“Really?” Reece propped herself up on her elbow.
“Yeah. Don’t sound so shocked. You know I love my mother, but she’s . . .” Liberty gestured with her cigarette, looking for the right word.
“A Siberian Ice Queen?”
“Well, yeah. And your mom, she was always warm, always inviting. Like, she cooked for you guys.”
“The hostess with the mostest.”
Liberty laughed.
“Well, you didn’t see the other side. Elin likes things to go according to plan. Her plan, mind you. Cameron is obviously going to be no help, so if she gets too pushy about the wedding stuff, tell me. Okay?”
“Deal,” Liberty said, lying back to gaze up at the heavy blanket of stars.
“Leo, you’re so bad for bringing that old cougar with us,” Nora said, leaning into his side, cuddling against him. They watched as Marissa, one of Elin’s tennis friends—newly divorced and in her late forties—tottered off toward the bathroom line, which at this time of night at Pink Elephant was a mile long.
“Why is it okay for you to age up and not me?” Leo said with a smirk.
“It’s different,” Nora said simply. “Goddamn it,” she said, “I’m freezing!”
“Do you want to go inside?” Leo asked.
“No, I like it out here; can we just get that space heater working?”
Leo looked around for somewhere else on the patio to sit, but it was busy, and space was scarce.
“Do you want my jacket?”
“I don’t want to cover up my dress! Leo, please.”
“Okay,” he said. He saw that Larry was approaching, followed by a bottle-service girl, who would certainly be of no use. “Let me go find someone. Here comes Larry; you sit tight.”
He made his way into the hazy nightclub where people were moving, sweating, flirting, taking shots, tracking sand in from outside.
“Leeeeooooooooo!”
He turned in the direction of the voice and saw a very intoxicated friend of his—some model girl he’d met at a dozen parties—standing and bellowing at him from a corner booth.
“Ashley! Hey,” Leo said, distracted immediately from his other mission.
“Leo!” she said, nearly tripping over the feet of the other model-y-looking girls, whose long slender legs created a precarious web around their booth’s table. “Hiyyeee!” She flung her arms around him.
At the center of the klatch of models sat an older man in an expensive linen suit; Leo thought he recognized him. But really, there were so many of these filthy-rich old bastards in places like this, sitting among their collected little harems. Like gorgons.
“Leo,” Ashley said, attempting to straighten herself, “you know Simon?”
“Of course,” Leo said, leaning forward to shake the man’s hand, who remained sitting. “Simon Beauchamp, Leo Lawrence.”
“Ah yes,” he said, sounding unimpressed. Leo suspected he did not appreciate his diverting Ashley’s attention. The other girls at the table seemed nearly inanimate: Leo suspected they’d not yet done as much coke as Ashley clearly had.
“I didn’t know you’d be out tonight,” Ashley said, practically yelling over the music, “you should have texted me.”
“It was last-minute,” Leo said, leaning in so she could hear him. He felt Simon’s eyes following him. “We were out in South for my sister’s engagement party.”
“Ohmigosh! Your sister in engaged! That’s amazing! To who?”
“Yeah, it’s great. Cameron Michaels. Good guy; we’ve all known each other for years. . . .”
“Cameron Michaels?” Simon was getting to his feet. He was a tall man, imposing.
“Uh, yes. They’ve been dating a while.”
“And they’re engaged?” Simon reiterated. Leo couldn’t fathom why he cared.
“Yeah.” Suddenly, Ashley or no, Leo wanted to get out of there. “Well, I’d better go back to my sister. Come say hi if you want. Simon, nice to see you.”
“Likewise,” he said, giving Leo a strange look.
24
* * *
THOSE MOMENTS that precede a catastrophe are always the calmest in our memories; whatever quotidian worries we were gnashing between our teeth before are blown to dust in our recollections. Therefore Laila would remember the Tuesday that followed Liberty and Cameron’s engagement party as a peaceful one. Blake had gone to the office early, as he normally did; Laila had drawn out her morning over the manuscript she was meant to be delivering notes on later that day. She’d been taking on more for the agency lately in order to make the job seem more legitimate to Blake. He had no tolerance for the idle rich (or in her case, idle broke), and she knew she needed to appear industrious.
That day, she’d decided she would take her pile of critiques directly to Liberty’s office herself rather than simply e-mailing them. Now that she lived uptown with Blake, she worked from home more frequently, but she was anxious to see her cousin that day—of course this would seem portentous later. In reality, she’d just wanted to see Liberty to reassure herself; she’d barely gotten a moment with her at the engagement party. She was unnerved by her encounter with Cameron that night. He’d seemed angry that she’d been there, but what did he expect? Did he think he could now claim complete dominion over her cousin’s life? Probably so.
Liberty had not been at the office when Laila had stopped by—she’d been sitting in on a marketing meeting at Simon & Schuster for one of her bigger clients—and the new assistant had taken the notes on her behalf. Laila felt a pang of regret that she hadn’t taken the job when she noticed the imperious way the new girl looked at her; the possessive way she rattled off Liberty’s schedule for the day. Laila was suddenly nostalgic for the intern position that had kept her at her cousin’s right hand.
With nothing to do with the rest of the afternoon, she headed down to the Agent Provocateur on Mercer Street and left with an outré new lingerie set to surprise Blake with that weekend. He was often too exhausted to have sex on weeknights, so she felt as if she needed to raise the stakes over the weekends.
By evening, Laila was curled up in their bed reading a copy of Vanity Fair, a glass of wine on the nightstand. Blake often came home late on weekdays. He usually texted her to let her know he’d be having dinner at the office, and he hadn’t done so that evening, but this in itself was nothing to worry about. This was simply an inconvenience of being with an important man, and Laila was nothing if not self-sufficient. She had been nodding off a little when she was jolted awake by the sound of Blake’s key turning in the front door, by the heavy footsteps that brought him to their bedroom.
“Hi, honey, you coming to bed?” Laila said absently, as he opened the door.
He stood there silently; his face looked pale, and his expression was ominous. Laila felt as though a chill had instantly spread throughout the room.
“What’s wrong, my love?”
He would come no farther than the threshold, and he leaned against the doorjamb as though to steady himself.
“You and Cameron?”
And then it was as if time slowed, nearly ground to a halt.
“Liberty’s fiancé, Cameron?” She laughed for good measure, though her heart was pounding so loud she felt she could barely breathe. “I barely know him. What about him?”
Blake was alarmingly quiet. He walked forward—near enough to touch her now, excruciatingly close—and handed her his phone. “Scroll to the right,” he said.
Laila’s hand betrayed her by shaking as she reached for the phone. She could barely steady her finger as it landed on the screen. The first photo was shadowy, but the subsequent images revealed Laila’s petite form pressed against the wall of the dimly lit hallway at the Box, and then another with her legs wrapped around Cameron’s torso, his face showing perfectly in profile. Laila could feel herself starting to panic. She centered herself and regained her focus, looking back at him as though exasperated.
“It was from before we were together. Are
you going to judge me for having a life before you? Talk about unfair.”
“Laila, the time stamp. It was while I was in London.”
A new wave of dizzy panic swept over her. Who sent that to him? Did it matter?
“What I mean is,” she took a deep breath, “it was before we were living together. Before we were serious.”
“Laila,” he said, stepping toward her, almost menacing. “We talked about this in Montauk. Cheating is the one thing I can’t . . . and your cousin’s fiancé?” She realized with horror that he was choking back tears. Why now, months after the fact? Why had this invisible enemy waited until now to share the photo? Things were over with Cameron.
“Blake.” She reached for him, and he snapped backward. His disgust was plain.
“I can’t,” he said. “I’m going to sleep on the couch tonight. Tomorrow . . .”
He didn’t even need to finish his sentence, Laila knew. She was no longer welcome here.
She got out of bed and followed him into the other room. The chilled air of the AC hit the thin silk of her nightgown. She felt raw.
“It’s over? Just like that?”
“Laila, I told you. I can’t deal with cheating. You’re not who I thought, who I hoped, you were.” There was no rage in his voice, only retreat, only disbelief. He was becoming more remote by the second.
“But . . .” She wanted to cite technicalities; anything to change his mind. But she wasn’t trying to convince a judge. “Blake, I would never do that again. Not now. I didn’t really believe that you loved me then; I was scared!”
He was on the couch with his hands between his knees, tears in his eyes.
“Oh, but I did, Laila. I did.”
She sat next to him and tried to peel his arms away and kiss him. Sometimes, moments like this could be saved by funneling all the feelings into sex, letting the lines blur between the passion of anger and the passion of lust.
“No,” he said, getting up and pulling away as though her touch had burned him. “Actually, I think you should go to your cousins’ tonight.”
As though she couldn’t even be trusted to stay in the apartment. And suddenly she too was desperate to be gone. She dressed hurriedly, grabbed her purse, and left.
So this, then, was the nadir? Blake, her last chance. Gone. She called Liberty, but she didn’t answer. She probably had her phone turned off, was absorbed in a book. Laila decided she would go over to her place. It was a Tuesday night; she doubted she’d be out. Laila’s mind raced: What had she done? What had she done? Then another terrible thought washed over her: What if her cousin had also received the pictures?
Liberty would never forgive her. It would certainly end the engagement. And her relationship with her family? Over. In one night, Laila realized that she might have obliterated every last relationship in her life. She had always felt alone, but now she might truly have no one. She barely heard her own voice as she told the cabdriver the address of Liberty’s apartment. Her mind spun: That night at the Box, who’d been there? Cece? But no, she was her friend, why would she? And then a detail emerged from the hazy, champagne-soaked memory of the night: in that sea of beautiful people, his face emerging like an augury of doom. Simon. But why? Well, revenge was always enough for men like him, wasn’t it? Was she imagining that she’d passed by one of those tittering, breakable-looking girls he was with when she was in that hallway with Cameron? She suddenly felt a stomach-churning certainty that she had.
Liberty still hadn’t answered her phone by the time Laila had arrived at her apartment. She held on to the hope that her cousin did not know. Laila dialed her apartment from the dingy call box. No answer. She nearly collided with the man who was leaving; Laila’s eyes were so blurry with tears that she barely recognized him at first.
“You okay?” he asked, holding the door open for her.
“Yes, thanks.” She tried to compose herself. It was the beautiful bartender from Trapdoor. What he’d been doing in the apartment building, Laila had no idea.
As she made her way up the stairs, she started sobbing uncontrollably. She knocked on Liberty’s door, but there was no answer. Laila suddenly remembered that she still had her key from earlier in the month, when Cameron had taken Liberty upstate to a B&B for a few days, and Laila had stopped by to feed Catniss.
Laila turned her key in the lock and pushed, calling Liberty’s name.
As she opened the door, the world fell out from under her.
25
* * *
REECE WOKE to her phone trilling the symphonic ringtone she used for numbers not in her contacts. This was normally her cue to ignore the call, but who would be calling her at 6:30 a.m.? Her alarm would not sound for another hour, and all she wanted was to disappear back into the soft, plush cave of her bedding. She stared at the phone: a 313 number. What? The phone stopped ringing, only to skip over voice mail and begin ringing again. Now her curiosity got the better of her.
“Hello?” she said groggily.
Laila’s voice was weak and raw on the other end of the phone.
“Reece?”
“Laila, what is it?” she shot up in bed.
Reece later became convinced that she’d known everything in that split second before the words could tumble out of Laila’s mouth. Her best friend, the person she loved most, remained in the land of the living only by a small thread.
The family was clustered in the waiting room of the hospital looking shell-shocked. Cameron was already there; Reece had called him on her way. Laila had spent the night at the police station, answering questions. She’d been the one to find Liberty. Cameron walked silently beside his sister into Liberty’s room.
The sight of her friend nearly made Reece’s knees buckle. Her face was swollen beyond recognition, and a series of tubes ran in and out of her mouth and nostrils; a cacophony of machines beeped and whirred around her. Reece let her brother fold her into his arms.
“I don’t . . . what . . . how?”
“Laila found her,” Cameron choked out in his dry and wasted voice. “She was supposed to be with me, but we’d gotten into an argument . . . about the wedding. Oh God, it was so stupid!”
“Who did this to her?” Reece’s voice was tinged with rage.
Cameron shook his head. “The police have a couple of leads. Laila was up all night talking to them.”
“But why? Why would anyone hurt her?”
Cameron let the unanswerable question hang there.
Reece had a busy day ahead of her at work, but suddenly the idea of being anywhere other than here—by Liberty’s side as she inhabited the unknowable space between life and death—felt ridiculous. She called her assistant and told her that she was in the midst of a family emergency and would be out all that day, possibly the next. That it was a family emergency felt true. She hardly remembered what it was like not to have Liberty as her closest confidante. In many ways, she’d been more of a sibling than Cameron had; they’d been the witnesses of each other’s coming of age. She could not fathom losing her.
The three days that followed were a unique kind of hell, during which the Lawrence and Michaels families shuttled between the hospital, the Jane hotel where they were spending a few fitful hours each night trying to sleep, and the police station where they answered endless questions trying to help the detectives put together a picture of what had happened. A blow to the back of her head had caused an acute subdural hematoma. Given where the police had found her, they surmised that Liberty might have fallen in such a way that her head struck the pointed edge of the kitchen counter. She’d also been struck hard across the face; one of her cheekbones was shattered.
Reece felt comforted by Detective Neely, the officer investigating the case. He was confident and kind, fatherly. Cameron, being Liberty’s fiancé, was questioned especially thoroughly, and he was the picture of polite cooperation. Reece knew that this was standard procedure, but it still made her shiver that anyone could think of her brother being responsible. Her
heart broke for Cameron. That his last words to Liberty before leaving her had been ones of anger was a regret unimaginable. She could see it in his haunted expression as he gazed at her in her hospital bed.
Their mother, Elin, rose to the occasion with grace as she was wont to do, speaking to the police on multiple occasions, charming them, even. She acted as a surrogate for Ben and Petra, who were so shattered they could barely speak. Petra seemed to have aged decades in a matter of days. It was as though whatever icy reserve had kept her so pristine had at last given way. She was as beautiful as ever, but all of her hard edges seemed to soften at once, and she collapsed into Ben’s arms periodically. Nora had come to see her sister the first morning but had become so hysterical that she’d had to leave swiftly thereafter. Leo went with her, shooing the hapless Larry away.
“Why, why would anyone do this to my baby?” Petra asked again and again: to Reece, to the cops, to no one. Elin was her champion: the mothers had grown closer since the engagement, and now Elin handily took the lead with the cops. Reece was proud of her mother, admired her strength, her calm at the eye of the storm.
“The poor darlings have been under so much pressure,” Elin told the police, confirming that her son had come to seek her counsel after his argument with his fiancée. “They love each other so much, but being newly engaged, preparing to take on all of this wedding planning, it’s stressful! I remember planning our own, goodness, Thatcher and I never fought half so much. And we just wanted them to be happy, of course. We still do!”
Laila kept a near-constant vigil at her cousin’s bedside. Liberty had gone into emergency surgery to drain the blood from her brain the night Laila had found her, but she had not regained consciousness, and her prognosis was bleak. Reece knew that Laila was on the outs with her other cousins, and she felt for the girl. If she’d made some questionable choices with men since arriving in New York, well, Jesus, who hadn’t? And she was twenty-five, for God’s sake; a hall pass seemed in order. Any grievance seemed so petty in light of what had happened.
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