"

Lauren stiffened when she reached out to touch her shoulder. She curbed the urge to tell Martha that she was fine, except for her husband's henchman ruining her evening, everything was just peachy.

"I'm okay," she murmured trying to edge past.

Marcus appeared, cutting off her escape.

"Oh, Lauren, you're back."

"Yeah," she sighed.

"But where were you, dear, I called Natalie and she said she had no idea where you were!" said Martha waving her phone in the air. "I was so close to calling the police, I thought that Spencer boy got his hands on you!"

Lauren's mouth opened and closed silently. Shit, she called Natalie?

"Uhm," she began, unsure of her own answer. "Yeah, I actually ended up at Grayson's.... house?"

She didn't know herself whether it was a question or statement that she'd said, but prayed for them to take it regardless.

Martha raised a brow. "Oh. Grayson? I see. Well, you really should have told me, dear."

Lauren again bit her tongue when the words 'You're not my mother.' burned to be spoken. She only nodded with a quick apology and turned to head up the stairs.

“Grayson’s?” Marcus asked and Lauren turned to him.

He was frowning and she couldn’t understand why. She nodded at him. “Yeah.”

Marcus’ mouth quickly formed a thin line as he gave her a final glance and stalked away.

She stared after him with a raised brow.

To hell with this family, they were pretenders. All of them. The mayor was a sick man if the photographs that Lauren and Aaron had seen were anything to go by. He'd been using her grandfather's house to hide his dirty deeds for years and hurried to try and clear out the evidence as soon as she began her renovations, Lauren was convinced of it.

Well, tough. If he was up to some shady deals, which she was sure he was, she'd drag him out into the light so everyone could see the big dirty stains on his pure white Mayoral suit.

She pushed open her room's door, wondering whether Martha and Marcus knew what Martin was up to.

Were they in on it?

With no answers to her questions, she headed right into the shower and scrubbed herself to a glow. She didn’t miss the way her breasts ached and were heavy in her hands. Aaron. What had he done to her?

Lauren stifled the smile and shook herself out of the daydreams that tried to fill her head.

She hurried through it all, trying to get started on her plans.

Somebody killed her grandfather, somebody killed her mother and hid the bodies, somebody was hurting young girls in the most disgusting, inhumane ways and taking fucking pictures of it. All this stuff was being kept in secret and nobody knew the truth. Well, they could stay blinded if they wanted to, Lauren was determined to dig up the truth.

She quickly dressed and swept her hair up into a pony.

With heightening determination, she left the bathroom, wiping her dampening hands on her jeans.

She reached the bed, still messy from the way she'd left it last night.

An impatient hand swept aside her hoodie and a towel, looking for the journal. Had she left it on the bed?

Lauren frowned, waving aside the veils and lifting every item on her bed only to come up empty. Her heart started to ram in her chest as she pulled aside the bed covers and sheets, panicked that her eyes just weren't landing on the little leather book.

Where the hell was it? Lauren tossed aside everything around the bed, frowning in concentration. She had to find it. Dammit.

She turned to the bedside tables and ripped open every single drawer. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

She gritted her teeth. Who could have taken it?!

Lauren huffed, standing and jamming her hands against her hips. Oh, no, she couldn't afford to have that journal in anybody else's hands. It contained her mother's most private thoughts! She couldn't let people read that!

With a growl, she stomped downstairs, feeling like a moody teenager, but not giving a damn because it was her mother's journal for fuck's sake!

She found the Stanfords around the table having breakfast. They looked up at her entrance. Lauren thought she'd seen a small smirk on Marcus' face, but when she looked, it was gone.

"What's wrong, Lauren dear?" asked Martha in the motherly tone that Lauren now saw was fake as a plastic fur coat.

"I... I've lost something," said Lauren, trying her hardest to not lose her damn temper. Somebody went into her room and took something that wasn't theirs! How dare they?

"Well, what have you lost? Marcus will help you find it." Martha said with a kind smile. Lauren didn't miss the smug glint that appeared in the woman's eyes for a split second.

"A book," she spat out through gritted teeth. They knew what she was looking for. They were playing with her.

"Don't worry, dear. Books are replaceable. Come and have breakfast," said Mayor Stanford, looking directly at Lauren. She ignored his gaze, afraid that if she took one look into his lying face, she'd fly at him, fists first.

"Not this one," Lauren murmured and before any of them could say anything, she spun on her heel and marched back up the stairs.

She thought she'd heard a muffled snicker behind her and although she couldn't be completely sure, she had a feeling one of them, probably big-headed Marcus, had just laughed at her.

What were they playing at? Now she was sure that they all knew what Martin had been hiding in her house. They were all in on it and now they were trying to hide anything that would damage their precious spot high on the pedestal in Woodfair. She stomped angrily towards her room but stopped when she came across the door she'd heard Martin's phone call through the other day.

With no guilt at all, Lauren pushed the door open and stepped inside it. It was their bedroom. Bingo.

The large room was decorated well enough for a king, but Lauren didn't stop to admire anything. She didn't have time for it.

They had just started having breakfast so she had some time.

She darted towards their bed and attacked the bedside drawers, pulling each one carefully open. When they produced nothing, she turned to their wardrobe and pulled the doors open, cringing when one door creaked, she pushed it closed and kept the silent door open.

She felt along the coats in the wardrobe, her heart racing as she stole glanced at the bedroom door beside the wardrobe. If it opened, she was dead.

Lauren froze when her hand hit something hard in one of the coats. She figured out which coat and quickly pushed her hand into the pockets. In a few moments, her fingers closed around something small, cold and hard. And leather.

Lauren pulled the little journal out, nearly weeping in joy. She'd found it! Thank God.

Her celebration was cut short however when footsteps sounded in the hallway outside. Lauren's eyes widened.

"I'll be down in a minute!" she heard Mayor Martin's voice call. Suddenly the door handle was pulled down.

Lauren froze.