Dru went home and had some dinner;  though, if anyone had asked her what she had eaten she could not have told them.  Dru was preoccupied, to say the least.  On top of Jill and Mrs. Kincaid’s unexpected deaths was seeing Dr. Burke.  She was in emotional hell.

Seeing Dr. Burke at the funeral had set all sorts of questions running through her mind.  She decided that she would never be satisfied until she had those answers.

Dru hunted through her room and eventually found what she was looking for: her photo album.  Then she had to look through all the pictures and find the one of her father, Dr. Burke, and herself.  It was taken last year, the summer before her senior year.  It was a close-up of the three of them standing in front of the small clinic in Britville.

Once she had found the picture she set out for the Anson’s house.  Dru arrived at the doorstep at quarter after six.

Jill’s father answered the door.  Dru suddenly felt foolish, bothering them on the day of their daughter’s funeral about a stupid picture.  Dru convinced herself with, No, it's not stupid!  It must have something to do with Jill’s death.

“Hi,” Dru started.  “I’m really sorry for bothering you right now.  I just have to ask you a question.”

“No bother.  We were just having a pity party, you are welcome to join us if you like,” Mr. Anson returned.

“For a little while,” Dru said as she walked in.  “I just want to see if you know this man.”

Dru held out the picture and pointed to the man on the left.

“No, can’t say that I do.  Mary, come see this.”

Mrs. Anson walked over.  Dru pointed the same thing out.  “Let’s see.  Hmm, I think I saw him this morning,” she said.

“But never before?” she asked.

“I don’t think so,” she said.

“Thank you,” Dru said.  “I’ve got to go now.”

Dru turned around and started walking towards the door.  On to Ivey’s.

Then she remembered:  Ivey didn’t have a house anymore.  She didn’t even know where Ivey was.  They didn’t tell her this morning and she never talked to them this afternoon!

Dru turned around again.  “Mr. and Mrs. Anson?  One more thing, where are Ivey and Cade staying?  Do you know?”

Mrs. Anson smiled.  “Yes, dear.  The motel at the corner of Walnut Street and Chester Boulevard.  Room 29.”

“Thanks again.”

This time Dru left and drove away, with the picture tucked safely in her pocket.  She was knocking on the door of room 29 seven minutes later.

Cade answered.  Once again Dru felt awkward, but not for the same reason as last time.  Being around Cade always was a little awkward, even more so lately.  That morning on the airplane.  Dru knew he suspected something was up.

“Hi.”

“Hi, back,” he said.

“Is Ivey around?”

“She doesn’t want to see anyone right now.”

“I’m not anyone.”

“You’re right, you aren’t.”

Dru pushed herself past him and walked into the motel room.  “Where is she?”

Dru heard a door open.  Ivey walked into the room that would be considered a family room, den, living room, and anything else that didn’t fall under the category of bedroom and bathroom.

“Hi,” Dru said.  “Can we talk?”

“Yeah, com’n.”

Dru followed Ivey into a room that held a double bed and dresser, nothing else.

“What did you want to talk about?” Ivey asked in a raspy voice.

Just by taking one look at her you could tell she had been crying for the last hour, probably two.
Dru pulled the picture out of her pocket.  “Who is this?”

Ivey stared at the picture in horror.  “Where did you get that?”

“From my photo album.”

“Stay here.”  She watched Ivey walk out of the room.  She soon returned with a Christmas card in her hand, which she handed to Dru.

Dru looked at the card.  On it was a picture of Dr. Burke, Mrs. Kincaid, Drake, Cade, and Ivey.  Dru’s guess was that it was taken about ten years ago.  Dr. Burke had changed quite a bit, but she could still tell it was him.  Actually, they had all changed quite a bit!  Beside the picture were the words ‘Merry Christmas from Andrew, Krystal, Drake, Cade, and Ivey Burke.’

“I thought everthing burned in the house,” Dru said.

“I had that with me.”

“Oh.”  And then suddenly Dru was angry.  “What the heck is this?” she screamed.

“I’m sorry!” Ivey sobbed as she fell across the bed.  “I never meant for any of this to happen.  He made us do it!”

Dru felt guilty for some bizarre, odd reason.  After all, it was Ivey’s fault Dru was yelling at her, not Dru’s.  Ivey was the one who was keeping who knows what from her!

“What are you talking about, Ivey?”

“It’s all my fault!  I should have listened.  He killed them because I wouldn’t listen!”

“Listened to what?  Who?”

“Him!” she screamed, pointing to the picture Dru still held in her hand.

“What?  Ivey, talk to me!”

She didn’t talk, though, she sobbed.  After a few more attempts at extracting the information that was so important to me, Dru left.

Cade was standing in the middle of the entryway with a menacing look on his face.  Dru tried to pass him without succeeding.

“Why did you do that?  As if she wasn’t upset already!” he stormed.

“Do you have any idea what I just learned tonight, Cade!”

“No, I don’t.  All I know is that you have disturbed Ivey very much just now.”

“To be honest with you, I think she deserves it.  I think your whole family deserves it!”  Once again she tried to move by him and toward the door.  Once again he wouldn’t let her.  He grabbed her arm, therefore exhausting any idea of getting out of the room easily.

“What are you talking about?” he asked, exasperated.

“As if you didn’t know!  Let go of me!”

“What?  Dru, this isn’t fair!”  He let go of her arm, which was now quite sore.

“Fair!  Don’t talk to me about fair, Cade.  You aren’t the one who is at the root of all these things that are happening.  You don’t know what it feels like to have a ruined life, just because someone doesn’t like your daddy.  You aren’t the one who has to deal with the result of that. And you aren’t the one that has no clue as to how it happened, but still is-” Dru stopped, realizing she almost told Cade about the little person inside of her.

The expression on Cade’s face had turned from anger to sympathy.

Dru brushed past Cade and stormed out, then running down the steps to her car.  Before she climbed into the jeep she looked back up at their room.  Cade was standing in the door, confused and mad.  Dru decided to give him one last thing to remember.

She yelled,  “Goodbye, Cade Burke!”  And she drove off into the night.
 

The next morning she woke up and ate breakfast.  Dru knew she had to find out what Ivey had started telling her the night before.

She was severely tired.  As soon as she had gotten home the night before she heard the phone ringing.  She had answered it only to find that it was Cade and had immediatly hung up.  Cade, however, wouldn’t give up, he continually phoned her until she took the phone off the hook.  Then he had taken to knocking on the front door for a few hours.

Dru looked at the phone, which was still laying on the counter instead of the phone cradle.  She decided to call Ivey.

Dru called the motel and waited for them to connect her to room 29.  Thankfully Ivey picked it up, not Cade.

“Hello.”

“Hi, Ivey, its me, Dru.”

“Oh.  Cade’s been trying to call you all night.”

“I know.  But I would rather not talk about that.”

“Okay.”

“Can you come over?”

“Okay, see you in a few minutes.  ‘Bye.”

“Goodbye.”  The line went dead.

Six and a half minutes later Dru was answering the door.  It was Ivey, of course.  Ten seconds after that they were sitting on the couch in the den.

“I’m going to tell you everything, Dru.  Just don’t get mad, okay?”

“I cannot promise that,” Dru said.

“Whatever.”

“I can’t.”

“Okay.  Anyway, I said I was going to tell you everything, and I will.”  She took a deep breath.  “About five years ago my family was very different.  My father worked at a hospital in Tennesee, where we lived.  One day he came home very happy, saying he had gotten a big raise.

“From then on our family was always quite rich.  Then, about a year and a half ago Dad had to go away on business.  That was when everything changed.  I haven’t seen him since then.”

“What happened?” Dru asked.

“He called and said he had made a business deal with a man named Rob Keieva, in Africa.  Mom said he told her he needed to stay there for awhile.  That was in January.  When May rolled around and he still wasn’t home we started getting worried.

“In June he called again saying he was sorry it was taking so long and that we needed to do some checking up on his partner for him.  We were instructed to move here, to Lafayette, and become acquainted with your mother and you.”

Dru started to realize what this was all about.

Ivey continued.  “I met you on the first day of school and became friends with you.  I was the only one doing my job.  Mom was supposed to become friends with your mother and Cade was supposed to-”  Ivey’s face flushed heavily and she stopped.

Dru thought, Seduce me, just say it Ivey.  It’s pretty obvious.  Cade was supposed to act like the perfect boyfriend, and then dump me when it was convenient.

“Was supposed to what, Ivey?”

“You can guess.  At this point Drake did not have a job from Daddy.  Anyway, because I was the only one with any information, I was elected to be the person to fax it off to Dad.

“By now we had found out Dad was in the middle of a heavy drug operation.  He was overseeing it grown in South Africa.  He had us stationed here just in case your dad found out, and then he would use you and your mother as blackmail so your dad wouldn’t report it.

“Meanwhile I was becoming good friends with you and I started feeling guilty.  I really was your friend.  Instead of sending off my monthly report in December I faxed Dad a letter telling him exactly why I couldn’t do my job anymore.  Within the week came Dad’s reply, I had better do my job or bad things would start happening.

“At this time your father was not in South Africa anymore.  Somewhere along the line he had stumbled upon Dad’s drugs and had threatened to report him.  Dad told him that if he was reported that Dru and her mother would die, so your father didn’t do anything.  Eventually your father couldn’t take it anymore and left.

“Dad was afraid I wouldn’t do my job with you so he told Drake that he was supposed to--well, you know.  Drake didn’t want to. . .and then he saw you.  Dad was also afraid that as soon as your father got back to the United States he would report him, so he had your father taken care of.”

Dru was afraid that it would come down to this.  So now she knew who had killed her father, and all this time she had thought it was a stupid war in Bosnia.  All that time when she had thought Ivey was her best friend, and she had known that her father killed Dru’s father.  Not only that, Ivey had been telling her whole family everything about her, and then sending it off to a criminal!  Ivey was a very good actress, able to act like she cared for Dru, and then stab her in the back, so to say.

Ivey was crying again.  Dru wondered how many tears she had shed in the last few days, or was that all an act, too?  Was she pretending to cry at the funerals?  The funerals!  She hasn’t talked about them yet, they’ve gotta have something to do with this!

“What about Jill?”  Dru asked.

“After your dad died my family agreed that we would not have anything to do with this anymore.  All along we had all known everything, we kept no secrets from each other.  So, all of us, as one, agreed to have nothing to do with Dad anymore.

“All the money Dad had given us to watch you and your mother sat in the bank, untouched.  I promised myself I was going to tell you everything.  And then you were in the hospital and everything, and I didn’t want to make things worse.  I always told myself that I would tell you, soon.

“Dad threatened us many times.  We got sick of it and a few weeks before we left for South Africa, Mom told the authorities all about Dad.  Unfortunatly, Dad found out about it before they got to him, and he escaped.  The authorities know everything you know, and there are many warrants out for his arrest, they want him for drug trafficking, murder, and petty thievery.  The DEA is tracking him, along with people from South Africa.  And Drake is off doing his own investigation somewhere.”

She paused for a moment before continuing.  “According to Cade, Daddy has been trying to kill us.  A few things happened while we were gone, ending with the fire.  The fire was meant to kill my whole family.”

“What about now, has anything happened since you’ve been home?”

“They have people watching us.”

“Oh.”

“Daddy also has people following us.  They probably think that I’m telling you everything, which I am, so they’ll probably try to kill you too now.”

“Ivey!  How can you be so calm?  We are talking about murder, here!”

“I’m used to it.”

Dru looked at Ivey closely.  She appeared to be struggling with herself.  How hard this must have been on her!

“Dru?  Could you ever forgive me?  I never meant for any of this to happen.  I just want us to be friends.”

How could Ivey expect her to forget all of this.  Something told Dru Ivey did not expect her to forget, just to be friends, this time truthfully.

Dru did not know how to say what she wanted to.  “Ivey, I know you didn’t kill Father and I know you did not kill Jill.  But a lot of this is your fault.  I don’t know if I’ll ever forget all of this.  One thing I do know is that I don’t know where I would be now without you, because you have been a very good friend to me.”

She smiled.

“So, yes, I think I can forgive you,” Dru finished.

They hugged, and then talked for a few hours about different things.

When Ivey left Dru became afraid.  What if people did try to kill her?  What if they decided to burn her house down, like Ivey’s house?  Dru didn’t want her house to burn, there were mountains of things in there that were very special to her.

How can I protect my most important things? Dru wondered.

Then the answer came to her.  Dru had a box in her closet, sort of like a safe, only it was not built into the wall or floor.  She got the key and opened it up.  Inside was her most expensive jewelery, which included a pair of diamond studs, and a gold necklace with an opal pendant.  With the jewelery was her mother’s passport; her’s was in the luggage she had not yet unpacked.

Dru went about the house collecting the things that were most important to her:  a very small porcelain jewelry box that had a lily on it;  her father’s Bible, which had been mailed to her after his death;  a picture of her mother, father, and herself, taken when she was three years old; the two photos from graduation, the one of Ivey, Jill, Merry and Dru by the car and the one of Cade, Brian and Dru with their diplomas;  a few more pictures, taken at various stages of her life;  a plastic, red carnation that a friend of hers had given her when she was thirteen; some more odds and ends.

Dru thought about putting her sapphire ring in with all the other stuff.  But the ring was too important to her, it was more important than all of the stuff in the safe combined.  Dru could not trust anyone or anything with it, she had to keep it with her.

Dru locked the hard, metal box and went to the bus station.  She put it in a locker and stuck the locker’s key in her pocket.  She now felt much safer, though she don’t know why.  She could still be killed at anytime.

It was at that moment that the second answer came to her.  The keys, they could be given to other people so if she were to be injured in some way, her things wouldn’t be.  Dru could still be hurt, but her most valued possesions would always be safe.

She drove to Merry’s house and gave her the key to the safe, but not the locker.  That way if anyone tried to get her stuff it would be twice as hard.

“What is this for?” she asked, looking at the key in her palm.

“It’s to a safe.”

“But why do I have it?”

“You have it for safe-keeping.  You can only give it to certain people.”

“Who?”

“I don’t know.  You will be able to tell at the time.  I trust you, Merry.”

“I still do not understand!”

“You will someday.  I must leave now.”

And with that Dru drove home.  She did not know who to give the other key to.  She thought about all the possibilities for forty-five minutes.  Ivey wouldn’t work, she was in the same situation Dru was.  Same with Cade, though she would not go anywhere near him right now.

Dru decided she would trust Brian, for once.  She drove to the McLaoy’s house and knocked on the door.  Mrs. McLaoy answered the door and told her Brian was in San Fransisco for the weeks until college.  She gave Dru the address of his hotel and Dru left.

She decided to drop by Ivey’s before she left for San Fransisco.  She  answered on the fifth knock.

“What took you so long?” Dru asked her.

“I don’t know, I feel sick.”

“Sorry.  I was just going into San Fransisco.  I might not come back tonight.”

“Okay.”

“If Drake gets in touch with you or anything, call me right away.  Tell him I’m going to help.”

“Help?”

“You said he’s off somewhere investigating.”

“Oh, yeah.  Why do you want to help?”

“To do something.  I feel so helpless against all this.  And besides, there is always the little matter of revenge.”

Ivey looked away.  “I know where he is.”

“Really!  This is great!  Where is he?”

She went to a table and grabbed a slip of paper, then handed it to Dru.

“Here.”  It was the address to the same hotel that Brian was staying in.

“Thanks, Ivey.  If you need anything, call Drake’s or this number.”

Dru wrote down the number of Brian’s hotel room and gave it to Ivey.  “This is the number to Brian McLaoy’s hotel room.  He’ll be there the whole summer.  That’s where I’m going now.”

“Bye.”

“Yeah, see you later.”

Dru left and headed back home.  If she were to go to Drake’s after she stopped at Brian’s, she might not come home that night.  She would want some clothes.

Dru arrived at the hotel around dinnertime.  As she rode the elevator up to Brian’s room she remembered the last time she had seen him.  It was the night they had graduated.    They had been dancing and she had completely blown him off.  Now she felt guilty.

She knocked on the door and waited for him to answer it.

“What the heck are you doing here!”  Brian was clearly surprised.

“Can I come in?”  Dru asked timidly.

“Yeah, sure.”

Dru walked in and saw that he was eating dinner while watching the news.  She sat down in the chair across from his.

“Have you had any dinner?” he asked her.

“I’m not hungry.”

Suddenly something on the news caught Dru’s eye.  It was a girl with long, curly, brown hair being wheeled into an ambulance.  Then an older woman came on and said something about how surprised she was to see an ambulance stop in front of her motel.  She couldn’t believe that one of her guests was poisoned!

The camera cut back to the news anchor and he said something about if you had any information, please contact the authorities of Lafayette.

“Did you see that?” Dru asked Brian.

“Yeah, that’s what I was watching when you got here.”

“That was Ivey.  I should have known . . .”

“Known what?”

“That they would get her.  Next will be Drake and Cade, then me.”

“What are you talking about, Dru!”

“Oh, I’m sorry!  I forgot you were there for a minute.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

“They are trying to kill us, Brian.”

“Who is they?”

“The same people who killed my father and Jill and Mrs. Kincaid.  Or Burke.  I don’t know anymore.”

“Jill and Mrs. Kincaid?”

“You don’t know about that?”

“About what?”

“Jill and Mrs. Kincaid were killed in a fire at the Kincaid’s house last week sometime.”

“Really?”

“No, Brian, I’m just telling you stories,” Dru said sarcastically.

“Oh.  So what you’re trying to say here is that the people that killed your dad are trying to kill you now.”

“Yes, that’s it.”

“Wow.  Why?”

“Because I know too much.”

“Of what?”

“Brian, I don’t want to involve you.”

“Whatever you say.  Why did you come here?”

“Oh, I forgot about that.”  Dru fished around in her pocket for the key.  “Here,” she said handing it to him.

“This is to the lockers at the bus station in Lafayette.”

“It is.”

“Why do I have it?”

“You have it in case something happens to me.  You have to keep it safe, Brian.”

“I will,” he said seriously.

“Good.”

“What am I supposed to do with it?”

“Keep it until someone comes for it.”

“Who?”

“That’s the problem.  I don’t know who.  You will have to judge that for yourself.”

“I don’t know who’s the bad guy and who isn’t!”

“I’m trusting you on this, Brian.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“I have to go now.  Thank you, Brian.  I mean it.”

Dru walked to the door.

“Dru . . .  Wait!”  There it was again.  Those two words.  Both Cade and Drake had said them.  They had both ended up kissing her, and she had ended up hating them both.  She must be crazy to think she could work peacefully with Drake.

It’s not just working with him, it is also surviving and putting Father’s killers away.

Dru turned to see Brian’s face mere inches from her’s.  He leaned down toward her.

“No, Brian.  Don’t.”  Dru put her hands between them.

He looked somewhat hurt.  “Look, Dru.  I have liked you ever since the moment I saw you, and now you are telling me I might never see you again.  How do you think that makes me feel?”

 “Brian.  Stop.”  She gentley pushed him back.  “This is hard enough as it is!”

They stood there in awkward silence for six seconds, though it felt much longer.

“You’re trembling.”

Dru looked down.  “So I am.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m afraid of what might happen here.”

He looked at her in disgust.  “You still don’t trust me?”

“I don’t trust anyone.”

 “Dru?”

“What?”

“At the end of the summer, call me.”

That is, if I’m still alive, Dru thought pensively

“Sure.”

Dru left his room and walked down the two flights of stairs to the room Drake was staying in.  She knocked many times, but no one answered.  She tried the knob and found out it was open.  Walking in, she heard the television on around the corner.

“Drake?  Is that you?”

Dru turned the corner to see Cade sitting on the couch.   Cade, of all people.  The guy who she had been screaming at just twenty-four hours before.

“So- sorry,” she stammered.  “I thought Drake was here.”

“He was.”

“Will he be back soon?”

“I hope so.”

Silence.

“Why are you here?”  He demanded.

“I suppose I could ask you the same question.”

“But I asked first.”

“Your point?”

“Answer me!”

“I’m looking for Drake.  Now now you answer me.”

“I’m helping Drake.”

“Help with what?”

“Finding someone.”

“Find who?  Your father?”

“My father?”  Cade looked startled.  “How do you know who he is?”

“I met him, remember?  He used to work with my father, as if you didn’t know!”

“How did you find out who he is?”

“Ivey.”

“So she finally told you.  She’s been trying to ever since Christmas.”

“I know.”

“Is she still at the motel?”

“Well, not really.”

“What do you mean, ‘not really’.”  Either she is there or she’s not!”

“She’s in the hospital.”

“She’s what!”

“In the hospital,” Dru repeated.

“Why?”

“Because your father decided killing Jill wasn’t enough.”

“That was cruel.”

“It was meant to be.”

“What happened?  To Ivey, I mean.”

“She was poisoned.”

“Is she okay?”

“Don’t know.”

“Is she alive?”

“Don’t know.”

“What hospital is she at?”

“I’m guessing Laffayette General, but they might have taken her to Berkeley if it was very serious.”

“When did you find out?”

“About ten minutes ago, on the six o’clock news.”

“Com’n, we’re going to pay her a visit.”

“What about Drake?”

“I’ll leave a note.”

He grabbed her arm, pulling her out of the room and down the hall into the elevator.  They met Drake in the lobby as he was coming up and explained everything to him on the way.  Dru also tried to tell them she wanted to be there when they confronted their father;  she needed to see this man who had so generously stopped at nothing to ruin her life.
 

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