by M. J. Lowell
I nodded as if I knew exactly when visiting hours started and ended and continued down the hallway that ran from the lobby. Doors lined either side, with a nameplate on each door to indicate whose room it was. Most of the doors were closed, but a few were open, and I could see inside to where patients dozed in hospital beds or watched TV.
At its end, the hallway opened into a large lounge. Seating arrangements scattered around the room held assorted groups of two and three and four, and at each group’s center was a patient in hospital pajamas. Many of the patients were in wheelchairs.
That made sense, I thought. These were people who had neurological and spinal injuries. But I still couldn’t figure out what this place had to do with Rhys—
Except Rhys was there.
He was at the far end of the room, seated alone at a table with an untouched chessboard before him. He was turned slightly away from me, but I would have known the close-cropped golden hair and the angle of his cheekbones anywhere.
Suddenly his head turned, and he was looking at me. It was too late to duck, to hide. Panic snaked through me, setting my heart pounding. Desperately my mind began inventing excuses: I’m visiting a friend, a relative, someone, anyone—
All the excuses died, half-formed, as it hit me: this wasn’t Rhys.
There were slight differences. A slackness to the jaw, a different shape to the eyes. And the eyes themselves – they were the same blue, but no fire blazed within. This man’s eyes were….empty. Hollow. Dead.
Joff, I thought. It could only be Joff.
He stared at me without recognition. Then a child giggled across the room, and his head swung to follow the noise. Only his head, though. His body seemed to be immobilized, slumped, I realized, in a wheelchair.
I turned, shaken, wanting to flee. There was something eerie about seeing this man, so much like Rhys and yet so different, so lacking in Rhys’s startling vitality. And as I hurried back down the hallway, my eyes landed on one of the nameplates.
“Joffrey,” it read. But not “Joffrey Carlyle.”
The name on the door was “Joffrey Stewart.”
Chapter Sixteen
I barely made it to work on time after catching the return train back from Mamaroneck to Grand Central. It was Saturday night and I was booked for three full sets, but I did them on autopilot, my mind still trying to make sense of what I’d seen and heard. My fingers moved mechanically from my laptop’s keyboard to the turntable and back again, but I was barely aware of the crowds dancing to the music on the floor below me. I was haunted by those empty eyes.
Did Rhys and Joff have different fathers? Was that why they had different last names? If that was the case, though, wouldn’t Davies have mentioned it when he talked about their father, and their days at the boxing gym? But at least now I knew why none of the research Val and I had done had turned up anything about a Joff Carlyle – there was no such person. Joff Stewart on the other hand….
When I finally arrived home it was nearly daybreak, and I was too tired to do anything but fall directly into bed. I slept until late afternoon, a deep dreamless sleep, but as soon as my eyes opened I was thinking about Joff again.
I took my laptop into the kitchen with me, and as I waited for the coffee to brew, I typed “Joffrey Stewart” into Google. The first hit was a list of race results from the Kings County Boat Club, but the next several were from local news outlets from two years ago.
“Playboy Pummeled¸ Tribeca Triplex Trashed,” blared the headline from the New York Post. The Times was more subdued: “Man assaulted in downtown home.” But the basic details were the same.
Joff – described as a “professional partier” by the Post – had been found alone and severely beaten in his apartment on North Moore Street in Tribeca. There was no doorman, but a security camera from an adjacent building showed someone in a black hoodie leaving Joff’s building around the time he’d been attacked. In spite of an anonymous million-dollar award offered for information about the assault, the attacker had yet to be identified.
It didn’t take much imagination to figure out who was offering that anonymous reward. And the beating Joff received must have been acute – the man I’d seen at the Institute was clearly unable to walk, and the blank look in his eyes suggested there might have been cognitive damage as well.
Now I understood why Rhys and Davies were both so on edge when Joff’s name came up, not to mention the urgency in Rhys’s voice when he pressed Dr. Ericksson for action. His inability to find Joff’s attacker or heal his injuries must be eating him alive.
Sounds familiar, I couldn’t help thinking. Not because it answered any of my questions about Rhys and my father’s death, but because Rhys was on a quest of his own, chasing any lead, no matter how tenuous, desperately searching for answers and clinging to the thinnest threads of hope. Just like me.
Maybe that was part of the connection I felt. And maybe one day I’d be able to tell him the truth about what had first brought me to his door, and he would understand.
Sure he will, said the voice in my head sarcastically. He’ll have no problem understanding that you lied to him from the very beginning, and that you only pretended to play his game to squeeze him for information. That is exactly the kind of thing he’ll understand.
The sun was already low in the sky, and as the light faded a gloom settled over me, bleak and unshakable. The coffee was ready, but I opened a bottle of wine instead and poured myself a glass.
There was no way to explain what I was doing, no strokes to paint a picture that would show Rhys why I’d done what I’d done. I had used him – I was using him – and that was something he would never understand or accept.
The truth was not an option. It was too ugly, I thought, pouring myself another glass of wine. Even if he ever wanted to see me again, lies were all we had, all we could ever have.
If he even wants to see you again. After all, he had women like Mrs. G throwing themselves at him every day. Women like Marina Essex-Jones.
I drained my glass and poured another before turning back to my laptop. It was a bad idea, I knew, but I’d been acting on so many bad ideas lately how could one more matter? My fingers were already clumsy with wine as I Googled Marina Essex-Jones.
I knew what I’d see – Val and I had done the same search when we first began gathering information on Rhys – but my heart still sank as the screen filled with images of the statuesque blonde, party pictures from the most exclusive benefits and galas on both sides of the Atlantic. Photo after photo showed her curves poured into gorgeous haute couture gowns, her finely drawn features and cool lilac-blue eyes. She was everything I wasn’t, and not just physically. Rich, aristocratic, assured.
I drank down the second glass of wine and refilled it before returning to Google. I was already torturing myself, and as my father had always said, “Better not to do anything by halves.” Now I typed in “Rhys Carlyle.” Immediately, I wished I hadn’t.
The first hit was a post from a gossip site and showed him leaving Agent Provocateur, the Soho lingerie store, with a shopping bag in hand. The post was only a few hours’ old.
“Who’s Rhys Romancing Now?” asked the headline, and there were already dozens of suggestions in the comments section, ranging from Hollywood starlets to professional tennis players and even a burlesque dancer with her own perfume line.
Which made it pretty clear I would not be hearing from him again. He’d undoubtedly be too busy with the voluptuous blonde he was buying lingerie for to even think about me.
I emptied the wine bottle into my glass and drank it down.
“It’s raining men!” sang my phone on Monday morning. “Hallelujah!” I groped for it blindly, cursing myself for having forgotten once again to change Val’s ringtone. It was bad enough under normal circumstances. This morning, after drinking an entire bottle of wine by myself, it could prove lethal.
“Please tell me you have a good reason for calling at the crack of dawn,” I said crossly
when I managed to answer the phone.
“With that sort of attitude, it’s not surprising Tuesday Granite is so much more popular than you are,” Val said dryly.
I pushed myself into a sitting position. I’d fallen asleep on the couch, fully dressed, the empty glass on the coffee table beside me. Now I had the vague sense I’d made a discovery the night before, but whatever it was had been washed away by the wine.
“Knock knock,” said Val. “Anyone home?”
I shook myself. “Sorry. I’m still half-asleep.”
“Well, you’d better get moving,” said Val. “Tuesday Granite has places to be and packages to open.”
It took a moment for that to sink in, but suddenly I was wide-awake. Exhilarated. The uncertainty that had plagued me all weekend vanished and the dark gloom with it. Rhys wanted to see me again.
“You mean—”
“That’s right. Do you want the note or the package first? I’m thinking the note.” Val didn’t wait for me to respond. “‘Today. Same time. Same place. Wear the blue ones.’”
“The blue ones—” I started to ask, but I was drowned out by a piercing squeal from Val’s end. I had to hold the phone away from my ear until it subsided. “Val? What is it?”
“I’ll let you find out about the blue ones yourself. I’m going to messenger this over to you. And tomorrow you and I are going to have a long, long chat about what’s going on with you and Rhys Carlyle because I seem to have missed out on some important details.”
Hearing Rhys’s full name aloud was enough to send my discovery of the previous night rushing back to me. Though it was more of a hunch than a discovery.
“I don’t know if that’s his real name,” I told Val now.
“What?” she cried in mock surprise. “Are you telling me I was right all along and his real name actually is Mr. Mysterio?”
I had to laugh. “No, but I think Rhys might have had a different name when he was younger.” I explained about my trip to Mamaroneck, and stumbling upon Joff Stewart. It took a while to get through it all since Val interrupted every few seconds to question my sanity, but I eventually got to the point. “That would explain why you couldn’t find anything about him in any of your databases before he turned twenty-one. Remember how you said it was like he just suddenly appeared, already a fully formed adult?”
“I think my exact words were more along the line of ‘an exceptionally hotly formed adult,’” said Val. “And now I have a feeling I know where this is going. So let’s cut to the chase. Yes, I will ask my guy in the firm’s London office to see if he can find anything on a Rhys Stewart. And yes, I am the most giving, loyal, brilliant, and beautiful friend and you are extremely fortunate to have me in your life.”
“I couldn’t have said it better myself,” I assured her.
The messenger arrived ninety minutes later. I barely let the door close behind him before ripping open the brown paper wrapping to reveal a thin black box. My chest went tight when I read the swirly pink writing stamped across the top. Agent Provocateur.
That was the lingerie shop Rhys had been photographed leaving. He hadn’t been shopping there for a Hollywood starlet or tennis champion or burlesque star. He’d been there for me. Me.
Inside were seven pairs of panties, made of gossamer silk in an array of colors – shell pink, pearl gray, and café au lait, emerald green and chocolaty brown, ruby, and finally a deep midnight blue. And each was embroidered with a single word in gold thread: “Tuesday.”
I ran a finger across the silk, smiling to myself.
I’d been given lingerie once before, in a big white box with a gaudy red bow. Inside had been—
Nothing like this, I told myself, purposely short-circuiting the memory. That was the past. Over. You were someone else then.
And now I was Tuesday Granite, I thought, staring at the gold embroidery. The idea brought with it a curious bittersweet sensation. Because it was a reminder that this was a game. All of it, just a game. Especially to Rhys. And it had to stay that way.
Which is better. Just because his meeting with Dr. Eriksson hadn’t been linked to my father’s invention, it didn’t mean Rhys was in the clear.
If only there were some way I could be completely sure, some way to prove Rhys had nothing to do with any of it.
I picked up the box and took it to my bedroom, pausing before the corkboard to examine each item yet again, searching in vain for an answer that had eluded me until now.
Finally my eyes landed on the phone bill that had started me down this path, with the mysterious calls to Rhys. Calls that continued up to the day my father died.
I froze. It had been right in front of me the whole time, literally staring me in the face. The solution was so simple I couldn’t believe I hadn’t seen it before. One question might be enough to eliminate Rhys as a suspect entirely.
And after that? challenged the voice in my head. What will be your excuse to see him then?
I hushed the voice and pulled the blue panties from the box.
Chapter Seventeen
I was in my own clothes again as I approached the Plaza – black leather jeans, a black sweater, and black ankle boots. Only the blue panties with their golden embroidery were new, the material cool and silky against my skin.
There was a low thrum of excitement coursing through me, and not only from the anticipation of seeing Rhys. It was possible I was only one question away from ruling out his involvement in my father’s death.
My dad had died on the evening of October 31st. Halloween. Which meant if Rhys had been somewhere else that night, anywhere else, he couldn’t have been responsible. All I had to do was find out where he’d been on Halloween – and then I could put any doubts about him to rest, once and for all.
I was around the corner from the Plaza’s entrance when my phone buzzed with a text from Val: “Feeling blue?”
I hit Reply. “In all the best—”
“Lucy?”
The voice seemed to come out of nowhere, freezing me in place. I wanted to run. Or better yet, rewind time, so I could have walked down another block, chosen another route. But it was too late to flee, or to take a different path. He was there, standing in front of me.
Sawyer.
He was as handsome as ever in his preppy boy-next-door kind of way. Sandy hair, hazel eyes that I knew looked green in certain lights, a strong jaw and rugby player’s physique.
“You look— wow,” he said, shaking his head. He smiled, the boyish smile that had disarmed me so many times. “Great,” he concluded. “No, not great – amazing. You look amazing.” The smile faded, replaced with concern. “Did you get my note? About your dad? I was so sorry when I heard.”
I bit my lip, not sure what to say. I remembered seeing his untidy scrawl on one of the many envelopes I’d received. I’d held it in my hand for a long moment, my index finger poised to open the flap, before throwing it away unopened. I cleared my throat. “I got it. Thanks.”
He gave an awkward shrug. “Yeah, well, I know how much your dad meant to you. How have you been? You know, otherwise.”
“Fine,” I said with a tight smile. I felt as though I’d been starched, stiff and unnatural. “You?”
“Great,” he said eagerly. “I’ve been sober five months now.”
“Congratulations.”
“Yeah.” He nodded, paused. “Why didn’t you answer any of my texts?”
I’d had a good reason, I knew – when we’d been together, he’d given me many good reasons – but now, with him standing there before me, handsome and mild-mannered, an unexpected wave of doubt washed over me. All of the hurt, all of the anger I’d felt – had I over-reacted?
The smile he gave me then was his warmest, his brightest, his most charming. “I miss you, Lucy. I miss us. Don’t you miss us?”
I felt myself slipping into the familiar pattern even as my body tensed. Say yes. Just agree with him. It will be easier. “It’s complicated,” I said instead.
&nbs
p; “It doesn’t have to be.” He reached for my hand and turned it over to examine my palm. His eyes returned to mine, searching. “Are you still having trouble playing?”
Without warning, my chest grew tight, my breathing shallow. His touch turned my stomach, made my skin feel clammy.
But maybe I was doing it again, over-reacting, He’s not a monster, I told myself, struggling to ignore the reactions of my body. Look at him. Look how sweet he’s being.
“Luce, what’s wrong?” he went on when I hesitated. “Talk to me. I know things between us didn’t end…ideally. But I thought we were still friends. You’ll always be my kitten.”
Kitten. I started to tremble. If I didn’t get out of there, away from him, I was going to be sick.
“Excuse me, I have to go.” I tried to pull my hand from his. “I’m— I’m late for an appointment.” I glanced at the solid respectable bulk of the Plaza behind him for reassurance.
He followed the direction of my gaze and his eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly. “An appointment? At a hotel in the middle of the day?” The boyish smile took on a mischievous twist. “Still a wildcat, I see.”
That word, from his lips, shattered my defenses. This time I couldn’t short-circuit the memory of that other lingerie box with its garish red bow.
The box had been a present from Sawyer, an apology after he’d gone missing for four days without warning or explanation. He’d sworn he’d stopped using, but by then I knew what his disappearances meant. I should have called his parents, but he’d told me I was the only one he could trust, that they were the reason he began experimenting with drugs in the first place. He’d begged me not to tell them, promised he could quit on his own. “One more chance,” he’d said. “Give me one more chance, kitten.”
