Chapter 9: The Money Jessica Took
Jessica lowered her phone, but didn’t put it away. Around us, the reunion had gone strangely quiet. The music was off, and every scrape of a chair from the kitchen seemed to travel through the house.
“I have to tell you something,” she said.
Ryan was near the kitchen doorway, talking to his mother. He glanced our way, then turned back to her. Jessica watched him do it. Her fingers tightened around her phone.
“Laura’s notice said nobody had permission to be here,” I said. “The listing said my house was available for rent. What else is there?”
Jessica swallowed. “Ryan took an advance from someone who wanted the weekend.”
Officer Ruiz looked up from her notes. Jessica’s gaze dropped to the phone.
“How much?” I asked.
“Eight hundred dollars.” Her voice caught, but she kept going. “He gave me six hundred. We were behind on the electric bill, and the car payment was late. I used it.”
She didn’t ask me to understand. That was something, at least.
“You knew it was money from renting my house.”
“I knew it was for the rental.” Jessica looked at me, eyes bright. “Ryan said you’d agreed. I believed him. Or I told myself I did.”
“You knew I was coming Friday.”
“I saw your text.”
“You replied, ‘Got it.’”
“I know.” She pressed the phone to her palm. “Then Ryan said you’d called him and canceled. He said you’d changed your plans again.”
“You could have called me.”
“Yes.” Her voice turned small, then steadied. “I could have. I didn’t.”
The answer landed harder than a new excuse would have. She had read my message, answered it, and then let Ryan’s version replace what she’d seen with her own eyes. The money had made that easier. It hadn’t made it an accident.
“You took it because you needed it,” I said.
“I took it because I wanted to believe there was a way for me to get help without asking you.” Jessica’s mouth trembled. “And because I wanted the bills paid. Both things are true.”
I looked toward the living room, where the blue mug sat on the mantel, abandoned among paper plates and someone’s half-empty drink. My grandfather had given it to me. For a moment, the sight of it brought back his warm hands around mine, the way he’d always asked before borrowing anything.
Then Jessica’s screen lit up.
She looked down. “There’s something else. I should have shown you before.”
“Show Officer Ruiz,” I said.
Jessica hesitated—not long, but long enough for me to see the choice. Then she opened a group thread on her phone and turned the screen toward Ruiz. The thread included Jessica, Ryan, and Wade.
“I started it to coordinate getting the rooms ready,” she said. “Ryan added Wade.”
Ruiz leaned closer, careful not to take the phone from her. “Can you scroll to the messages you mean?”
Jessica did. Her thumb stopped at a message from Ryan, sent Thursday evening.
“Clear the back room before the guests arrive.”
A minute later, another message appeared beneath it.
“Take nothing traceable to me.”
No one spoke. The house seemed to draw tight around those words.
“Did he say what he meant by ‘clear’?” Ruiz asked.
“No.” Jessica’s eyes moved from the screen to me. “I thought he meant move the boxes and personal stuff out of the way for renters. That’s what we were doing, right? Getting the house ready.”
“You thought that second message was about boxes?” I asked.
Her chin lifted a fraction. “I didn’t want to ask what he meant.”
Ruiz recorded the wording and asked Jessica to preserve the thread. Jessica nodded and sent Ruiz screenshots while keeping the messages open on her own phone. Her hands shook so badly she had to try twice.
From the kitchen, Ryan’s voice rose. “Jess.”
She flinched. The old response came before she could stop it: her shoulders drew in, her face turned toward him. Then she looked back at the phone.
“Don’t,” I said. Not because I could decide what she did next. Because I knew what that one syllable cost her.
Jessica’s eyes met mine. She turned her phone facedown on the table.
Ryan came into the room. His mother followed a step behind him, still holding the blue mug. He looked at the phone, then at Ruiz.
“What are you showing her?”
“Messages about the house,” Jessica said.
His expression hardened. “Those are private.”
“They’re about my house,” I said.
“You’re twisting things again.” Ryan’s glance cut to Jessica. “You said you were going to handle this.”
She didn’t answer. The silence was different now. Before, it had been a wall between us. This time it was a decision she was making in front of him.
Ruiz stayed beside the table, writing. “Jessica has shown me messages that I’ll add to the report.”
Ryan gave a short, humorless laugh. “A report. For what? A couple of texts?”
“Then you won’t mind them being read exactly as written,” I said.
He stepped toward the table. Jessica put one hand over her phone.
“Don’t touch it,” she said.
The words surprised her as much as they seemed to surprise him. Ryan stopped. For one fragile second, I saw the sister who used to stand between me and a barking dog when we were kids. Then the years between us came back—the money I’d sent, the calls I’d answered, the choices she’d made when my back was turned.
Ryan’s face softened into something meant only for her. “Jess, think about what you’re doing.”
She looked at the message again. “I am.”
He turned away first. His mother kept the mug clutched against her sweater as she followed him. I wanted to ask her to put it down. I wanted to take it from her. Instead, I let it remain where it was, waiting between us like another truth no one could carry away for me.
Jessica sat down. The words on her screen stayed with her, even after Ruiz finished documenting them. She rubbed her thumb along the edge of the phone, not looking at me.
“I thought I was just helping him rent the place,” she said. “I knew that wasn’t mine to offer. I knew you hadn’t said yes. I just kept telling myself he’d already talked to you.”
I wanted her to say she was sorry. I wanted her to have refused the money, called me, stopped Wade from coming back. I wanted a version of my sister who had made the right choice before I had to find out what the wrong one cost.
May you like
Instead, I watched her take one breath, then another, while the house held the shape of all the things she had chosen not to ask.
She looked at me and said, “He knew Wade was taking something. I just don’t know if he knew it was your case.”
