The Towering Sky

by Katharine McGee

  Leda was very quiet and still. She tried to breathe silently, in and out through her nostrils, deliberate yoga breaths. She waited for the other shoe to drop.

  Officer Kiles was the one who broke the silence. “You didn’t meet her in that context? As Eris’s girlfriend?”

  “Eris didn’t exactly gush about her relationships with me.” That, at least, was true. “I didn’t know Mariel.”

  “Didn’t know her?” Kiles repeated. “But apparently you know that she’s dead?”

  God, what was wrong with her? “She’s dead?” Leda lifted her eyebrows, as if she couldn’t be bothered to know what had happened to Mariel. “I only used the past tense because Eris is dead. As you may be aware, I was actually on the roof of the Fullers’ apartment when it happened.” The worst day of my life.

  Leda wondered, again, how Mariel had died. She hadn’t been able to find that information on the i-Net, and it wasn’t as if the obituary said what had happened; they never listed the cause of death. Presumably that was in poor taste.

  Campbell leaned his elbows onto the table, trying to impress upon Leda how much sheer physical space he occupied. “Mariel drowned. Her body was found in the East River.”

  Leda’s mind lurched violently to one side, as if yanked by a thin thread of memory, but it snapped off and floated away before she could be certain of it. She felt cold all over.

  Mariel had ended up with the death she’d tried to give Leda. There was a dark irony there, as if this were some kind of poetic justice administered by the gods.

  “What does this have to do with me?”

  The two police officers glanced at Leda, then at each other, then at Leda again. They seemed to come to some unspoken understanding, because Kiles leaned forward with what she probably assumed was an encouraging expression. “You may not have known Mariel, but she certainly knew you. She was gathering information about you before she died. She had a file on you and your movements.”

  Of course she did. Mariel had been planning her revenge on Leda, for what Leda had done to Eris. But the police didn’t know that—right? If they did, wouldn’t she have been brought here a long time ago?

  Leda did her best to act afraid, which wasn’t difficult given that her nerves were stretching tighter and tighter over the empty pit of her panic. “Are you saying that Mariel was stalking me?” she demanded.

  “That is what it looks like, yes.” There was a pause. “Do you have any idea why she might do that?”

  “Isn’t it obvious? She was grief-stricken over the loss of Eris and wanted to feel close to her. So she turned to Eris’s friends.”

  It was a gamble, but it was the best Leda could come up with on the fly.

  There was a silence heavy with meaning, as if all the air in the room had gone stale. Finally Campbell lifted his brows. “You see, until now, we thought Mariel’s death was accidental. But we recently uncovered new evidence that suggests it might have been the result of foul play. So we’ve reopened the case as a murder investigation.”

  Mariel had been murdered? But who would do such a thing, and why? Leda blinked, panicked that the subject of her thoughts was somehow visible.

  “We’re trying to understand what was going on with Mariel before she died. Especially since she had been dating Eris.” Officer Campbell lifted an eyebrow to underscore the strangeness of it, that two young women should die under unexpected circumstances, so soon after dating each other.

  “What kind of new evidence?” Leda asked as innocently as she could.

  “That’s classified.”

  Leda’s mind echoed with a strange, unsettling silence. It was a silence that rang with chilly finality, like the weight of a gravestone, as if the entire current of the East River was pressing down on her chest, forcing the air from her lungs. They might find out.

  If the police were investigating Mariel, they might somehow discover Leda’s relationship to Eris—and worse, the fact that Leda had accidentally pushed her. . . .

  “Mariel was very fixated on you,” Kiles was saying. “I don’t think it’s just because you were friends with Eris. Do you know of any other reason she might have been watching you?”

  “I don’t know,” Leda said defensively, wishing she could put her hands over her ears to block out the terrifying silence. Fear and alarm were swirling wildly through her.

  “Perhaps you—”

  “I don’t know!”

  The words burst out of her like bullets and rebounded sharply around the room. Leda put her hands firmly on the surface of the table to hide their trembling and stood.

  “I have made every effort to be cooperative,” she said clearly. “But this line of questioning is useless. I didn’t know this Mariel person and have no information about what happened to her. If you need to get in touch with me again, please do so through my family’s lawyer. Otherwise, I believe we’re done here.”

  Leda stormed away, half expecting one of the detectives to stop her. But neither of them said a thing.

  Outside the station, she leaned against a wall for support, her mind spinning through the implications of what had just happened.

  The police were reinvestigating Mariel’s death. They had already discovered the connection between Mariel and Leda. How long would it take before they found out the reason Mariel was stalking her: that Leda had pushed Eris off the roof?

  And that wasn’t the only thing that Mariel had known before she died. There were also the other secrets: Rylin’s, and Avery’s, and Watt’s. The secrets that Leda told her in a drug-fueled haze. If the police kept digging, they might discover Mariel’s connection to the others too. They were in danger, and it was her fault.

  She was going to have to see them again, she realized. All of them. Even Watt.

  WATT

  YOU’RE NERVOUS.

  I’m not nervous, Watt insisted, then realized that he was perched on the very edge of Avery Fuller’s couch. He scooted back against the pillows self-consciously.

  Okay, he told Nadia. Maybe a little nervous.

  When Leda flickered him last night, Watt had practically slid out of his desk chair in shock. He almost thought the message was some kind of twisted practical joke from Nadia. He hadn’t been expecting to hear from Leda anytime soon—really, anytime ever—given the bleak finality of their good-bye last year.

  Then Watt realized that it was a group message, and the other two recipients were Avery and Rylin. We need to talk—in person, Leda had written. I think we’re all in danger.

  And despite the gravity of the situation, despite the fact that he should probably be concerned about whatever Leda had discovered, Watt couldn’t help feeling a fragile hope ballooning in his chest. He was going to see Leda again.

  He’d shown up early to Avery’s apartment, hoping that he might catch Leda for a moment alone; after all, she was the one who’d summoned them all to this group meeting. But she hadn’t yet arrived. Watt just sat there silently, ignoring Avery’s pointed glances, trying to figure out what the hell he was going to say. How did you greet the girl you loved when you hadn’t seen her in eight months—when her last words to you were If you care about me at all, you’ll leave me alone?

  He cast his gaze nervously around the room, all brocade carpets and blue-patterned wallpaper and carved antiques that looked as if they’d been shipped straight from Versailles. For all Watt knew, maybe they had. He’d forgotten how imposing it was simply to get this high: switching on the 990th floor to the private elevator that opened onto the Fullers’ landing, then stepping through that massive two-story entryway. He’d felt a bit like Hercules climbing the staircase of the gods to Mount Olympus.

  Now here he was, in the fabled sky island, the bright human aerie perched atop the greatest structure in the world. Watt glanced out the floor-to-ceiling windows, the flexiglass so impossibly clear that it looked like it wasn’t there at all. He felt like he could stretch out his hands and brush the sky. What was it like for the Fullers, having no neighbors e
xcept those below them? Didn’t it feel strange that their only connection with the rest of the city was the opening to their private elevator shaft?

  His head darted up at the sound of the doorbell, but then he realized that of course Leda wouldn’t need to ring the doorbell at all. She was on the preapproved entry list here.

  “I thought we were done with all this.” Rylin Myers sank into the opposite armchair.

  “I thought it was over too. A long time ago.” The sleeve of Avery’s sweater dress fell forward as she reached for a glass of lemon water. A platter of snacks was arranged on the coffee table before them, completely untouched.

  How like Avery to provide refreshments at a time like this. Yet Watt couldn’t help thinking that it was oddly comforting, as if Avery’s unobtrusive hospitality was helping diffuse the tension.

  He’d almost forgotten that when he first met Avery, he’d thought he was infatuated with her. But after dating Leda—after realizing what it really felt like to fall for someone—Watt knew that all he’d felt for Avery was a crush. He and Avery were much better off this way, as occasional friends.

  He heard footsteps again, and before he could figure out what his first words to her would be (Something witty, Nadia, help!) Leda stepped into the living room, knocking all the air from the immediate vicinity.

  She was even thinner than before, draped in a black turtleneck sweater, and her hair was cut short. It drew attention to the stark architecture of her face.

  Leda’s eyes automatically rose to meet his. For a moment there was no one in the room but the two of them. Watt swallowed against the maddening flood of old tendernesses and love and frustrations that rose up in him.

  She was really here. For the first time in months, she was here, and Watt couldn’t believe it; he felt as if he’d taken an adrenaline boost, slapped a million caffeine patches over every last inch of his skin. It was as if he’d been in a trance these long months without Leda, and seeing her again had struck him violently back to life.

  “I would apologize for being late, except I think you’re all early,” she said smoothly, taking a step forward. Watt had forgotten the way she moved, as if every motion began in her warm, dark eyes, and flowed unbroken all the way to her ballet flats. She sat down next to Avery and crossed one leg over the other, only the slight jangling of her foot betraying her anxiety.

  “We’re early because your message was so terrifying and vague!” Rylin cut in. “What’s going on?”

  “The police are investigating Mariel’s death.”

  There was a beat of collective silence at Leda’s announcement. Avery twisted her hands in her lap. Rylin’s eyes were wide with horror.

  Nadia, Watt thought fiercely, what do the police know so far? And why weren’t we keeping tabs on this?

  I’m sorry. But you know I can’t hack the police department. They back up those files using location-specific hardware protections.

  Leda explained that police detectives had called her in for questioning because they were reopening the investigation into Mariel’s death—this time as a homicide case. The cops had clearly found a connection between Leda and Mariel, but they didn’t seem to understand it yet.

  Avery clutched a chenille pillow to her chest. “Did you tell them about Dubai?”

  “You mean, did I tell them that Mariel tried to kill me? I don’t think it would make me look very good in a murder investigation. All I said was that I have no idea what happened to her.”

  “None of us know anything!” Rylin burst out. “So we’re fine, right? That’s the end of it?”

  “Except that Mariel knew our secrets,” Watt said, speaking up for the first time.

  All three girls whirled around to face him. Avery’s and Rylin’s eyes were wide and startled and thick-lashed; but Leda just met his gaze evenly. She’d clearly already been down this line of thought.

  “She knew our secrets,” he repeated. “There’s a clear connection between Mariel and us. Now that the police are digging into her death, it’s only a matter of time before they figure it out. After all, they already found Leda.”

  Leda gave a terse nod of agreement, her dangle earrings brushing forward over the collar of her sweater.

  “Are you saying that we’re suspects?” Rylin demanded.

  Watt knew what she meant. If Mariel had been gathering files on all of them, it could look like they’d killed her to cover up what she knew. It was proof of motive, if nothing else.

  “There’s no way,” Avery insisted. “We didn’t even know Mariel. Why would we be suspects?”

  “Because the police seem to be questioning motive rather than means,” Watt explained. “They obviously don’t know who killed her, so they’re trying to figure out who might have wanted to kill her and working backward from there. And if they make the connection between Leda and Eris’s death—”

  He didn’t need to finish the sentence. If the police learned the truth about Eris’s death, the fact that Leda had blackmailed them all to keep it hidden, then they would clearly try to find out what that blackmail had entailed. Which would lead them straight to everyone’s secrets.

  Avery gasped. The sun cast the shadow of her eyelashes on her cheekbones. “You’re saying that if the cops keep investigating, they might discover what Mariel had on all of us,” she summarized.

  Silence hung in the air. Watt imagined he could see it, as if all their unspoken fears had been made tangible, swirling like snowflakes.

  “Now you see why I wanted to meet up. I had to warn you guys,” Leda said miserably.

  “I still don’t get it. If they have no clue who might have killed Mariel—if their only option is to guess at motive and work backward—then why did they reopen the case at all?” Avery asked.

  “They must have some new evidence,” Rylin posited. “Something that made them think it was murder without suggesting who did it.”

  Leda bit her lip. “The police told me how she died,” she said softly, and they all looked up, because that information definitely hadn’t been in the obit. “Mariel drowned in the East River.”

  “She drowned?” Avery repeated. “That sounds like an accident to me. What new evidence could they possibly have found to prompt a reopening of the investigation?”

  The room erupted into a storm of theories.

  “Maybe they found new security footage of someone pushing her, but can’t see who it is?”

  “Or maybe they found a weapon, and realized that someone used it to attack her.”

  “But how would they know that weapon was used on Mariel? DNA?”

  “Why can’t they just use location data to see who was there that day?”

  “Location data isn’t stored for more than forty-eight hours, you know that. It was a landmark Supreme Court case—”

  “Maybe they found a record of a security breach somewhere along the river but can’t tell who it was?”

  “Enough!”

  Leda had begun pacing back and forth like a caged lioness. When she reached one end of the carpet, she would turn automatically and start back in the other direction. Watt had forgotten that about her: the way she was always doubling and twisting on herself, as if it were impossible for her to ever fall still.

  “I didn’t call you guys here to instigate a blind panic, okay? Especially since you might not even be involved! Mariel was obsessed with me. This is my problem. That doesn’t necessarily mean it’s all of yours. I only wanted to warn you, just in case,” she added a little less vehemently.

  “It’s my problem too, Leda. If they find out about—” Avery faltered. “It wouldn’t be good, if anyone learned what Mariel knew about me.”

  Rylin nodded. “Same.”

  Nadia, did we ever find out what Leda had on Rylin?

  She stole drugs, Nadia informed him.

  Watt didn’t have to ask Avery’s secret, because he already knew what it was. Her relationship with Atlas.

  He glanced over at Leda. Her secret—the fact that she h
ad killed Eris, no matter that it was an accident, and had then tried to cover it up—was as dangerous as his. Maybe even the worst of all.

  “We’re all in this together,” he said, which was true. The three other people in this room had once been strangers, but now their lives were inextricably bound with his.

  “I have to go,” Rylin said abruptly. “Keep me posted if anything happens. And be careful.”

  Leda was still pointedly refusing to look at Watt. “Thanks for letting us meet here, Avery.”

  Watt nodded good-bye to Avery before following quickly on Leda’s heels. “Leda,” he called out, but she just kept walking down the Fullers’ long entryway, her footsteps quickening. Her heels echoed on the white marble tiles with their black border.

  She’s avoiding you, Nadia pointed out unnecessarily.

  Watt started running. “Leda!” he tried again, not that it would be any use—the elevator doors were opening, and she was hurriedly retreating inside.

  He just barely managed to squeeze into the elevator before the heavy brass doors shut behind him with a resounding click. He didn’t have much time. Just the length of a single elevator ride, to convince the girl he loved that they had to see each other again.

  “Hey, Leda.” He said it nonchalantly, as if he hadn’t just chased her down a hallway after a discussion about a murder investigation. As if it wasn’t a big deal that they were alone in the same space for the first time in months. Close enough to touch. Breathing the very same air. “We need to talk.”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “Not about us.” Watt attempted to force a beat of normalcy into his voice, which was pretty much impossible. “I meant about this Mariel stuff. I want to help.”

  “Thanks, but I’ll be fine. I only wanted to warn—”

  “Warn us, yeah, I got it.” Watt leaned forward, bracing his arm against the elevator’s wall so he effectively boxed Leda in. “You need my help, Leda.”