The Truth About Us

“I don’t know. But I guess we’re going to find out.”

“You don’t have to do this, you know.”

“What? Talk to my dad?” Kaden raised a brow.

“Yeah. Talk to your dad. Help me. Any of it. You don’t have to. I’ll figure it out on my own eventually. If you’d rather keep your focus on nothing but school like your dad wants, I would totally understand. I mean, we skipped school today and—”

“Abby...”

Abigail bit her lip, bracing herself for what he might say. How could she hate the thought of him not helping her when she only confided in him minutes ago?

She hesitated, then turned her gaze to his, acknowledging the slight emptiness in her chest at the thought of never having another morning like this—the two of them, sitting on the lawn, talking, working together, and coming up with a plan. In fact, she wondered if maybe this was what real friendship was like, not just hanging with the girls at school but actually letting one of them in, having someone to share her secrets and fears with, having someone to confide in.

But now, with her grandmother gone, it felt as though the life she had known tipped on its axis. Suddenly, she wished she had spent more time nurturing her other relationships instead of pushing them aside. How many times had Cammie asked her to go out with them over the weekend, and she turned them down? And where did that get her? The loss of GG left a gaping hole in her life that needed to be filled. She had put all her love and care into only a couple of relationships. And as she stared at Kaden, she realized Cammie was right. She needed a friend. She needed to get out and forget her worries and be a teenager. She needed to have fun and do things with her peers.

Was that what Kaden was being? A friend? Or was it more?

Abby released her lip from her teeth, allowing her gaze to linger on his face, the square line of his jaw, and his chocolate eyes. When he reached out and clasped her hand firmly in his, her heart leapt. The warmth from the contact sunk into her bones.

“I want to help more than I care about what my dad will think or say. Why do you think I came with you today?”

The tension drained from her rigid spine. Abby smiled and squeezed his hand. “Okay, then. I just wanted you to know you had an out. You’re under no obligation to see this through. It was my grandmother’s wish for me to do this. Not yours. As long as you know that, then we’re good.”

Kaden rolled his eyes and stood, pulling her up with him. “I got it. You’re not as persuasive as you think.”

She quirked a brow at him. “Really? Because I’m pretty sure I coerced you into the whole skipping school thing?”

“Like it was that hard.”

“Still...”

Kaden glanced around them. “Maybe we should get out of here. No matter how old your grandfather is, I’d rather not have him return and see us sitting in this particular spot with evidence we’ve been snooping.”

Abby snickered. “Are you afraid of my eighty-seven-year-old grandpa?”

Glaring, he waved a hand up and down her body, heating every square inch of her as he gestured. “No, but we’re not so secretive when we’re caught red-handed like this, and it’s supposed to be a secret, right? I think you’d have trouble explaining this one.”

She glanced down at her dirt-smudged jeans to the shovel, hole, and mounds of earth around them and grimaced. “Good point.”

She moved toward the shovel, but Kaden grabbed it before she could and filled the hole up with ease. He finished five times faster than it took her to dig it out in the first place, which was only slightly vexing but a lot impressive. Once they were finished, key in hand, they made their way back to the car.

“So, what’s the plan now?” Kaden asked as they stopped in front of her car. “We can’t exactly walk into the precinct yet since we’re supposed to be at school. My dad would really blow a gasket.”

Abby pursed her lips. “I thought about that. I think we should work on one of the other unknowns. I think we need to find out who this person was my grandmother spoke to, the one she thought might be a relative.”

Kaden frowned. “Did your grandmother say to contact her?”

“No, but I think it’s worth following up on. If she is connected to my family, she could be a huge help.”

“Maybe she isn’t related. Could be just a waste of time. I mean, we’re talking about around six million Jews being killed. I’m sure there were a lot of victims with the same name.”

“True.” Pushing off the car, Abby couldn’t shake the feeling there was something her grandmother wasn’t telling her about the woman she mentioned.

She stared out at the road, her thoughts churning, while something she couldn’t put her finger on nibbled at the back of her head. Glancing over at Kaden, she unlocked the car and rounded to the driver’s side. “It could be nothing. You could be right, but something tells me she’s important.”

Abby opened her door and climbed inside and waited until Kaden followed suit.

He turned to her in his seat. “So, how do we find this relative? We don’t have a private investigator.”