“Oh, is it? Well, while I’m being overdramatic, let me go ahead and tell you this: you need to find a new maid of honor because there’s no way in hell I’m letting her anywhere near the wedding.”

  Chloe set her glass of water down and did her best to let her tremors of anger subside. They’d only ever had two serious arguments—a third one currently progressing before her very eyes—but on each of those occasions, she had to remind herself that she was not in a class or interning on a case. She could not grill him in the same way she had sometimes grilled people as part of her training.

  “Steven, I’m afraid you have no say in that. She’s my sister. She will be my maid of honor. You have no say in it. And neither do your overprotective parents.”

  “I think they should,” he said. “They are, after all, footing the bill.”

  Chloe drew in a sharp breath, taking it in as an attempt to keep any harsh words from coming out of her mouth. In the end, she simply picked up the glass of water with her left hand and then showed Steven the middle finger of her right hand. She stormed out of the kitchen and to the back deck. She slammed the door behind her, almost hoping she might break something inside in the process.

  She sat down in one of their deck chairs beneath the decorative patio umbrella. As she seethed, she could hear the commotion of the block party on all sides—the murmur of conversation and the occasional outburst of muffled laughter.

  Probably talking about how crazy the new family in the neighborhood is, she thought. Probably laughing about the fight between Steven and Martin.

  “Screw ’em,” she said quietly to herself.

  But even as she said that, trying to pretend that she did not care, there was one moment from the event that stuck out in her mind. It was that thin and nearly sinister little smile she had caught on Danielle’s face.

  It was somehow worse than the blank and distant expression she had gotten used to during their teenage years.

  Something dark and a little evil seemed to be lurking behind that smile—as if she had enjoyed the fact that Steven and Martin were fighting. As if she had enjoyed the idea of causing chaos in the midst of such a perfect little suburban paradise.

  Chloe tried to get the image out of her head but it went nowhere. Instead, she found herself picturing that smile looking out into a crowd from her position as a maid of honor in several weeks.

  It was not a pretty picture.

  She let out a deep sigh as she sank into the chair. She was going to have to talk to Danielle. She was going to have to find out what had been going on in the years since they had last actually spoken and hope the sister she had once known wasn’t too far gone.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Danielle stared out the window of Martin’s car, hating the fact that she felt like an angry child giving her parents the silent treatment. She wanted to ask Martin what had driven him to be so obnoxious at Chloe’s house and during the block party. He’d always been a little irritating but never to that level. She also didn’t ask him because she was pretty sure she knew. He’d acted that way for the same reason Danielle had found it difficult to look Chloe in the eye—for the same reason she always seemed to shrink inside of herself when she was around Steven.

  It was because they had stepped into another world today. It was a world they told themselves they hated, a world they didn’t need and did not care for. But truth be told, it was a world that Danielle had always dreamed for herself. She was making decent money as a bartender—it all came in the form of tips after eleven o’clock at night, really—and she spent very little money. She knew that one day, if she kept up with such practices, she would be able to afford her own house—maybe not in a neighborhood like Lavender Hills, but something much nicer than her one-bedroom apartment.

  While Martin had never come out and said as much, she knew he had similar feelings. Yet today was the first time she’d ever actually seen him in such an environment. Needless to say, it had not gone well.

  “That Steven guy is an asshole,” Martin said as they neared her apartment. “A little pretentious, don’t you think?”

  “Yeah, I think that’s safe to say.” It wasn’t a lie, as she had never really cared much for Steven anyway.

  “He didn’t like me, right from the start,” Martin said. “It was obvious.”

  “That might be true,” Danielle said. “But did you really have to make such smart-ass comments?”

  “Hey, the one thing I said that set him off, I whispered to you. It’s not my fault he heard. What was he doing? Eavesdropping? Just waiting for me to say one thing wrong so he could go off on me in front of all of his snotty new neighbors?”

  “I don’t know,” Danielle said. “But I have to be honest with you. I didn’t peg you as one of these guys who had to resort to name-calling and fist fights when something doesn’t go your way. At the end of the day…you threw the first punch.”

  “So sorry to disappoint you,” he said.

  He slammed his hand down on the steering wheel.

  “What is it?” she asked. She wasn’t scared of his little mood swings. If anything, she found it entertaining. She could easily remember him getting upset with her the other night, so upset that he had pushed her down on the couch and bruised her arm. But if he did that sort of shit again, she’d be ready…and he’d be sorry.

  “Nothing. The gas light is on. We’re almost out of gas.”

  Danielle said nothing. She just looked out the window, wondering how it was that when Martin got angry about something, it fed into everything else about that day—even something as trivial as needing to put gas in the car.

  He pulled the car into the next gas station they came to. He had a set expression on his face as he opened the door and stalked his way to the pumps, as if he thought the world was out to get him today. Danielle had never seen him in this sort of a funk and it made her feel like an idiot for thinking he might be this perfect man.

  It brought to mind just how protective he had been about his phone the other night. Sure, he told her later that it had just been something concerning work. But why hadn’t he said something then, when she was trying to be funny about it?

  She looked down at the console and saw his phone. She’d spied him earlier putting his code in on the lock screen, so she knew how to get in.

  She took a glance out the window and saw that he was zoned out, staring across the street while the gas pumped.

  To hell with it, she thought.

  She grabbed the phone and quickly punched in the four-digit code. The phone unlocked and she instantly went to his messages. She scrolled through, looking for texts from a couple of days ago. There were texts from her and there were texts from work. There were also messages from one of his weirdo friends but then, a few messages down, messages from a number he had not saved—the ID showed only a number and not a name.

  She opened it and looked back to see if he was still zoned out. He was. She had a few seconds, at least until the click of the pump when the tank was filled.

  Within the first two messages, she knew what she had found. And although she knew there was only venom ahead, she kept reading anyway. It was a simple back-and-forth between Martin and, Danielle assumed, a very needy and exploitive woman. The woman started the conversation.

  Her: When you coming back by? It’s been 3 days. Can’t wait much longer. A girl has needs, you know…

  Him: Oh I know. And I plan to meet them. Tomorrow, ok?

  Her: You promise?

  Him: Yes.

  Her: Good. I’m already wet just thinking about it. You can’t even imagine the things I’m going to do to you…

  Him: Oh, I can imagine plenty. Feel free to send me your ideas and suggestions.

  And boy, did she. Danielle would have blushed at some of what she was reading if she hadn’t been so irate. At least now I know why he’s always so hesitant to be physical with me, she thought. It’s because he’s got some other woman’s smell on him.

  Behind her, she heard the click of the pump. With shaking hands, she closed out of the message thread, pushed the button to put the phone to sleep, and placed it back in the console. She did it all with plenty of time to spare, as Martin didn’t open the door for another five seconds.

  She wanted to tell him right then and there. To tell him she knew about the other woman and about all of the very descriptive things she wanted to do to him—had probably already done to him, in fact.

  But she stayed quiet. She wanted to see just how far he might take it. Maybe the ridiculous fight at the block party was going to uncover some part of him she had not seen yet.

  She turned her head away from him as he pulled the car out of the gas station parking lot. As he started down the road, Danielle began to think long and hard about some things. Slowly, a smile crept to her lips and she wasn’t even aware of it.

  If Chloe had seen it, however, she would have recognized it right away.

  But Chloe wouldn’t have known what it meant…why the smile was there.

  Think you’re getting one over on me, do you? she thought, still refusing to look at him. Let’s just see how that works out for you.

  And then her mind wandered. It veered and stretched and eventually reached into a place she had not allowed herself to visit in a very long time.

  A dark place.

  A place she always thought she had left behind but which was always waiting there for her whenever there seemed to be no place else to go.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  As hard as she tried, Chloe could not get the image of Danielle’s sinister little smile out of her mind. Something about it gnawed at her, an itch she could not scratch. She wrestled with it on Sunday and it occupied her mind while she and Steven sat around the house, avoiding one another. She could tell Steven was starting to feel ashamed of his actions at the block party but was not quite ready to own his part of it.

  Still stumped by why Danielle’s nearly passive smile continued to bother her, Chloe started to become aware that there was something there—something that smile seemed to be dragging up from the past. That’s why Chloe wasted no time on Monday morning; she called Dr. Skinner’s office as soon as she could. She was able to schedule an appointment for one o’clock that afternoon.

  As the hour approached, Chloe started to wonder if she had somehow been lying to herself about her past—particularly about what had happened with her mother. She had been young and even the shrinks she had seen as a young girl had indicated that such a trauma might never truly be peeled all the way back. It was an idea that was heavy on her heart as she finally stepped into Skinner’s office that afternoon.

  “You told my receptionist that you had an eventful weekend,” Skinner said. “Care to tell me about it?”

  She did, with great embarrassment. But getting it out and speaking to someone other than Steven about it was quite helpful. She ended the summary with seeing the devious smile on Danielle’s face and how it had seemed to trigger something within her.

  “Do you think she simply enjoyed seeing Steven being confronted in front of your new neighbors?” Skinner suggested.

  “I honestly don’t know,” she said. “But the more I thought about it over the weekend, the more I started to think about the day my mother died—about the very scene I walked you through last week. I was wondering if there might be something more there, some memory that might still be muddy.”

  “And you were hoping I could help to clear it up…if, that is, there is anything at all to be cleared up at all?”

  “Yes, that’s my hope.”

  “Well, we can certainly give it a try if you are willing,” Skinner said. “The last time we attempted it, you seemed very flustered near the end. It’s one of the reasons I stopped the session when I did. Are you sure you’d like to try it again?”

  She almost said no. She felt like she was expecting some magic trick, for Skinner to reach inside of her head and pluck out the very thing she was looking for. It made her feel naïve and helpless. But before she could utter an answer either way, Skinner seemed to have made the decision for her.

  “As you recall,” he said, “I need you to make sure you are absolutely comfortable where you are sitting. And that means doing your best to rid your mind of any expectations…of any hopes or doubts. Can you do that?”

  She pressed in against the chair, closed her eyes, and was reminded of just how comfortable it was. She also knew that he was going to ask her to concentrate on her breathing, to make sure that every part of her body was relaxed. She did all of that, hearing his voice but not paying much attention to it. She was trying to wipe her mind clear, to forget about the fight at the block party, about Danielle’s smile…

  “Do you remember the shoes?” Skinner asked. “The Chuck Taylors?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can you still see those laces? The big looping ones?”

  She could. And they were exceptionally clear. She could even see the dirt and grime on them.

  “Are you back out there on the stoop to the apartment building?” Skinner asked.

  She nodded. She was finding it hard to speak. She was intently focused on her shoelaces. Even before Skinner asked her to do so, she stood up, watching the loops on the tied laces shift. “I’m going back inside,” she said.

  “Good, good. Now this time, though, I need you to try to look beyond your mother’s body and the blood. I know it will be hard, but I need you to try. Instead, I want you to give all of your attention to Danielle. Do you think you can do that for me?”

  She nodded, understanding that she found speaking difficult because going back to that moment in time had happened incredibly fast this time. She felt dizzy, only in no way she had ever experienced before.

  She watched her shoes move up the stairs, into the building, and then to their apartment. She heard her father inside, screaming—he was on the phone, she knew, speaking to someone with 911. But she ignored it as well as she could. As Skinner had asked, she even looked past the shape of her mother’s body on the floor. Nope…just the shoelaces, tied loosely and matted with dirt in places.

  And then there was Danielle.

  “Okay, I’m here,” she told Skinner in a sleepy voice. “I see Danielle. She’s standing over Mom’s body.”

  “Do you see her as she was that day?” Skinner asked.

  “Yes.”

  Blood on her clothes. A vacant look in her eyes as she stared down at their mother. Yes, this was a ten-year-old version of Danielle for sure.

  “Okay, so now I want you to look away from those shoelaces and focus on her. Don’t concentrate too hard. Just look at her and wait for it. See if something comes to you.”

  “It’s…no, it’s not here. Not now. It’s something later…after the cops came. We were in the back of our grandmother’s car.”

  “Can you see that car?” Skinner asked. “Can you see your sister in that c—”

  The scene switched right away. She was no longer standing at the foot of the stairs by the motionless shape of her mother. She was sitting in the back seat of her grandmother’s car. She and Danielle were huddled together. It was the first time Danielle had showed any real emotion. She was crying, but just barely.

  Oh my God, I forgot about this, Chloe thought. How did I….

  “It wasn’t him,” Danielle said. “It wasn’t Daddy. He didn’t do this. I know it wasn’t him.”

  From the front seat, their grandmother let out a little moan of sadness.

  And it was that noise from the past that seemed to pull Chloe straight out of the memory. She opened her eyes and let out a short, jerky breath. She looked around the office, her eyes finally settling on Dr. Skinner.

  “You okay?” Skinner asked.

  “Yeah. I…I don’t know how I forgot about that.”

  “Was it the answer you were looking for?”

  She thought of Danielle’s face in the back of their grandmother’s car. There had been genuine sorrow there, real tears and a legitimate expression of grief. While it wasn’t what she had been expecting, it seemed to open a few doors that had been closed for quite a while.

  “I don’t know,” she answered honestly.

  “Well, while we’re here, why don’t you tell me how your internship is going?” Skinner asked.

  At first, she did it only because he’d asked—purely out of obligation and nothing more. But after a minute or so, she found that the distraction was a welcome one. She’d been so preoccupied with Steven and Danielle that she’d nearly forgotten the true center of her life—interning to become a field agent.

  She spent the next half hour talking about the internship as well as what she planned to accomplish over the course of her career. And while it did indeed feel great to start looking into her future and seeing how it was coming into shape, she was also fully aware that it was her past that had helped to form the woman she was right now.

  ***

  She got a text as she was walking out to her car. She checked it, assuming it would be Agent Greene, but did not recognize the number that popped up on her display. The message itself, though, clued her in.

  Hey, it’s Kathleen. Sorry I didn’t get a chance to see you Saturday. Heard about what happened. Sorry to hear it. Hope all is well. Anywho…I’m going out with some ladies from the neighborhood tonight for drinks. Ruthanne Carwile will be there, too. We’d love for you to come. Want you to see that one unfortunate event does not blacklist you! LOL.

  At first, Chloe was a bit insulted by it. But she also knew just how easy it was to misread tone and voice in a text message. Based on what she had seen from Kathleen—the overenthusiasm and cheer—she didn’t think her old high school friend would invite her out just to belittle her.

  And besides, she sure could use a drink.

  She thought of the way the crowd had gathered around Steven and Martin as they had fought. She easily recalled the expressions—some laughing, some hiding their heads as if they were too good to witness such a thing. And then, of course, there had been Danielle, detached and smiling.

 

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