Thirteen Months Later
May applied a new layer of SPF 50, her third of the day. She was always serious about protecting her skin, but law school classes were starting in two weeks and it seemed obnoxious to show up with an obvious vacation tan. She tinkered with the floppy brim of her straw hat until it was just right and leaned back in her chaise longue, gazing out at the turquoise water between their beach and the lush, rolling hills of St. Barts.
“You guys, do you think I can convince the Anguillan government to open an American law school here? Maybe I could be the inaugural dean.”
“I’m in,” Lauren said. “I’ll teach music at the high school and get a standing gig crushing it at one of the resorts.”
On the other side of Lauren, Kelsey flipped another page of the trashy gossip magazine perched on the top of her cute little belly bump. “I’ll develop commercial real estate projects.” She took a loud sip of her virgin rum punch, which she derisively referred to as boo-juice because “no alcohol is boo.”
“No fair,” May said. “Your idea would actually work.”
May was the one who’d proposed the idea of another summer beach trip. Kelsey kept saying she was worried they were cursed, but May and Lauren finally convinced her that they needed to prove to themselves that they could go on a perfectly uneventful vacation. She and Kelsey initially balked when Lauren suggested a trip to the Caribbean in August, but apparently the first week of the month in Anguilla was known as Carnival, a celebration of Emancipation Day filled with parades, boat races, and live music.
It was only when they arrived on the island that it became clear Lauren was a known quantity there. She used first names with the resort staff and ran into someone she knew at the wine store. It turned out she and Thomas had been coming here at least once a year for more than a decade.
“How come you never talk about him with us?” May had asked. “He’s obviously important to you.”
“Because I see no reason to take up the valuable time of other women talking about a man unless I really need to talk about him. And part of why Thomas and I work is that he doesn’t do anything that makes me need to talk about him outside his presence.”
It made perfect sense. May, on the other hand, had taken up plenty of Lauren’s and Kelsey’s valuable time talking about Josh in the months after Nate had jumped from their terrace. Initially, they had opted to take back their deposit on the reception hall while it was still fully refundable—just to have one less thing to worry about in the aftermath of Nate’s death and the investigation that followed. Then she saw Josh’s laptop open to apartment rentals. He let her believe that it was because May felt queasy every time she had to walk past the terrace door, but by October, he had signed a lease for his own place on the Upper East Side.
She had gotten a message from Carter a few minutes ago asking if they could meet in the city for dinner the night after she got home. So far it wasn’t serious, which was exactly what she needed right now. She had been planning to tell Kelsey and Lauren, but decided there was no reason to. She’d talk about him with the Crew if the time ever came when she needed to.
Kelsey set her magazine aside and began scrolling through her phone. “You guys, good news. Luke’s murder case is finally officially closed. My lawyers convinced them to put out a statement saying that they have concluded that Nate was responsible and acted completely alone.”
The East Hampton police had done the same with David Smith’s murder last November, but they had the advantage of stronger evidence. When they tracked down the car that Nate had rented the day David Smith was shot, they conducted a thorough forensic search for DNA evidence. The car had been cleaned multiple times since the murder, but the search found a small amount of blood inside the hard plastic casing in which the driver’s-side seat belt retracted. It was a match for David Smith.
May had seen Kelsey a half dozen times in person over the last year. With each visit, she noticed Kelsey grow more comfortable saying Nate’s name. She was still in therapy, but the really bad days were behind her.
So far, they had managed to withhold the truth behind Nate’s motive for the murders. The recording from May’s apartment made it clear that he thought he had done it to help his sister, but so far everyone seemed to accept the explanation that he was protective of Kelsey because she was the Ellis who had continued to take care of him after their families divorced.
Explaining Nate’s reason for killing Marnie had been trickier. That day in May’s apartment, when Kelsey asked Nate if he did it because Marnie had overheard his “crazy talk,” he claimed that he had grabbed Marnie’s arm “to get her to understand why she couldn’t tell anyone.” Kelsey had wanted to tell the police the entire truth, even if it meant reliving the shame from what had transpired between her and Nate when they were children. May had persuaded her that she could give Marnie’s family closure without disclosing that piece of the story. Instead, Kelsey told the police that Nate’s “crazy talk” was an admission that he had been cheating on May and that Nate was scared that Marnie would run to May with her newly gleaned information. It was close enough to the truth.
May didn’t tell Kelsey, but the usual lookie-loos on the KillerInsights board were still convinced she was in on Luke’s and Dave’s murders with her brother, and nothing the police said was likely to change that. But some of the same people also believed in pizza places that were human trafficking hubs, that the moon landing was faked, and that 9/11 was an inside job. There was nothing Kelsey could do about it, so why did she even need to know?
“To new beginnings,” Kelsey said, raising her glass.
“To new beginnings.” Lauren and May joined in the toast.
The twins were due before Christmas.