Black Tangled Heart Read online

  I hadn’t had a best friend since second grade.

  “Skye moved to LA a few years ago to become an actress, and she just won this amazing role on the show, The Sorcerer.”

  My eyes widened. There were a lot of wannabe actors in LA, but that didn’t mean I’d met anyone from a show as big as The Sorcerer. “I love that show.”

  Skye beamed. Like Lorna, she had the kind of smile that prodded your own lips to mirror the action. While Lorna’s ocean eyes were flinty and a little too hardened for a thirteen-year-old, Skye’s were warm and sparkled like waves beneath the sun. “Great! A fan! I’m a new major character.”

  I noted then that Skye’s accent was more diluted than her sister’s.

  “That’s amazing.” I was totally impressed.

  “You want to be an actor?” Lorna misunderstood my awe.

  I shook my head adamantly. No way. Cameras in my face, pretending to be someone I wasn’t. People watching my every move. My face plastered across tabloids. Ugh, I would rather eat slugs.

  “Let me guess … an artist?”

  I blushed at Lorna’s guess and shrugged. Which meant yes.

  “Do you want to act?” I asked Lorna.

  “Nope. The money is too uncertain.” Lorna straightened her spine. “I’m going to go to college and become a fancy litigator. That’s a kind of lawyer. They make a ton of money.”

  “And she’ll do it too.” Skye grinned affectionately at her sister before turning to me. “Your new best friend is the most ambitious person you’ll ever meet.”

  “Well, it makes up for having an actress and a moody writer in the family.”

  Lorna’s sister scowled. “Stop teasing Jamie about his writing. You know it sets him off.”

  The brother was a writer. How cool. “I love books.”

  “Yeah, see?” Skye gestured to me as she stood. “If Jamie finds out you’re telling everyone about his writing, this place will turn into World War III, and I don’t have time for that.”

  “Jane can keep a secret. Can’t you, Jane?”

  I nodded vehemently.

  “Told you.”

  Skye offered me her kind smile. “Jane, I love my sister, but try not to let her bulldoze you into agreeing to everything she wants you to agree to. Or doing stuff during this burgeoning best friendship of yours that you’re not comfortable with.”

  Lorna huffed. “I wouldn’t do that.”

  Her sister rolled her eyes. “I have to get to work. There’s money on the counter for pizza and Jane is welcome to join you. I’ll tell Jamie to order more than one pizza, so there’s enough for everyone. That boy could eat through a house.”

  Skye disappeared down the hall, and I could hear her talking to someone.

  Obviously, Jamie. Despite my shyness, I was curious to meet him. If he was anything like his sisters, I’d probably fall in love with him immediately.

  After Skye left, Lorna turned toward me on the sofa, tucking her knees to her chest. “Skye has been living in LA for a couple years, but her new job means we can afford to move here instead of the crappy apartment she was sharing with a buddy. She said there’s a big shopping area here. Is that true?”

  I nodded and told Lorna about Brand Boulevard, a stretch filled with shops and restaurants, a movie theater, and how there were plans in development for an outdoor shopping mall. I told her how Glendale was the one place you could get authentic and great Armenian food. We didn’t eat out a lot, but we’d eaten enough takeout I could recommend my favorite places. I also offered to take Lorna to my favorite bakery.

  After listening intently, Lorna cocked her head to the side and studied me. “You seem way older than thirteen. I know why I’m wicked mature.” She gestured dramatically to her chest. “But why are you?”

  I was a little thrown by the change of subject. I considered it, though, and remembered the time I’d overheard Willa and Nick talking about me. It was not long after I’d arrived to stay with them.

  “She’s like a little grown-up,” Willa whispered to Nick. They were in the kitchen; I was in the hall, having gotten out of bed for a glass of water.

  “I know. That’s what growing up in the foster system does to you.”

  “Yeah, knock every ounce of childhood out of you. This is why I prefer fostering younger kids. If we’re lucky, we can keep them long enough to give them a proper childhood.”

  “Do you wish we hadn’t agreed to take Jane?”

  “No, I’m glad. She’s been through a lot. At least we know she’s safe here.”

  Overhearing that hadn’t eased my worries. What if one day, Willa decided they couldn’t handle a teenager on top of two young kids?

  It occurred to me that all the worrying was probably one of the reasons I came off twenty years older than my actual age.

  “Foster kid,” I replied to Lorna. “Seen a lot too, I guess.”

  Lorna considered this and nodded. “I knew from the moment we met, we were kindred spirits. Do you know what that means?”

  I nodded. I read a lot.

  “So, you agree?”

  I nodded again.

  She smiled. “Do you want to see my room?”

  I followed her down the hall, but as she marched ahead, I slowed to a stop at the first open doorway. It belonged to the smallest room where a boy, several years older than me by the look of his long legs, laid on a single bed pressed up against the wall under the window. He’d unpacked his room quite neatly for a teenage boy. A poster of the album cover for Eminem’s record, The Marshall Mathers LP, hung on the wall above his headboard. On the opposite wall was a scary-looking poster with blurred faces and a fanged skull. The name Richard Matheson was typed along the top of the image and above that were the words I Am Legend.

  Was that a book?

  My gaze swung back to the boy, and I felt goose bumps prickle all over my skin.

  His light brown hair hung over his forehead in disarray, earbuds visible in his ears, an audible low hum of music playing through them. He had a strong profile, a slight cut to his cheekbones, and an angular jaw. One jean-clad knee was bent, his arm resting on it and in his hand, a worn paperback. His lips were pursed, as if in concentration.

  A flutter made itself known in my belly.

  A flutter that intensified when I watched him slowly turn his head toward me.

  Stormy ocean eyes glared at me from beneath a moody brow.

  We stared at each other a moment. A moment that felt like forever. My skin flushed.

  The boy suddenly dropped the book and swung his legs off the bed.

  His black T-shirt had the words “The Black Keys” on it. My heart skipped a little beat. We liked the same band. The T-shirt was paired with jeans that might have been dark denim once but had been washed within an inch of their life. He pulled out his earbuds.

  “Who are you?” he bit out, just before his eyes flicked to my left.

  Lorna had returned to my side.

  “What are you doing?”

  She shrugged. “Showing Jane around. She’s my new best friend. Jane, this is my big brother, Jamie.”

  Jamie McKenna transferred his glower from Lorna to me. “God help you.”

  “Hey!” Lorna cried, indignant.

  “I don’t need your friends poking around my room.”

  I blushed. Hard. Mortified.

  “Ugh, you’re embarrassing Jane with your moodiness,” Lorna huffed. “It’s not cool to be a broody bastard, Jamie, no matter what those books you’re reading tell you. It’s very nineties, and if you hadn’t noticed, that decade is way over.”

  “Oh, I’m so sorry I embarrassed your nosy little friend here,” he scoffed, before marching across his room to the door. “And stop cussing, you little brat. You don’t sound smart—you sound like you’re trying too hard to be cool.” With that, he slammed his bedroom door in our faces.

  Oh, I’m so sorry I embarrassed your nosy little friend here.

  My cheeks burned even hotter.

  �
��Don’t mind him.” Lorna grabbed my arm and hauled me down the hall to her room. “He loves me really.”

  Lorna’s room was the same size as the room that Tarin and Flo shared back in Willa and Nick’s apartment. I tried to throw Jamie out of my head and concentrate on the surrounding space. Lorna’s room was bigger than Jamie’s, which I thought was odd since he was older.

  There were a few boxes piled in the room, but she didn’t seem to have a lot of belongings. As if she’d read my mind, she put her hands on her hips and announced, “Skye has promised to take me shopping before school starts. I’ll need new things. Lots of them. And she can afford it now.” Her expression turned mischievous. “I’ll buy cute posters, too, for my room. Unlike Jamie’s. Did you see the skull thing?”

  I nodded.

  “Creepy, right? It’s his favorite book.”

  I mentally added I Am Legend to my to-be-read pile.

  I’d noted there were stacks of books organized along one wall in his room, all in need of a bookcase. He was a fellow bookworm. That fluttering in my stomach wouldn’t go away. It was so weird!

  “I bet he’s hidden his writing in his room somewhere.” She smirked, like she was thinking of breaking in to find it. “He writes by hand because we can’t afford a laptop. Or we couldn’t. I bet Skye will buy him one now. Did you see his books? Back home, he’d never have left those out.”

  “Why?”

  She shrugged, turning to me. “If his friends knew he liked to read books and write stories, they’d have kicked the shit out of him.”

  “They don’t sound like very nice friends.”

  Lorna snorted. “Right? I don’t understand why he’s so pissed we moved when he can, like, be himself here. So, this is my room. Nothing special. Yet.” She grabbed my hand again and led me back out to the living room, where she gestured for me to sit on the sofa. She plopped down beside me, turning her knees toward mine.

  “Okay, we’re going to be best friends, agreed?”

  I nodded, getting the feeling I might not have a choice in the matter.

  “There are rules in friendship. Rule number one: Always have each other’s back.”

  I could do that.

  “Rule number two: Don’t give each other shit about the things that we like or don’t like. For instance, you enjoy drawing and art and stuff, and I enjoy shopping. At least I think I’ll like it.”

  I grinned at that.

  “Rule number three: No liking the same boys. Friendship is more important than boys. That’s if you like boys?”

  Considering my crush on Zion Reynolds in the sixth grade, and the way my heart still raced after the run-in with Jamie, I’d say so. I nodded.

  “Cool. Though it would have been cool with me if you didn’t.”

  I liked rule number three. Loyalty was important to me. I didn’t have a lot of experience with it, but I’d like the chance to prove I was capable of it.

  “Rule number four.” Her eyes narrowed on me, as if she could see right into my soul. “And this is the big one because I’ve lost friends to this shit.”

  “Okay?”

  “You can’t crush on Jamie like every single one of my other friends, and you can’t become best friends with Skye. You’re my friend.”

  I blushed. Could she see I thought Jamie was cute? Not that her fifteen-year-old brother would ever pay attention to me. As for Skye … I liked Skye, but she was older. I doubted she wanted to become best friends with her little sister’s best friend.

  “Okay.”

  Lorna grinned and clapped her hands together. “Sick!”

  I smiled, feeling another flutter of nerves. This time I realized these were butterflies of nervous anticipation. Maybe my final year at middle school wouldn’t be so bad now that I had a best friend. And not just any best friend—a tough-talking Bostonian who seemed as fierce as she was determined.

  2

  Eighteen Months later

  JAMIE

  Sixteen years old

  My phone buzzed, interrupting the Silverchair track I was listening to. Probably one of the guys. Pulling my cell out, I discovered I was wrong.

  The text was from a girl.

  Hey, Jamie, it’s Julie. Trewitt. Wht r u up 2 2nite? Xx

  The plans I had for finding a girl to hook up with that night came to fruition in one text. Julie was a senior, and she’d been checking me out lately. Who she got my number from, I didn’t know. And I didn’t care. Everyone knew Julie was a sure thing, and she wasn’t interested in a relationship. The girl just wanted to have fun—who was I to stop her?

  My fingers hovered over the keypad, about to tell her where to meet me, when something whacked softly against the back of my head. A cushion.

  I spun around, ready to chew out Lorna, and instead found Skye standing in my doorway.

  She mimed pulling earbuds out of her ears and I did as she asked, “Ana’s Song” fading into a murmur.

  “What’s up?” I didn’t have much patience for my annoying little sister, but I had all the time in the world for my big one.

  At first, it pissed me off to leave Boston. I was pissed about everything. My mom being selfish and bitter her whole life, my dad taking off because he couldn’t stand being around her anymore, my mom dying when I never got a chance to stop being mad at her, and then having to leave behind what I knew for California, of all places. LA couldn’t be more different from Boston.

  However, the last year and a half in LA hadn’t been so bad. I joined the track-and-field team, something the guys back in Boston would’ve ripped me apart for. But my new buddies on the team were cool. Not cool enough to tell them I was a writer, but safer than the friends I grew up with who were already getting into seriously shiesty shit back in Dorchester. A couple guys back home had been good friends; the rest, not so much. All of them, however, were heading down a dark path toward prison.

  I was glad to be away from all that.

  Skye did that for me and Lorna. Gave us a safer place to live. Only a few years ago, I was so pissed at her for leaving us behind, but when Mom died, Skye stepped up.

  Now she was doing so well as an actress, she’d moved us from the apartment into a three-bedroom house in Glendale, close to the apartment we first moved into.

  A house.

  None of us had ever lived in a house.

  And this one had a pool and views of the Verdugo Mountains from the back deck.

  “I hope you don’t have plans for tonight.” Skye looked apologetic.

  Any hopes of finding satisfaction between Julie Trewitt’s gorgeous thighs hovered precariously out of reach. “Why?”

  “I have a meeting.”

  I frowned. “It’s Saturday night.”

  “I know, but I can’t skip this meeting. It’s with a very important guy who could do amazing things for my career. Amazing things.” She stepped farther into my room. “Which would mean having the financial freedom to give you and Lorna whatever future you dream of.”

  Shit.

  Why couldn’t Skye be even a little like my mom and Lorna? Selfish to the core. Instead, she genuinely cared about making life better for us.

  I tried to argue anyway. “She’s fourteen.”

  Skye gave me a look that pricked my guilt. “If something happened to Lorna while she was alone, neither of us would forgive ourselves.”

  “Fuck.” I slumped down onto the bed. “I had plans tonight.”

  “I’m sorry. I know babysitting your little sister and her best friend is not what you had in mind, but it’s just one night.”

  That meant I was babysitting Jane too.

  Shit, I could deal with Jane over Lorna anytime. “She’s such a brat when you’re not here, Skye.”

  “Uh, she’s a brat when I am here. But she’s our sister and we love her.”

  “She’s Mom.” I gave Skye a concerned look. “She’s Mom through and through.”

  Skye sighed heavily. She knew I was right. My little sister was selfish and self-inv
olved and intensely focused on money because until last year, she’d never had it. She was also exhausting. No one ever loved her enough. Cared enough. Paid her enough attention.

  Mom through and through.

  “I’m not sure that’s true. I think she’s fourteen, and fourteen-year-old girls can be hard work.” She shrugged. “You weren’t exactly a picnic a year ago.”

  I grunted.

  “And Mom didn’t have Jane Doe in her life. Jane’s a good influence on Lorna.”

  I snorted. Jane was a pushover. That kid was so desperate for someone to care about her, she let Lorna bulldoze her. I felt a little guilty thinking that, knowing what I knew about the kid. As bad as we’d had it in the parental department, we hadn’t been left outside a police station as a baby.

  I’d never met anyone who was a real-life Jane Doe before.

  Skye smiled, her eyes flicking to the hall. “I love that kid,” she confessed. “I love that our kid is hanging out with a great kid like Jane.”

  I already knew that. Skye didn’t hide her affection for the little orphan. I sighed. I guessed if anyone could temper Lorna, it would be Jane.

  There went my night. “Do I have to be in the same room as them?”

  My big sister chuckled. “No, drama king. But I want you in the living room and not hiding out in here. They could sneak out if you do that.”

  “Sneak out where?”

  “This is Lorna we’re talking about. She’s unpredictable.”

  That was true. “Fine.” I pushed up from the bed and kicked off my shoes. Grabbing my copy of The Stand by Stephen King from my bedside table, I followed Skye out of my room. Down the hall came the sound of giggling beneath the strains of Kings of Leon’s “On Call.” I smirked. Another point in Jane’s favor was that when she was around, she improved my little sister’s taste in music.

  As we made our way downstairs, I texted Julie back that I was babysitting, but we should catch up tomorrow night. Passing the coffee table, I saw the open sketch pad sprawled across it and stopped to look. I turned the pad by the corner so I wouldn’t smudge the drawing. It was a sketch of Skye. She was staring off into the distance, fingering a strand of hair, wearing a thoughtful expression.