The Masterpiecers (Masterful #1) Read Free Page A

They called in to say a small Honda had a large, bloodied crack in the windshield, and the girl at the wheel was nervous and apparently cold. Covered in some blanket.”
    “I admitted I hit a man. And I’m allowed to have been cold. I was in shock.”
    “What did the blanket look like?”
    “I don’t know. Blue.”
    “He said it was multi-colored.”
    “It was dark out. He couldn’t have seen.”
    “Was it one of Ivy’s quilts?”
    I shake my head.
    “Where’s the blanket now?”
    “Probably still in my car.”
    “It wasn’t. I checked.”
    “Then someone took it out. Why is this even important? Troy Mann is what’s important.”
    He smacks his palms against the table, which makes me jump. It also makes the guard in the corner stop picking at his cuticles to stare at us. The sound reminds me of my mother’s palm colliding with my face, leaving a glaring red imprint that would begin fading just in time for the next slap. “That’s not the point, Aster. You can’t go around killing people.”
    My saliva suddenly feels like plaster, thick and dry. “But he was yelling at me. He tried to strangle me.”
    “You should’ve driven away,” he says, his tone more sad than angry.
    “I would’ve lost him, Josh.”
    “I’d rather you lost him. Instead, I—we—might lose you, Aster.”
    “I’m right here,” I say, wrapping my hands around his.
    “No touching,” the guard snaps.
    I glare at him, but let go.
    “What happened after you hit him?” Josh asks.
    “I drove off.” I smelled the blood through the shattered windshield. “I threw up, so I went home to take a shower.” I swallow. “You know me, I hate blood. Especially since…” I don’t mention the awful morning. Josh was there. He remembers.
    He shakes the small pen. The ink tip slides back in. He shakes it again. It slides back out. He does this several more times before asking, “You didn’t take anything from the crime scene, did you?”
    I shoot my gaze downward. “No,” I say, peering down at my cracked nails. They’re all so short. Except the one on my right pinky. That one is long and sharp. It’s the only one that never breaks. The one on my left hand is torn off like the others. My pinky nails are like Ivy and me—one’s stronger than the other.
    “The police report states there was dirt underneath your nails.”
    I ball my hands and burrow them underneath my armpit. “My keys fell in the potted plant by the door, because my hands were shaking. I had to dig them out.”
    He eyes me in silence. “Aster…”
    His voice is so soft I’m expecting him to tell me he loves me, reassure me that he’s going to get me out, that—
    “Tell me the truth.”
    “That’s what I’m doing!”
    “I know you well enough to know when you’re lying, and you’re lying. I can’t help you if you don’t help me.”
    “You never believe me anyway,” I say. My vision is clouding. “You didn’t believe me that morning in the park and you don’t believe me now.” Josh’s face wobbles. The entire room wobbles. There are two, three, four guards. An optical illusion. “This conversation’s over.” I’m about to stand, but Josh grabs my arm and squeezes it.
    “It’s not over.”
    “Take your hands off me,” I say coolly, since the guard is suddenly totally useless.
    “Aster, please…” His voice has dropped to a whisper. “Please…stay. I didn’t mean to upset you.”
    “Thanks for making them approve the TV channel.”
    His overly tanned forehead scrunches up again. He’s going to have skin cancer someday and he’ll deserve it.
    I shrug his hand off. Accompanied by the guard, I leave and count the number of footsteps it takes to reach the dayroom and the little screen that will make the next few days bearable.
     

Chapter Four
    Ivy
     
    I haven’t been sleeping much since Aster entered the Indiana Department of Correction, so I doze off in the back of the sedan, which makes me miss my first glimpse of the city.