Silence - eARC Read Online Free PDF Page B

medieval!”
    “Told you.” Beth leaned over the table, dropping her voice. “They’ve been here forever. Sean Blackthorne is a senior at the high school. They’ve got, like prehistoric money, they all look like movie stars and live like movie stars too. There’s all kinds of stories about them, where they get their money, because the cannery and the mill can’t be taking in as much as they spend. Some people say that they’re in the mob, some people say they’re a family of super spies or something equally stupid. I think it’s simpler than that—I think they were smuggling booze in the Twenties and drugs after that. The stoners around here never seem to have any problem getting their stash, and the cops never hassle the stoners, which would make sense if the Blackthornes are the suppliers, since they pretty much own the cops.”
    Beth stopped to catch her breath, her eyes wide and a small smirk creasing her lips. “The little bit of excitement this burg has is the gossip about the Blackthornes; sorry about the run-on.”
    “Naw, it’s okay,” Staci replied, thinking to herself that the “mysterious” source of the Blackthorne money probably was no more mysterious than that it was all coming out of Wall Street. Having grown up mostly in New York City, and overhearing Dad’s conversations with clients, she had at least a passing knowledge of stocks and investing; it seemed like magic for other people sometimes, and that always confused her. The only “mystery” about the Blackthornes to her would be—why live in this backwater burg, and why Sean Blackthorne wasn’t going to a fancy prep school.
    Then again, she’d glimpsed crazy money in New York, and maybe what kept the Blackthornes here was that here they were the local kings and could hold court in the Yacht Club, whereas in New York they’d be “just another millionaire” and couldn’t get a table at Nobu.
    Or maybe they really are running drugs, and are smart enough to stay where they have the cops paid off.
    “Beth!” This time the owner of the voice came out from the kitchen and stood behind the counter, wiping his hands on his apron. “I need you to get the prep work done for the morning!”
    “Yessir, Ray,” Beth sighed. She stood up. “Nice to meet you, but it’s back to the salt mines for now. See you later, Staci.”
    Beth vanished into the back, and since she was done with breakfast, Staci decided she might as well leave. She climbed the diner steps down to the street and stood there with Beth’s map in her hands, looking up and down the street.
    It was pretty obvious that Mom didn’t have it together enough to keep groceries in the house. If she couldn’t manage to put stuff in the fridge when she knew I was coming… And at the rate she was meeting people—or rather, not—there was no way she was going to make friends with anyone who had a car.
    But there was a store down the hill with a sign with a bicycle on it. And Dad had given her a debit card.
    And Beth had said that if she wanted to get any cell reception at all, she was going to have to go up to Makeout Hill. Plus…groceries.
    She’d been thinking she’d be able to use that card to get herself stuff in cute little boutiques, and she hated to think about wasting that money on something as blah as a bike. A bike… ugh. But if she didn’t…
    She glanced up at Makeout Hill. It was a long way away. She thought about the yawning emptiness of the fridge. And she headed for the bike shop.
    * * *
    A half hour later, she was pedaling away from the grocery on a new bike with a cart, like some sort of hemp-wearing hippy or a second-wave hipster. She hated it…but at least she could get groceries once a week, then take it off and leave it at home. And at least now there would be something to eat in the house. It sucked that it was uphill all the way from the store, though, and she hadn’t thought about how heavy all that stuff was going to be when she was buying it.
    I