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Thanks for ratting me out to Connor. Now he wants to take a step back from our friendship because he isn’t sure he trusts me. I wish you would’ve given me a chance, Ivy. I thought we could be friends. I text Ivy the next morning before I curl my hair at my vanity mirror. I’m ready for this drama to end so I can continue the investigation without any more hiccups.
I research Allegra online for what seems like the millionth time, looking for any shred of evidence that she might have had a darker side, but come up empty-handed again. She was every publicist’s dream author: Attractive, witty, encouraging, smart, social media savvy, and engaged in nothing questionable or controversial—minus the QVC incident. Everything appeared ideal.
After coming up with nothing, I make the mistake of googling the most recent pictures of Allegra, whose movie-star good looks make me notice my flaws all the more. I’ve got a good twenty pounds on her skinny ass, even though I’m on the smallish side. Her slender nose makes mine look too wide, especially when I smile. Her icy-blond hair makes my dirty-blond locks look, well, dirty. So I try to step up my game by spending more time on my hair and makeup, especially since Graham spent the night at Mom’s, and I have extra time for prep.
I really am sorry I hurt you. It’s for the best. He’s not ready for whatever you guys are, and it would only hinder you from finding out the truth about Allegra. I had to be sure you were telling me the truth about not being in a relationship before Allegra passed. Now that I feel like you were probably telling the truth all along, maybe we can start over? I don’t guess Connor would be so upset with you if you really hadn’t tested him. And you wouldn’t have tested him if you’d already been in a relationship.
Ivy has texted me back quickly. She’s taken the bait, hook, line, and sinker. I know why she’s done what she’s done, but I still can’t get over my overwhelming sense of betrayal.
Maybe I’ll give Mayven Bennett another visit to see what I can find out from the Queen Bee of Sequoyah Hills herself. Lord knows if there’s anyone who has all the dirt on Ivy, it’s Mayven.
I’ll still be in touch with you and Connor regarding my investigation. As for being friends... That, I’ll have to think about. I write her back before misting my hair with flexible-hold hairspray.
I get that. And I’m truly sorry you got hurt.
Despite her reply, I’m still not sure what I think about her, even when the haze of my anger clears.
I feel a smidge better about my appearance after I’ve contoured my nose, cheekbones, and jawline. It helps chisel my face, but I would have to get a nose job, lose twenty pounds, and brighten my shade of blond about four levels to come anywhere close to measuring up to Allegra. I shrug in the mirror, giving up. I wonder what Connor thinks when he looks at me. There must be something he likes. Maybe he simply likes how Allegra and I are different.
***
THIRTY MINUTES LATER, a woeful song plays on the radio as I steer my way toward Mayven’s house. I instantly recognize the tune as one of the tracks on the melancholy album I tortured myself with for months after Clayton died. The playlist was full of love songs I cruelly used to inflict a deeper level of suffering upon myself. The self-torment made me feel better, like I’d gotten what I deserved—more pain. But now, the brutality of the song makes my throat tighten, my head throb, and my stomach knot up. An intense headache appears, and I pull over at the park in Sequoyah Hills, where I leave my car and spill over into the grassy knoll to catch my breath.
Like a truckload of bricks falling on sheets of glass, haunting images fill my mind. Every once in a while, random triggers hit me like this, and there’s nothing I can do about them except relive the harrowing scenes that play out in my head.
I see myself at twenty-one, married and with Clayton at our apartment. We’d planned to go to his aunt’s lake house that weekend and use the new kayaks we’d bought for our one-year anniversary. But I’d come down with a horrible stomach bug. Clayton wanted to stay and take care of me, but I urged him to go on to the lake house—so he wouldn’t get the virus himself. My anxiety over sickness runs deep, and I hated the thought of him puking his guts up.
“I’ll be fine. I have plenty of Sprite, crackers, and full access to the bathroom.” I weakly laugh. “Really. Go on, babe.” I shoo him away as I try not to gag. “You do not want to get this! It’s a bad one. The last thing I want is us passing it back and forth over and over again.”
“Are you sure? I feel terrible leaving you this way.” Clayton walks toward me and feels my head. “You don’t have a fever. I may not even catch it. Could be food poisoning.”
“We ate the same thing for dinner and lunch, babe. It’s a virus, for sure.” I’m certain I’m right. “Really, go on. It’s probably one of those twenty-four-hour things. I’ll see you when I feel good as new tomorrow. Just don’t go out on the lake kayaking alone. They say it can be dangerous,” I beg him before he goes. He’s always had daredevil tendencies.
“All right, babe. I’ll go. Just take care of yourself and promise you’ll call me if you need anything. I’ll only be about forty minutes away, okay?” He gathers his bags.
I make him a deal. “I’ll call if I need you to come back, as long as you don’t go out there by yourself.”
“All right, babe. I love you,” he declares one last time before he opens the door and leaves my life forever.
“Love you too,” I answer, not knowing he would get up early the next morning for a workout in his kayak all alone, just like I’d asked him not to do. A workout where he would flip upside down and get trapped inside his kayak until the lake water slowly filled his perfect lungs. Before he hit the water that day, those lungs had had plenty of years left in them to breathe in and out with me and the child we didn’t yet know was in my belly.
That was the Graham Cracker he’d never have the chance to know, the one who would look like Clay’s little twin and who would also be too adventurous for my liking—just like his daddy. Clay would never walk through the door to kiss me, bring our baby home from the hospital with me, or sigh at the end of a mundane workday and say, “Honey, I’m home. What’s for dinner?” He would never walk through the door to love me—ever again.
I’m sitting on the near-frozen grass with my head in my hands, close to hyperventilating from my own breathless sobs and mumbled words. The keys are still in the ignition, and my car beeps incessantly, though I barely hear it. Someone’s voice is muffled by my cries, then I see Connor’s face in front of mine.
“Is it Clayton? Did you say Clayton, Madeleine?” I read his lips and nod as he throws his coat on top of me. He sits in the grass next to me, pulls me to him, and rubs my back as I weep.
I cry, knowing I was to blame for Clay’s death and that Connor will surely think I’m an awful person. “I shouldn’t have let him go. I knew he would go out on the water. I knew it. He never listened to me about stuff like that. I should’ve been there, or I shouldn’t have let him go.”
“It wasn’t your fault. You couldn’t look after him every second of every day. He was a grown man. He knew there was some risk involved in going out there on the water alone. Don’t put that kind of pressure on yourself. He made a choice. A choice that unfortunately ended very badly. It’s no one’s fault. It just happened.” Connor wipes my tears away with his thumbs.
I cease crying and stare at him with narrowed eyes. “I never told you exactly how he died, though. How did you know?”
Connor sighs. “I tried to tell you. I’ve heard the story before. I know it quite well, actually. We have a mutual friend, Clayton and me.”
“Yeah, you did say that. Who is it?” I ask as I try to calm myself.
Connor looks at the grass in front of me. “Allegra.”
“Allegra? How in the world did she know Clayton?” Confused, I cry again.
Connor pats my hair. “I think they went to the same school or something.”
“The same school as Clay and me? She was forty, and Clayton would only be twenty-five, like me now. That doesn’t make any sense.” I rub the base of my neck.
Connor explains, “Well, you can go to the same school and be different ages, you know? They knew of each other.”
“Yeah, I guess.” I’m too exhausted to question it further. It doesn’t really matter how Allegra heard about it. She heard, one way or another.
“Were you coming by to see me?” Connor asks as he holds my hand.
“No, I was going to Mayven’s to dig around a bit more.”
“Dig around about Ivy?” Connor winces.
“Yeah, a little. Plus, I just need to talk to her again. She’s hard to get a good read on.”
“All you have to do is talk about her charities or about how you despise Ivy Richards. Then you’ll get her lips moving.” Connor laughs.
I frown. “You’re right. But deep down, I think Ivy’s all right.”
Connor nods. “She is. She’s good people, Mad.”
“Yeah, I hate that.” I giggle, and Connor gives me a squeeze—almost a congratulatory hug. Apparently, since I’ve gone from crying in the grass to giggling at a funny, it’s worth celebrating. “I’d better get on over there, I guess.”
As I wipe my eyes, Connor smooths my hair down where I’m sure it was sticking straight up.
“You sure you’re okay?” he asks.
“Yeah, I am. Sorry you had to see that. I’ve not done it in a long time. It creeps out every once in a while, unexpectedly.” I shrug.
“What triggered it?” Connor pulls me to my feet, and we approach my ever-dinging car.
I answer curtly, not wanting to go into details. “A song.” The last thing I want is to get upset all over again.
“Ah. A song. Those are the worst, no?” Connor asks with big eyes like he’s been there.
“They really are.” I smile as I get in the car, shut the door, and roll down the window. Just seeing Connor’s face makes things better. Through the open window, he kisses me on the forehead and holds my face with both hands like I’m a fragile doll he can’t bear to see unhappy.
“Go do your thing, but call me when you’re done. I want to see you and make sure you’re doing okay.” He smiles as he walks toward his car, parked on the street and the door wide-open. It appears that he jumped out as soon as he spotted me. God help me, I’m falling in love with this man.
I head toward Mayven’s house but stop when I notice a scribbled note lying on my passenger seat. It wasn’t there when I pulled over. So many people were jogging and walking by when I was talking to Connor that the note could’ve been left by anyone.
You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone—a source.
It could be a threat against someone I love, but my gut instinct says “a source” has someone on their mind and misses them. Perhaps it’s Allegra Hudson. Or perhaps they’re softening their view of me and Connor.
***
MAYVEN OPENS HER FRONT door and looks like she’s been prepped for a Vogue cover shoot. I’m magically put back together thanks to Connor—and the emergency makeup kit I keep in my car.
“Oh, hi, Madeleine. C’mon in. I’ve got about ten minutes until I have to go to an appointment, so I can’t chat long. Are you feeling better?”
The last time she saw me, I was running out her front door in agony from the stabbing pain in my head. “Oh, yeah, much better. Thanks for asking. Migraines.” I wink in a sad attempt to downplay the situation, knowing that I’m truly not a lot better in the random-headache department.
“I’m so sorry to hear that. I hear they can be quite the nuisance,” Mayven says in her notoriously poised tone as she takes my coat and hangs it up. She’s the definition of sophistication and refinement, basically the opposite of me, a hot mess. I can barely get it together when I know I’m expecting someone, so I can’t imagine being prepared at all times for a drop-in visitor.
“So, what can I help you with?” She pours me a cup of tea as I take a seat, almost as if she was prepared for me to stop by.
I cut to the chase. “I just wanted to feel you out a little more on Ivy Richards.”
“Oh, because she told Detective Wentworth that you and Connor might have been having an affair before Allegra died?” Mayven is as cool as an icicle as she pours her tea.
My eyes bulge, and my jaw plummets. “Do you...? She... How did you?” I try to form a sentence but fail epically. Perhaps well-to-do families like the Bennetts have personal contacts on the police force, maybe even higher up than that.
“Oh, honey, Wentworth came over here yesterday and asked me all sorts of questions about you, Connor, and Ivy.” Mayven takes a sip of tea with her pinky in the air.
“What did he ask? What did you say?” I lean forward, almost out of my chair, barely able to wait for the scandalous answers that will drip from her mouth as smooth as honey. This is terrible. What if I get framed for Allegra’s murder? What if everyone gangs up on me?
“I told him the whole thing was utterly ridiculous. There was no secret affair. Connor would never cheat on Allegra, and Ivy Richards is just jealous that Connor is clearly into you now and not her. She’s always had a thing for him, if you ask me. She was always a little obsessive with Allegra as well, and now, I think she wants to be her.” Mayven leans in closer and whispers, “It’s kind of sick.”
“Wow. Well, uh, thanks, I guess.” I gulp a huge swig of tea, more than relieved that Mayven told Wentworth the truth. I knew Ivy was jealous, but I thought that perhaps her jealousy was also the result of her protectiveness on behalf of Allegra and her relationship with Connor. I’d never considered the fact that Ivy might have wanted to pick up the pieces with Connor.
Mayven crosses one leg over the other and sits closer to the edge of her seat. “No need to thank me. I simply told him the truth, dear. I don’t mean to pry, but are you and Connor a thing or not?”
I knew this was coming. It was bound to with the information given to her by the police. I don’t know how she’s going to feel if I tell her that we might be a “thing.” Maybe she’ll see things from my perspective in a way Ivy never could.
“I’m going to be transparent with you.” I sit back farther into my seat. “We became fast friends because of the mutual loss of our spouses. We had a real connection until Ivy told him something I told her in confidence. Nothing earth-shattering but something I didn’t necessarily want Connor to know. Now we’re sort of cooling things off a bit.”
“I can’t say I’m surprised. That sounds exactly like an underhanded Ivy Richards move, if you ask me.”
Wheels of potential motives and schemes turn inside my frantic mind. I wonder whether Ivy truly is sick in the head. She has been tough on me, and she did go to the police about me, so it’s not like the idea of her being a little “off” is completely unbelievable. I’m not convinced she’s got a real problem, but it’s something worth keeping in mind. After all, Mayven is likely to believe the worst about Ivy and vice versa. It’s probably best to let each of them think I’m on their side so I can gain all the information possible.
“Thanks for the heads-up, Mayven. This is good to be aware of as I continue to deal with Ivy.” I rise from my chair. “I know you’ve got to go, so I’m going to run. But thanks again for chatting with me. It’s nice to know someone has my back here.”
Mayven follows me to the front door and opens it as I throw on my coat. “I know you think we don’t have a lot in common,” she says, “but neither did Allegra and I at first. Just remember one thing when it comes to you and me. The lamps are different, but the light is the same.”
“I like that,” I say as I step down to the sidewalk and look back. She’s growing on me, and I can sense she’s letting her guard down around me too. “And your honest opinion about Connor and me being friends?”
Mayven cocks her head and scrunches her lips to one side. “I loved Allegra, but she’s gone, and although we all loved her immensely and miss her terribly, we have to move on at some point. Connor’s been through absolute hell over everything, and whoever can make him happy again is a friend of mine as well.”
“Good to know.” I smile her way as we part, surprised and glad to have her support.
On the way to my car, I dig for my keys in my bag, and the light from my phone catches my eye. Apparently, I’ve been a hot commodity for the last ten minutes. First, I see a text from Lane Stone: I need to talk to you when you get a chance. Detective Wentworth and another cop were just here questioning me about you and Connor Hudson. Is something going on with you two?
Another missed text from “a source,” stating the obvious: Oh, what a tangled web we weave...—a source.