Every Step She Takes

by K. L. Armstrong

  What have I done?

  Oh, God, what have I done?

  Karla warned me, and somehow, I thought I understood journalists better than a celebrity manager.

  I forced myself back onto the bed, and I read it to the bitter end, and bitter it was, the portrait of a girl who was ugly inside and out, a stupid, thoughtless slut who seduced Colt Gordon and blamed everyone else.

  Again, I heard my mother’s voice, saying this wasn’t right, and there had to be a law against the lies this woman spewed about me, the way she’d twisted my words, every quote taken out of context.

  Unlike my mother’s voice, mine took on a whine, the perfect tone for the girl in the article.

  It’s not fair.

  Why is this happening to me?

  I heard Karla’s words again, warning me not to speak to the media, not to believe anyone who said they were on my side.

  I’d been played. Maureen Wilcox knew exactly the face to show me, exactly the angle to take, exactly the words to say. She got an exclusive interview by promising to tell my side of the story.

  The only story she told was her own. Whatever fiction would sell her article and get her own name in the news.

  I stared down at the paper. Then I folded it and tucked it into a drawer.

  Let this be a lesson to you, Lucy. Every time you open that drawer, remember and learn. Be smarter. Be stronger.

  I took a deep breath. Then I went to the kitchen to warn my mother.

  TWENTY-ONE

  I stare at the TV reporter coming out of the bathroom. She looks like Maureen Wilcox. Could be her if time had stood still, and I’m thrown back into that memory, the horror and humiliation and hurt.

  Before the woman can look up, I stride past, and her heels click in the other direction. I zip out the back door, duck into an alley and jog behind a dumpster. An elderly woman peers down the lane, as if she saw me, but she doesn’t slow for a better look.

  I keep seeing that article, feeling as if I’m back there again, reading it for the first time, and I start shaking so badly I need to lean against the wall.

  It’s happening again. I’m going to see articles like that again.

  I can’t do it. I just can’t.

  I wrap my arms around myself, and squeeze my eyes tight and pull back into the present. I envision the article again through the eyes of Genevieve, older and at least slightly wiser.

  I’d been so angry with myself for giving that interview. How could I be so stupid? Karla warned me. I knew better. Such a fool.

  Looking back now, I don’t see a fool. I see a desperate and confused girl taken advantage of by a predator.

  I’m sure Maureen Wilcox doesn’t see herself as a predator. Probably gazes back on that younger version of herself and applauds her chutzpah. A few years ago, I looked her up. Her article about me didn’t launch a career. She’d quit journalism school to work for the Gazette and was fired two years later for fabricating a story.

  Maybe that should make me feel vindicated. It doesn’t. She isn’t the one who will come across the word feral or homely fourteen years later and feel physically ill. I trusted a young reporter who claimed sisterhood, and she publicly pilloried me for a byline.

  I’ll never be that naive again. Articles will come, and they will say horrible things that I’ll feel fourteen years from now. That thought might make my stomach clench, but at least I know I will never be an active participant in my own humiliation again.

  I’ve just fled a reporter. I made a clean escape, but I need to be more careful. More alert and aware in a way I haven’t been for fourteen years. In a way I wasn’t, even then.

  I stand in that alley and take deep breaths, ignoring the stink of New York garbage bins in June. Then I send a text to Thompson.

  Me: Your news crew has arrived.

  Silence. I think he’s going to leave it at that, which is fine. I just couldn’t resist commenting. Then my phone pings with an incoming text.

  Thompson: I just spotted them myself. I am appalled by their audacity, and I apologize for not understanding how quickly they’d jump on this case.

  Thompson: I know you’ve had regrettable experiences with their ilk in the past, and I don’t blame you for being upset.

  Please allow me to send a car to retrieve you, and we will meet at another location.

  I laugh, a burbling laugh that edges a little too close to hysteria.

  Me: A location where you can absolutely guarantee me that I won’t encounter either media or police? Because if I do, I’ll fire you in a heartbeat.

  A long pause.

  Thompson: I can’t guarantee anything, naturally, but I assure you, I will choose a place with as much discretion as humanly possible.

  Me: That officer was right. Screwing your client over like this should be a hanging offense. Or at least grounds for disbarment.

  The pause stretches longer.

  Thompson: I don’t think I understand your meaning.

  Me: You set me up. I overheard everything.

  My phone rings. It’s his number. I ignore it.

  Me: Don’t bother explaining. And if you’re telling the police to track my phone, I’ll be trashing the SIM card in five minutes.

  Thompson: Are you intending to become a fugitive, Ms. Callahan? Let me assure you, that’s a very bad idea. Professionals fail to pull that off. You are not a professional.

  I bristle at that. He has judged me already and has decided he knows what I am—and am not—capable of.

  I want to prove him wrong.

  By what? Becoming a fugitive from justice?

  No. His tone makes me grind my teeth, but he has a point. Running isn’t smart. It’s not what I have in mind, either. I’m only going to throw out my SIM card so I’m not picked up before I get to a police station.

  Is that still my plan? To turn myself in?

  Thompson: The more you run, the harder you make this on yourself.

  Thompson: I am here to help you navigate this situation.

  Thompson: At the very least, I would like the opportunity to discuss that with you.

  The more you run, the harder you make this on yourself.

  He’s right about that, too. With each mistake, it gets more difficult to turn myself in and expect to be treated as innocent until proven guilty. My actions will scream guilty.

  Yet while I might kick myself for every so-called mistake, I’m not sure I could have done anything different.

  Should I have let myself be found at the murder scene?

  Let myself be arrested before I could warn anyone?

  Let myself be arrested on the news, duped by my new lawyer?

  No to all of those.

  So now what?

  That’s the question, isn’t it?

  With each passing hour, it will be harder to walk into a station and say, “Hey, weird thing, but I just saw on Twitter that you guys are looking for me. Here I am.”

  And is turning myself in the right move? This isn’t a misunderstanding. Isabella’s killer is actively trying to frame me for her murder. It’s not just the texts luring me to the hotel. It’s not just the fact I was on the scene that morning. It’s the other evidence the police claim to have found in Isabella’s suite. Also, someone broke into my hotel room and planted forensic evidence, and while it might just be on the clothing I took…

  A niggle at the back of my brain whispers that there’s more, that I overlooked something in the room. I try to chase it, but it only hovers there, vague and formless.

  Even if this is the easily dismissed case
my mother expects it to be, my name is already online. Memories slam over me, and I have to take deep breaths against the panic attack hovering at the edge of my consciousness.

  I will not allow this to happen again. Yet I must acknowledge that the accusation is out there, and I know better than anyone that insinuation and gossip and innuendo are a miasma one cannot escape, a stain that truth never fully erases. But truth must help. I didn’t get a chance to correct the story with Colt. I have that chance now. I don’t want this accusation quietly dismissed. I want my name cleared with proof.

  And how do you intend to find that proof? You aren’t a private eye.

  Thompson has texted me a few times since my last response. I don’t read them. I just write my own.

  Me: I’m being accused of murder. I’m not going to hire someone I don’t trust.

  Me: However, I do need legal advice, and I think you owe me.

  Me: You might disagree, so don’t consider this a request. It’s a threat. I have a question. I demand an honest answer.

  Me: Lie to me or refuse to answer, and I’ll let everyone know what you did. Try getting clients after that.

  It takes thirty seconds for him to respond, and I feel the chill in his words.

  Thompson: What is your question, Ms. Callahan?

  Me: If no one has attempted to arrest me or serve me a warrant, am I committing an offense by not turning myself in?

  Thompson: No.

  It takes a moment before he expands on that.

  Thompson: If you resist arrest or flee an officer, that is an offense. If an officer knocks at your hotel door, identifies himself and you jump out the window, that is an offense. What you are currently doing is not. However, I wouldn’t recommend it.

  Me: Thank you.

  Thompson: You will be arrested. The longer it takes, the guiltier you look.

  Me: I know that.

  Thompson: So what is your plan? Please don’t tell me you intend to investigate and prove your innocence. No matter how many times you’ve seen that in the movies, I assure you, it never works in real life.

  Me: I’m being framed.

  Thompson: Perhaps. But that’s something for me to investigate, as a lawyer with trained investigators.

  Me: Goodbye, Mr. Thompson.

  I open my phone, take out the SIM card and snap it in half. Then I toss it into the dumpster and stride away.

  * * *

  —

  I find the nearest ATM and withdraw the limit from my bank card and my credit card. That almost empties both. For years, I kept every spare penny in my checking account in case I needed to flee at a moment’s notice. But I got comfortable in Italy and started investing extra income and keeping my credit limit low. Excellent financial planning…unless you’re a fugitive from justice, needing every penny before your bank records are tracked.

  Am I a fugitive from justice?

  No. I’m a conscientious objector to the misapplication of justice.

  Right…

  I am on the run. Even thinking about that, I want to flee and hide in a dark spot…and I want to come out swinging at the person who murdered Isabella. Murdered her and framed me.

  I cannot afford to tear myself apart like that, lost in a maelstrom of terror and rage. So I focus on what I can do, starting with dyeing my distinctive hair.

  I’m about to walk into a Duane Reade when I spot an advertisement for a museum exhibit on Marco Polo.

  Oh, God. Marco. I haven’t responded to his text, and it’s been hours.

  I grab my phone.

  No SIM card.

  Damn it!

  I look around for a pay phone and then remember it’s 2019. What I see instead are Wi-Fi hotspot booths. I can connect to Wi-Fi without a SIM card. However, that will not help me make a phone call.

  I head into the drugstore and purchase hair dye and a cheap prepaid cell. Then I find a quiet spot, turn on my new phone and punch in…

  I don’t know Marco’s number. I always just hit his contact info on my phone.

  I pull out my cell, my heart pounding.

  There, he’s still in my contacts. I exhale and dial. It rings. Rings. Rings again. It’s a strange number, and he’ll think it’s spam.

  His voice message comes on in rapid-fire Italian, followed by English.

  “Hey, it’s Marco. As you probably know, I’m terrible at checking voice mail. Text me, and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible.”

  There’s no beep. Marco isn’t going to warn people against leaving messages and then let them do exactly that. I knew this—I just forgot because, well, we always text.

  I start a text…and then pause. A voice mail message can be erased, but if the police connect me to Marco and subpoena his phone records, they’ll get his texts. If I’m on the run, I’m sure as hell not making him an accessory.

  I try calling his number again in case his curiosity is piqued and he answers. He does not.

  What I’ve done is an unforgivable breach of trust. I screwed up the moment that parcel arrived, and I pretended not to know who Lucy Callahan was. I could have fixed it then. Could have fixed it at any point thereafter. Now, though, it’s too late.

  I send up a silent apology to Marco with the promise of a full explanation, and I pray it’s not too late for that.

  TWENTY-TWO

  Before the Colt Gordon scandal, the worst thing that ever happened to me was Dad’s death. Mom came to get me from my kindergarten class, and then I sat in my bedroom, waiting for the phone call that would tell us it was all a mistake. How could he be killed by a drunk driver in the middle of the day? The answer was three-martini lunches, but I’d been five years old, and confident in my knowledge of the world, which stated that adults drank after dark. I only had to wait for him to come home and set this whole misunderstanding straight.

  Dad did not come home.

  That mistake didn’t keep me from doing the exact same thing post-scandal. Mom found me with Nylah in my dorm room, holed up, waiting for the world to realize it had made a mistake.

  I will not do that again. While I’m certainly hoping the police will realize they’ve made a mistake, I do plan to hole up in a hotel room, but only so I have a quiet place to dig for answers.

  I dye my hair in a single occupant bathroom. Then I take the subway to a part of Queens that Nylah and I accidentally ended up in during our first week at Juilliard. I remember her joking about the rooming houses that rent by the hour, week or month. I find one of those places and walk in. A middle-aged woman sits at the desk, her eyes glued to Netflix.

  When she asks for a credit card, I say, nervously, “My, uh, husband holds on to it. For safekeeping. I forgot to get it from him.”

  Her gaze flicks to my face and then my arms. She’s looking for track marks, signs that I might be a difficult guest. Then she takes in my dark sunglasses and nods, accepting my story. Not the part about forgetting my credit card. That nod says she understands an older story, one that says I’m running away from the kind of husband who doesn’t let his wife have her own credit cards.

  “Can I pay cash?” I ask. “I’ll only be here a few days. My sister’s coming from Idaho to get me.”

  She quotes me a weekly rate, and I pay it. Then I retreat to my new room and take out Isabella’s phone.

  In the twenty-four hours before her death, Isabella had no fewer than a dozen text conversations. Most of them are business. She’d been texting with cowriters and others involved in a production. Two more seem to be friends. The “Hey, I’m in NYC for a few days. Lunch?” type of message.

  There’
s one from Karla, who knows about Isabella’s plan with me. She approves, while warning that Isabella needs to remember I have a new life, and she should do nothing to jeopardize that. My heart lifts a little reading that. Karla understood, and if Isabella had lived, Karla might have proved a valuable ally in my fight for privacy.

  Could she be an ally now? No. Colt is still her client, and we are right back where we were fourteen years ago. Even if Karla didn’t think I killed Isabella, her priority is the family.

  Isabella’s shortest text conversation is with Jamison. It’s a simple “Call me” from her to him, sent at 8:03 last night. When I flip back in the thread, there’s a lot of “Call me” and “Just checking in!” from Isabella with a one- or two-word response from Jamison. Not unlike my mom when I’d been away at Juilliard, a parent nudging her busy child for a call.

  A quick check of her phone logs shows he did call after receiving that nudge, and they’d talked for half an hour.

  By contrast, the longest text thread is from her other child. Tiana lives in New York. When she learned Isabella was coming, she offered her the spare room with a joke that she was the only twenty-five-year-old Manhattanite with a spare bedroom.

  My heart aches, seeing those texts and recognizing the girl I’d known. It hurts worse, realizing she’d spit nails if she knew I was reading her private correspondence with her mother. And I wouldn’t blame her one bit.

  I shouldn’t read those texts, but I cannot help it. A story unfolds here. A story I love. A different mother-daughter relationship that is as good as my own. This is mother and daughter as adult friends who flit in and out of each other’s lives, grabbing cocktails and, I’m sure, talking deep into the night as we all had in that massive bed in the penthouse suite.

  The suite where Isabella died last night.

  I have to pause there to collect myself. Then I keep reading. Another answer comes soon, one that has me flinching again.