Are you sure you’re okay to drive?” I asked as we cruised down the road.
“Fine,” Vera snapped, making the turn toward town.
She didn’t say another word as she wound through Woodstock. past the shops, past all of it. She’s not doing this, I kept telling myself. She’s not doing what I think she’s doing.
But by the time we reached Platform and she slowed down, by the time she pulled into the lot, I couldn’t deny it anymore. She was doing it.
“Not here,” I said, voice quaking. “You said Sam’s always here. There’s got to be somewhere else.”
“There’s not,” she said. “And besides, I don’t care. I’m tired of hiding. He claimed every place in this town as his, and it still wasn’t enough.”
Opening the door, she got out, sending a rush of cold into the car.
And I followed her, like I always did.
Behind the bar, a large man poured one beer after the next, sweat pooling in the creases of his neck as if oblivious to the chill outside. From the back, a song I couldn’t make out blared from the jukebox, and I cast a look over my shoulder. A doorway opened up to more rooms—and more people. The place stretched back farther than I realized. Pool table. Jukebox. Old living room furniture permanently retired to the corners of the shitty dive.
Vera spotted two free chairs at the bar, the only ones left, and pounced, her movements purposeful, her long dress kissing the dusty, beer-spilled floor as she took a seat.
“Come on, Lucy.” She tugged out a chair so it made a scraping sound on the floor, and I felt like I was going to be sick. “Sit next to me.”
I did, my eyes darting back and forth, looking for Sam, feeling fully exposed, but he wasn’t there. Vera shot me a crooked smile. She looked gothic, decadent, as if she made this place different through the sheer force of her presence.
She shrugged out of her poncho and leaned forward, the neckline of her dress buckling, exposing a flash of eggplant-colored lace, the small curve of her left breast. “What have you got for red, Joe?”
She used to come here all the time, she’d told me. How different had her life been before everything started with John? How much had this wrecked her, long before John died?
The bartender—Joe—grunted out the limited options, his accent thick but unplaceable, like someone who’d spent a long time in the woods, and Vera ordered two Malbecs.
“Generous pours,” she added. “You can charge me extra.”
“Aren’t you driving?” I asked.
She shrugged me off. “We’ll get a cab.”
“When I first moved here, you told me there weren’t any car services around here.”
“God, Lucy, I know one, okay?” She scooted her chair closer to the bar, sat up straight. “Sam’s not even here, see?”
“He could be in the back.”
Vera ignored me as the bartender delivered two glasses, fat and brimming. She dug a credit card out of her bag and handed it to him.
She pushed one glass over to me, sloshing a bit of wine onto the counter, then took a sip from her own. “Come on. Drink.”
I rested my hand on the glass but didn’t bring it to my lips. “I’m sorry I said anything. I shouldn’t have, so soon.”
Vera shook her head so violently, it looked like her neck might snap. “I don’t want to talk about that.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“I don’t want to hear you say that ever again.”
I froze, staring at her. I feared I’d fucked it all up, just like Rachel had. That I really might have lost her this time. “I’m sorry. I won’t.”
Vera sat up straighter and took another sip. “Lucy, you know me, I’m a social person. I didn’t want to be some recluse. It’s not my fault that people are obsessed with rumors, but they are, and I am not going to let them touch me, not anymore. I planned on coming up here, making just as many friends as I had in the city. Going to bars like this, eating out in town. Just like you. But—” She paused, taking a sip. “They took that away from me. With their gossip and their looks and now these absurd accusations from Rachel. God.”
She twisted the glass in front of her, almost as if she were inspecting it for cracks. “At least in the city,” Vera went on, “if you pissed someone off, you didn’t have to see them all the time. At least you could be anonymous. I played Sam’s stupid game, I played along with all of them, but it didn’t even matter. He still killed John. These people still hate me.” She took my hand in hers and lowered her voice to a whisper. “We still had to do what we had to do, didn’t we?”
I swallowed a touch of wine, my stomach flip-flopping. “Maybe we should just tell them about that,” I said, my eyes again searching for Sam. “They know I lied, but what we did is nothing compared to what Sam did. Maybe they’ll finally believe me if I tell them.”
“Don’t be stupid,” Vera said, her hand recoiling instantly from mine. “I’m not going to throw away my life, too. I’ve already given up way too much.”
She was right, I knew that. I couldn’t risk opening myself up to closer inquiry, either, only the way she dismissed it was so . . . callous.
“Let’s forget about all that, okay? Let’s pretend you never said a word.” She grabbed my hand again and squeezed it so hard it almost hurt, then quickly let it go. “Let’s just have one good night. I’m begging you.”
I did my best to give her what she wanted.
I barely touched my wine, taking only the most cautious of sips, but I didn’t object when she ordered another.
She dragged me to the jukebox, and after tossing her things onto a chair in the corner, she picked out songs like it was her job.
I couldn’t pretend so easily. I found myself constantly looking around, waiting for Sam Alby, hoping beyond hope that he wouldn’t show up tonight, that McKnight had taken me seriously, that Rachel had told him what she knew and that the cops had properly taken Sam in this time, that all of this would be over soon. And that Davis, for his part, would do what he said he would—finally let me go.
Vera drained her next glass almost as quickly, and when she wasn’t looking, I grabbed her car keys, nestled in the top of her handbag, and put them in my pocket so she wouldn’t do anything stupid like try to drive home.
She was playing Dinah Washington, swaying back and forth, almost like she was dancing with the jukebox, when a guy my age sidled up to her—someone up from the city, most likely. With wide brown eyes, he took Vera in, top to bottom. “Nice choice,” he said to her.
She flipped around, startled, and when her eyes caught him, they sharpened. “I’m just trying to have a night with my friend,” she said tightly.
The guy smiled—he wasn’t giving up yet. “You shouldn’t play such good music, then, if you don’t want anyone to talk to you.”
Her lips pressed together.
“Sorry,” I said. “We’re just—”
“Mourning my dead husband,” Vera snapped.
“Jesus,” the guy said. “I didn’t mean to bother you. I was just making—”
“Well, you did. Come on, Lucy.” She grabbed my hand and dragged me away, past the pool table, toward the next room.
She had to stop drinking, I realized. She had to stop, or else she really would flip out—say something, do something she’d regret.
But as we entered the next room, my worries about Vera were momentarily pushed aside.
My heart stopped. And time, once again, stood still.
Sam was there, in the corner. He wore a denim shirt, perhaps the same one he’d had on when he’d spilled wine on us, and his gray-brown hair gleamed in the muted bar lights.
Staring at her—at me—drinking a beer like nothing in the world was the matter.
The man who had been in my house just last night.
The man who killed John.