The police officer lowered his light. Clicked open his door. There was not another vehicle on the road, not a sound in the snow-wrapped neighborhood, not a dog barking as the officer got out of his car. A squawk came from the radio inside the cruiser, muffled and garbled, words encased in static. Cassie saw flashing lights on the dashboard, tiny round ones, red and green and white, as the officer approached them.
“You Berwick students?” he demanded. He’d left his car door open and now stood in front of them, booted feet planted wide apart, looking down at them, no hat on his buzz-cut dark hair. A gold badge attached to a silver chain hung from his neck. He pulled a narrow spiral notebook from the pocket of his thick black bomber jacket. The streetlight glinted on the metal spiral, and he flipped the notebook open. Yanked a pen from a loop on his belt. “Names, please.”
NOW
CHAPTER 38
LILY
Greer took the last step from the doorway into the garage and, in one quick motion, pulled open Lily’s car door.
“Welcome,” she said.
“Welcome? Greer? Welcome? What’re you talking about?” Lily, searching Greer’s face, felt like someone’s mom, a mom who’d been terrified with fear that her daughter had vanished and there was nothing she could do about it, and now, seeing her safe, couldn’t decide whether to be enraged or burst into tears of relieved joy. “Greer? Are you okay?”
Greer’s smile vanished. “What d’you mean, okay? Of course I am. Why wouldn’t I be?”
Banning had opened his car door and unclicked his seat belt. “Come on, you two,” he said. “We can talk inside.”
Lily didn’t budge from the front seat and kept her eyes on Greer, hoping for answers. Looking for signs of coercion, or capture, or complicity. Banning’s car door had closed, and she heard his footsteps coming around from behind, leaving her alone inside with her tote bag on her lap and her phone in her hand. She took off her seat belt. The car wasn’t going anywhere without Banning in the driver’s seat, and she was safer—whatever safe meant after all this—being on her own two feet.
“Talk? Inside?” She swiveled on the seat, planting her shoes on the concrete floor, twisting to glare at Banning as he came toward her. “What the hell is going on? I mean—you could have just, say, called me. Without all this drama. Greer?”
“Oh, I know. Yeah, all good.” Greer was shaking her head like it was all water under the bridge. She backed toward the open door to the house, gesturing. “Yeah, let’s go in. Apologize for all the subterfuge. But there were lots of moving parts.”
Lily heard the clang and whir of some mechanism, and the garage door behind them began to lower, changing the light of the garage with every inch it descended. Shelves stacked with unlabeled cardboard boxes lined the garage walls, and the place smelled vaguely of damp and ash. The orange glow from the home’s lighted interior seemed to grow brighter as the daylight vanished. How long had Greer been at Banning’s house? Since last night?
She got to her feet, wary, slung her bag over her shoulder. Kept her phone in her hand. Kept her car door open, standing behind it like a makeshift barricade.
“Lily, it’s fine.” Banning now stood next to Greer. “Your producer made me show every damn piece of identification I—”
Lily’s phone pinged with a message. Petra. Petra? Rowen was at school, still, at—she looked at the time. Two twenty-three. You there? the message said.
“Banning?” Greer said.
Lily still thought of him as Banning, even though she finally knew his real name.
“You need to get that?” Banning asked. “Call someone?”
She tapped a response to Petra. Rowen’s class had gone on a field trip to the aquarium this morning. Penguins, Mumma! Rowen had clapped her hands. She’d begged to take her stuffed Penny along. Why would Petra be texting?
Lily glanced at the two of them, then kept her eyes on the screen for Petra’s reply. “Let me know when you want to include me in this. Since you abducted me, after all.”
If something were really wrong, Petra would have called instead of text- ing. It had to be nothing. Still. If Lily didn’t see an answer in ten seconds, she’d call her.
The garage door landed with a clank, metal on concrete. Lily flinched at the sound of it. Banning and Greer were being pleasant, for whatever that was worth, but there was no ignoring the reality that she was trapped here in this clammy, darkened garage with a guy who’d lied to her from the moment they’d met, and the one person in the world who she’d have predicted never would.
Nothing from Petra yet. “Listen, Smi—Banning,” Lily said, “mightn’t it have been easier to have the two of you come to the office this morning? Like regular people. Imagine how simple and painless that would have been.”
“Did you tell her who you were?” Greer asked.
“After a complete charade outside Lido,” Lily answered for him. “Dragging me there, pretending he was investigating your disappearance. When all the while he knew precisely where you were.”
“Oh, no, no.” Greer was shaking her head. “He didn’t. I only texted him a while ago, saying I’d meet him here. What, Lil, you thought I’d been here all night or something?”
“Makes just as much sense as anything does.” Lily risked a look up from her cell. “Which is none. I think you’re both insane.” Lily now stared at Greer and Banning, standing side by side. “And ‘insane’ is not hyperbole,” she went on. “Tell me, right now—”
Lily’s phone pinged again. Petra had typed one word. Flowers.
Flowers what? Lily typed back.
“Lily?” Banning interrupted her. “It’s about Cassie.”
“That’s what I’ve been working on,” Greer added. “See, I met with Smith—Banning—last night. He made me promise not to tell you.”
“I’m sorry, Lily.” Banning took over. “I told you in the car, I had to find out how you’d react. I was also trying to protect your sister, and I needed to know how much you’d confided in Greer. Turns out nothing. She knew nothing about Cassie. I told her about your sister. Right, Greer?”
“Right,” Greer said. “So this morning I was—well, I am so, so sorry, but we had to keep it from you. In case it was all a big disappointment. But—”
“I think we can bring her home to you, Lily,” Banning said. “If you decide you want that to happen.”
“Lily?” Greer put her hand on Lily’s arm for one brief moment. “I first thought we could surprise you with her. Do a live reunion show. But first, um, there are some things you need to know. Serious things.”
“Cassie’s alive?” In the thick gloom of the closed garage, something hissed and settled—an air conditioner kicking on, or water pipes refilling. Lily’s world rearranged itself, too, making space for her sister.
“You know where she is?” Lily had to ask. Had to make sure. Had to believe it. “Alive? Where?”
More lilies arrived. Petra’s words appeared on Lily’s phone screen. Same kind, from same place.
It’s fine, she typed back, trying to sound normal, trying to keep her brain from catching fire. And if Banning was Smith, sending flowers probably made as much sense as anything else he’d done. She narrowed her eyes, worrying. Rowen OK?
All is good.
Lily clicked off her phone, then looked at Banning, then Greer, then back again. They exchanged glances, but didn’t answer her.
“Tell me. Now. Cassie’s alive? Is that—true? So where is she?” And there was another question, another one that could change their worlds forever. Lily’s. Rowen’s, too. “And what ‘serious things’?”
BEFORE
CHAPTER 39
CASSIE
“Did we do something wrong?” Marianne had answered the police officer before Cassie could decide what to say. Cassie felt herself shrinking away from this almost-menacing guy and his police car, longing to disappear into the snow and the night. She’d stay in the background and let Marianne talk, she decided. Long as Marianne didn’
t screw up. Why had she ever agreed to come to this party? The police were the last people she wanted to mess with. She pressed her lips together. No. If they’d wanted her, she was easy to find. They hadn’t come looking for her.
“And where’re you two headed?” the officer asked. “On this snowy night?”
The sound of the police car’s idling engine, a low grumbling undercurrent, filled the space between them. Cassie couldn’t decide if the cop looked suspicious or was genuinely concerned about Marianne’s tumble into the slush. He was a real cop, no question about that, with the small shield-shaped Berwick decal on the side of his maybe gray car, hard to tell in the streetlights’ glare. It had antennas on top. Plus, it wasn’t like he was going to kidnap them, or hurt them, or something. He was just a cop who saw two girls on the street at night, and one of them had fallen. This was random, this was a coincidence.
But she felt so guilty, and she couldn’t afford to let that show. Maybe she could distract him.
“My friend fell,” Cassie said. “Because I guess she didn’t see you coming. I worried you were about to hit her.”
The cop raised his eyebrows, looked at them with some expression Cassie couldn’t decode. “I saw her fine, miss.” His voice was cold as the night. “And I saw you push her.”
“What?” Cassie yelped. “No, I didn’t!”
“Oh, no, no way, no, she’s right, she totally didn’t.” Marianne’s protest overlapped Cassie’s. “She tried to help me up. She’s my roommate, we’re friends.”
The police officer nodded slowly as if contemplating their denials. “Fine, then, young ladies. Shall we agree this was an unfortunate series of events, and go from there? I saw you, miss, beginning to cross the street. I was nowhere close to hitting you. But let’s start our conversation over, shall we? Like I said, names. And destination.”
“I’m Marianne Dawe,” she said as if she couldn’t acquiesce fast enough. “Alcott Hall.”
“Alcott Hall is that way.” The officer pointed his right forefinger across his chest. “Not the direction you two were headed.” He turned his attention to Cassie. “And you?”
There was no way out of this, but she didn’t have to make it easier. “Cassandra Blair Atwood.”
“Thank you, Sandy,” the officer said.
Cassie didn’t correct him. She felt Marianne wanting to chime in, and needed to stop her. If the guy wanted to think of her as Sandy, all good. She kept talking.
“And we were kind of on the way to a friend’s house.” Cassie tried to look like a cliché of a college freshman, cute and a little baffled. A Berwick town cop, how on top of things could he even be? This was a coincidence. Nothing about Jem Duggan. “It’s Friday, so no classes tomorrow, and we were just—”
“On the way to 19 Ardella?” He finished her sentence. “I fear your hostess is in a heap of trouble, young ladies. With us, and with her parents. You have one of the flyers they were handing out?” He held out his hand. “Let’s have it.”
“I, um.” Marianne’s hand went to her chest.
“I take that as a yes,” the officer said. “You can just toss it when you get back to Alcott. But we arrived long ago and sent everyone home. You’re late to the party, young ladies, but you got lucky this time. You weren’t there, so it’s not going on your record. If you cooperate. So count your blessings.” He gestured to his car. “How’d you like a ride back to campus?”
“Cool,” Marianne said. She patted one hand along her jeans. “I’m kind of wet, and now kinda cold.”
Go back to the dorm in a police car? Cassie tried to decide whether that was a doable thing. But now that Marianne had said she was cold, she’d look like a jerk if she refused.
“Sure,” Cassie said, drawing out the word, because she wasn’t sure, not really. She didn’t want to hang out with a police officer. But she didn’t want this on her record. Her mother would kill her.
She and Marianne both slid into the back, coming in from opposite sides. Left the doors open. It felt weird, the hard black plastic seats, and heavy molded plastic mats on the floor. Now she saw there was a fine mesh screen between them and the front. She was sitting there, feeling like a prisoner in this strange car.
The officer was coming toward her open door. He reached out for it, looking right at her.
He closed the door with a jarring metallic thunk. She made herself as small as she could, almost curling up against the driver’s-side door. She was invisible. Invisible. She had done nothing wrong.
“Officer?” Marianne had leaned forward, braced her hands against the front. Spoke through the mesh. “Did you work on the Jem Duggan case? Or on the explosion?”
“It’s Detective,” he said. His radio squawked, a blast of static. “And yes, in fact, I did.”
Cassie saw his eyes go to his rearview mirror. Connect with Marianne’s, then hers, then back to the road. She heard the cruiser’s tires slushing on the pavement. Saw the lights of the Berwick campus visible in the far distance. There was no way to get Marianne to shut up.
“Why do you ask?” The detective had reached toward the dashboard, clicked the radio to black silence.
“Well, it was so scary,” Marianne said. “Right? I mean, Cassie—”
Cassie closed her eyes. So much for being Sandy.
“—was actually there. In that building where the explosion happened. She was in Professor Shaw’s office, even. She got out just in time. Right, Cass?”
This girl was an idiot. Why was she trying to make conversation? To ingratiate herself with the guy? Make sure this episode wasn’t on her stupid record? Marianne was such an idiot. But what she’d said was true, and it didn’t matter, in the real world that Cassie was creating, it didn’t matter.
“Uh-huh,” she said.
“And,” Marianne went on, seemingly enraptured by her own story and super-obviously trying to show what a helpful person she was, “She talked to Jem, you know, right before he went back in to save Professor Shaw. Can you even believe it?”
“Lucky you,” the detective said.
“Yeah,” Cassie said. She desperately wanted to give Marianne some kind of shut-up signal, but there was no way to be sure this detective wouldn’t notice. Seemed like half the time he was watching them instead of the road. “But I went out of the building when the alarms went off, like everyone else.”
“So Professor Shaw was still in the building when you came out?”
The detective seemed to be driving more slowly than before.
“I guess so,” she said. “I mean, I didn’t—”
“Oh, no, Cassie, remember?” Marianne interrupted. She’d perched on the edge of her side of her seat, bracing herself to keep her face close to the mesh barrier as she talked. “You told me you had an appointment. And you came out, then Jem Duggan came out, and then you talked to Jem and you were the one who told him that the professor was still in the building. Remember? And then he went back in. To save him. You totally told me that. I totally remember that. It was even in the paper.”
“Yeah. Sure.” Might as well agree and cut this short. “It’s all kind of a blur. I mean, I just happened to be there.”
“It was so brave of him, right, Detective?” Marianne had plastered herself against the mesh screen as if it were normal to have such a conversation. She was really laying it on, all drama and performance. “And so incredibly sad now.”
“You a particular friend of Jem Duggan?” the detective asked. He’d pulled to a stop sign, kept a foot on the brake, and twisted his head to look at them over his shoulder. “Either of you?”
“Not me,” Marianne said. “I’ve never even—”
“No,” Cassie said at the same time.
“But you were both in the building. Cassie? Talked to him, is that correct? Atwood, you said. Cassie Atwood.”
“Yes, I guess so. Like, so were fifty other people, in the building, I mean, so I—”
“Of course.” The detective took his foot off the brake. “No bi
g deal.” The car moved ahead through the almost-deserted neighborhood, where the blue lights of televisions glowed through translucent front curtains, and a lone woman in a long puffy coat followed a lumbering black Great Dane along the narrowly plowed sidewalk path.
The next right would put them back on Mountville, back in college territory. Maybe, Cassie figured, she could somehow get out of the car, say she’d planned to meet friends. Or something. Which would never work. Marianne would definitely not be nimble enough to improvise along with her, and that would make it worse. So far so good, anyway. The detective had asked his questions, they had answered them. She could gut it out until they got to the dorm.
They turned right on Mountville, where, despite the weather, the front doors of the Sand Bar and Outpost were wide open, orange lights radiant inside, and even far away, the fragments of live music escaped into the night. Thank all that’s holy, she hadn’t gone to the Post with Jem that night. That one wrong choice could have ruined her story. But then—might Jem not have died?
She thought about that for a beat, how every single thing we do, every single decision we make, opens one door and closes others. If they’d been in the restaurant, having burgers, would he have collapsed? And if he had, even if he had, they would have been surrounded by a million people and someone would have called 911 and no way she could have been blamed for any of it. She’d have been a victim, too. And brave. And sympathetic. And good.
Not like now.
She had made the wrong choice.
When would she even learn how the world worked? She was trying to do the right thing, but it never seemed to turn out right. There had to be some way to make up for what happened, to say she was sorry, because she was, she truly was, and she wished she could undo her decision, but she couldn’t, but now she could never say so. The moment she explained, or even tried to, her world would crash around her, never to be repaired.
Her Perfect Life Page 20
