Lauren took the liberty of switching the pool speaker to her favorite “yard party” playlist as a break from the reggae Nate had been streaming nonstop for the past two days. Nate had volunteered to make a grocery run for their dinner provisions, and Kelsey was reading a Megan Abbott novel on the chaise longue next to hers. As “Lovely Day” by Bill Withers came over the speaker, Lauren tried to gauge if Kelsey’s eyes were actually scanning the pages. She could tell that Kelsey was struggling to cope with David’s death and all the questions it raised.
Lauren moved from the playlist on her screen back to the daily bee, knowing that Kelsey would appreciate the distraction. Nate had chipped in with a few hard-to-find compounds, and now she and Kelsey were missing only two words. They had cheated by looking at the hints and knew that both missing words started with b. One was a musical instrument and the other was related to bacteria, but they were hopelessly stuck.
“Have you found them for us yet?” Kelsey asked, resting her book open against her flat belly.
“No, and it’s driving me batty. I’m certain we’ve had these words before—multiple times—but we never remember them.”
“You know who probably has them, don’t you? She always gets the science words, and I distinctly remember her knowing about a certain kind of musical instrument that not even you had heard of.”
May had texted Lauren this morning to offer another apology, but Lauren wasn’t ready to accept it. I never meant to hurt you. I thought you were being taken advantage of and was trying to help. Lauren knew her relationship with Thomas was complicated and unconventional, but she had never questioned her own voluntary participation in it until the Me Too movement made it clear to her that modern notions of consent were different than the ones she had always accepted.
May was only nine years younger than her, but even that age gap was enough to explain why May would simply assume that the dynamics of wealth and power would make Lauren a victim in any sexual relationship with Thomas. But when those conversations became omnipresent after the Weinstein stories opened the floodgates, Lauren had replayed her entire relationship with Thomas and still saw it for what it was—two people who loved each other without needing the confines of traditional monogamy. And it wasn’t May’s place in 2008 as a twenty-two-year-old busybody to question the decisions of a grown woman with agency.
She did have to admit that May’s text reply of best wishes, warmest regards after Lauren wished her well had made her laugh. May was always trying to be the nice girl, but someday she’d realize that the people closest to her loved her for the other parts, including her inner snark.
“Okay, I’m giving up,” she announced. She pulled up the Canceled Crew group thread and searched for bacteria and then musical instrument. “Got them both. Sure enough, May was the one who found these same words five months ago.”
“Just tell me. I’ll never get them.”
“Bacilli and balalaika. Seriously, how does that girl know these things?”
When she looked up from her phone, Kelsey was studying her with a puzzled expression. “You’re really not going to talk to her again?”
“I honestly don’t know.”
“She’s not the only one who was keeping that information from you,” Kelsey said. “I also could have told you.”
“But only if you betrayed your best friend. It’s not the same.”
“We were just kids, and it was before Marnie died and the three of us got closer to each other. You never would have known except she pissed me off and I acted like an asshole.”
“She was out of college, on her way to law school. That’s a grown-ass woman. And honestly? Has she even changed? We call her the ‘little sheriff’ for a reason. There’s a self-righteousness that borders on the edge of sanctimony. I think deep down, May is a really angry person.”
“May?” Kelsey said, shaking her head with a chuckle. “Who apologizes twenty times a day? I think I’ve seen her mad, like, three times in our whole lives.”
“Well, she was running red-hot at you the other night.”
“I can’t really blame her. I dragged you all into this mess with Dave.”
“No, I’m telling you. She’s been pressured her whole life—by her mom, by society—to be a smart, perfect, docile little girl. She hates it. That incident on the subway platform might have been the tip of the iceberg. One of these days, she might completely lose it. Like Celie in The Color Purple with a knife to Danny Glover on Thanksgiving.” Lauren made an explosion sound with the accompanying boom hand gesture. “Speak of the devil.”
A new text message from May. Hey, I know I’m not your favorite person right now, but I just got an email from a Long Island reporter named Tamara Linton asking about Kelsey, and I think it has something to do with this. Thought you should know because if I’m right, she’ll probably contact you too. And not that you want my advice, but I would at least keep an open mind about what else Kelsey might be hiding.
The text was followed by two screenshots from some message board called KillerInsights. The conversation thread made clear that someone knew that the police were looking at Kelsey as the common link between David Smith and Kelsey’s husband. May and Lauren had both been named as the friends who were in the Hamptons with her.
She checked her email and found a recent message from the same reporter.
“I think you need to see this,” she said, switching her screen back to the message from May. She scrolled past the part about doubting Kelsey’s innocence to show the two screenshots from the KillerInsights message board.
As she read, Kelsey chewed at her lower lip so hard that Lauren was afraid she might draw blood. “And a reporter from Newsday emailed both May and me asking about you.”
She was shaking her head as she returned Lauren’s phone. “I can’t believe this is happening again. Why in the world would I hurt Dave? We were on the verge of getting back together. He was going to be my future. Now that’s all gone and they think I would do that not only to him but to myself?” Kelsey was practically yelling by the time she was finished.
“It’s going to be okay, sweetie.” Lauren reached over and gave Kelsey’s hand a reassuring squeeze. “They can’t prove something that didn’t happen.”
“Tell that to all the people who rotted in jail after wrongful convictions.”
“Oh, but they weren’t pretty rich white girls like you,” Lauren said with a straight face.
“Okay, that was funny.”
“I aim to please.”
“God, Lauren, I’m so sorry you’re getting dragged into this. What that person said about you online is disgusting. That actually does make me want to kill someone.”
“Don’t worry about me,” she said. “My skin might be gorgeous, but it’s calloused where it matters.”
Despite her words, Lauren was worried about the potential blowback. She was certain a couple of those biddies on the symphony board had Google alerts at the ready, searching for a reason to get rid of her without making it about their buddy, Jessica. In her letter, Jessica had portrayed herself as a victimized woman shocked by her husband’s tawdry infidelity, but her arrangement with Thomas predated Lauren. Jessica only got resentful about it when the woman Thomas had chosen for his long-term unconventional relationship was Lauren instead of some Twinkie. Lauren knew for a fact that Jessica had been seeing her current gentleman friend for the last seven years and was on Xanax and Ketel One martinis when she’d written that email to her friend trying to get Lauren fired.
She turned her head at the sound of a car pulling into the driveway. She hoped Nate had followed her shopping instructions. She was cooking her famous enchiladas with chili con carne and green rice tonight, and she wasn’t sure she trusted a bachelor to know a corn tortilla from flour, cilantro from parsley, or a poblano from a jalapeño.
She was rising to her feet when she heard another car engine and then the distinct sounds of car doors opening and closing. She turned down the music on the speaker and exchanged a glance with Kelsey. Something wasn’t right. The knocking on the front door quickly escalated into pounding.
It wasn’t until she was opening the door that she made out the words. “Police, open up!”
Detective Carter Decker was flanked on each side by two uniformed officers. The folksy just-have-a-few-questions demeanor from two nights ago was gone.
“Who else is on the premises?” he asked.
“No one,” Lauren said.
“My brother will be back soon though,” Kelsey added.
The detective nodded toward the uniformed officers, who swept past them and began moving quickly through the house. Lauren wondered why the detective hadn’t asked about May. Was it possible he knew she had returned to the city?
“Kelsey Ellis, we have a search warrant for this house, your vehicle, your telephone, and any other electronic devices that might contain evidence of your communication with David Smith. Turn around and place your hands behind your back.”
Kelsey looked to Lauren in panic.
“You can’t possibly—”
“Ma’am,” Decker said to Lauren sharply, “you need to step outside to the front yard until this matter is handled. Now!”
As she walked away she heard the detective tell Kelsey she was under arrest for falsely reporting an incident in the third degree and obstructing governmental administration in the second degree. She repeated the words over and over again in her head so she wouldn’t forget them. As soon as she could get her phone from the back deck, she’d text them to herself. A lawyer would want to know the charges.
Decker was escorting Kelsey toward a patrol car in the driveway. The sight of her in handcuffs felt surreal. Kelsey’s eyes pleaded with Lauren silently as she passed. “I’m going to call your father, okay? We’ll get you a lawyer. Stay strong.”
She tried to tell herself that it could be worse. At least they weren’t charging her with murder.
Lauren spotted Kelsey’s little Audi accelerating toward the house. It screeched to a stop in front of the driveway, and Nate sprang from the driver’s seat toward the commotion. “What’s going on? What are you doing to her?”
Decker held up a hand to halt Nate’s movement and guided Kelsey into the patrol car’s backseat. “Slow your roll and back up, sir, or we’re going to have a problem.”
Kelsey had vowed to always take care of Nate since her father had turned his back on him. His mother was still alive, but in light of the rapid progression of her Alzheimer’s disease, Kelsey was in some ways the only family he had left. Lauren could see now that the loyalty was mutual. Nate looked ready to charge at the police car if necessary.
“She’s my sister,” he yelled.
“And that doesn’t give you the right to interfere with a lawful arrest.”
“Arrest? For what?”
“I’m going to ask you one more time before you end up next to her in cuffs. Back. Up.”
Nate’s shoulders sagged as he stepped away as instructed.
“I left copies of our warrants on the front porch so you’ll see the two charges listed there. We’ll be transporting her to the East Hampton Town police station, and she’ll be arraigned tomorrow at two p.m. at the Justice Court behind town hall. Now I’m going to need you to move that car.”
Lauren could see that Nate was assessing his choices, but there were none. As soon as he’d inched the Audi forward the necessary distance, Decker rapped his knuckles two times on the patrol car’s passenger window and stepped away.
Lauren tried to give Kelsey one more reassuring look as the car backed up, but her head was slumped forward, her shoulders trembling. She watched as the patrol car got smaller and smaller until it reached the curve at the end of the road near the bay. And then Kelsey was gone.