Cunningham Family: Lost And Found Part 5

For us.

When we begin our adventure, I decide to take stock of our belongings. Our stash is pretty pitiful. Between us, we have one set of clothes each (currently being worn), an oversized beach towel, and only the most basic of toiletries. Plus my credit card and bank card (which currently has a balance of about seven hundred dollars) and whatever Ward has in his wallet.

It's not much, and though I can't imagine we'll need much on the road, I want something-anything-to wear besides my salt-encrusted jeans. I convince Ward to stop at one of those discount mega-stores so I can grab myself a sundress. If we're going to play Bonnie and Clyde, I want to look at least somewhat glamorous.

Ward's eyes light up when I step out of the fitting room. The dress I've chosen is sky blue with spaghetti straps, and when I twirl from side to side, the skirt flares up slightly.

"What do you think?" I ask.

He's still looking at my body. When he speaks, his voice is lower than usual.

"I think I want to shove you back into that stall and show you what I think."

My answer catches in my throat. I don't think he's joking. I shoot a glance at the fitting room attendant, but she's busy folding some s.h.i.+rts.

Ward takes advantage of the opening. He grabs me by the waist and pushes me back into the stall, then swings the door shut behind us. I start to pull off the dress, but he shakes his head.

"Leave it on. I want to f.u.c.k you in it."

He spins me around and seizes my wrists. He places my hands against the room's mirror before grabbing the hem of the dress and pus.h.i.+ng it up past my waist.

"The attendant will hear," I tell him, even as I press my hips back against him.

"Then you better bite down those sweet little cries of yours," he says into my ear. He shoves my panties down my legs and undoes his zipper.

I do keep quiet. At least as quiet as physically possible. My hands squeak against the surface of the mirror as my palms sweat, and every once in a while I can't keep a small gasp from escaping my lips as Ward moves behind me. I raise my eyes to his face in the mirror, watching his expression as he drives into me again and again from behind, and when his eyes meet mine, a bolt of pleasure shoots through me. Even through reflective gla.s.s, the desire between us is still electric.

Naturally, we buy the dress.

We also stock up on inexpensive and easy food-chips, granola bars, and supplies for PB&J sandwiches-as well as a cheap six-pack of beer. I consider grabbing some dye for my hair, but my stomach tightens when I find myself faced with the rows upon rows of hues. Coloring my hair means addressing my past decisions, and I'm not ready to do that yet. Instead, I throw my curls up in a messy bun and return with Ward to the car.

"Well," he says with a grin as he starts the car, "that's one state down."

We keep to the coast as much as possible as we make our way up through North Carolina. Our windows are down so we can continue to smell the sea. Ward hasn't had enough of it yet, and I can't get enough of that smile. It's hard not to be happy when he's beaming like that beside me.

We fight over what to listen to on the radio. Ward wants cla.s.sic rock, but I'd rather stick to the country station. Honestly, though, I don't care what we listen to-I just like the way his eyes light up during our little back-and-forth.

"Just because your music is older, that doesn't mean it's better," I tell him.

"It's not old. It's cla.s.sic. And cla.s.sics are called that for a reason."

"I think people just attach the word 'cla.s.sic' to things so they don't feel bad for having such old-fas.h.i.+oned tastes."

"Oh, so we're arguing about taste levels now?"

"I have amazing taste."

He laughs. "Not in music. I can't comment on other things."

"Other things?" I grin. "Like dresses? s.e.x positions? Men?"

"I see what you're doing," he tells me, "but it won't work."

I lean my elbow on the open window and smile.

"And anyway," Ward continues, "stop changing the subject. I'm the driver, so as a rule I get to pick the music."

"Such a gentleman," I tease.

He throws me a devilish look. "You of all people should know I'm not a gentleman."

No, he's most definitely not. And I have no doubt he intends to remind me of that the next chance he gets.

But I imagine something of our conversation sticks in his head, because over the next couple of days I begin to notice little things about the way he treats me. At first it's small gestures-taking my hand more often, running a few steps ahead to open the door, things like that-and soon it's clear that he's making an effort to be more of a gentleman. Ward's always treated me with respect, but he's not exactly Johnny Boyfriend, the sort of guy who brings you flowers and writes you sonnets and surprises you with tango lessons. He's the rough and rugged type. The guy who's always a little disheveled and never fails to make your panties wet.

But the night the subtle changes in him truly become clear to me is the evening we stop for dinner in Virginia.

"What do you say?" I ask when we pa.s.s the billboard for a barbecue joint. "I've already had three PB&Js today. Want to splurge and try something different for dinner?"

"Sounds good to me," he says.

We probably should be budgeting our funds, but I always have my credit card as backup when the money runs out. I'm not sure how far we'll get with what little we have in our actual accounts-though staying at grungy motels and eating at cheap roadside places certainly helps-but I don't want to think about it. We'll go as far as we can go and then figure it out from there.

Ward steers us off the highway at the next exit. The restaurant isn't far from the road, and I can smell the pit smoke even before I spot the giant pig statue standing at the head of the parking lot. My stomach rumbles. Back at Huntington Manor, I hardly ate for weeks. Now, I'm starting to have a normal appet.i.te again.

"This'll be good," Ward says as he parks. "You can always trust a barbecue place with a giant pig out front."

I smile as I get out of the car. Ward's there to close my door, and when we head across the parking lot, he puts an arm around my waist. I lean against him. Yes, I like this new gallant side of him very much.

Unfortunately, my good spirits evaporate almost as soon as we're inside. While Ward asks the hostess for a table, my eyes drift down to the stands of newspapers just inside the door.

On the front of the closest newspaper is a giant picture of me.

I grab the paper and unfold it.

"SABOTAGE!" the headline reads. "Former Heiress Causes Major Damage at Huntington Manor." Beneath those words, my own wide eyes stare back at me. It's an old picture-from two years ago, at least-but one of the more famous shots of me. Beneath that, there's a slightly fuzzier image of someone running-and I realize with a jolt that that's me as well. One of the reporters must have managed to snap a picture of me as I made my mad escape from Huntington Manor.

I should have known this would happen. I should have been prepared. But I'm not.

"Hey," Ward says just behind me. "The table is-what's that?"

I don't know what to say, so I tilt the paper toward him, letting him read the headline.

"f.u.c.k," he says.

"It was inevitable." I let my eyes skim down the page. I need to see what they're saying about me.

But Ward s.n.a.t.c.hes the paper out of my hand. "You don't need to look at that."

I try to grab it back. "I do. I need to see it."

"Why? Will it make you feel any better?"

"They've written about me before," I remind him. "They've written about my entire family. I'm used to it. I just want to read it."

He holds the paper over his head, out of my reach. "You don't need to read it. You know what happened."

"But I want to know what they're saying happened."

"How will that help? It won't change anything."

"It might." I leap for the paper, but he pulls it out of my grip.

"Come on, Lou," he says. "Our table's ready. Can't we just forget about this for a little while? You don't need to know how some jacka.s.s journalist spins this."

Anger flares in my chest. "Don't tell me what I need."

He's still holding the paper above my head, but I lunge around him and grab the next copy off the rack. I know I'm supposed to be running. That I've spent the past week actively avoiding anything that might remind me of my mistakes. But it's impossible to do that when you're confronted with a giant image of your own face.

This is one thing that Ward will never really understand-what it's like to be a target of the media. If they decide to focus on you, you can't escape it. Every time you log on to the internet, every time you step into a supermarket, every time you turn on the TV-your story is there. And if you're easy to recognize in person, the situation is even worse.

I've been lucky so far. Personally, I've always done very little of interest to journalists or gossip sites. They've always focused on my brother-or my father, especially in those months just following his death-but that just changed.

I look up at Ward. I don't know how to explain it. I don't know how to show him that I need to read this, if only to prepare myself. I have no doubt the worst is yet to come.

But I can tell with a glance that he won't get it. He's frowning, and he gives a little shake of his head.

"Lou, I really don't think-"

"I'm reading it."

"I'm just trying to-"

"You can't protect me from this."

That shuts him up. His eyes soften slightly, and my own anger dissolves. Because that's what this is about-he's only trying to protect me from what he knows will cause me pain.

Some understanding pa.s.ses between us, though I can tell he's still not exactly happy. But he places his hand gently on my lower back and guides me across the restaurant without another word.

This place is small, but fortunately, we get a relatively secluded booth near the back. Ward is still silent as he slides into his seat. I sit down on the other side of the table and spread the paper out in front of me. I feel his gaze on me, but I ignore the unpleasant sensations his disapproval brings.

I press my fingers against the picture of me at the estate. You can't see my face, but my blond hair is clear as day. Someone must have snapped this shot while I was still relatively close to the house because there's no sign of Ward in the image.

Ward. I hadn't even considered that this article might mention him as well. My stomach drops. If this becomes a huge story, and if the press realizes that Ward is involved, they'll probably go digging into his past. They'll want to know everything about the random handyman who helped the deranged ex-heiress escape.

And when they realize his connection to Edward Carolson, this story will explode in an entirely new direction. He'll be subjected to the same scrutiny my family's suffered these past two years.

I glance up at him. He's stopped looking at me, though I can tell by the set of his shoulders that he's preparing himself for my inevitable reaction. He rolls his knuckles slowly against the table.

A waiter appears in front of us.

"Good evening," the man says cheerfully. "Welcome to Big Pig's Smokehouse. Best barbecue on the East Coast."

He's way too upbeat for my current state of mind, but I glance up and try to return his smile. He appears to be a little older than us-maybe in his early thirties-and he has a bacon tattoo on his left arm. According to the st.i.tching on his Big Pig's Smokehouse s.h.i.+rt, his name is Bill.

"Can I get you guys started with something to drink?" he asks. "People go nuts over our iced tea."

"Sure, that's fine," I say. I just want him to go away so I can go back to reading the article. Ward orders the same.

The minute Bill goes back to the kitchen, I look down at the paper again. But now that I have the chance to actually read the article, I find myself hesitating. My actions are in writing now. That makes them real in a way they weren't before.

Suck it up, Lou, I tell myself. You need to do this. I force myself to look down at the paper. My eyes move across the words, and though my stomach is still rumbling with hunger, my appet.i.te disappears as the phrases jump out at me from the page.

"...hasn't been dealing well with the death of her father..."

"One employee speculates drugs might have been involved..."

"...though her brother couldn't be reached for comment..."

I learn that they've pushed back Huntington Manor's grand opening. I'm not sure whether I'm excited or sickened by that fact. A little of both, maybe.

But the worst part is the sentence at the very end: Authorities ask that anyone with information about the whereabouts of Louisa Cunningham contact the Moore County Police Department.

So the police are after me. I try to tell myself that it could be worse. There's no number for a national tip hotline. No sign that the FBI is after me or anything. But it doesn't really help.

What does help is the realization that there's no mention of Ward anywhere in the entire article. No hint that anyone suspects I'm on the run with another former Huntington Manor employee. Maybe he can still extricate himself from this situation. Maybe, if we're lucky, Carolson hasn't even put two and two together and realized that his son is helping me.

I glance over at Ward again. He's still not looking at me, but he's definitely thinking hard. His mouth is a thin line, and he's rolling his knuckles a little more firmly against the table.

But right when I'm about to a.s.sure him that it's all right-that I'm not about to have an emotional breakdown, and that he might actually have a chance of reconciling with his father-Bill reappears with our drinks.

"Here you go, you two," he says, sliding two mason jars of iced tea across the table. "Decided on what to eat yet?"

I haven't even picked up the menu, but before I can say that, Bill rushes on.

"We've got a pork belly special," he says. "Tenderest meat you've ever tasted. Melts right in your mouth."

"Sure," Ward says without even looking up. "Sounds fine."

I nod. "Same for me."

When Bill is gone, I fold the paper and push it to the edge of the table. Ward stops rapping his fist against the wood and raises his eyes to mine.

My gut twists at everything I see in his expression. He has no idea what he does to me.

I reach over and touch his hand. He uncurls his fingers and twines them in mine.