Dead Certain

by Adam Mitzner

  He walks me to the door. Before I open it to leave, we kiss again. He pulls me tightly against him so I know he’s ready, willing, and able to go another round. But I have no desire for any more. Besides, if I’m out much later, Marco will become suspicious.

  “Good night,” I say.

  “You know, Clare, someday I’m going to follow you home and come upstairs to your apartment.”

  I’m sure he knows that was the wrong thing to say by the daggers my eyes shoot at him. “Don’t even joke about that,” I say.

  He backtracks immediately. “Sorry. I wouldn’t do that. It’s just . . .”

  I don’t give Jason an inch. I want him to understand that he’s crossed a very serious line.

  “If I thought you were considering doing anything like that, I’d stop seeing you right now. Do you understand?”

  He looks more like a child than usual, which stands to reason because I’ve cast myself in the role of the disappointed mother. His eyes are glued to the floor.

  “Look at me,” I say, and I actually grab his chin between my thumb and forefinger to lift his gaze so that it meets my eyes. “I need you to look at me and tell me that you understand. If you care about me . . . If you care about our relationship, you’ll promise me that you’re never going to do anything that would hurt me.”

  “I’m sorry,” he says again, looking as if he’s trying to fight back tears. “I would never. I swear.”

  “Okay,” I say.

  I kiss him quickly and leave. As I’m walking toward his elevator, I tell myself that I need to end things with Jason before he does something from which there will be no coming back.

  DAY FIVE

  SATURDAY

  16.

  Gabriel calls me at a little before eight. His first words are to apologize for waking me. Needless to say, I have already been awake for two hours.

  “Is there any news?” I ask breathlessly, already thinking the worst.

  “I’m not calling about your sister. But Jennifer Barnett’s body’s been found.”

  It takes a moment for this to register. For some reason, I just assumed that “missing” would be Jennifer Barnett’s permanent state.

  “She’s dead?”

  “Yes. Died the day she disappeared, we assume. She was found in a landfill over on Staten Island.”

  That’s his way to indicate it wasn’t a suicide or an accident. Jennifer Barnett was murdered.

  I had been praying that Jennifer Barnett was alive because, in my mind, that would somehow increase the chance of Charlotte’s safe return. Of course, one thing really had nothing to do with the other; it’s like thinking the odds of a coin turning up heads will be improved if the three previous flips are tails.

  But now that Jennifer Barnett is dead, the two do seem connected. One maniac is responsible for both, which means the odds are very good that Charlotte is also buried beneath a pile of garbage. The very thought makes my stomach lurch.

  “Ella, you still there?” Gabriel says.

  I hadn’t realized how long the silence must have been. “Yeah. I’m . . . just trying to process, I guess.”

  “Jennifer Barnett notwithstanding, you’ve got to stay positive. Being optimistic costs the same as losing hope.”

  I appreciate the pep talk, but it doesn’t change my outlook. I know in my heart that, like Jennifer Barnett, Charlotte’s corpse is awaiting discovery too.

  After getting off the phone with Gabriel, I go online to see for myself the media circus surrounding the confirmation of Jennifer Barnett’s death. A banner headline on CNN shouts SHE’S DEAD, and beside it is the same photograph of a smiling and beautiful Jennifer Barnett I’ve seen for the past week. Among the subheadings are two related to my sister. One is the basic story they’ve been running since her disappearance was announced: a short biography of Charlotte with a direct segue to my father’s representation of Nicolai Garkov. The second article is new, quoting sources “close to the investigation” as saying that it is extremely unlikely that Charlotte’s still alive.

  Having learned all I can from the Internet, I call Paul to share the grim news about Jennifer Barnett.

  He sounds as if I’ve awakened him. Paul obviously wasn’t losing sleep over her disappearance.

  “Hey, Ella,” he says.

  “I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but Jennifer Barnett’s body was found this morning. In a landfill on Staten Island.”

  “Jesus,” is all he says next.

  “Yeah,” I confirm. “We need to strategize. Now that they have a body, it’s definitely a murder investigation, and they’re going to be looking hard at you.”

  He initially doesn’t offer any response. Then he says, “Why do you say that? The looking at me part, I mean.”

  The question at first confuses me. How could he be so obtuse? Then I remember that he doesn’t know about the diary.

  “The police found her diary,” I say flatly.

  More silence. I wonder if he’s still going to deny the affair, but instead he says, “Okay. I guess we need to talk, then.”

  “I’m busy during the day today, but we can meet later tonight. Does seven o’clock work for you?”

  I don’t tell him that I’ll be engaging in a search for my sister’s body this afternoon, adhering to my father’s commandment about not sharing anything personal with the client.

  “That’s fine, but if it’s all right with you, I’d rather not be going to your office after hours on the weekend. How about if I buy you dinner?”

  Normally alarm bells sound when male clients want to meet with me outside the office. In my three months at the firm, I’ve had half a dozen overtures to meet in hotel bars—or worse, hotel rooms. But Paul’s right. Our building makes everyone sign in and indicate who they’re visiting, and I’d rather not leave a paper trail showing that the same day Jennifer Barnett was found dead Paul Michelson showed up for a late-night, weekend strategy session with his lawyer.

  “Okay,” I say. “Somewhere quiet, though.”

  “How about we meet at Mas? I know the owner, and he’ll give us a table in the back.”

  17.

  The weather is absolutely beautiful. Eighty degrees, no humidity, not a cloud in the sky. A perfect day for a stroll in the park—if only our purpose wasn’t to find my sister’s corpse.

  My father picks me up at my apartment with his car and driver. We arrive at Riverside and Ninety-Sixth Street, where my father’s PR guy, Phillip Lashley, is waiting.

  I have never before met Phillip in person, but he fits the image I’ve had of him, and PR guys in general. Sharp featured, tall and trim, and well dressed. For our day in the park, he’s wearing a blue blazer and cream-colored pants—what someone else might don to attend a country-club dinner.

  “Clint,” he says as my father alights from the back of the car. “It’s all set up. The local TV news, the Times, and the tabloids have all agreed to cover it. I even got some network interest. George Stephanopoulos’s kid goes to school with my kid, and I asked for the favor. No promises, but my guess is that today’s event gets national exposure.”

  Phillip seems very pleased with himself. For an instant it bothers me that he’s living off someone else’s misery, but then I realize that’s also what I do for a living. Of the two of us, he likely has the nobler calling.

  “We’ve plastered Charlotte’s picture and the notice for the hundred-thousand-dollar reward everywhere in the city,” Phillip continues. “You’ll see the pink fliers throughout the park. I think we’re going to have more than five hundred people here today, and we’ll tell the press we got twice as many. A lot are volunteers, but some are the people we go to when clients need to fill a room for an event or something, and those we pay. It doesn’t cost very much, and it’s well worth it because it makes for a good shot on the news to see a high-volume search going on. The way it’s going to work is that half of the volunteers will walk down from Ninety-Sixth to Seventy-Second, and the other half will go north
to One Hundred and Sixteenth. We’re giving out these silver wristbands so the volunteers can identify one another, and we’re encouraging everyone to keep them on until Charlotte comes home. We’re also going to be distributing them throughout the city.”

  He hands me one. It’s rubber, like the yellow bracelets everyone once wore to support Lance Armstrong’s cancer foundation. I slide it around my wrist, and then my father does likewise.

  Phillip keeps on talking. “We’ve set up a podium. I think you should say a few words, Clint. Ella, you can too if you want. Be brief, because we want to be able to control the message. I recommend you don’t say anything about Jennifer Barnett. Stick to Charlotte. Something along the lines of thanking the volunteers for coming and then a word or two about what a wonderful person Charlotte . . . is. I’ve taken the liberty of jotting down some talking points, but I know, Clint, that you prefer to speak off the cuff, so just use them for guidance.”

  He thrusts an index card at my father, who scans it, then hands it to me. The card contains five bullet points that recite what Phillip just said. He has actually written the words, “We love Charlotte.”

  I put the card in my pocket. Like my father, I don’t need a PR flack to tell me how wonderful my sister is.

  In the distance, the flashing of police lights comes into view. A black SUV with four squad cars behind it pulls up along Riverside Drive. Gabriel is the first one to get out of the SUV.

  “Please excuse me,” I say. “That’s the lieutenant in charge of the investigation.”

  Despite the summerlike weather, Gabriel is in all black, wearing a long-sleeve Henley and flat-front slacks. He has on what look like designer sunglasses, not the standard aviator ones most cops wear. As usual, his badge is on a chain around his neck.

  He looks over at the crowd. “It looks like you’ve got a very good turnout.”

  “Something like five hundred people,” I say. “But . . . I know this is going to sound strange because we scheduled the event, but I feel really odd about doing it. I mean, the last thing I want is for someone to find Charlotte’s body, and here we’re essentially asking people to give up their Saturday to look.”

  “I get it. You want closure, but only if it’s the good kind. That’s perfectly understandable. If it takes some concern away from you, your sister isn’t here. We’ve already been through the park with cadaver dogs.”

  Cadaver. The word jolts me as if it were a racial slur, taking away Charlotte’s humanity. To those dogs she’s nothing but rotting flesh, a scent.

  He obviously reads my discomfort with the thought. “The search is still a good idea,” he says. “It will generate a lot of media coverage and that’s always helpful. Someone hears about it on the news and it jogs a memory . . . or you pull on some heartstrings and someone turns in a brother or something. That’s the way these cases get solved a lot of the time. We instructed your father’s PR guy to make sure everyone signs in and provides some contact information. We’ll cross-reference the names and phone numbers to see if they have any connection to Charlotte we didn’t already know about. I’m not saying that the criminal always returns to the scene of the crime, but it’s a cliché for a reason.”

  It is true, although I’ve never understood why people are so stupid. A shrink or criminal profiler might say it’s all about power. There’s some psychosis in the perp—he or she is convinced of their superiority, and seeing the cops fumble around reinforces it. Others get off on the chaos and pain they’re inflicting on the family, a way to commit the killing all over again. And still others find it’s a way to shadow the investigation. Coming to these types of things allows them to see the evidence the cops are uncovering in real time, so they can figure out if they’re at any risk of getting caught.

  None of the psychology behind it matters to me in the least, of course. All I care about is that, if it’s true, my sister’s killer might show up.

  Phillip strategically places my father in front of the flower garden on Ninety-Sixth, so that the plantings are in the foreground. After my father gets into position, Phillip hands him the microphone.

  My father squints in the bright sun. Then he turns to me and tries to force out a smile. After my father’s inability to speak at the police press conference, I stand close by, ready to step in if needed even though I doubt my father will falter again.

  “Thank you all for coming today,” he begins. “I can’t tell you how touched I am by the outpouring of love for Charlotte. Of course, it doesn’t surprise me. Everyone who met Charlotte instantly fell in love with her. So thank you. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart.”

  He hands the microphone to Phillip. “Everyone,” Phillip says, “you were each given numbers when you arrived. On the back is the location where you should check in. Go to that spot, and your group leader will be waiting with further instructions. Once again, on behalf of the Broden family, thank you all very much.”

  A few of the faces in the crowd I recognize as Charlotte’s friends. Brooke actually gives me a cheerful wave before she realizes it’s inappropriate for the setting. Josh and Zach are on opposite ends of the crowd, and I can’t help but wonder whether it’s intentional on their parts to stay as far away from each other as possible, but realize that it must be a coincidence because they’ve never met. I wonder too if either is really here because they’re murdering sociopaths and want to watch the police fumble around and witness my father and me suffer, or to stay abreast of the investigation.

  For the next two hours, we all parade up and down Riverside Park, searching for something no one wants to find. Rows of people walking straight lines, like some grim military exercise.

  Every so often, the shrill sound of a whistle rings out, the signal that someone has found something that requires further attention. Despite Gabriel’s confidence that no one will discover Charlotte, my heart stops with each blare. But then I hear the two rapid-fire whistles declaring the first interruption to be a false alarm.

  In the end, no one locates Charlotte or anything belonging to her. I take the failure as good news, but can’t deny a part of me wants this to be over. It has been more than three days now. Surely, Charlotte is dead.

  Everyone meets back at Ninety-Sixth Street for refreshments. Phillip tells me to stand in front of the tent, to welcome each volunteer with a smile and a thank you. While I’m waiting for the last of them to report, I see a familiar face approach.

  I’m beyond shocked. It’s Dylan Perry, my one-night stand from Lava.

  “Dylan?”

  “Hello . . . Ella,” he says.

  I can feel my cheeks flush. I’ve finally been outed by someone who knows that Cassidy is actually Ella Broden. At the same time, I’m pleased that if anyone’s going to crack my secret identity, it’s Dylan. I’ve definitely wanted to see him again, but hadn’t realized just how much until this moment.

  “I wanted to get in touch with you,” he says, “but I’m such an idiot. I never got your number the other night, and you never gave me your last name—and, as I since learned, Cassidy is a stage name. I thought about dropping by your apartment building, but that seemed kind of stalkerish. I was just about to leave you a note at Lava when I saw you on the news and decided that I’d come here to see you. I hope that was okay.”

  “Yes. I’m really glad you came, Dylan.”

  “I’m so sorry about your sister,” he says. “I can’t imagine what a nightmare this must be.”

  “Thank you,” I say. “It’s been really awful.”

  “I know this is going to sound odd because we don’t really know each other at all, but if there’s anything I can do, please just ask. Even if it’s just to talk.”

  “That’s very sweet. Thank you. I appreciate your coming out today, and wearing the bracelet.”

  He lifts his arm up to show off the accessory. “Normally I’d ask for your number, but I don’t want to reach out to you until you’re ready, so why don’t I give you my number instead? That way, you can call
me whenever you want. No pressure, though.”

  He smiles at me, and I’m instantly jolted the same way I was at Lava.

  I take out my cell phone. “Ready.”

  He recites the numbers, and I punch them into my phone. When I’m finished, I hit “Dial.”

  His ringtone is “Under Pressure”—the same song he sang at Lava.

  “No pressure, huh?” I say, laughing.

  It’s the first time I’ve laughed in days.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  My sister Emily is many things that I’m not. All of them good. She’s honest, loyal, and cares about other people more than herself. She’s also brilliant and beautiful. The apple of our father’s eye, and our mother’s favorite too, while she was alive.

  I know that comes across like I’m jealous, but I’m not. If I were our parents, I’d favor Emily over me too. When our mother was diagnosed with cancer, Emily stepped up and took care of me and, truth be told, our father too. In many ways, it’s Emily who actually reared me. She’s the voice in my head—not my mother, whose voice I sometimes have trouble even remembering, or my father—who expresses the profound disappointment in the person I’ve become.

  Not that Emily knows the depths to which I’ve sunk. I keep my issues secret from her due to my own shortcomings, not hers. I’m certain that if I confided in her, she’d provide me with good counsel. The reason I don’t talk to her about it is that I’m even more certain that I’d reject her advice.

  My sister is an Assistant District Attorney, and her office is a block from the courthouses in Lower Manhattan. I almost never venture that far downtown, as my usual southern boundary is Tribeca, but figure it’s the least I can do for Emily, given that she has a full-time job and I don’t have any commitments today. Aside from the commute, another reason I hate the courthouse area is that there are very few places to eat unless you venture into Chinatown, and I’m not a big fan of Chinese food. At least Emily has selected a diner where we can meet.