Sins

by Lee, Nadia

  Suddenly I can’t speak. The entire house seems to fill with dread.

  Harry looks at me, his eyes haunted. “It’s Edgar.” He swallows. “They found Ivy in a bayou. A car accident in the storm on Saturday. That’s…where… Aw, shit. That’s why I thought maybe we should just wait because…” He breathes out roughly, shoving a hand into his hair.

  My vision dims. The words get caught in my throat. No. No.

  “It’s her car,” Harry adds, his voice shaky. “Her ID.”

  No! I take two large steps, rip the phone from Harry’s hand. “Edgar.”

  “Tony. I’m so sor—”

  “Was there any jewelry? A necklace or anything like that?”

  “Tony, the ID was posi—”

  “Was there any jewelry?”

  “Hold on.” There’s a pause while Edgar confers with someone. “They found a pendant in the car. Some kind of astrological motif…”

  The rest of his words don’t register. A light-year away, I feel Harry’s hand on my shoulder.

  It’s all fucking lie. A mistake. It has to be. Some messed-up prank. Ivy’s still mad, so she’s doing this to fuck with me. That’s fine. I deserve it.

  Right? It’s just a prank. Her car in a bayou… It doesn’t mean anything…

  But I know. Deep in my withered, fucked-up heart…I know the truth.

  I should’ve never been such a coward, too afraid to let her in, to let her see all of me. If not, she wouldn’t have been in Tempérane over the weekend and she wouldn’t have had the accident. She would’ve known the depth of my feelings for her, that I love her more than anything in the world—more than my ego, more than my pride…more than anything—and how that feeling short-circuited my thoughts, flinging me from absolute bliss into an abject fear that she would know everything and cast me aside the way Mother did.

  My knees hit the floor as my stomach heaves. The skin around my eyes grows hot, but no tears stream down my cheeks. They’re gathering and swelling in my heart instead, growing heavier and eating away my insides like acid, drop by drop.

  This is all a lie. A lie. But even as I repeat it to myself …I know. And despair. And rage. And grieve. And loathe myself.

  I never realized how dark and cold a Louisiana summer day could be.

  The sun no longer rises, the moon no longer shines and there aren’t any stars to put a spark of happiness in my heart.

  Part Two

  –Present Day

  The monk I met in Raiding, Austria, was fascinating. I’d never seen a Buddhist monk outside of Japan or Korea, so it was a little startling. He said he liked my Liebestraum (he overheard me practicing) and offered to read my palm and tell me my fortune based on my birth date and time. I only know the date, which seemed to disappoint him. He said I wanted something I lost, which was amusing. Such a generic “observation.” But the rest of what he said gave me an ah-ha moment. I have to write it down so I don’t forget later.

  –What did I lose? (I expected him to say an earring or something.)

  –People.

  –No. (I lost my parents, but they’re dead, so…kind of impossible to find them.)

  –No? Then tell me what you lost.

  –My memories. (I only say it to see what he’ll say. Besides, I’m leaving for Vienna tonight, so I’ll never run into this monk again, and he doesn’t even know my name. But he just smiles.)

  –Memories are people. You don’t remember things. You remember people, your feelings for them, how they made you feel in return, because those are the memories worth carrying through life. (I think I looked unconvinced, because he added) Ice cream by itself isn’t memorable. But ice cream you had with your parents on a hot sunny day at a park when you were a child…now that’s something.

  –So how do I find these people?

  –You stay here. They will come.

  –Stay? In Austria?

  –Yes. Aren’t you from here?

  –I’m a tourist. I’ve been traveling the last six years.

  –How can your people find you if you keep moving around? Choose a place. Settle. And live your life the way you want to live it. Don’t hide. Be seen.

  –Seen?

  –If nobody sees you, they can’t find you.

  –What if I attract bad people? (I’m worried about the fake friends who came to take advantage of me when I was confused and distraught after waking up from the coma.)

  –So? You can’t pick and choose your memories, can you? There are more good people than bad. Haven’t you seen that during your travels?

  I have. And now I know. I have to return to L.A.

  –from Iris’s notebook

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Anthony

  The Rolls’ A/C does a good job of keeping the Los Angeles heat at bay as we wait in the passenger loading area at LAX. TJ, my bodyguard/chauffeur, is up front behind the wheel. I’m sitting in back, arms folded and not happy.

  I glare at Harry as he climbs in. He looks like shit, his eyes bloodshot, and reeks of alcohol. If he throws up in my brand-new Cullinan, I’m going to skin him. Then send him the cleaning bill.

  “Running off to Vegas is your idea of showing how responsible you are to everyone?”

  “You really want to do this in front of…” He jerks his chin toward TJ.

  “Yes.”

  Harry shrugs, totally unrepentant. “My fortune cookie said I was going to meet my destiny in the west, and Vegas is west. Almost west coast.”

  Palm, meet face. “That was my damn fortune cookie you stole last week, and there’s nothing coastal about Vegas.”

  “Same time zone.” He flashes a smile in my direction. He knows he’s good-looking and can get away with murder with that bright, innocent smile. Except it’s never worked on me, so I don’t know why he still bothers.

  “And ‘Destiny’ was a hooker.”

  “She’s not a hooker.”

  “You were paying her to sleep with you. That makes her a hooker.” I let out an impatient breath. I wouldn’t be bothering except for Edgar asking me to keep Harry in line. He was quite unhappy to see Instagram photos of the hookers our youngest brother was spending time with, and since he’s traveling, I’m it. I might’ve been publicly disowned seven years ago, but I’m still Harry’s older brother, and I take care of my brothers, just like they do me.

  “You look upset.” He stops, then drops his voice. “Are you thinking about Audrey Duff?”

  “Audrey? Why on earth would I be wasting time thinking about her?”

  He looks incredulous. “Are you kidding? Don’t you read the news?”

  “Occasionally. But unlike you, I don’t get it from OMG GOSSIP dot com.”

  “It’s everywhere. She tried to commit suicide. Over you!”

  “Oh, that. Wei said something about it.” Mainly to warn me. My assistant knows I don’t enjoy surprises, especially those set up to exploit me for someone else’s benefit. I instructed him to make sure she’s blocked from contacting me, ever.

  Harry is staring at me like we don’t even belong to the same species. “That’s all you have to say?”

  “What else would you like me to say?”

  “How about ‘Wow, that’s terrible.’ Or ‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ or ‘I’m deeply saddened by the news.’ She said she couldn’t live without you when you dumped her.”

  “Harry. It’s one thing to be younger, another to be gullible.” I give him a cool, pitying look. “Audrey clawed her way out of inner-city Chicago and found a modicum of success in Hollywood. She didn’t do that by being half-assed or weak-willed. If she really were intent on killing herself, she would’ve done it. What she craves is the attention and money she can get by being with me. But my love? Not on the list.”

  “She tried to kill herself because you dumped her,” Harry tries again, as though insisting will make it real.

  “I never promised her anything. If she thought going out a few times would entitle her to my undying devotion, she was wro
ng. I won’t be manipulated.” Only Ivy held that special place in my heart. It’s been nine years, but the pain of losing her is still crippling. I imagine putting it in a box in my heart and closing the lid—a coping technique I’ve learned. It lessens the pain until the ache is only a dull throb.

  “That’s cold, Tony. Like, Antarctic. I can’t believe you still have an army of women panting after you.”

  “Like I said, they want my money.” Bitterness courses through me. I have more money than I can ever spend, but the only woman I’ve ever loved is gone. After my parents tossed me out of the family seven years ago, I worked like a man possessed to build my empire. It was going to fill the void in my heart, give me the power and influence to protect what’s mine…

  But now that I have a fortune and the leverage that comes with it, the aching emptiness in my heart is simply…bigger. More painful.

  What’s the point when I don’t have her?

  I look out the window. Ivy’s dead, and I’ll never get another chance with her. My brain knows this. But my heart… That’s another thing. It whispers that maybe she didn’t really die. Maybe they made a mistake. Maybe, just maybe, she jumped out of that car before it plunged into the bayou. Or maybe she swam away, or…something. Anything.

  I hate these thoughts and denials. Nine years. If she were alive, she would’ve found her way back to me long before now. I need to accept the truth—the ashes I helped scatter can’t magically come together and become a living woman again—but a small part of me still can’t. It thinks she has to be alive somewhere because otherwise I would’ve shriveled and died as well. It doesn’t recognize that the living go on living, even if it’s as an empty husk.

  Harry hesitates, his face tight with concern. “Did you dump Audrey because she bleached her hair and got colored contacts?”

  He saw her at the last public event she and I attended together. Even though he’s wasting his life, getting yet another pointless postgraduate liberal arts degree, he’s still a Blackwood and gets all the invitations my family receives as a courtesy. Since he likes good booze and dolled-up women, he attends as many as possible.

  “She’s prettier as a brunette,” I say tonelessly.

  He grows glum. “Maybe some people know.”

  “About Lauren?” I say, deliberately misunderstanding him. “So what? She’s dead.” Lauren was the very public mistake I made within two years of Ivy’s death. There’s no reason for anybody to know about Ivy. I was too young and unimportant back then, our love too short…with the abrupt end that still leaves me reeling every time I think about it. Recently, the old memories have been coming more frequently. Maybe I’m getting old. Or sentimental.

  Harry knows better than to bring up Ivy. Silently, he checks his phone. He’s almost never off that damned thing. His phone plays Grand Galop Chromatique, and I tense at the cheery music coming through the tinny speakers. I can’t stand Chopin and Liszt. Actually, I can’t stand most classical piano pieces now. They hurt too much.

  It’s a bravura panty-dropper from the nineteenth century. Did it make you want to get naked with me?

  “Turn that off.”

  Harry raises a finger. “Wait a minute.”

  “I said turn that shit off!” Grand Galop Chromatique is one of the worst. Every rapid note of the music feels like a blender blade shredding me.

  “It’s from this video that’s going viral, titled Showing the Jerk How It’s Done. But the pianist…” Harry squints hard. “What the fuck?”

  Grinding my teeth, I snatch the phone out of his hand. But just a glimpse of the strawberry blonde in the video stops me cold.

  The pianist is young—maybe in her mid- or late twenties—and looks exactly like Ivy, from the hair to the posture to the gray eyes. If that were all, I’d consider it a coincidence. But there’s more.

  It’s the way she plays—the sublime expression, her body utterly relaxed. Her technique and tempo are flawless. She has the same unshakable confidence and wild exuberance Ivy used to play the piece with.

  It’s already a crazy coincidence that there’s a woman who looks just like Ivy. But one who plays like her?

  To be able to play Liszt like that not only requires talent, but years of diligent practice.

  “What the fuck is this?” I find myself asking in an awful voice I don’t recognize as my own.

  Harry takes his phone back. “I don’t know. But somebody posted this less than an hour ago, and tagged the location as L.A. Hammers and Strings.”

  She’s dead, Tony. You helped scatter her ashes. There’s no second chance.

  I know that. The pain of losing her is still as sharp and excruciating as having my bones shaved. But I can’t ignore the video. As crazy as it sounds, I want to go and see this pianist in person.

  “TJ, pull over,” I say.

  The Cullinan stops.

  I turn to Harry. “Get out.”

  “What? How am I going to get back to campus?”

  “Call an Uber.” I’m not taking him, hungover with no filter on his mouth or brain. I shove him out when he doesn’t move, shut the door and instruct TJ, “To Hammers and Strings.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Iris

  My phone buzzes again, but I ignore it and continue to sip a cappuccino at the Starbucks two doors away from the piano store.

  Byron stirs the ice in his latte, his motion elegant and unhurried. That’s his greatest charm—no matter what, nothing fazes him. It also doesn’t hurt that he’s classically handsome, with a boldly chiseled face, stunning blue eyes and dark brown hair. A white button-down shirt is draped over his lean torso, and the coffee-colored slacks fit his narrow pelvis and long legs perfectly. He radiates an air of entitled affluence without trying, which I guess comes from his background. His family is filthy rich.

  The women in the café aren’t immune. Many are openly staring, and some are even giving me an envious glare or two. I regard them with mild amusement. Their anger with me is totally misplaced, since I’m not in the picture that way. He isn’t mine, not like they think.

  As usual, Byron’s oblivious. Or maybe just pretending not to notice. I can never tell.

  “I should’ve gotten a macchiato.” His baritone voice is as lazy and cultured as the man himself. He sighs, then glances over at my phone, which buzzes…again. “Sure you don’t want to answer that?”

  “I’m sure.” I don’t want to deal with Sam right now. “And I blame you.”

  “Moi?” He puts a hand to his chest.

  “If you hadn’t put that recording up on Facebook and YouTube, none of this”—I gesture at the phone—“would’ve happened. Sam’s already upset I’m back in the country, and he hates it when I ‘show off.’”

  A distant uncle, Sam has become my de facto guardian since the accident that killed my parents and almost ended my life nine years ago. Normally, I wouldn’t have needed anybody to act as a guardian. I was already eighteen. But a year-long coma meant somebody had to make decisions on my behalf. If Sam hadn’t stepped up, I would’ve died. The doctors wanted to unplug me after a couple months, saying the situation was hopeless. It was Sam who kept the faith and refused to allow it.

  “Nothing pleases that old man, Rizzy,” Byron says carelessly, using the nickname he gave me. “Besides, you weren’t showing off. You were teaching the idiot how it’s done in your own imitable fashion. Why not share with the world?” He looks at his phone. “People are loving it. Over five hundred comments and likes already, and it’s been less than an hour.”

  I take a slow sip of my brew. Byron’s right about one thing: I did show that abusive jerk how it’s done. I couldn’t believe the nerve of the guy, coming into the store, berating his girlfriend and the saleswoman, then sitting down in front of the Bösendorfer I wanted to try and playing Liszt’s Grand Galop Chromatique. He must’ve thought the music would showcase his virtuosity. Guess he didn’t understand that if he played badly, it would make him look like a toddler trying to compete in
the hundred-meter dash in the Olympics.

  “If he hadn’t called his girlfriend a talentless hack, I wouldn’t have done it.” I sigh as the thousandth text arrives. “Sam’s probably ready to explode now. He never wanted me back in L.A.”

  “Why not?”

  “He said I should go to France—Chopin’s birthplace—or Berlin, to see Liszt’s childhood home.” I roll my eyes. “It would help my musicality, or so he claimed.”

  “Seriously? All he has to do is Google to know Chopin was from Poland and Liszt came from Hungary.”

  Sam claims he’d rather have me focus on music because he knows it means a lot to me. He doesn’t care that I can’t be a concert pianist anymore. He says it doesn’t matter that I can’t take care of myself financially via music, because he can provide for me. The only thing he’s interested in is my happiness…

  But every time I try to assert my independence, he subjects me to stories of how he had to take care of me for so long, how he ignored the doctors who thought I should go off life support because he knew what was best for me deep in his heart.

  “It hurts me you won’t consider my perspective, Iris,” he’s said more than once. “Remember that old friend of yours? You were happy to see him, but it turned out he just wanted to use you to get to me and my money? What did I say when you saw him? That you should be careful, right?” He sighs. “I’m only doing this for you because it’s the least I owe your parents, God rest their souls.”

  Part of me suspects what he really wants is for me wander the world until the day I die, but another part can’t deny all that he’s done for me. And for all I know, maybe he truly believes traveling is what makes me happy.

  But enough. I can’t let his charity or good intentions derail me from what I have to do.

  “It took me a week to convince him I’m tired of traveling,” I tell Byron. “I’m going to be twenty-eight soon, I haven’t lived in one place for longer than a couple of months in the last six years, and I’ve never held a job. I want to settle down and do what normal people do.” It’s the same rationale I gave Sam.