The First to Lie

by Hank Phillippi Ryan

  “TrevorTrevorTrevor!” She screamed it, like one word, and then saw the top of his head, she knew it was, come to the surface for one exquisite instant. She threw the life preserver, threw it with all her might, toward that thatch of sandy hair. Wishing, as if eternity was now and now was eternity, to see that fragment of her brother again. He was there, he’d grab the life preserver, call for help.

  Radio, her brain screamed, call for help.

  The tiller flapped now, the boat under no one’s control, and it tipped, side to side, the mainsail rocking and the spinnaker a puddle of fabric on the deck, one edge of orange touching the water then slipping, like a blanket from a fidgety child, into the dark water.

  The life preserver, floating helplessly, ebbed and flowed and did nothing except taunt her, and Brooke turned and ran, somehow, down into the hold and hit the mayday. They’d find them by the radio signal and GPS, she knew that, and all she had to do was hold out. All Trevor had to do.

  Back at the deck’s edge she saw him, a human bubble in the waning sun, she did, she did, it was him, it was completely him. “Trevor!” she screamed again. But the life pole would never reach, and there was nothing else she could do.

  “Trevor!” she yelled. She yanked off her life vest, then stuck one arm back through its webbing so she could somehow dive and not die. But how could she find him? She had to make sure they both didn’t sink into the darkness, swallowed up by the sea. “Trevor!”

  Screaming would not help. There was no one to hear. She licked her lips, tasted salt. She was a good swimmer, they both were, and there was no reason Trev would not pop to the surface. She scanned the water, it was still light enough to see, and kept one arm in the life jacket, trying to remember where it was she’d seen him, but the Caddy was her only point of reference, and with no steadying hand on the tiller, it listed and lurched, a drunken sailor. The shore seemed more distant than ever, the useless sails flapping them nowhere, only the unpredictable waves and the random walk of the water deciding where the Caddy would go.

  She hooked the life jacket to a metal cleat on the side of the boat, took a huge breath and dived under, somehow believing she might see him, might be able to swim to him, and bring her brother back to safety. She was trained in lifesaving. She knew her stuff. This wasn’t completely crazy. It could work. It could matter. She could rescue her brother.

  The cold shocked her, surrounded her, and she gasped, flailing to the surface, her body recalibrating to the traumatic change in temperature. She ordered her brain to focus, but under the water was dark as a night sky, so opaque she wondered why she hadn’t remembered how dense and infinite and infinitely uncaring it could be.

  Her legs turned to weights. She could feel them, and then not feel them, and her clunky sneakers were bricks impelling her down. Salt water sloshed into her face, into her eyes, and she could not tell if it was ocean or tears.

  She burst through to the top, grabbed at the life vest. Missed. Grabbed again.

  And there was not a trace of Trevor.

  She felt the water wash over her, insistent, demanding, vast as the sky. Get that vest, she commanded herself, and drew a last gasp of intention from her own breaking heart.

  BEFORE

  CHAPTER 43

  LACEY

  She’d always remember this place with the fragrance of limes and salt water, Lacey thought, and the wash of sinuous jazz floating out over her back deck and off into the Chesapeake Bay.

  Brinn had collapsed into her wine, now holding a new glass of white and staring off over the inky bay as her Eastern Shore friends compared golf notes and complaints about whatever they cared about, a cynical undercurrent of ego and dismissals. Lacey might as well not have been there, her existence in their lives only validated by her husband. The music filled the gaps in the languid conversation, the moments when even complaints seemed too wearisome to articulate. These people, all khaki and confidence, rattled ice in their stubby glasses and tonight, for some reason, were competing to name the emerging constellations.

  “Orion,” one said.

  “Like hell,” someone else countered.

  “Lacey?” Brinn’s voice cut through the murmuring rivalry. “Why is Trevor so late? He’s off with her somewhere, isn’t he? Has he called you? It’s your party night. He should be here. But why won’t Brooke come home, Lacey? What did she say to you?”

  Lacey shook her head as she leaned against the deck rail, ever so sympathetic.

  “What did she look like?” Brinn turned, searching Lacey’s face. “I haven’t laid eyes on her since she was seventeen. The day she left for college. And now she’s all grown up, but I can’t picture her. Can you imagine how that feels?”

  Lacey could. But Brinn kept talking.

  “I have no vision of my own daughter! I see her, now, still with all that hair, and those eyes, taking in everything. And so—so confident, I remember. Standing up for herself. We called it sullen, but now I see she was simply coming into her own. Remember her from the wedding? She had no idea how beautiful she’d become. Is she? Beautiful?”

  Lacey shook her head. “I only spoke to her on the phone.”

  “How did she sound?”

  “Sound?”

  “Happy? Sad? Is she still angry? Did she say anything about me?”

  “I’m so sorry, Mother, I really am. She sounded like a normal young woman, all I can tell you, I’m afraid. I asked her, of course, about tonight, and you, but she…” Lacey took a sip of her club soda, tasted the lime from the carefully cut wedge. “She declined the invitation. And then must have given the phone back to Trevor.”

  “And he kept it all from me,” Brinn whispered. “That she was here. How long have they been in touch? And wait—that means he has her phone number. Do you have it too?”

  “That’s between you and your son, I’m afraid. He’ll have to choose how much to tell you. I feel so bad for you, because I know how hard you must have tried with her. If I had a daughter, I’d never let her out of my sight.”

  “Ms. Vanderwald?” The waiter approached, an empty tray in her hands.

  “Yes?” Lacey answered first.

  “Shall I bring the shrimp now? Your guests have finished the prosciutto and melon, and the Brie is pretty much gone. And we’re into the fourth chablis.”

  “Thank you.” Lacey saw her company had settled into the line of green Adirondack chairs, drinks on their armrests, watching the sky as if it were nature’s own home movie. “Let me show you where the—”

  “Lacey. Do you know where she’s staying?” Brinn persisted, interrupting. She followed, still talking, as Lacey led the waiter toward the kitchen.

  “I’ll go to wherever it is,” Brinn went on. “I could make it look like a coincidence. How long will she be here? Is she coming to stay with you and Trevor? I’ll wait here to see her, I will, I cannot bear to … Lacey. Please.” Brinn caught her by the arm, stopping her. Then threw back her head, closed her eyes.

  Lacey looked up too, at the fickle universe. Above her the sky was scattered with nameless stars, wisps of foggy clouds cloaking them, briefly, then revealing the brightness again.

  “Do you? Know?” Brinn clutched at Lacey’s arm. “Lacey, you have to tell me where she is. She’s my daughter.”

  “It must feel terrible, losing a child.” Lacey stepped away, extricating herself. “Do you think about her some days?”

  The waiter turned back to them and held up one finger, nevermindIgotthis, and trotted into the house, leaving the two of them outside.

  “Do I think about her? Every day.”

  “Especially here, I’d imagine.” Lacey noticed the array of twinkling lights out over the dark bay. Some of them were red, she half-noticed. And blue. So pretty. “All that time you missed?”

  “Until you have a child, you can’t know,” Brinn told her. Her wineglass was empty.

  Until you have a child. And that was it. That was the edge. Lacey felt her heart toppling over the deck railing, past
the first-floor garage, past the hydrangeas, shattering like fragile crystal on the mermaid tiles below.

  “What happened between you two?” Lacey, with no heart left, no longer tried to stop herself from asking. Brinn was the vulnerable one now, not Lacey, not anymore, and this was the perfect time to pry that mystery out of her. Lacey felt brave. Sober. Strategic.

  But Brinn only closed her eyes again, drawing in a breath of the evening. “And where is Winton? I swear that man—Lacey.” Brinn clipped off her own train of thought. “Does he know about our daughter? Does he know Brooke is here?”

  Lacey sipped at her soda and lime, keeping her head. “He would have told you, don’t you think? I mean—does he keep secrets from you?”

  Brinn waved a careless arm toward the stars and the bay and the people she’d probably known since her children were babbling toddlers. She shook her head, her mind elsewhere, as if she were looking into the past.

  A doorbell rang, distant and otherworldly. Not Trevor, she thought. The waiter would get it.

  Brinn did not react. She had both hands on the railing, looking at the water, maybe imagining her devoted son and her brilliant daughter sailing together, as if it were back in the days when they all loved each other. Back in the days that were gone.

  The doorbell rang again. Lacey frowned, wondering why the waiter didn’t answer it.

  “Excuse me,” Lacey said. “Someone’s here. Are you all right, Mother?”

  She didn’t wait for Brinn to answer but crossed the living room—white slipcovers not in place until after Memorial Day—and down the three tiled steps to the front door. Opened it, smiling, expecting more guests.

  “Lacey Vanderwald?” A police officer. Blue uniform, pocket flaps pressed and buttons shiny. “I’m Officer Teo Lane. May I come in?”

  “Is something wrong?” Lacey felt her face change. Her hands tingle. Something happened between her shoulder blades.

  “May we come in, please?” Behind Lane, Lacey saw a black and white police cruiser, with the yellow emblem of Anne Arundel County. Another officer stepped into view behind him. She’d apparently been there the whole time, but Lacey had been transfixed on Teo Lane’s reluctant eyes. Pooled with sorrow, and maybe fear; she could see that even a trained police officer could not hide the burden of bad news.

  “I’m Sharyn Forney.” The woman pointed to a black plastic name tag pinned to her uniform pocket. Her braided hair coiled like nautical ropes under her billed cap. “May we come in, Ms. Vanderwald?”

  “What happened?” Lacey’s feet would not move from where she stood, not toward these visitors or away from them. A list of horribles spooled out faster than she could label them. Or maybe it was nothing, someone’s lost dog or Boh-happy teenagers slashing tires. “What? Is everything okay? What can I do for you? What’s happened?”

  “Who is it?” Brinn’s footsteps behind them. “Oh. Oh. My husband. My husband?” Brinn clutched at Lacey’s arm, her fingers wrapped around the pink silk.

  Someone had turned up the music in the background, and soft jazz filtered through the living room’s built-in speakers.

  Lacey could feel Brinn’s tension, almost hear her mind cataloging her own gruesome possibilities.

  “Tell me,” Brinn whispered.

  Lacey felt her own knees buckle. She tucked her arm through Brinn’s, balancing her, balancing herself. The brittle chess game they’d begun would be forgotten; she was sure of it. The universe was about to play. And its moves would be bigger. Whatever they were.

  “Ms. Vanderwald.” Officer Lane looked at Lacey, then Brinn, then dropped his eyes, either in apprehension or respect. “We need to come in.”

  More footsteps behind them. The waiter, Anna, that was it, flustered into the room, this time carrying a thick metal tray arrayed with glistening pink shrimp and a fluted glass bowl of red cocktail sauce. “Good evening,” she said. “Oh.”

  Lacey recoiled at the shrimp, too fishy and too wet and the red sauce too red. She looked away, straightened her shoulders, gestured toward the living room. “In here,” she told the police. “Anna, will you go to the deck and serve the shrimp? And say we’ll be there momentarily.”

  “Ma’am?” Officer Forney looked uncomfortable.

  Lacey tried to read the officer’s face. It was not difficult.

  “Is it my husband?” Brinn, in slow motion, lowered herself to the couch.

  A new song started, incongruous in the silence, beginning the beguine.

  “Is it my husband?” Lacey had to ask, she had to.

  Officer Lane nodded. “I’m afraid so.”

  CHAPTER 44

  ELLIE

  “Where the hell have you been?” Gabe’s voice came over her car’s Bluetooth as Ellie drove out of the state police headquarters lot and onto the highway. Three in the afternoon—the traffic around Boston at its most sparse during the fifteen minutes between rush hours. The threat of snow had vanished. It you don’t like the weather in Boston, just wait and it’ll change, someone had joked to her.

  Was it the same with life?

  “Hey, Gabe,” she answered. “I’m driving back to Boston. Warren sent me out to the state police HQ.” That was semi-true, although in the interim she’d made that stop at Pharminex.

  Gabe. She’d just secretly thrown him under the bus by trading her access to Nora Quinn for information on this potentially unreliable “ally.” But if Gabe was a bad guy, better for Lieutenant Monteiro to find out about it than for her to discover it when it was too late.

  Monteiro, her new best friend, now thought Ellie was on the hunt for Nora Quinn. If he’d known or even suspected that Ellie was Nora, he hadn’t betrayed it for a flicker of a moment. So that assignment was not going to be tough. Ellie knew exactly where Nora Quinn was every moment of every day. She almost laughed, thinking about it.

  “Did the cops confirm the victim was Lydia Frost?” Gabe asked.

  Ellie stopped at the light, grateful for a moment to regroup. When she was killed, Lydia had been driving, just like Ellie was now.

  “How did you know it was Lydia Frost?” Ellie hoped she’d managed to sound curious, not contentious.

  “I take that as a yes,” he said.

  “But how did you even know of her? Did you know Lydia?”

  Silence on the phone as Gabe apparently decided what to say. It was not that difficult a question.

  The red line of her fuel gauge was tickling E, and she scouted for a gas station. And food. She hadn’t eaten since … whenever it was.

  “You told me who she was on the elevator,” Gabe said. “Plus, she was on my radar. Like you were?”

  “From a dating app?” Ellie asked, then instantly regretted it. The woman was dead. “Never mind. Anyway. How’d you know she was in the … crash?”

  “It was on TV, Ellie,” Gabe said. “So what’s the scoop? Do the police think Lydia Frost’s accident is connected with Kaitlyn Armistead’s?”

  “Connected?” Ellie steered her Passat into a Shell, lining the car up against the nearest vacant pump. No real food here, but she’d get pretzels and maybe a cheese stick when she paid. She tucked her phone between her cheek and the shoulder of her coat, pulled off her gloves and hopped out. She could wash the gas from her hands, but her gloves always reeked. “Why would they?”

  “Because—hang on a sec. Another call’s coming through.”

  Gabe put her on hold. She watched highway traffic ebb and flow as the gas meter clicked forward, hearing the ding at each dollar. Thinking about how accidents happen, and wondering how easy it would be to cause one—and get away with it.

  The cars straggled by, their wheels slushing on the damp pavement, some with a caked layer of snow stubbornly clinging to their roofs. A white metal awning protected customers from the weather, but attached to that, three black cylindrical surveillance cameras pointed down at the station. From underneath, Ellie saw another one, a cylinder of white metal, attached to the roof of the auto body shop across the street. T
hree lenses pointed out from the storage company next door.

  You couldn’t do anything these days without someone taping it, she realized. Did Monteiro have video? If another car had deliberately—or even accidentally—caused Kaitlyn’s and Lydia’s accidents, it would be evident from the video. And, theoretically, simple for the police to track. Slap thirty seconds of that footage on tonight’s eleven o’clock news, Ellie thought, and helpful citizens would be all too happy to rat out their reckless—or homicidal—acquaintances.

  Or maybe they hadn’t used a car as their murder weapon.

  She jammed the gas pump back into the slot, her neck now permanently cricked from holding the phone in place.

  “Gabe?” But there was still only the on-hold silence.

  She jogged inside to pay for the gas and pretzels and a pack of peanut butter crackers and a Diet Coke, still listening for Gabe’s return, and ripped open the pretzels with her teeth while carting her purchases and the phone back to her car. No Gabe.

  She put her stuff on the car’s roof, then her fingers on the door handle. Gabe was still MIA. She clicked off, annoyed. Why call her if he was in the middle of something?

  After swiping the spilled pretzel salt from the front of her coat, she sat, organizing her stash of food and getting angrier by the minute. If there was a connection between these two women’s deaths, it wouldn’t necessarily be how they were killed. It would be why.

  What the hell? A sound. A loud, wrong sound. Her car lurched forward. Her neck and back clenched with fear. A cascade of pretzels tumbled to her lap, and the crackers toppled to the floor. She flattened her hand against the window to keep her balance. What?

  “Sorry!” a voice called out.

  A silver SUV had smashed her from behind. Ellie grabbed her phone and leaped out of the car, leaving the door open, whirling to confront whoever was responsible. And to see how badly her car’s rear end had been damaged.