by Robin Spano
“His name is Jules. Jules the Bear. I was going to bring him into my room but he only has one eye and that freaks me out. Mrs. Westlake says here . . .” Jana poked at her screen. “‘Sacha took Jules everywhere. If she went to her father’s weekend home, Jules would go. When she had her interview at NYU, even though it was only a subway ride away, she tucked Jules into her knapsack for good luck. That’s how I know my daughter didn’t kill herself. If Sacha was going up that mountain to die on purpose, Jules would have been with her.”
Clare wanted a cigarette. There was a smoking area out back by the kitchen door. But it was well below freezing, and hard to smoke with gloves. Jana’s rule inside was hard and fast: marijuana, not tobacco. So Clare warmed her hands on her coffee. “Sacha’s parents didn’t want Jules sent home with the rest of her things?”
Jana made a sound like she was sucking on her tongue. “You’re pretty inquisitive, Lucy. For someone who allegedly doesn’t care.”
“I guess I’m more curious than I let on.” Clare said. “It’s a weird feeling, arriving in a town where this girl who kind of looked like you has just been found dead. Is what her mom says true? You think Sacha would have taken Jules with her, if she was going to . . . you know . . . kill herself?”
“Can you keep a secret?”
“Of course,” Clare said.
“Sacha left Jules behind on purpose. She didn’t want him to see her in her final, awful moments. She loved him too much.”
“Um. How do you know?” Clare tried to keep her voice light — as in, not like an inquisitive cop.
“She left me a note inside Jules.”
“Inside?” Clare imagined Jana slicing up the bear, surgically or maybe violently, in order to find this note. If it existed.
“He has a zipper on his back. When Sacha was found dead, and it looked like suicide, that’s the first place I looked.”
Clare tried her best to act like Lucy would, when the wheels in her head were screeching madly against each other. “That’s so sad.”
Jana brushed a tear from her face. Real or forced, Clare couldn’t tell. “I hate her for leaving, but her mom is so wrong. Sacha killed herself.”
Clare pulled out a chair and sat with Jana. She didn’t know what to say. She had to get her eyes on that note, and if she could, she had to get the note to Amanda.
“Have you shown the letter to the police?” Clare decided to come right out and ask.
“I gave it to Richie on Sunday to give to the cops. I get it back when the case is closed, though.”
“Oh. Good.” Clare didn’t give a shit who got what once the case was over. She’d be back in New York by then, fighting with Noah.
“Richie thinks the note should get rid of the undercover, once the handwriting analysis comes back and they know it was Sacha’s writing.”
Clare wondered why Amanda didn’t know about this suicide note. Maybe Richie hadn’t actually given it to the cops.
“You want to read her mom’s interview with me?”
What Clare wanted to read was the suicide note, but she’d have to find a copy first. “Yeah. Why not?”
Jana pushed her computer toward Clare so the screen was halfway between them. She scrolled back up to the beginning.
Martha Westlake Unplugged
A chance encounter at LaGuardia put me up close and personal with Martha Westlake, New York’s junior senator in Washington. Did we talk about politics? No. Foremost on my brain — and readers’ brains, and Martha’s — is the death not even two weeks ago of Martha’s 23-year-old daughter, Alexandra Westlake — known to friends and family as Sacha.
“Sacha may have fallen off the beaten path,” Senator Westlake told me, “but she would not have taken her own life.”
I asked the Senator what she meant about the beaten path.
“I judged Sacha harshly,” Westlake said. “For wanting to take time out in Whistler before she jumped into a high-impact career. But maybe my generation should have taken our twenties for self-exploration before ramming head first into our own adult lives. Maybe then we wouldn’t have presidents who think bombing other countries is the optimal conflict resolution technique.”
I pointed out that Westlake sounded more like a radical than a Republican — that her party has led the United States into some of the most irrational bombing in history — and I asked her if she wanted me to strike that quote from her reply.
“I don’t care,” she said. “Does anyone even read your blog?”
“Has anyone commented yet?” Clare asked.
Jana scrolled down to the bottom of the page. “135 people. The post has only been live for an hour.” She scrolled back up so they could keep reading.
TWENTY-TWO
WADE
Wade pounded his fist beside his keyboard. He hoped that stupid detail — that Sacha had been found without her teddy bear — wasn’t enough to convince the undercover that he needed to make himself comfortable in Whistler. Sacha was gone, and Wade needed to make himself some money — fast.
He read the blogger’s profile in the sidebar:
My name is Lorenzo Barilla. I am an investigative journalist. I work for myself, because if you call yourself an investigative journalist and you work for a traditional newspaper, you are actually a peon in their system that is designed to control the world.
Wade snorted. Kid must be in his twenties.
His coffee tasted bitter. He reached into the cabinet beside his desk, pulled out a bottle that he’d hidden behind some books, and added a healthy dose of vodka to his mug. It still tasted bitter, but at least it would make him feel better.
Wade closed the blog and opened Facebook. His news feed reminded him that it was Valentine’s Day. Georgia had already left for work, but he could buy some flowers for when she got home. Roses, because she was conventional like that. And some chocolates — nice ones, from Rogers or Rocky Mountain. And a bottle of something she liked.
Wade let his fingers take him to Sacha’s profile. The past two weeks had turned it macabre. Messages like “Luuuuuvs you OMG u r gone 2 higher place & don’t mean high on acid” adorned the page along with pictures of flowers and candles. One idiot had even posted a clip-art tombstone — Wade looked closer and saw that the idiot was Jana.
He clicked through a bunch of party shots until he found a photo of Sacha alone. She was standing in the woods in a dark green ski jacket. Snow covered the ground and trees and there was even some in her hair.
Wade wanted to reach into the photo, to brush the snow from her head, to touch her tiny, upturned nose and magically pull her out of the photograph, into his arms where she would whisper encouraging things to him, let him know he wasn’t a fuck-up. He felt like a necrophiliac for the erection that was bulging in his jeans.
He remembered their first night together, in his condo. Georgia had been in Hong Kong trying to sell Schenkers on an ad campaign, and Wade brought Sacha home from work. Sacha said, “Normally I wouldn’t be here with an old married guy, but the way you sang ‘My Way’ at karaoke had me hot all night. It’s like, you get it.”
“I have a guitar,” Wade said, “if you want more.”
“I want a lot more.” Sacha nodded, a sweet, solemn expression in her eyes. “Can you play the Beatles? My favorite song in the world is ‘Revolution.’ But you have to sing it like you feel it, like you want to change the world.”
“How about ‘Fool on the Hill’? I feel like that guy, especially in my marriage.”
“Misunderstood?” Sacha laughed. But she got it. Georgia would have given him a confused stare and told him to get a grip.
“Fine.” Sacha had shifted toward Wade, taken his hand in hers and squeezed it like they’d known each other for years. “Sing ‘Fool on the Hill’ and I won’t feel so guilty about screwing someone’s husband.”
TWENTY-THREE
MARTHA
/> The plane thudded down onto the Michigan tarmac. Martha did not like landings. She’d had a bad experience once in France, and since then, she always imagined the plane careening too far off the runway or smashing into another plane or burning up in a spontaneous explosion. Today, though, despite the ice and snow, she felt relaxed about her fate. She still imagined the fiery death, but for once that thought was peaceful.
Had Sacha shared that feeling — that numb sense of not caring if she lived or died — when she rode up the mountain that last time? Martha closed her eyes and imagined she was sitting beside Sacha on the chairlift, telling her daughter what she needed to hear to stop her from taking her life. Except even in the daydream, Martha couldn’t open her mouth. And Sacha couldn’t hear her.
Martha waited for the in-flight announcement to give the green light back to cell phone use. When it came on, she immediately powered up her phone and sent Ted a text:
Need you for phone call in 15.
Ted’s response came in under a minute.
Here & ready. Hope you’re OK.
There was something claustrophobic-making in the hope you’re OK. Martha wasn’t sure what. Probably she was being unfair.
She tugged her briefcase from the overhead container and followed the foot traffic off the plane. When she found a quiet corner where she wouldn’t be overheard, she phoned Ted.
He picked up on the first ring. “Are you in Detroit? What can I do for you?”
Again with the claustrophobia — like Ted was trying to baby her.
She said, “I need you to tell the FBI that Sacha was — possibly — transporting LSD across the American border. Two independent sources have confirmed this.” Martha decided not to mention that the two sources were a blogger and a floozy.
Ted’s end of the phone was silent.
“Are you there?” Martha said.
“Who are your two sources?”
“I’m keeping them private.”
“Surely not . . . from me?” Ted’s voice had a trace of a tremble, reminding Martha how young he was.
“From everyone,” she said, “until I get confirmation. Will you pass this on, or are you too busy?”
“Of course I’m not too busy.” The tremble seemed to border on rage. Or maybe she was imagining that. “But I’m not sure the FBI needs to be let in on this.”
Martha gave a death glare to a gray-haired man who was coming too close to her. Her security guys stepped between the man and Martha, and the man moved on. “Ted, why don’t you sound remotely surprised to hear that my daughter may have been smuggling drugs into our country?”
“Well . . .” Ted paused for several beats. His breathing was shallow and audible. “You know my friend who works for Governor Kearnes . . .”
Martha waited, her knuckles clenched white against her black phone.
“He let it slip, maybe three weeks ago, that their campaign had dirt on Sacha. They weren’t planning to leak it unless you climbed high enough in the ratings to be a threat.”
Martha’s head began to spin. If Kearnes knew about Sacha and the drugs, and the blogger knew, and Daisy knew, how was this not in the press? And how did the police not know — on either side of the border? The DEA, in particular, should be on this. “What’s going on, Ted?” And then she asked her real question: “How did I not know?”
Ted sighed. “I first heard the allegation a week before Sacha died. I was looking into it discreetly, to find out what was true before distressing you. And when Sacha died . . . well, I didn’t see the point of adding to your grief. Or of investigating the rumor any further. Kearnes won’t release it now — he’d look desperate and cruel.”
Martha saw a Starbucks, and the only thing that calmed her enough to not hang up on Ted was the knowledge that once this conversation was over, she could walk up to the kiosk and order another chai latte.
“Should I have told you?” To Ted’s credit, he sounded uncertain.
“Yes,” Martha said. “Why are you reluctant to share this with the FBI?”
“Because what if we tell them and the press gets wind? It could really hurt your shot at the nomination. Things have been going so well in the past couple of weeks, rating-wise.”
“You did not just say that.”
“I’m sorry.” Ted sighed. “I’m not celebrating the reason behind the surge. But which is more important: finding Sacha’s killer or leading the country back to greatness?”
“Justice is more important. I want you to give the FBI all the information we have. Including anything you haven’t told me. Where are you now?”
“Dulles,” Ted said. “My plane to Detroit boards in eight minutes. My plan is to meet you at the tail end of your lunch with Hillier. We can head to the university together. I have a list of talking points we can go over in the car. The team has done some good work on this.”
Martha was too enraged with Ted to want to see him. “I can handle today on my own. Email the notes if you like, but I want you to stay home and work on counter-spin. If this bit about Sacha and the drug smuggling does come out, I’d like us to have our line snug and ready.”
“I’m sure the girls in charge of media can work on counter-spin.” Ted sounded deflated.
“I want your brain on this. I’m flying straight home from the debate, and I look forward to speaking on the phone first thing tomorrow.”
“I look forward to it, too. Um, should I call you, or . . .”
“I’ll call you.”
Martha hung up and walked slowly to the Starbucks. But as desperately as she gulped at her second chai latte, the flavor was not as consoling as it had been hours earlier at LaGuardia.
Martha really had to wonder if this investigation made sense. Not because it might cost her the presidency, but because she didn’t want to learn — not conclusively, anyway — that her daughter had taken her own life.
TWENTY-FOUR
CLARE
Amanda opened the door for Clare. Amanda’s townhouse was a vacation rental that looked like it would have been all the rage in the early eighties — sloped ceiling, shag carpets, lacquered blond wood accents. She ushered Clare in quickly. Like she was paying the heating bill.
“How was your snowboarding lesson?”Amanda asked.
“Ugh. Chopper.” Clare ripped off her puffy plaid gloves and set them on the radiator in the hallway. “He’s all ‘Lucy, I think you’re ready for a new challenge.’ So he takes me on a blue run. But it should have been coded black, it was so steep, and there were these bumps that make it even harder, they’re called moguls, covering an entire section of the hill. I took off my snowboard and slid down on the seat of my ski pants.”
“Because you were scared?”
“Because I was mad.” Clare hung her purple ski parka on the hook by the door. She loved this jacket — it was warm, but sleek-lined, with high-tech thermal design. Lots of pockets, including a few that were hidden unless you looked super closely. She hoped she could keep Lucy’s wardrobe at the end of the assignment.
Amanda shifted her tan leather coat over a couple of pegs, away from Clare’s wet parka. “Your instructor’s name is Chopper?”
“Yeah.”
“Good. Chopper’s who I asked for, but the ski school is run by such hippies, they said there was no guarantee.” Amanda gestured past the foyer, inviting Clare to come into the open living space, where a dining area, kitchenette, and sitting area with a fireplace rolled into one room. It would be a great space for a house party, if anyone other than Amanda were staying here.
Clare took a seat in a plush, plaid armchair. “Why would you care who my snowboarding instructor is? Is it because he used to sleep with Sacha?”
“I didn’t know about the sleeping with. But yes, we knew they had an association.” Amanda perched on a bar stool by the kitchenette. “Would you like some coffee? I’ve just bre
wed a pot.”
“Sure, thanks. But why would Lucy request a specific instructor? She’s not supposed to have known a thing about Whistler until she got here.”
“I told the ski school I was your brother’s friend, and your brother wanted to surprise you by having your lessons arranged, and I have a condo here and I’ve heard good things about Chopper. It works with our cover story if we’re ever seen together.” Amanda passed Clare a chunky pottery mug.
“Smells good.”
“I brewed it with a stick of cinnamon. I called you here because we need to learn more about Chopper.”
“Oh,” Clare said. “I guess it was wishful thinking that you called to loop me into Sacha Westlake’s drug smuggling.” Damn, she had to learn to cut the spoiled teenager from her voice. But Amanda always brought out the best in her.
Amanda sighed, took a seat on the couch opposite Clare. “I know you’d like to be included on every level of this investigation, but can you please concentrate on your own job and trust that I’ll tell you what you need to know?”
Trust, like Noah had told her to do. Clare wished she could say yes. It just felt so counter-intuitive. She cupped the mug in her hands, warming them.
“Okay.” Clare attempted a smile. “There probably isn’t even a killer, anyway.” She told Amanda what Jana had said about the suicide note.
“We’re waiting for handwriting analysis on that.”
“Sorry — you already knew about the note and didn’t tell me?” Clare shot Amanda a confused glance.
“Yes.”
Clare couldn’t find words. Which was probably a good thing — if she did speak, it wouldn’t be to say something nice.
“Handwriting results are unconfirmed. As with the drug smuggling, we don’t feel it’s wise to loop an undercover in to every speculation. It could cloud the information you gather.”