Influenced

by Eva Robinson

  Rowan was stroking her arm now. “It’s the same outcome, Hannah, whether he’s on the grass or in the pond. But if he’s in the pond, we can build the teen center. We still get the grant. Stella gets to keep her kids. Do you see what I’m saying? There’s really nothing morally wrong with dragging someone. We didn’t kill him, did we? We’re just making sure the grant is funded like he wanted. It’s what he would have wanted. He always said that the outcome is what matters when it comes to morality. This is the better outcome.”

  “You thought this was a good idea?” Hannah narrowed her eyes. “There’s something else, isn’t there?” Rowan had some other angle motivating her, but Hannah couldn’t figure out what it was.

  Rowan stroked her hair. “Well, what’s done is done.”

  “Right.” Stella started pacing. “But Daniel does have a point. It was illegal. I’m not sure what the law is, but I’m sure there is one.”

  “That is what I said!” Daniel’s eyes were wide. “Why are you only just now understanding this? I said that from the beginning and you both ignored me.”

  “Keep your voice down,” said Rowan sharply. “Both of you.”

  Hannah’s breath felt shallow, and she couldn’t seem to get enough oxygen. “Am I understanding this correctly? Peter died, and you dumped his body in the lake? I’m now implicated in a crime, and I didn’t even get a say in it? Just by being here while you made this idiotic decision, I’m now involved in this crime?”

  Stella folded her arms. “The question is, what did you put in the brownies?”

  Hannah’s jaw dropped. “Are you accusing me of poisoning him?”

  “Not intentionally, of course,” said Rowan. “But he had a severe nut allergy. Very severe. Were they homemade, or a mix?”

  “I told you about his allergy,” Stella added. “And he vomited before he died.”

  “There were no nuts in it,” said Hannah. “It was a mix. Chocolate chips and sea salt or something.”

  “A mix?” Stella asked, horrified. “Did you check with the manufacturer if they produce it on factory lines that are shared with nuts?”

  Hannah stared at her. She felt like she was underwater now, drowning. “No… I didn’t check. I didn’t know that was a thing.”

  “What about your kitchen?” asked Rowan. “Do you ever use peanut butter? Even a trace amount could kill him.”

  Hannah held her stomach, ready to vomit all over the grass. Nora ate peanut butter all the time, and she wasn’t exactly a tidy eater. And the kitchen had been a bit messy this evening.

  “Sometimes,” said Hannah in a whisper.

  “It’s just that he threw up.” Stella’s tone was almost sympathetic now. “Like anaphylactic shock. And I did tell you about the allergy, Hannah.”

  Hannah turned, covering her mouth as the wine and punch she’d drunk earlier started to come back up. With supreme effort, she choked it back down again. She needed to get home, back to her own house.

  “You don’t know it was the brownies,” Daniel added. “You are blaming her for no reason.”

  Now that some of the fog of alcohol was wearing off, the true horror of the situation was starting to dawn on Hannah. She turned back to them, staggering a little.

  Daniel shook his head. “I don’t understand how we got so drunk. I never do.”

  “I still think we need to call the police,” said Hannah.

  “No!” Rowan shouted. “It’s too late. He’s already been moved. We can’t go back on that.” Rowan grabbed her arm. “If you’re sure Peter is dead, what’s an ambulance going to do? Except stop the teen center from being built and get us arrested?”

  “This was insane,” said Daniel.

  Rowan crossed her arms. “I woke up to this. I was down by the pond. I was passed out. I mean, I guess I’m worried about what people will say, after the Arabella situation.”

  There it is.

  “But I’m also trying to look at this how he would,” Rowan went on. “He wouldn’t be sentimental about a body. He really wouldn’t. If we didn’t shift him a little into the water, his most important work would be destroyed—the grant he just got. He doesn’t have a partner. He doesn’t have kids. All he cared about was doing good in the world for young people. This was his legacy. And we’re preserving it.”

  She wiped a hand across her nose, sniffling. Hannah was sure that Rowan had ingested a king’s ransom in cocaine that night.

  Daniel rubbed his palms into his eyes. “I just wanted to do what’s right, but it was very confusing. And you are very confusing, Rowan.”

  “I didn’t mean to bring something dangerous,” Hannah whispered.

  “You didn’t,” said Daniel. “Forget that.”

  Rowan stepped closer to her. “Oh, Hannah.” She enveloped Hannah in a hug. “It’s not your fault. We were all passed out. You didn’t know how severe his allergy was. We just can’t tell anyone about this, okay?” Now, the sun was just starting to rise, streaking the sky with amber. “This was just a bad night. But one thing at a time, right?”

  “It was a terrible night,” said Daniel. “At last we agree.”

  “So we need to get our stories straight,” said Stella. “Because when anyone realizes he’s missing, we all need to be on exactly the same page. Rowan. Did you take any photos at all this evening?”

  Rowan pulled out her phone. “I posted one. Maybe two.”

  “Delete it, now,” said Stella.

  Hannah bit her lip. “When would someone be likely to notice he’s missing? Soon?”

  Stella shook her head. “No. He doesn’t live with anyone. He doesn’t see many people socially except us. Monday is Memorial Day, and then—well, I don’t know when his colleagues might report him missing, but it’s the end of the school year, so it would be normal to take time off.”

  The sky was brightening—a pale blue that spread out above them. Rowan pulled Hannah in tight.

  But Rowan’s warmth wasn’t enough, because Hannah was sure that they were careening into icy disaster.

  Thirty

  Hannah knelt on her kitchen floor, her mind still in a fog from the party. It still seemed unreal, like she was watching someone else’s increasingly nightmarish life unspool on a screen. The ants were crawling around her now, over the tiles. Slowly, she traced her fingertips over the S&O bracelet on her wrist.

  She caught a glimpse of herself in the shiny metal handle on the side of the cabinet. Her hair looked disheveled, her eye makeup smudged halfway down her face.

  She would never drink again. Not beer, not spritzers. Not even Luke’s homemade wine.

  With a tight chest, she pulled open one of the wood cabinets beneath her sink. There, stuffed into a paper shopping bag, was her recycling. She reached for the folded-up brownie box and pulled it out carefully.

  She scanned the ingredient list, slowly breathing out. Sugar, cocoa powder, chocolate chips… Nothing anywhere about nuts. That was a good start, but she still didn’t know about the factory line situation.

  She slid it back into the recycling and hoisted herself up.

  As she stood, her gaze slid across her countertop. She stared at it, wondering how she’d missed it before. She used to keep this place so clean…

  There on the counter was an open jar of peanut butter. Two knives, bread that hadn’t been closed. No wonder the ants were going crazy today.

  But the knives were the problem. She’d used one of them to make Nora’s sandwich, and one of them to test the brownies. What if she’d used the peanut butter knife to test the brownies? Ants crawled over it now, swarming around the thin smudges of peanut butter.

  Guilt pressed on her chest.

  What could she do now? She had to clean everything. Then she’d be able to think clearly. She’d scrub the house from top to bottom, get rid of the ants, and her thoughts would be clear.

  Her phone buzzed on the floor, and she practically jumped out of her skin. She picked it up, relieved to see it was Luke. She needed him now more than
anything, because she could feel herself about to spiral out of control.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, Han. We’re just outside. We stopped at Friendly Toast for breakfast, and she’s a bit covered in maple syrup.”

  “You’re here already?” she said.

  “I thought we said nine? I have that meeting this morning, remember?”

  “Sorry, I forgot.” In fact, it was erased from her memory entirely.

  “I could reschedule…” he said.

  “No, it’s fine. I’ll buzz you up.”

  She crossed to the door and took a moment to lean against it, her forehead against her arm. Then she pushed the buzzer.

  She heard the stairs creaking below, and Nora’s happy chatter through the door. “Go see Mama. Mama home.”

  She pulled the door open.

  Luke stared at her for a little too long, and she remembered how she looked. Still in her dress, hair a mess, smudged makeup. Hastily, she licked her finger and tried to rub some of the makeup off from under her eyes. “Hi. Sorry, I slept in my clothes.”

  “Late night?” he asked.

  “Too late, unfortunately.”

  “Mama!” Nora wriggled out of his arms onto the floor.

  Warmth lit Hannah as she picked up Nora and pulled her close. She closed her eyes, nestling her face into Nora’s neck. She smelled faintly of syrup and milk.

  Hannah didn’t even realize that tears were stinging her eyes until Luke asked, “What’s wrong?” He leaned against the doorframe. “Annie?”

  She hugged Nora close, like a shield. “Uh, just… hungover, I guess.”

  “Did something upset you at the party?” He could always tell when something was wrong. He could read her like a book. “Was that guy you hated there? The judgmental one.”

  She squeezed Nora closer.

  “Too tight, Mama!”

  “I didn’t hate him.” It came out too sharp. Angry, almost. And it took her a moment to realize she’d used the past tense. “I mean, I don’t hate him.”

  Luke’s smile faded. “I thought you said… he was pompous and judgmental or something.”

  “It was just an awkward conversation, that’s all. You don’t have to turn it into me hating him. Anyway, sorry. I just let loose maybe a little too much. Luke, this is a weird question, but were you here when I tested the brownies? When I took them out to see if they were done?”

  “I don’t think so. Only you talking about the ant poison. Why?”

  “I just was worried about the knife I used. There was one with peanut butter, and one without. And someone at the party is allergic.” She was already saying far, far too much. But insanely, she needed Luke’s reassurance.

  “Did he get sick?”

  “No. Not that I know of. I’m just worried that I’m forgetting things, I guess. That I’ve become forgetful.”

  He squeezed her arm. “You do seem a little overwrought, Hannah. You need to be gentle on yourself, though. Everyone makes mistakes sometimes.” Luke frowned, looking around her apartment, taking in the mess on her countertop. “Look, you just seem like you’ve been under a lot of stress lately. You quit your job, and you’re starting your own business. All that is stressful. And I know how the sleep situation is—I only have Nora two nights a week, and I’m exhausted, even though I’m not with her as much as you are. I’m going to cancel my meeting, and I’ll help you tidy up here while you take a nap. You can’t keep getting three hours of sleep a night and expect to still function. You’re bound to make mistakes in that state. Let’s get you some rest, okay?”

  A fat tear rolled down her cheek. Yes, and she had made a huge freaking mistake, hadn’t she?

  From this point on, she was going to make changes. She’d be the perfect mom.

  “Thank you, Luke.”

  As she crossed to her bedroom, her mind burned with a vision of how Peter would look now, at the bottom of Fresh Pond.

  But she was going to sleep—just like Luke said. And after this, she was going to pull herself together.

  Thirty-One

  The stench hit Michael hard before he got anywhere near the police tape, and he regretted the blintzes he’d eaten for both breakfast and lunch… He’d been thinking about Russian pancakes a lot lately, so he’d made them for himself.

  But now, as he trudged off the path and through the mud toward the pond’s edge and the pervasive smell of decay, all the creamy ricotta seemed like a terrible mistake. The unusually intense June heat didn’t help the situation, nor did the strong wind that whipped off the pond in his direction, carrying the scent of death.

  As he moved closer to the pond’s edge, his gaze darted to Ciara, dwarfed within the circle of crime scene tape. She crouched near the body, strangely still, her head cocked. When she turned to look at him, he noticed her cheeks had flushed in the humid air.

  For some reason, his attention was so focused on her that he nearly missed everything else. The young prosecutor, looking uncomfortable in his suit. The diminutive coroner—Linda—speaking into a small recorder; the police photographer snapping shots of a bloated body. The victim’s face ravaged by the bottom of the pond…

  Bloody hell.

  He wondered how long he’d been down there. Michael pulled his eyes away from the body, shifting his gaze out to the water, trying to master his nausea. Ducks floated serenely, drifting by on the gentle water as if nothing were amiss.

  As he approached the crime scene tape, a uniformed officer named Jeff handed him a clipboard. Michael quickly signed in, then grabbed a pair of gloves from a box on the ground and pulled them on. He ducked under the tape.

  Ciara looked up at him from where she crouched. “A jogger found him. He just drifted on to shore. The wind blew him in this way, so we don’t know where he entered the pond. But we haven’t had any missing person reports fitting his description the past few days.”

  Michael looked him over. Apart from his face, there were no obvious signs of trauma—no gunshot wounds, stab wounds.

  The clothes gave the impression of youth. He wore a black T-shirt, jeans, and sandals. Michael just had no idea who he was.

  Michael crouched down, tilting his head at a bit of brown leather sticking out of the man’s pocket. With a gloved hand, he carefully pulled out a wallet. When he opened it, he found a Harvard University ID card showing the face of a man of about thirty-five. Handsome, glasses, grinning from ear to ear.

  A sense of sadness pressed on Michael’s chest like wet soil.

  “Peter Sylvestro,” Ciara read over his shoulder.

  It rang distantly familiar in the hollows of his mind. Had he seen that name somewhere?

  “How did he end up here?” Michael whispered to himself. Then he looked up at the coroner—but not very far up, because she was only about five feet tall. “Do we have any idea how long he was down there yet?”

  “I don’t know exactly. Given the state of decomposition and the water’s temperature, I’d estimate maybe four or five days. Looks like he was submerged, face down by the bottom of the pond, and some of the rocks ripped up his face. After a few days, the gases building up in his body would have forced him up again. I don’t know the cause of death yet, obviously.”

  Michael rose and crossed over to the edge of the pond, looking out over the rippling water. Maybe Peter had been drunk or high, and stumbled into the pond, drowning accidentally. It wouldn’t be the first time it had happened to someone from one of the universities—except that in those cases, they’d been reported missing, because whomever they’d been drinking with would have noticed they didn’t make it home.

  “Michael? Michael?”

  It took him a moment to realize Ciara was saying his name, and he turned to look her. She blew a ginger curl out of her eyes.

  “I spoke to campus security. Peter Sylvestro was an associate professor in the education department. He reported his laptop stolen from his office last week.”

  It was after nine by the time Michael got home to make
his dinner, and by then he could hardly think straight because of his hunger. He found himself leaning against the doorframe of his small kitchen, staring at an unopened bottle of Shiraz on his marble countertop. His eyes swept around the space—the dark wood cabinets, the bare walls painted an antique grey, the counters clean except for his bowl of onions and garlic.

  Usually, his home was his refuge, a tidy place of calm—but he felt off today.

  From his phone, he turned on Spotify, playing a song from Miles Davis. Then he opened a drawer and pulled out a corkscrew. Thunder rumbled outside, and rain started pattering against his window.

  He’d interviewed Peter’s colleagues today, but had gotten nowhere. Peter lived alone, and he’d been expected to go on vacation that week. The professors he worked with hadn’t even realized he was missing. It seemed Peter didn’t see friends often, and he spent a lot of his free time playing video games or jogging by himself. He was like a ghost, with nothing on social media, few close contacts.

  With his stomach rumbling, Michael poured himself a glass of wine. But if he didn’t fill his stomach with food, he’d find his head swimming fast. As his mind slid over today’s fruitless interviews, he filled up a pot with water, then dropped it onto the stovetop.

  Because there were now two dead academics with missing laptops, the autopsy had happened fast—but it didn’t give them much to go on. Four or five days ago, Peter had died of unknown causes, then he’d been dragged into the pond. He hadn’t drowned.

  The autopsy had showed his stomach was nearly completely empty. Either he hadn’t eaten in a while, or he’d thrown up what he had. From medical records, Michael knew that Peter had a life-threatening peanut and tree nut allergy. If he’d died of anaphylaxis or a poison, he likely would have vomited before death.

  The body had been in the pond too long to know if his throat had shown any signs of swelling, but the real question was if he’d been poisoned with thallium. Or maybe another toxic substance. It’d be another two weeks before they learned what had happened.