“I just don’t think it’s very successful,” I said. “There are a lot of people out there who are very good at getting past the security folks.”
“I’m sure that’s true, but she tries. It’s pretty good money, at least, so she could afford to set aside money to send me to school. I still haven’t managed to get a degree anywhere, of course, because that was about the time Dad died.”
“How did he die?”
“Cancer,” she said with a shrug. “It fucking sucked.”
I watched her closely, noticing her fingers twitch and her eyes blink rapidly a few times to hold back the moisture forming in them.
“You were with him,” I said.
“I had just finished high school when he was diagnosed. They said he had maybe a year, but he didn’t make it past eight months even with all the chemo and shit. I took care of him because there really wasn’t anyone else, and William did all the business stuff while he was sick so we could afford medical bills.”
“So your fiancé worked for your dad?”
“Yes, for about six years.”
“While you were in high school.”
“We started dating when I was fifteen.”
“How old was he?”
She blushed a little, and my suspicions about him being quite a bit older were confirmed before she answered.
“He was twenty four at the time.”
“Around here, we would’ve called you jail bait,” I said.
“Only if the parents pressed charges,” she said, and I knew she was right. If the parents were okay with it, well, at least one parent, then the law would turn a blind eye.
“What did your mom think?”
“She didn’t like it,” Lia said. “She didn’t like Will, anyway, and definitely didn’t like me being with him.”
“Just because of the age thing or something else?”
“I think just age initially, but I also think she realized, long before I did, that he wasn’t quite what he pretended to be.”
“You mean before he threw you out of a moving car and left you for dead?”
Lia glanced at me with dark eyes and then looked down at her hands.
“Something like that.”
“Have you seen him since then?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
She looked back up at and me and bit her lip for a moment.
“He was there at my mom’s house.”
“After I dropped you at the bus station?”
Lia nodded.