The Trial (The Tree House) (4 page)

Aly looked at me, a hint of empathy in her eyes. “Just lay low and try not to kill each other while I'm gone.”

After the door closed behind her, I pushed my bowl away and stood up. “I'm taking a shower,” I muttered. “I can still smell that guy's blood on me.”

Ben didn't object as I grabbed my clean clothes off the table and trudged out of the kitchen. The bathroom wasn't too hard to find in this tiny, cramped place. Some promotion if she couldn't even afford anything bigger than a closet in this city. The water sputtered pitifully out of the shower head barely strong enough to penetrate the top layer of dried blood still caked on my skin.

What
had that man been doing in our house anyway? Why were they coming after us? I thought I'd lived a pretty normal life. Nothing had happened – as far as I knew – that would warrant anyone coming to kill me. My mom taught English at one of the colleges and Dad had the car lot; pretty normal jobs. I thought the only thing that didn’t make us a normal family was the fact that Ben and I had both come from different parts of the world and had been adopted when we were babies. But I guess there was something deeper to my parents. Maybe even something dark. Maybe I didn't know them as well as I thought I did.

I squeezed a stream out of the shampoo bottle and began working at the matted, bloodied hair at the base of my skull.

Then there was Ben. If there was anyone I had been mistaken about, it was my own brother. What had he been talking to Aly about the night before? Something about someone somewhere. Something bad apparently. Something that wasn't supposed to leave London, but had ended up following him here. But that man in our house had known my name. He'd wanted both of us to come with him. So apparently, I was in this too. My own life was being threatened and Ben was still trying to keep me in the dark. I had a right to know what was going on. I had a right to know why we were being hunted.

I turned the water off and got out of the shower, drying myself off quickly and pulling on the clothes that Aly ha
d washed for me. I looked clean, I smelled clean, but I still felt coated in that man's blood. Maybe I would feel that way forever.

Ben was still sitting at the table so deep in thought he looked like he was in a trance. I watched in silence for a bit as he held his spoon up over the bowl of cold oatmeal then let it drop in with a sick thud over and over again. The gun he had gotten from home was sitting on the table next to his hand
, gleaming at me like a taunting smile. Like it was saying “I know something you don't know,” in a metallic, annoying, singsong voice.

I put my hand in my pocket and closed my fingers around the note from my dad. Aly must have taken it out to wash my pants then put it back in after they were dry. Taking it back out of my pocket, I read it once, twice, three times, then slammed it down on the table in front of my brother causing him to jump.

Neither of us said anything at first as I glared deep into my brother's eyes hoping that maybe I’d find the truth scrawled across his retinas. No luck. I opened my mouth with a click of my tongue. “You know the saying 'what you don't know can't hurt you'?” Ben nodded slowly. “Okay, and do you remember when we were younger and we were watching TV with Mom and Dad and there was that story on the news about the couple that had been murdered in their home?”

“Sure, I remember,” Ben replied, his voice still shaky from being startled.

“And then after the fact, the police found out the husband had lost his job and owed all kinds of money to this other guy–”

“Yes, Jack,” my brother interrupted me. “What's your point?”

I shifted from one foot to the other. “The wife had nothing to do with it, had no idea what was going on and she still ended up dead.” Ben blinked and raised a blond eyebrow waiting for me to continue. “I kinda feel like the wife in this situation.”

“So then,” my brother leaned forward on his elbows, “that makes me the husband?”

I shrugged. “In the least awkward sense, yeah. You're hiding something,” I said narrowing my eyes. “Something big. And I need to know before you get me killed.”

“It's not about you.”

“The man knew my name,” I said. “He knew I was your brother.”

“They're coming after me,” Ben explained leaning back in his chair again. “Of course they're going to know who my family is.”

“But why are they coming after you?” I asked. “You're my family. I want to help.”

“It's too dangerous for you to get involved.

“I'm already involved!” I shouted hitting my fist on the table. Ben clamped his mouth shut so the muscles in his jaw stuck out. “Dad said we need to stay together,” I said stabbing the letter with my finger. “We need to take care of each other. That's what he said,
Ben
.”

“I know,” my brother finally sighed. “I know. I was just hoping you wouldn't have to get dragged into this.”

“Well, I've been dragged through and thrown into this head first so I think it's time you start telling me what's going on.”

“Alright, alright,” he muttered and covered his face with his hands. I sat down in front of my own bowl of rock
hard oatmeal and waited for him to say something. Slowly, he slid his hands down his face, pulling the skin around his eyes and mouth down into an unpleasant scowl. “Where do I start?”

I crossed my arms and leaned back in my chair.
“London.”

Chapter three

Ben stood up and walked over to the coffee pot sitting on the counter. After pouring himself a cup, he leaned on the counter and tapped on the mug with his thumbs thoughtfully. I sat there eying the gun on the table waiting for him to start. Instead, he brought the mug up to his lips and took a swig of coffee. He drew his mouth up into an ugly grimace then spit it back into his mug.

“Ack!”
He coughed and poured the coffee out into the sink behind him. “Isn’t there anything in this place that hasn’t expired?”

“Ben.”
He met my glaring eyes.

“Right, sorry,” he muttered and joined me again at the table. “I didn't go to London to study abroad,” he started.

“Then what did you go for?”

Ben sighed and looked up at the ceiling. “I guess I just wanted to get away,” he shrugged.

“From what?”

“Life isn't as easy for me as it is for you,” he said, his voice hinting at irritation. “I just needed to get away, alright?”

I leaned back in my chair putting my hands up defensively. “Alright,” I muttered. “Sorry.”

“Anyway,” he continued. “I'd saved up some money so I was able to get an apartment while I was there. I met this guy, Chris, and he and I split rent and food and stuff and he got me a job bartending at a pub down the street from our place. Things were going well for a few months.”

“Well, what changed that?” I asked him.

Ben put his head in his hands again. “I left work early one night and came home to find Chris dead on the floor.”

“Oh,” I said shocked. “Well…yeah, I guess that changes things. How'd he die?”

“Shot in the head.”

“He was murdered? Do you know why?”

Ben gave me an exaggerated shrug. “I haven't the slightest idea,” he cracked throwing his hands up. “To this day, I
still
have no idea.”

“Did you ever find out who killed him?”

“Yeah,” he nodded his voice still high with anxiety. “Cuz the guy was still there.”

My jaw almost hit the table. “And you're still alive?”

“I was hoping maybe he hadn't seen me. Like maybe I could get out of there without him knowing I'd come home early, but then when I tried to leave, I got shot.”

“You got shot?”

Ben pulled the sleeve of his shirt up to his shoulder to reveal a puckered white scar. “Yeah and I hit my head on the door and it knocked me out,” he said rubbing his forehead like he was remembering. “And when I woke up again, there was a gun in my face and the guy with his finger on the trigger said that I was going with him or he'd kill my whole family and then me.”

By now I had scooted myself to the edge of my seat and my elbows hurt from pushing them into the tabletop. “So what did you do?”

“What else could I do?” Ben shrugged sadly looking down at his hands. “I went with him.”

“Well
, what did he want?”

He lifted his eyes again, just barely so he was looking at me through his hair. “He wanted me to work for him,” he muttered and pushed his bowl of oatmeal to the edge of the table.

“Doing what?” I asked. My brother stared at the bowl in silence. Why wouldn't he just answer me directly? “Doing what, Ben?” I repeated.

“Tracking people down and making them disappear.”

“What?” I asked. “What does that even mean?”

“He made me kill people,” Ben replied steadily.

I stared in silence for a moment, my mouth hanging slightly open. I was about to say something, but what was I about to say? My mind was drawing a blank. What could I say? How does a person respond to that? How many people can say their brother was an involuntary murderer?

“And the people I had to take out...” He shook his head covering his face with his hands. “They'd never wronged me. I didn't even know them. They weren't bad people.”

“You don't know why you had to kill them?” I asked now staring down at the gun lying on the table.

Ben took his hands away from his pale face again, any color completely drained away making him look sick and tired. “I was just given a gun and orders to either kill a person or bring them somewhere. Whatever happened to the
m after that, I don't know.”

“So where does Aly play into all this?”

My brother carefully picked the gun up off the table causing me to tense up automatically. Get a hold of yourself, Jack. You aren't about to be killed by your own brother. Though maybe I couldn't really be sure...

“She was in charge of the list of targets,” Ben said pulling me out of my inner argument. “We would meet up somewhere or she'd
send a text telling me what to do next.”

“So she was working with them?” I felt my hands
clench into fists as anger welled up in my throat like bile. “And now we're staying here in her apartment.”

Ben shook his head. “It's not like that,” he whispered. “Aly didn't want any more part in this than I did.”

“Sure, that's what she tells you,” I muttered.

“It's the truth,” Ben said sternly.

“Then why is she still working for them?” I asked now locking eyes with him and clenching my jaw. “Isn't that why she's here in Seattle?”

“I don't know, Jack,” he said irritated and dropped the gun back down on the table. “I didn't ask who of her loved ones they threatened to kill.”

I shut my mouth and clamped down hard on my bottom lip. The pain made the churning in my stomach calm down a bit. “You don't know her story,” I finally said through gritted teeth. “But you're sure we can trust her?”

Ben looked at me confidently. “Yes.”

I let myself relax a little bit. If he was sure, then I guess she was okay. On the other hand, my own brother had failed to mention anything about being a killer. Sure I hadn't seen him much in almost a year, but we had talked. He’d come home for Christmas. You'd think he would have mentioned something about it. Or at least looked a bit distraught.

“And now someone's coming after you?” I asked tapping my fingers anxiously on the table top.

Ben’s shoulders sagged in defeat. “I guess,” he muttered. “I don't know why though. I thought he was done with me.” He shoved his fingers up and into his hair, staring down at the gun on the table. “Now he wants me dead. After everything he put me through...”

“Who's
he
?”

Ben looked up at me. “I don't know,” he said. “I never actually met the man in charge.”

“Maybe Mom and Dad know something and that's why they left.”

“That's got to be it. What are the chances that there's more than one screwed up thing going on in this family?”

My brain was turning to mush like the oatmeal in front of me. I'd almost forgotten about it. I pulled the spoon out of the bowl and half the oatmeal came up with it.  “Do you think it has something to do with us being adopted?” I asked watching the mush slide slowly off the spoon and plop back into the bowl. Disgusting. I shoved it away trying not to gag.

“Could be,” my brother said. “But what are the odds of that?”

I shrugged. “I'd say the odds are pretty good.” Then I nodded at the gun on the table. “So whose is that?”

“It was Dad's,” Ben replied picking it up protectively.

“I didn't even know Dad owned a gun,” I muttered

“He would've shown you eventually a
nd taught you how to shoot it.”

Now
, I looked back up at him. “He taught you how to shoot?” Ben nodded. “Well, why you and not me?”

“Because I'm the oldest.”

“Yeah, by three months.”

“Then because I'm the favorite.” I threw him a sarcastic sneer. He didn't notice. “Dad just hadn't gotten to you yet,” he added.

“Or maybe he didn't think I needed to learn.”

I'd lived a pretty non-confrontational life. I'd done well in school and had kept to myself for the most part. The few friends I had were good kids. Ben, on the other hand, had always been a bit of a troublemaker. Sometimes he would just leave and we wouldn't see him until a few days later. One time he'd been gone for almost two weeks then came downstairs one morning to join us for breakfast. He'd just sat down like nothing was wrong. I'm pretty sure that was the first time he had come home with a black eye, but not the last. My dad and Ben liked to argue a lot too.
Nothing too scary. But it didn't make sense why the troubled son would be the apple of his father's eye. Maybe I was missing something.

“Want to learn?” he asked interrupting my thoughts.

I eyed the weapon. The only gun I'd ever handled in my lifetime was made of bulky, bright green and yellow plastic and shot out a stream of water up to twenty five feet. That didn't even come close to the damage this thing could do. “I don't think so,” I replied and got up from my seat.

I needed to lie down. I needed to process everything I had just
learned. Too much had happened in the last 24 hours. There were too many secrets. Too many things I didn't know that I should have known. Maybe my brother hadn't always been some sort of trouble maker. Maybe he and my parents had known something that I hadn't known. Maybe I was the screwed up one in our family. Maybe for me to be the normal one, made me abnormal.

Now
, I wasn't making any sense. I needed to sleep. I needed to close my eyes and go through the miles of filing cabinets in my head and pitch out anything I thought I had known before today. Maybe I could make a big bonfire out of everything I thought I'd known and then rise up out of the ashes new and enlightened like some sort of phoenix. Yeah...I definitely needed to go back to sleep.

The hard, thinly carpeted floor in the extra room wasn't very comfortable. Maybe it was the dull headache or my exhausted brain, but it didn't take me long to fall asleep.

* * *

A soft
click
had my eyelids flying open instantly and I found myself staring down the barrel of a gun pointed directly between my eyes. I could barely make out the shape of the person behind the gun, either from the dark shadows in the room or the half sleep I was still in. There was no mistaking the white blond hair, though.

“Ben?” I croaked as his face came into focus. “What
are you doing?”

With unemotional eyes, my brother held up a piece of paper. My face and name filled the page. “You're on the list,” he said coldly and pulled the trigger.

This time when my eyes shot open, I was alone on the floor in Aly's extra room. There were two heavy blankets covering me that hadn't been there when I'd gone to sleep and now I was hot and sticky with sweat. I could hear voices coming from the kitchen. Aly must have been home from work.

I knew I should get up
, but I still felt groggy from the heat and the dream and for a few more moments I just lay there taking deep breaths. I was sweating; the hair was sticking to my forehead. Outside the sky was almost black. How had I slept the whole day?

The inside of my mouth tasted disgusting and my stomach ached with hunger. The only thing I'd eaten was a few bites of that pasty oatmeal that morning when Ben had told me what he'd done.

I sat up and rested my head in my hands. My hangover was completely gone so at least I had that going for me. What else was there? Someone was coming after us, my parents had skipped the freaking country and my brother was a hit man. Awesome.

Back in the kitchen, Aly and Ben were arguing about something. I'm not sure what though since they dropped it as soon as they heard me coming down the hall. Ben
was sitting at the table looking like he hadn't moved since the last time I'd seen him that morning. Now, two guns sat on the table. I'd almost forgotten about the one we'd taken from the suited guy the night before.

“Morning, sunshine,” Ben said unenthusiastically when he heard me come in.

Aly put three bowls of chili down on the table. “Hungry?” she asked.

I was starving actually, t
hough the chili looked about as appetizing as the oatmeal had that morning. I wouldn't be surprised if it tasted pretty similar too. “I think I want to go for a walk,” I finally said heading for the door.

“You're supposed to be lying low,” Aly said and leaned back against the counter. “It's not really a good idea for you to be out by yourself.”

“I just need to get some air. I'll be careful.”

“Let me go with you,” Ben said still looking down at the table.

I shook my head. “I want to go alone.”

My brother nudged the black gun toward me. “At least take this then.”

“I'd rather not,” I replied and nudged it back to him.

Now
, Ben looked up at me, irritation and annoyance glinting in his eyes. “Take it anyway,” he said through his teeth. “You need some sort of protection.”

I shrugged. I'd never been in a physical fight with another person
, but I used to have a punching bag in my room and I'd gotten pretty good at hitting it. “I can take care of myself.”