Girls' Night Out_A Novel

by Liz Fenton

  Natalie glanced at Ben again. He gave her a look like he was sorry—for pushing her so hard to get Ashley to change her mind.

  “Our company. Revlon wanted to buy it. They offered us eight figures. And Ashley didn’t want to sell.”

  “And you did?”

  “Exactly.” Natalie remembered standing next to the cenote—pointing her finger at Ashley. Her anger boiling. She couldn’t recall ever being that furious with anyone. “We’d been going around about it all week. But after she took the balché, she seemed to change her mind about selling. Begged me to take the drug with her.” She shot an apologetic look at Ben. “So I did. I drank it.”

  “And then you pushed her?” Officer Garcia sat up taller in his chair.

  “What? No.” She looked at her lawyer. Wondering if she should have consulted with him.

  “She would never hurt Ashley,” Ben said.

  “I would never hurt Ashley,” Natalie repeated.

  “But you’d been arguing. She wasn’t going to give you what you wanted. You said eight figures was at stake. With her gone, they’d still sell to you, right?”

  “I don’t know. I never thought about it like that.” Natalie’s hands were suddenly clammy. She rubbed them on the chair. “I would never hurt her. That’s not what happened. Yes, I wanted to sell the company, but I wouldn’t have killed her over it!”

  “Do you want to talk to me privately?” Jesús asked.

  “No, listen.” She stared at Officer Garcia. “I didn’t push Ashley. She slipped.”

  “How?” he asked.

  “It was a terrible accident. Marco came over to us—he was trying to help. He . . .” Natalie started to cry as she remembered Ashley’s eyes wide, blinking rapidly. She had let out a primal scream.

  “He was trying to get us to stop arguing, and he stepped toward her to try to get her to move away from the edge. She was closer than I was, and she lost her balance.” Natalie stopped, her tears falling hard. She didn’t bother to wipe them. “So yes, in that way, I’m responsible. Because if we hadn’t been arguing, then Marco wouldn’t have tried to break it up, and then she wouldn’t have fallen.” She sucked in too much air and coughed.

  She remembered Ashley’s hands flailing in the air, trying in vain to hook on to anything. It had seemed to happen in slow motion, her fall. Her screams echoing through the dark night. Neither of them able to get to her in time. “I tried to help her. So did Marco, but she was already falling.” Natalie covered her face, crying into her hands. Finally, she looked up, meeting Ben’s eyes. “She fell down into the cenote. There was a crack. It was so loud.”

  The room was silent as Natalie tried to find her next words. She struggled, feeling sick. They were harder to say than she could have ever imagined.

  We need to get her out! Save her! Natalie had screamed, her pulse racing. She had broken into a cold sweat.

  Marco had raced down the ladder and jumped into the water, frantically searching for Ashley. Natalie shone her flashlight to help him.

  I have her, he had yelled.

  Natalie’s heartbeat had pulsed in her ears. Maybe Ashley was still alive. Please God, she had prayed, let her be breathing.

  “He pulled Ashley up the ladder. I don’t even know how he did it, but he did. And laid her down on the ground. He performed CPR. Finally, he stopped pressing his palms into her chest. He pulled his mouth away from hers.” Natalie couldn’t say more.

  There had been so much blood gushing from her head. Natalie pressed her hand on it, but it kept coming.

  Oh my God, Marco had said. She’s dead. I can’t believe she’s dead. His eyes had bulged. He had rocked back and forth on his knees. This is all my fault. It’s all my fault.

  We have to get her to a hospital. Maybe they can still save her, Natalie had yelled over the sound of her heartbeat.

  It won’t do any good, she’s gone, Marco had said.

  Natalie had checked Ashley’s pulse again, put her head on her chest. Maybe he was wrong. He had to be wrong.

  “I wanted to call the police, take her to the hospital. I wanted to get more help.”

  “But you didn’t,” Officer Garcia said matter-of-factly. “Why not?”

  Natalie shook her head, her cheeks burning. Jesús handed her a box of tissues. She blew her nose. “I didn’t have a phone. And Marco wouldn’t give me his. I searched for Ashley’s, but couldn’t find it either. Marco said the police wouldn’t believe us. That we’d be arrested, or worse.” She looked at Officer Garcia, whose jaw tightened. Something told her he was one of the good ones, that he always played by the rules.

  The ground was cold underneath her as she had cradled Ashley’s lifeless body in her arms.

  Marco had been pacing. We need to get out of here—now.

  “He wanted to leave. To protect ourselves. I refused. I told him that I was going to the police with or without him. That there was no way I was leaving her there, like an animal.” Natalie’s voice cracked again.

  Natalie had pulled her knees to her chest, everything around her spinning. She pressed her eyes shut, praying that when she opened them, Ashley would be alive again. That it was all just a bad dream.

  “I finally managed to convince him. We were going to take her to the hospital and then call the police.”

  Natalie’s vision had been blurry from the tears that wouldn’t stop. She didn’t care if the police arrested her. She didn’t care what happened next. She needed to get Ashley’s body somewhere safe.

  “But you didn’t take her there? Why not?” Officer Lopez asked.

  “Clearly Marco must have given her something besides the balché,” Jesús cut in, looking at Natalie. “Right?”

  Natalie held the officer’s steely gaze. “Yes.” Ben shook his head, his fists balling at his sides. She wondered what it must be like for him to hear this. “As we were walking back to the car, he was carrying Ashley, and he stopped and told me I needed to hydrate. He bent over his backpack for a minute, and I thought he was trying to find a water, but that must have been when he crushed the Xanax into the bottle. He told me to drink it all. That I was in shock.” Natalie could still feel the water as it coated her dry throat. “I didn’t think anything of it—why would I? We were on our way to get help—or so I thought. But maybe if I hadn’t drunk so much tequila and God knows what else, I would have noticed something about his demeanor.”

  Marco had stood beside her as Natalie closed her eyes. I’m so sorry, Ash. I’m so sorry, she’d said as she’d stared at Ashley.

  “He just had Xanax in his pocket?”

  “Both balché and Xanax are legal here in Mexico,” Jesús interjected. “Not that hard to believe.”

  “So, after the Xanax, you passed out and Marco presumably took Ashley’s body back and put it in the cenote and then drove you back to your hotel?” Officer Lopez said, his eyebrow raised as if he wasn’t sure this was plausible.

  “I became drowsy after I got into Marco’s car. The last thing I remember is Marco carrying her body back toward the cenote. And then I must have passed out.” Natalie started to cry again, staring down at her gnawed fingernails. “I don’t see any other way I would have ended up back at the hotel.” Natalie glanced at the officers, wondering if they thought this was another lie.

  Officer Lopez gave Natalie a long stare. They all sat in silence for a few moments.

  Finally, Natalie took a deep breath and spoke the words that had been circling inside her head. “So now what?” Officer Lopez’s gaze unnerved her. She turned to Officer Garcia. “Are you going to arrest me for having an argument with her?”

  Officer Garcia took a moment before responding. She wondered what he was thinking. Did he believe her? Did he want to keep investigating? Did he want to find Marco first? “We need to get the autopsy report back and see if it is consistent with a fall. They conducted it yesterday after you left the morgue, so we should know soon—although this is Mexico. We are on our own clock, as you Americans know.” He paused, c
onsulting his notebook again. Natalie wondered how many he had—if there was one for each case he worked on. What he did with the notebooks for the cases he couldn’t solve. “Although there is always the chance you drugged yourself, as I mentioned to you the other day. You could have done that to create an alibi. After you concocted this story.”

  “I didn’t concoct this story.” Natalie’s eyes flashed to Jesús. She now officially needed his help.

  “Are you accusing my client of killing Ashley Green?” Jesús asked. “Because if you aren’t—if you aren’t planning to arrest her—then she does not need to sit here and listen to your accusations. Which is all they are, accusations. That are clearly unsupported. You have no evidence of a sign of a struggle at the cenote. You have no way to prove Ashley was pushed. You have no eyewitnesses. You only have a body, which shows a laceration to her head that you stated could be consistent with a fall. But you don’t have the autopsy report back yet. I know you’d love to make a quick arrest to please your superiors and get the press to move on, but arresting the wrong person will only make it worse.”

  “We have motive. And opportunity.”

  Jesús didn’t hesitate. “We both know you can’t prove Natalie pushed her. Ashley had been drinking and had done drugs. Have you considered the possibility she committed suicide? That she jumped?”

  “That would be almost impossible to prove,” Officer Garcia said.

  “It sounds like you have your answer then—my client’s account of what happened. She has cooperated with you every step of the way. You have nothing else except theories. My client was an eyewitness to what happened. I suggest you take her statement officially and close the case so everyone here can move on.”

  Natalie bit down on her lip hard. She wondered if the officers would ever believe her. Or if they would continue to try to find her at fault—to try to put the puzzle pieces together in a way that made Natalie responsible. She knew in her heart that Ashley hadn’t jumped, but she wasn’t going to say that now. It seemed to her that the more theories that were in the mix, the better. It meant they couldn’t prove anything. That they could take Ashley’s body home. That Natalie could get back to her girls.

  Officer Garcia cleared his throat. “Let us complete our investigation—in due time. We will not be rushed because your American client wants to go home.”

  “I will ask you again, are you planning to arrest Natalie?” Jesús asked.

  Natalie’s heartbeat raced. Her nerves felt raw. Was this it? Was she going to be arrested? Should she have left out the part where they’d argued? She looked at Ben, her eyes full of fear. She should have listened to him. And to Jesús. What was she thinking?

  “At this point, no,” Officer Garcia finally said.

  Natalie let out a long breath.

  “But I am going to continue to hold your passport until the autopsy report comes back. And we’ll scour Cenote Calavera to see if we missed anything. Make sure there were no eyewitnesses. And we are going to continue to look for Marco. Only after all of that will we consider clearing you to leave Mexico.” Officer Garcia looked at Natalie. “Unless you have something else you’d like to say.”

  “Only that I did not push Ashley. I swear to you.” She looked down at her shredded cuticles and nails bitten down to the beds. She wanted to be alone with her memories of Ashley. With the guilt that she was sure would haunt her for the rest of her life.

  As terrible as they both were, they were all she had left now.

  CHAPTER FORTY

  ONE WEEK AFTER

  LAUREN

  Lauren walked heavy-footed through Cancún International Airport. The police had finally cleared them to go home that morning—Officer Garcia handing them back their passports. He’d seemed like he’d wanted to say more as he held out the small blue books, but he didn’t. He simply wished them well in their journey home. Lauren had been at a loss for words when she’d heard about how Ashley had died. Natalie had sat her down in her hotel room, tears streaming down her face, trembling as she told her the story, stopping frequently to catch her breath. Lauren’s heart was crushed. God, how she wished she had agreed to leave with Ashley. To talk things out. But she’d been too angry and selfish to step outside and see Ashley for what she had been—a woman, much like herself, who was desperate for her friends to understand her. And now, in her death, Lauren did finally understand. Ashley had been trying to protect her. But when she’d been the one needing protection, Lauren and Natalie had failed miserably. And she could only imagine how Natalie must feel. She had been there. Standing next to her as she’d fallen, unable to save her. How Natalie was going to live with that, Lauren did not know. But she could understand living with her own guilt. Over telling Ashley she wished she were dead. Those final words would haunt her forever.

  For the three additional nights they’d been required to stay in Tulum, Lauren had refused to turn to José. He’d offered, but she had politely declined. She knew it would help her escape the pain, but only temporarily. She’d already deleted her Tinder app and had confessed to Annie that she had a sex addiction. Annie said to call her anytime she felt the urge to have a random hookup and she’d remind her of all the ways she could get nasty STDs. Lauren had laughed quietly, both wanting and not wanting to feel better.

  Lauren found herself in the gift shop now, passing by the bottles of hot sauce and tequila, the bright T-shirts and woven bracelets. She watched a curly-haired woman deliberate over which wooden picture frame to buy—the one with the dolphin carved into it, or with the flip-flops? She looked up and caught Lauren staring at her, and Lauren turned away quickly. She was sure she’d been scowling at her, finding her souvenir dilemma trivial.

  Her insides went cold when she saw Ashley on the cover of People en Español. Even though she’d been living through the media storm for the past seven days—her voice mail full of messages from reporters wanting a statement, some even finding them at their hotel and accosting them for a comment—it still felt surreal. Lauren couldn’t believe Ashley was gone. That she’d never again hear her throaty laugh after listening to a raunchy joke. She’d never again watch her eat her favorite dessert—dairy-free coconut chocolate-chip ice cream—licking the spoon as if it were the greatest thing she’d ever tasted. And she’d never again see her lift her chin in anger—determined to convince you she was right. What Lauren wouldn’t give to go back to El Castillo and see that chin again—to hug Ashley tightly after she confessed what Jason was like, instead of pushing her away. She would have unraveled the intertwined feelings that tied Ashley and Geoff together. Maybe that would have saved them. Saved Ashley.

  She’d made the decision yesterday to apply to go back to school—to stop letting the past hold her future hostage. Annie was picking her up from the airport, and they were going straight to a grief meeting where, for the first time, Lauren was planning to tell her story to the group. Every last word of it. Including the most important words of all: I forgive you, Ashley. And I forgive myself.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  ONE WEEK AFTER

  NATALIE

  She had told as much of the truth as she could. It was the best she could do for everyone involved. At least, that’s what she kept telling herself. As she’d packed Ashley’s clothes, carefully folding each item and pressing it into her pink roller bag, her chest ached from crying. Lauren passed her Kleenex until the box was empty. They’d sat on the beach last night as the glowing pink sun set on the ocean and told their favorite stories of Ashley, but Jason was unable to finish the one about their wedding night. When they had gotten into the shuttle for the airport, Natalie squeezed her eyes shut, wishing she could leave the memory of what had happened behind, but she knew it would follow her home and through her life, like a shadow.

  The pain would chase her too. Because she would never stop grieving, even though it couldn’t change what had happened. Nothing could. Ashley would still be at that cenote with Marco because she believed it would somehow be her salvatio
n—that the water would cleanse her, that the balché would bring her clarity. Natalie would still be there too, bitter and looking for an outlet. Ashley would still end up dead.

  Natalie glanced over at Jason in the airplane seat next to her. Ben had given up his seat and taken one in the back of the plane; he didn’t want Jason to sit alone. His eyes were closed, but she knew he wasn’t sleeping—that he was afraid to fall asleep. He told her the pain of waking up and remembering was almost worse than living with it while he was awake. Natalie wished she could do something to make him feel better, but there wasn’t a single gesture or word that could help. The truest words inside her would only make it worse.

  She wasn’t quite sure how to live with that.

  The email from Arthur had come in right before they boarded the plane. Revlon had told Arthur, off the record, that they were so sorry about Ashley’s passing, but they had to retract their offer. Even though Natalie had already prepared herself for this, the news had hit her hard.

  The story had become an absolute firestorm in the last week—a mixture of truth and lies about Ashley and the investigation splashed across magazine covers and newspapers—some saying she had been having an affair with Marco and painting her as a careless party girl who’d gone to Mexico to break all the rules. The speculation stabbed Natalie in the heart. She hated anyone believing bad things about Ashley. The truths tore her insides too, each time she read them, her wounds reopened. All of it scared Revlon away.

  It turned out the police department leak had been Officer Lopez. Officer Garcia had told them as much the day before they left, when he’d stopped at the hotel to return their passports. Officer Garcia had suspected him, so he’d fed him an innocuous lie and it appeared in one of the stories. Lauren had been shocked, but Natalie wasn’t. Nothing would ever shock Natalie again.

  Officer Garcia had pulled Natalie aside before he handed her passport back. He’d said the autopsy had come back, and the head wound was consistent with a fall. The medical examiner agreed that the laceration could have been caused by Ashley’s head hitting one of the jagged rocks below. Traces of Ashley’s blood were also found on the wall of the cenote. They had theorized that it had to have been Marco who sent the emojis to Jason, no doubt buying himself time to get out of town, terrified that he would have been blamed for Ashley’s death. He’d then leaned in close and gripped her arm. But I don’t think she stumbled and fell. I think she was pushed. And I think you’re the one who pushed her. Once you knew Marco had disappeared, you could tell any story you wanted. Maybe the two of you even planned it out before he left—when he dropped you off at the hotel?