Part of me was thrilled at the prospect of Asher still wanting me, but a bigger part of me was disgusted by what he’d said just after he broke the kiss. How childish could he possibly be? He acted like he couldn’t stand me most of the time, and then the minute he saw me having a perfectly nice chat with a perfectly nice guy—Liam—he jumped in and dragged me off to kiss me and feel me up before telling me it was all some test to ‘remind’ me who I belonged to.
Well, sorry, Asher, but this wasn’t the 1950’s, and that was a steaming pile of crap. The only person I belonged to was myself, and manipulative snakes like Asher could go screw themselves if they thought I was going to buy into all those games.
No more. The kiss we’d just shared would be the last one between us.
This was good news for me. After the last year of misery and moping around, my old confident self was finally beginning to shine through again. I took a deep breath, gathered my wits about me, and exited the hallway, intent on ignoring Asher’s bullshit. I also needed to help Alex keep control of things, because drinks were being spilled everywhere, a handful of drunk girls were shrieking and drunkenly pulling their dresses off, and it looked like things were generally taking a turn for the worse. I didn’t want him to lose his assistant job for the summer, so I headed for the bar so that I could grab a cloth to quickly wipe up a spill.
As I did so, I caught a whiff of champagne-laced vomit emanating from behind the bar, and I groaned as I leaned over to see that someone had thrown up right there on the floorboards. I sighed and set about cleaning it up with a wad of paper napkins from the bar, and I wrinkled my nose as the acrid scent reminded me of the first party I ever went to—Cora Barnett’s seventeenth birthday party last year.
That night was the reason I generally disliked parties so much now.
Cora was a school friend of mine and Mercedes, and her parents had been out of town for the weekend of her birthday, so she’d promptly thrown a rager which we had been invited to. Mercedes had been to tons of parties before that—she’d always been more of a social butterfly than me—but it was my first time partying and drinking, so I hadn’t been used to it. I’d ended up getting blackout drunk and going home to vomit all night, not to mention all the next morning too.
Or did I?
I frowned as another brief flash of a memory came back to me; one that had never surfaced before now. In my mind’s eye, I saw a blurry image of the dim interior of my family’s investment property on Fontenot Avenue—the same house where Catalina St Clair was murdered. In fact, she was murdered there the same night of Cora’s party. I remembered waking up the next day with not only a hangover from hell, but also a fraught conversation with my mother over breakfast as she informed me that a body had been found in one of our investment properties. The police hadn’t known much at the time, other than the fact that my father had apparently found the body at eight o’clock that morning when he went there to check something (this was just before suspicion had fallen on him).
That morning had been awful, and I’d sworn off drinking for several months after that. So why was I suddenly remembering being in the Fontenot house that night? I wasn’t there at any point, was I? As far as I knew, I went straight home after Cora’s party.
I rubbed my eyes and kept scrubbing at the floorboards, trying to push the thoughts away, but it was like I’d unlocked some sort of mental safe deep within my mind; one which couldn’t be shut now that it was swinging open. Fragments of memories kept flashing through my head, and every single one of them was some sort of hazy image of the inside of the Fontenot house. I saw the foot of the stairs, I saw a bedroom door opening in front of me, I saw a soft white pillow as I drunkenly collapsed on the bed.
I shook my head, once again trying to clear the thoughts from my mind. There was no way I’d been in the murder house that night. No way at all.
But later, when the masquerade party died down and I decided to head to bed, it was all I could think about.
And then I wasn’t so sure.
“So how was the party last night?” Mercedes asked, reclining on my bed.
I’d invited her over to hang out and chat, but last night’s masquerade couldn’t be further from my mind right now.
“It was pretty weird,” I said, giving her a brief rundown of what happened with Asher in the hallway after he saw me with Liam.
She rolled her eyes and agreed that Asher was acting like a total ass, and then she frowned. “What else is going on?” she asked.
“Um…nothing.”
“I can always tell when you’re hiding something, Chloe.”
I sighed. “Fine. You’re right. There is something. I actually wanted to ask you about Cora Barnett’s birthday party.”
Mercedes wrinkled her forehead. “What, the party from last year where you got totally hammered?”
I nodded. “Yeah, that one.”
“What about it?”
I hesitated. “You weren’t drinking that night, were you? So you remember everything clearly?”
“Yeah, I had those killer period cramps, so I didn’t want to make them worse by getting drunk. That’s why I was driving, remember?”
“I thought so. Do you remember dropping me home that night?”
Mercedes smiled, then looked confused when my expression didn’t change. “Are you kidding?”
“No. Why would I be kidding?”
Her eyebrows drew together, her confusion obviously deepening. “Because I didn’t take you home that night, duh. I mean, I took you somewhere, but it wasn’t your house.”
My stomach lurched, and my heart began to beat faster. “Where did you take me?”
She frowned. “Do you really not remember?”
“Yes, really.”
“Well, you were wasted. In fact, you were so drunk you almost made out with Jordan Beaufort even though he had a massive cold sore. So I cut you off from the keg and told you I was taking you home. But when we got in the car you started drunk-crying and saying I couldn’t take you to your house, because it was still only ten or eleven o’clock, and your mom would still be awake. You said she’d kill you if she saw you in such a messy state. So you demanded I take you across town to one of your dad’s empty investment properties, where you could crash for the night.”
Goosebumps prickled across my arms as she confirmed the hazy memories that had finally returned to me the previous night. “You took me to the house on Fontenot Avenue, didn’t you?” I said quietly.
She nodded. “Yeah, that’s where you asked me to drop you off,” she replied. “Anyway, you got out there, vomited in the garden, shouted, ‘I’m okay!’, then stumbled inside. I know because I had the pleasure of seeing the whole thing while I waited in the car to make sure you got in safely,” she added with a touch of sarcasm.
“How come I woke up in my own bed at home, then?”
“Well, you texted me an hour or so later, asking me to come pick you up. Something about the bed being uncomfortable and wanting to go home after all. But I was asleep so I didn’t get it till the next morning. Hold on, I’ll show you.”
She grabbed her phone and scrolled back through countless text messages. “What was the date that night?” she asked.
“Twenty-eighth of May,” I replied. At least I remembered that well enough.
She finally reached that date and nodded confidently. “Here, see?” she said, handing over her phone. “You texted me just after eleven-thirty asking me to come get you. And then you sent me another one half an hour later saying ‘you must be asleep, don’t worry, I’ll get a cab’.”
I shook my head slowly. “I honestly don’t remember any of that. All I remember is being inside the Fontenot house that night, and even then, all I remember is a brief flash of seeing the place.”
“Wow. Really?”
“Yeah. Why didn’t you ever tell me I was there that night?”
She shrugged, looking at me like I was a crazy person. “Honestly, I kinda thought you knew. I j
ust figured you didn’t want to talk about it, considering how a woman was murdered there not long after you left, and your dad was accused of it and all.”
Now I was looking at her like she was crazy. “Of course I’d want to talk about that!”
She held up her hands. “Okay, well, I’m sorry. I just assumed it was a touchy subject. I guess I also thought you were so drunk that night that there wasn’t much for you to even remember or discuss. But we’re talking about it now, if it makes you feel better.”
I didn’t reply. I simply stared at her as the cogs and wheels of my mind whirred.
“What?” she said, looking at me like I was insane again.
“During my father’s trial, they said the coroner ruled that Catalina was likely killed around midnight. And she’d been living there, right? So she must’ve been in the house when I got there, if it was at eleven like you say.”
Mercedes wrinkled her nose. “Well, did you see her when you went inside?”
I shook my head. “I don’t remember seeing her, but like I said, I barely remember a thing from that night. I mean, I only just remembered that I was even there.”
“Well, she was pregnant. Maybe she was asleep or heaving in the bathroom when you drunkenly stumbled into the house, and she never even noticed you were there.”
My blood suddenly ran cold. “Wait. I need to see those texts again,” I said, snatching her phone. I looked at the timestamps, and I saw that the text from me telling Mercedes that I was getting a cab had been sent just after twelve that fateful night.
I looked up at my best friend, my eyes wide. “If I didn’t leave till after midnight…that means the killer was probably in the house while I was there, as well as Catalina.”
Mercedes’ eyes widened. “Oh, god, you’re right. Shit. I never even thought of that. I always thought you left the house way before she was killed.”
I shook my head slowly. “How am I only just remembering and realizing all of this now?” I asked.
She shrugged. “You were drink, drank, drunk that night, that’s how.”
“God, I wish it wasn’t all so blurry. If I could just remember it all properly, then maybe I’d be able to remember something that could help exonerate my father. Like maybe I saw a glimpse of the real killer!”
Mercedes sighed. “Yeah, well, alcohol kills brain cells. I doubt you’ll ever get most of those memories back.”
“But I might,” I insisted. “Maybe the memories are all locked away in the drunk tank of my mind. Maybe if I keep trying, they’ll start to come back.”
“Yeah, maybe. But Chloe, you’ve seen CSI and all those other shows. Time of death isn’t always totally accurate. For all we know, Catalina was actually murdered at one or two o’clock in the morning, and you were definitely long gone from the house by then.”
“That’s true,” I said with a sigh. “So maybe I never really had a chance to see the killer.”
A sickening idea suddenly occurred to me, and I clapped my hand over my mouth. Mercedes raised her eyebrows, her pale blue eyes darkening with concern. “What is it?”
“Nothing,” I muttered. I couldn’t say it loud, couldn’t admit what I’d just thought.
She frowned. “You have to tell me.”
I chewed on a fingernail and carefully inspected the brocade pattern on my duvet, unable to look at my friend while these awful thoughts swirled through my mind.
“Chloe,” she demanded, an edge to her voice. “What is it?”
I finally raised my eyes to meet her gaze. “Mercedes, what if….what if it was me?”
She pulled a confused face. “What if it was you who what?”
“I mean, what if it was me who did it?”
“What, killed Catalina St Clair?” she asked, her voice incredulous.
I nodded, my hands trembling by my side. “Maybe when I went inside that night, I did see her. Maybe I realized she was living there and having an affair with my father, and I was so angry and drunk that I pushed her down the stairs.”
Mercedes rolled her eyes. “Oh, for fuck’s sake, Chloe. For a second I thought you were being serious.”
“I am being serious!”
She gave me a scornful look. “You’ve never even killed a freaking plant. And you honestly think there’s a chance you murdered a woman in cold blood?” she said. “Jesus, Chloe, think about it. Whoever killed her didn’t just push her down the stairs. They also grabbed a big knife from the kitchen and stabbed her. More than once. That’s not something a blind drunk teenage girl does.”
“But it could be if that blind drunk teenage girl feels angry and betrayed enough.”
“You did not kill Catalina, Chloe,” she said. “The cops even said that whoever pushed her down the stairs did it with so much force that they must’ve been pretty damn big and strong, and well…five foot six and a hundred and twenty pounds isn’t exactly huge. It wasn’t you!”
“I guess. But…”
My voice trailed away, and Mercedes leaned over and squeezed my hand tightly in hers. “Chloe, you’re really starting to freak me out. I honestly think you might need therapy. Like, sure, you were in the house that night, blackout drunk, but you didn’t do anything. You left before she was even killed, most likely, and you had nothing to do with her murder! Get that through your head, babe.”
“I don’t need therapy,” I mumbled, though I wasn’t convinced. Maybe she was right; maybe I did need some sort of therapist to help me deal with these dark, intrusive thoughts.
Yes, of course she was right. I was being crazy. There was no way I could’ve killed Catalina. Even if I was the sort of person who became a brutal murderer after a few too many drinks—and I knew I wasn’t—I would’ve surely had some sort of memory of committing the crime if I’d really done it.
Right?
I finally nodded slowly. “I guess you have a point. If I did something that awful, I’d at least remember something about it.”
“Exactly. And also, if the killer was in the house and murdered Catalina while you were there, you would’ve seen her body when you came downstairs and left.”
“Yes, and no matter how drunk I was, I’d remember seeing something that horrible,” I said, nodding more confidently now. “So it must’ve happened after I left the house that night. God, I’m sorry. I really am being an overly-dramatic idiot.”
Mercedes smiled and patted my head. “It’s okay. You’re my overly-dramatic idiot,” she said in a soothing tone. “And at least we know you didn’t kill anyone, right?”
“Yeah. But should I tell someone I was there that night now that I remember it?” I asked. “Like the police? It could help my dad.”
She shook her head. “What good would it do? I know you had nothing to do with Catalina’s murder, but the cops don’t. Do you really want them thinking that you might’ve done it after all, just for the sake of coming clean and admitting you were there earlier that night by pure coincidence?”
“True.”
“There aren’t any surveillance cameras in the area, anyway. So no one will ever even know you were there except me. And yourself, of course. Oh, and maybe the cab driver who picked you up.”
“I wonder why he never came forward to say he remembered picking someone up from the house that night,” I pondered, furrowing my brows. “That’s weird, right? I mean, the case was huge last year. Surely he realized.”
Mercedes shrugged. “Yeah, it’s weird, but maybe he just didn’t remember picking you up from that exact house on that exact night. Not everyone has a perfect memory. So don’t worry about it.”
“I guess,” I replied, still mulling it over in my mind.
Something still didn’t sit right with me about the cab driver. Mercedes was correct about not everyone having a perfect memory, but like I’d told her a second ago, the Catalina St Clair murder case had been huge news throughout the state. Surely a cab driver would’ve remembered collecting me from the very same house she’d been killed at on the night she w
as murdered.
The only feasible reason a driver wouldn’t have remembered me was if I’d never been picked up by a cab in the first place. But if Mercedes hadn’t taken me home and a cab hadn’t either, that begged the question: who took me home that night, and why?
At that moment, there was a knock on the door, and Alex entered the room.
“Hey, Chloe. Just checking to see if your friend is staying for dinner so I can let the cooks know to make extra,” he said. “I’m Alex, by the way,” he added, glancing at Mercedes.
He extended a hand to her, and she jumped up and shook it firmly with a smile before reaching out and rudely grabbing at his hair. “Oh my god,” she squealed. “Chloe, look! It’s almost the same color as mine, and it’s actually real! So rare these days.”
I grinned and rolled my eyes as she flipped her own long hair over her shoulder. She was constantly harping on about how she was a natural blonde as if it was some sort of achievement which made her superior to all the fake bottle blondes around Claremont Bay, and she always got excited about seeing other natural blondes like she was some sort of talent scout for the Aryan Brotherhood. It was shallow and pretentious, but she was my best friend, so she was allowed to be a little vapid sometimes without me disliking her for it.
“Sorry, Alex,” I said. “This is Mercedes. She’s not always this weird.”
Mercedes stuck her tongue out at me, and Alex nodded. “I think I actually remember you from my sister school, Mercedes. Same as Chloe.”
She squinted at him. “You went to Wesley?”
“Yeah, but I guess I wasn’t exactly all that popular. I was just a scholarship kid,” Alex replied with a self-deprecating grin. “So it’s okay that you don’t remember me.”
“Well, I’ll certainly remember you now that I’ve realized you’re practically my hair twin,” Mercedes declared before turning and heading for my bathroom. “I’ll be back in a minute. And no, I can’t stay for dinner, sorry,” she called out over her shoulder.
Scandal (A Dirty Money Novel) Page 11
