“Someone’s trying to kill me,” Connor repeats when I don’t say anything for longer than is normal for me.
“Are you joking?”
“I most definitely am not joking.”
My brain is whirring. I was just thinking about killing him and someone’s beaten me to the punch? Is this God answering my prayers? No, no. I’m going to hell for even thinking that. And Connor’s still here, alive. So my prayers haven’t been answered.
Not yet.
“Why would someone want to kill you?”
“I would’ve thought that would be obvious,” Harper says under her breath, but, you know, not that quietly.
Connor ignores her, intent on me. “I don’t know why.”
“So why do you think someone’s trying to kill you, then?”
“It started a couple of weeks ago. At first, I thought it was an isolated incident, but now…”
“What isolated incident?”
“The brakes on my car gave out when I was driving in the Hills.”
He means the Hollywood Hills. He has a house up there paid for by yours truly.11 It’s nicer than my house, even though I’d never want to live that far away from the beach. He claims it was mostly paid for with his finder’s fee money,12 but he blew most of that at the baccarat tables in Monaco soon after he got it, so …
“The Citroën?”
And yes, he drives a baby blue Citroën from the 1960s because of course he does.
“Yes.” He takes off his fedora and runs his hand through his hair. Usually, he does that to draw attention to its thickness (his hair is pretty awesome), but today it comes across as a genuine nervous tic. “Thankfully, I realized the brakes were out when I was going uphill, so nothing bad happened. I was able to turn into a driveway and call Triple-A. The car’s old; I chalked it up to bad maintenance.”
“That sounds scary,” Harper says.
“It was.”
His voice is steady, but I recognize the tone—genuine fear.
Goddamn it.
“What did the garage say?” I ask.
“The brake-fluid hose clamp failed, which they said was likely due to the age of the car.”
I sigh slowly. “Is that it?”
“No. Yesterday, after the tour of the Vatican, someone pushed me into traffic. If it hadn’t been for a passerby who yanked me back at the last moment, I would’ve ended up under the wheels of one of those hop-on, hop-off buses full of bleeding tourists.”
I know it’s wrong, but I can’t help but smother a laugh. The image of impeccably dressed Connor being flattened under the wheels of a bus full of sightseers in fanny packs using selfie sticks, well … it’s not quite a cartoon, but it is cartoon adjacent.
“Where did this happen?”
“That main road into Vatican City.”
Harper and I had been on that road yesterday, too. The Via della Conciliazione is a beautiful cobblestoned boulevard lined with sandstone buildings that connects Vatican City with Rome. But it was also so thick with tourists that it was hard to breathe. I’d been jostled more times than I could count.
“Hmmm.” I click my tongue against the roof of my mouth. “Harper, let’s go.”
“Wait, I—”
But I don’t wait for him to say anything more. Instead, I grab Harper and haul her outside. Connor has some good qualities—even I can admit that—but his tendency to think everything is about him isn’t one of them.
I mean, who thinks being elbowed in a crowd equates to attempted murder? Connor Smith, that’s who.
And yes, I agree with Harper that if he were murdered, there’d be a long list of suspects. But just because someone’s a master at creating antipathy doesn’t mean that every almost-accident is a cover for something nefarious.
All this to say, I doubt very highly anyone’s trying to assassinate him.
Except for me, that is.
And that’s our little secret.
We step out of the church, and I immediately feel like I’m drowning in heat. Whoever thought it was a good idea to book a tour in Italy in July is a lunatic.13 But I’d said yes to it, hadn’t I? So maybe I’m the lunatic.
I mean, obviously.
“Can we get gelato now?” I ask Harper, clinging to the shadow cast by the church as I cover my eyes with a pair of oversized sunglasses.
“Don’t you want to find out what’s going on with Connor?”
I glance over my shoulder as he exits the church. He’s put his fedora back on, but his shoulders are still slumped like he has a slow leak.
“Do you?”
Harper shakes her head. “I vote for ice cream.”
“This is why I love you.”
“Also genetics.”
“True.”
She links her arm through mine and we march away from Connor. I don’t care if he follows us. I need to shake off the cognitive dissonance of the last five minutes.
Because what if someone did kill Connor?
That would be amazingly convenient.
Which is why it can’t be happening. Or maybe I’m magic. I’ve sometimes suspected as much. I know it sounds crazy, but sometimes I think something and then it happens. Okay, well, once.14 But still … 15
Sigh. This is all just magical thinking—the idea that I can make what I know needs to happen come true with my thoughts. It’s going to take more than that. A whole book, in fact. Can I do it? Incur the wrath of my “public” and my agent and my publisher and let him die in the next book?
If I did do it, I could kill him off in the first third, and then use the rest of the novel to introduce my new hero. No, heroine.
Yes. Good. My new main character will be a competent, trained woman. A police officer, maybe. The police officer brought in to solve Connor’s murder—
“El?” Harper says, tugging on my arm.
“Yeah?”
“You okay?”
“Hot, but why do you ask?”
“Because you were talking to yourself. It sounded like you said, ‘One quick blow to the head.’”
“Oh, sorry. Plotting.”
“I’ll never understand how you do that.”
“What?”
“Figure out plots when you can’t even pay your electric bill on time.”
I pull her closer. “Don’t be silly. You could do it if you wanted to.”
She stiffens. Shit. That wasn’t the right thing to say.
Harper was supposed to be the writer in the family, something she’d been planning since she was eight. Instead, I got a book deal, and she agreed to be my assistant for a six-month stint that never ended. Now her life is too much about me and she barely writes anymore.
I don’t know what to do about it. But the unspoken agreement between us is that we don’t speak about her writing, or her not writing.
We struck that bargain when I’d pushed her finally finished manuscript on my editor a couple of years ago and she’d politely declined to publish it. When I asked her why, she’d asked me if I’d read it. The truth was, I hadn’t. I was so certain Harper’s novel would be as brilliant as Harper, I hadn’t stopped to check.16
“I’m sorry, Harper, I didn’t—”
“It’s fine.”
“No, it isn’t.”
She pulls away. “It doesn’t matter.”
“We can ditch this stupid tour and go somewhere and talk.”
“Nope. Remember? After.”
“Okay, after.”
“Come on, it’s just over here.”
We round the corner onto a short, narrow street full of tiny shops and tourists. There are old cobblestones under our feet, and the storefronts are a colorful mix of reds and blues. It’s a nice respite from the busy street behind us, and whatever bullshit Connor’s spinning.
The gelato shop is, miraculously, free of the usual long line, and we step inside. The young, hot guy behind the counter coos over Harper, like all men do, and I try not to let it bother me.17 It’s no coincidence, though, that the two men I’ve been in love with met me without her present.
Anyway, she doesn’t give the gelato guy her number when he asks for it, just picks up our order—lemon for me and chocolate for her.
I want to linger in the cool air and stare at the vibrant colors of the massive vats of gelato, but Harper pulls me outside because we need to meet our tour guide in ten minutes.
Once we’re on the street again, I take a slow bite of lemon-flavored creaminess while the hot wind blows on my face. I close my eyes in pleasure, savoring the cool feeling in my mouth.
By the time I leave this trip, I’m going to be equal parts gelato and Aperol spritz.18
Speaking of which: “Is there time for a drink before the tour?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Damn it.”
Harper grins at me before a storm cloud passes over her face. I sense Connor’s presence behind me, like how the air changes before it rains.
“I need your help, Eleanor,” Connor says.
I turn around slowly, but not slowly enough. He’s standing so close to me that my elbow catches on his arm and my cup of gelato pops out of my hand and falls to the ground. Its contents spread across the cobblestones, immediately melting like butter in a hot frying pan.
If I murder Connor in revenge for killing my ice cream, would that be considered justifiable homicide?
“Sorry about that, El.” Something in his tone is different—less sure of himself, less cocky. Like his voice in the church, it reminds me of the Connor I used to know.
“Suppose it’s true. What do you want me to do about it?”
“Help me figure out what’s happening. Like the old days. You remember.”
I shudder despite the heat. That’s the problem. I do remember. Too much of it.
“Your brakes failed on an old car, and you got jostled in traffic. That’s a pretty thin plot.”
He nods slowly. “It’s all true, though.”
“What aren’t you telling me?”
He takes his fedora off and holds it between his hands. “I’m not certain I can say.” His voice is full of emotion and—
Oh good God, no. No, no, no. I am not going to feel sorry for Connor Smith.
“If you want my help, you’re going to have to tell me everything.”
He glances at Harper. She stares back, eating her gelato slowly.
“Harper’s part of the equation,” I say. “You tell me, you tell her.”
“And I have your promise that you’ll keep whatever I say confidential?”
“If someone is trying to kill you, we might have to involve the police—”
“No. No police.”
This is what I get for plotting a murder in a church. And shit. I forgot to put money in the offering box. I’m being punished—this is the penance Mr. Texas Priest forgot to mete out.19
“Okay, no police for now,” I say. “Spill.”
He works his jaw and then opens his mouth to speak, but before he can get the words out, the air is filled with a Pop! Pop! Pop!
“Get down!” he shouts, dragging me to the ground with him. He covers my body with his, half suffocating me into the cobblestones.
And now I know I’m not just being punished; I’m in hell.
Because only the devil could come up with an ending for me like this.