Her Perfect Life

by Hank Phillippi Ryan

  “Kidding me?” She glared at it, grabbed the receiver. “Lily Atwood.”

  She cradled the phone against her shoulder. The receptionist downstairs, Audrey, was telling her someone was in the lobby to see her, which meant she’d lost this episode of telephone roulette. People were always showing up, wanting to talk to her, needing to, they’d plead. Sometimes with their personal tales of woe and disaster, but sometimes hoping to see her without the television screen between them. Sometimes they brought gifts, even flowers—her heart twisted, remembering what she still didn’t know. Maybe this visitor was Smith?

  “Who is it?” she asked. “What about?”

  She stood as she heard Audrey’s responses. A detective? Looking for Greer? “No, she’s not here yet,” she went on, her mind racing. “Send him up. But, Audrey? Just yes or no. Did he say anything else?”

  She hung up, glanced in the wall mirror as Audrey said no, saw her own worried face looking back at her. Nothing was wrong with Rowen, at least; Maryrose Glover had her cell number and would have called her for that.

  The elevator door down the hall clanged open. She fingered her hair away from her face, trying to understand why a cop was here looking for Greer. If the police wanted to talk to her, they would have called her. Unless Greer had done something wrong. If Greer was working on a story and had requested something sensitive, maybe this guy was a source. Or a suitor? Maybe Greer had met a cop in a bar and they’d hit it off.

  She planted herself in the doorway, wanting to assess him before she let him enter their office.

  Youngish, but not too young, she saw as he walked toward her. Audrey had called him detective, so he couldn’t be that young. Fortysomething, maybe. Navy jacket, white tee, jeans. Leather backpack slung over one shoulder. Standard-issue tough guy. But tall, slender, wiry. Maybe she was right about the cop-in-a-bar scenario. She could picture Greer and this dark-haired police detective, two workaholic information junkies, heads together to solve crimes. Greer seemed to have no personal life—not that she’d mentioned, anyway—so this might be a good thing.

  Not a cop she’d met before, but she wasn’t on that beat. She watched the recognition on his face, though, saw that dawning expression that she’d seen so often—Oh, it’s Lily Atwood. Lily always attempted to mentally fill in the blanks of their assessment. She looks different than on TV. She’s older younger smaller bigger taller shorter—more attractive or not—than I thought. The detective’s unreadable expression lasted a millisecond, then vanished.

  “You’re Lily Atwood?”

  He pretended to ask it as a question, as if he truly didn’t know, and she didn’t call him on it. “Yes. I’m Lily Atwood. What can I do for you, Detective?”

  “Walt Banning.” He flapped open a badge wallet, flapped it closed. “Ms. Atwood? You work with Greer Whitfield?”

  “Is she okay?”

  The detective took a breath. Lily frowned, watching him mask his reaction.

  Before he could reply, she picked up the receiver on her desk phone. Dialed Greer’s cell. No answer. No answer. Voice mail. “Greer? It’s me. Where are you? Call me.”

  The detective shifted the backpack strap on his shoulder.

  “When was the last time you talked to Ms. Whitfield?” Behind him, images flickered on her TV monitor, the crimson headline graphics fronting the midmorning newscast.

  “Is Greer okay? What’s wrong?” Lily hung up, trying to read the detective’s expression. He had high cheekbones, dark eyes, and a thin scar beside one eyebrow, though it might have been shadow from the overhead lights.

  “This hers?” The detective reached up and took down a laminated press pass that had been pinned to the bulletin board above Greer’s desk. He stabbed the pushpin back into the cork and dangled the pass from its red lanyard. “She still recognizable from this photo, if we show it around?”

  “Yes, it looks like her, but stop.” Lily pointed to it. “Show it around? Who to? You said—last night? Is she okay?”

  “Can we do this my way, Ms. Atwood?”

  “No,” Lily said.

  “That wasn’t an actual question,” he said. “But this is. When was the last time you saw her? Greer Whitfield?” He held up the press pass again. “You can tell me that, certainly. Did she tell you where she was going? What her plans were for last night? Who she was with?”

  This guy was off, totally off. He didn’t act like a cop, even an incompetent cop. She flipped over the cell phone in her hand. Flipped it again. Saw his eyes on it, watching her motions.

  “Are you really a police detective?” She half smiled as she asked him, to show she was kidding. “If something’s happened to Greer, tell me what information you’re looking for. And I’ll do anything I can to help.”

  The detective tapped his pen against his notebook. It made a pocking sound, like a clock ticking out his thoughts.

  “She’s missing, Ms. Atwood.”

  CHAPTER 22

  LILY

  Lily put one hand on her desk, then lowered herself into her chair. “Detective? You’re not with homicide, are you? You’re not saying she’s—”

  “Hang on,” he said, holding up his cell. He stepped into the empty corridor, turned his back.

  Her brain revved into overload. She looked at Greer’s desk, stacked with files and spiral notebooks. A mug of pens. Her computer screen saver generating a maze of white tubing, over and over and over. Greer’s empty chair. Missing? What did that even mean? Missing had to mean dead.

  And Lily would have to somehow explain this to Rowen. She loved Greer. She’d be inconsolable. In Rowen’s world, people didn’t just go missing. In Lily’s, they did.

  She had a memory, a wispy-edged, sepia-toned memory of a tall gray-haired man, a man in a black parka with a wintry dusting of snowflakes on his shoulders, standing in the entryway of their house in Hamilton. Lily’d been cross-legged on the living room carpet, cutting out dresses for her Buffy paper dolls. Her mother had called the man detective. Mumma had scooted Lily out of the room as she brought the man inside, leaving scraps of colorful paper scattered over the blue-carpeted floor. Lily had clutched her paper Buffy and run all the way upstairs; then tiptoed down again, step by silent step, and parked herself on the third step from the bottom, trying to hear what her mother and the detective were saying. It must be about Cassie, she knew it was about Cassie, and for one blossoming moment of hope, she thought maybe they’d found her, found Cassie. Or that she’d changed her mind. Decided to come home.

  Lily waited, with fingers crossed on both hands, crossed tight as she could. It seemed like time had stopped. Finally she’d heard the front door close again.

  When she tiptoed back into the living room, she’d seen her mother crying. Head in hands, her shoulders shaking under her thin gray sweater, Pooch snuffling up against her lap. Pooch’s tail had been wagging, hard, as if he were trying to reassure her everything would be fine. Lily, transfixed and frozen, had felt her last reserves of hope float up to heaven.

  Mumma had cried every day after that. The police had come back a couple of times, too, and she’d even tried to talk to them, but she was little, and they wouldn’t listen. That’s when Gramma Lily had come to stay with them. Making sure Mumma got the rest she needed. They’d sit on the edge of Lily’s bed, side by side, Gramma smelling of what she called mew-gay. Lily had looked it up. Muguet, it turned out to be. Lilies of the valley.

  “She’s my little girl again,” Gramma had told her. “We need to take care of your mumma, my little Lil. It’s only the three of us now.”

  “Will Cassie come home?” Lily had dared to ask.

  “We can always hope so,” Gramma had told her.

  Now this Detective Banning had arrived at her door. She was no longer the child, waiting and powerless. Cops don’t come by themselves to tell a reporter that their producer is missing. It wasn’t how the system worked. Not at all.

  “Detective? What was that phone call? Was that about Greer? Have you gon
e to her apartment? How did she—have you asked her family? Is anyone else investigating? Do you want us to put something on the air? Is that why you’re here?”

  “All good questions.” Banning had stashed his notebook in his jacket pocket, checked his watch, and turned to look behind him down the hall.

  She looked over his shoulder, too. The hallway was empty.

  “Detective … Banning? Are you expecting someone?” Maybe he was hoping Greer would arrive. Checking his watch to calculate how long she’d been gone. “Was Greer supposed to show up someplace and didn’t arrive? Where? With who? Did she not come home last night? Who told you that? When? How do you know she’s not at maybe Starbucks, or at a friend’s house, or out running? What do you mean, missing?”

  She knew she was talking too fast, cross-examining, but this guy had not told her one tangible fact. “What happened to Greer?”

  Banning checked his watch again, an oversize black plastic runner’s contraption with an array of readouts, chunky against his sinewy wrist. “I know it’s upsetting, Ms. Atwood,” he said. “But—”

  Lily’s cell phone rang, vibrating in her hand like a living thing. Ten thirty now. The detective cocked his head at the phone.

  “Do it,” he said.

  She did not take her eyes off of him as she accepted the call. “Lily Atwood.”

  “I thought you were ignoring me,” the voice said. “You usually answer more quickly.”

  Smith. No matter what story he—or she, it sounded like today—had for her, Lily had to keep the line open for Greer.

  “So don’t say anything, but is the detective there with you now?” he—or she—asked.

  She remembered what Greer herself had said, just yesterday, about the Graydon alarm. The next time he tells you something, you’ll ignore it. It’s like the boy who cried wolf.

  “What?” she whispered into the phone.

  Smith ignored her question. “Please. Don’t say anything about me. Do what he says. I am sure Ms. Whitfield will be just fine.”

  And then he hung up.

  What Smith had said—I am sure she’ll be fine—was a threat, a flat-out threat. Because it proved he—or she—knew about Greer. And where she was. He’d asked about the detective, too. That meant Smith knew Banning.

  Still, all she’d said out loud was her own name, and “What?” Simple to explain. If she lied.

  “Wrong number,” she said. “Of all times.”

  “Happens,” Banning said.

  “Yeah.” Lily stared at her phone. Willing it to ring again.

  Willing it to be Greer. Willing her to be safe, telling Lily not to worry, that she was running late. She’d laugh and laugh when she heard the story of the mysterious detective arriving at their office, having concocted this story that she was missing. These days, if you couldn’t reach someone instantly on their cell, Lily reassured herself, everyone decided it must be a disaster. But it rarely was.

  In thirty minutes, the afternoon shift would be arriving, and this hall would buzz with activity. Their privacy was about to end.

  “Detective? Why are you here, where Greer obviously isn’t—instead of out looking to find out where she is?”

  She classified his expression as patronizing.

  “We know what we’re doing, Ms. Atwood. It’s not just me. So listen.”

  He looked at his watch again, then gestured toward Greer’s desk. “I need to—we need to—look through her computer and notebooks. See if there’s a calendar, or a schedule, some clue as to her whereabouts.”

  “So you think she was planning to go somewhere, or to meet someone.”

  “Ms. Atwood? I’m trying to be polite here, and hey, I’m not trying to be a jerk. But the sooner we get the show on the road, the sooner we may find your friend. How about her computer password?”

  “I don’t have the authority to let you look through her property.” Lily was blocking the cop’s path, but didn’t move. “I’m so worried about Greer, but we need to ask someone who can legally say yes. I can’t.” She shook her head, perplexed. “Don’t you need a warrant?”

  Banning put up a palm and advanced toward her, taking just one step as if he were trying to calm a wary animal.

  “Ms. Atwood? Are you a lawyer? No, correct? I’m not required to explain this to you, but I will, and then we’re done.” He took another step toward her. “It’s called the safekeeping exception. Ms. Whitfield is not a suspect. She is a potential victim. She may be in danger. She may not. Anything I find is not to be used as evidence against her, but to help find her.”

  He took a deep breath. Lily imagined him trying to control his anger.

  “And now, Ms. Atwood. It’s time to either help me or get the hell out of the way. Apologize for the language. What if you were the missing one and I’d asked your colleague to help find you? Or listen—has there ever been anyone in your life who went missing? Then you’d know how desperate their loved ones feel.”

  Lily felt tears come to her eyes. This guy’s random sarcasm landed harder than he could have imagined.

  He took a step closer to her. “You’re part of the solution or part of the problem.” He swiveled to the stack of notebooks on Greer’s desk, a multicolored pile of book-size spirals. Took the one from the top.

  “I have to get the news director,” Lily said again.

  “Sure.” Banning licked a finger, flipped through the pages of the notebook. Put it back. Picked up another one. Lily watched as he turned the pages. If she left and ran to the news director’s office, the guy would be alone in here. She checked the hallway. Still empty. Where was Greer?

  She turned, deciding to call the news director. But Banning was looking at a Channel 6 scratch pad, glue-topped, the size of a paperback book.

  She took a step closer, trying to see the words, but Banning now held the pad with its cardboard back to her, so she couldn’t.

  “This was between the notebooks,” he said. “It’s a list, and dated yesterday.”

  “What’s it say?”

  “At the top, it says Lido, 9PM.” Banning gestured with the pad. “You know that place?”

  She did. “So that’s where she was last night.”

  “It’s a start,” he said. “But then—any of these other words mean anything to you?”

  He held the list so she could read it. The air between them stayed so silent that Lily could hear the fluorescent lights buzzing.

  There’d be no reason, Lily thought as she read the list, no reason she could imagine, for Greer to have a list like that. Those words, just four words, could only be put together to mean one thing.

  Kirkhalter, Grandmother, Marianne, Berwick. In four words, the chilling story of her own past. For some reason, but unquestionably, Greer Whitfield had decided to investigate the missing Cassie. Now Greer was missing, too.

  BEFORE

  CHAPTER 23

  CASSIE

  Cassie knew what her mother would tell her. Gramma Lily, too. You’re only eighteen. Leave it alone. But she had to sit in this creepy, clammy waiting room at Penn General Hospital. Had to know. Professor Shaw had been rescued from the Wharton Hall fire. But would he live?

  She’d understood, in the flash of an instant thought last night, understood what had really happened last Saturday morning.

  It had been her fault.

  Her. Fault. She had stalled. Kept Professor Shaw there. Tried to read his body language, wondering why he’d arranged to meet her when the building was mostly empty. If she’d only followed the fire alarm’s directions and left, the professor would have, too.

  Then he wouldn’t have been inside when the explosion happened. It had been her complete fault, the whole thing. And he knew it, too. If he didn’t die and he could still think, that would be what he’d remember. That she had delayed him from leaving. If not for her, he would not be here in intensive care. It was her fault. Her fault. Her fault. She could almost hear the words, as if a jury were passing judgment on her.

 
; Nurses in scrubs and flowered tunics bustled past. Men dressed in white clattered empty stretchers to an emergency, or away from one. The soft gurgle of a massive tank of tropical fish, a moving rainbow of placid obliviousness against the beige cinder block wall, almost taunted Cassie with its serenity. She’d been unable to concentrate on classes, or her roommate, or her responsibilities at Berwick. The smell of the fire—it was still in her nose, even all these days later. She could still hear the sound, the explosion, her own cry.

  If she closed her eyes—but she wouldn’t, she couldn’t—she’d see Jem Duggan engulfed in all that black. No, she’d told him, Stop. But he hadn’t listened.

  That day, as soon as she could, Cassie had ripped off her soot-infused clothing and thrown it all away, stuffed all the evidence of disaster into a metal trash can and smashed down the top, made it gone forever, erased and nonexistent and so she’d never have to wear those things, not ever again, they were bad luck and now she knew it. Even her Doc Martens, they had to go. They were sacrifices, sacrifices to the fire. Make him be okay, she begged the universe. I’ll do anything.

  Now she fidgeted in the uncomfortably unyielding white plastic chair. Cassie pulled a flyer from her purse, a printed memo that the provost had sent to parents. Someone had slid two copies under each dorm room door. She unfolded it, and read it again. Investigators suspect a gas leak in one of the aging pipes under Wharton Hall, it explained. They theorized the leak had gone undetected in a rarely used room in the building’s basement, the leaking gas had built up in the enclosed space, and “met an as-yet unexplained ignition source.”

  Police tell us they see no ongoing threat to any building on the Berwick campus or to any citizen of the Berwick community, the memo went on. It assured parents and students that each and every building on campus had been exhaustively and comprehensively tested to make sure no additional leaks existed.

  Everyone was discussing it, speculating. Marianne had told her some kid had told her that Berwick had done it on purpose to get insurance money.