So, I hired Rufus.
And he took care of it. I never asked him how or what he had to do to squash it, but he did. And I didn’t pay any sort of bribe money to make it go away, because that never works. You pay them once, they just come back for more. Or they threaten to release it anonymously. You never get rid of roaches, after all. They just come back every season.
Paying them off wouldn’t do and Rufus knew that.
In the end, Rufus is worth every single penny.
I’m fortunate. I haven’t had to use him much, but he’s on standby at all times, just in case. I know very little about him, which is best for both of us. He’s former CIA and owns a private investigation firm that caters to the rich and powerful.
He refuses to work with two kinds of people— politicians and people who hurt kids.
“Their dirt needs to be revealed,” he likes to say. The man has a voice like a chainsaw, riddled with years of cigars and whiskey. He’s something out of a noir novel from the 1930s, someone who still refers to women as “broads.”
But he’s professional and clean. He only works with the best of the best, and when I told him about Wendi Hughes and what I needed him to do, I knew before I’d even finished selling him on it, that he was in.
“You know I love to take down a politician,” he chortled. “But a politician’s wife? I’d almost do it for free.”
“You’re always welcome to,” I grinned.
He winked at me. “Nah. No free lunches, right? When do I begin?”
“As soon as possible. She’s had her fun for long enough.”
* * *
I’ve been dreaming about the sound a body makes when it falls from the top of a six-story building.
I used to dream about it every night. I’d wake up screaming, shaking, gasping for the breath I’d been holding in my sleep. Lovers would hold me, ask me what’s wrong: “You were having a nightmare. Come back to bed.”
I have shared my body many times since that night, but I’ve never shared the truth about what happened.
How could anyone understand what it’s like to both love and hate someone enough to push them off a building? How could they grasp how it’s possible to be both sickened and yet aroused at the sound of bones, muscle, and blood smacking the concrete?
We are taught love is an absolute.
I know all too well that it’s not.
Because the darkest of my secrets is this: You think I’m having a nightmare.
I’m here to tell you this: I’m reliving a cherished memory.
I’m screaming because I’m awake.
I’m shaking because I can’t go back and kill her again.
* * *
That entry was dated January 1st. Wendi wanted to start her New Year off with a bang. I could appreciate that. It’s important to have resolutions and goals.
We’d received our invitations to the reunion a week after she’d scribbled that confession in her journal.
As smart as Wendi was, she was also a victim of her own hubris, just like most sociopaths. She had to have a way to relive the dark times, the ones that clearly still got her off.
Freshman year, in our creative writing class, Wendi had bragged about keeping a journal since she was seven years old.
“For my memoirs,” she said. So smug. “One day my diary will be in a museum.”
Even fifteen years later I could hear the smirk in her voice.
Do kids even have diaries these days? Or do they stick to documenting their self-admiration in their blogs and Tumblr accounts? It’s a shame, really. There’s something about spilling your secrets in ink across the page that can’t be replicated with words on a screen.
Besides, you can’t prove words on a screen were typed by you.
Handwriting though? There’s a whole business behind analyzing it.
And Rufus knew that all too well.
* * *
Two weeks later, I held the journal of Wendi Hughes in my freshly-manicured hands. I made sure Hollis was with me; she’d flown into LA the night before in eager anticipation of this meeting with Rufus.
“How do you know he has anything?” she’d asked. For an attorney, Hollis could be so naïve about certain things. Maybe because she specialized in glamourous tax law.
“He doesn’t meet with me unless he has something,” I replied.
“How did he get it?”
“Does it matter?”
“Are you asking me that as your friend or a lawyer, because my answer is different depending on your preference.”
“Rufus is on the level,” I assured her. “Just sit back and enjoy this.”
And sure enough, he’d delivered. I held the journal in my hands, and Hollis and I sat there for over two hours reading every single entry in it. It covered two years of time where Wendi had been dumb enough to rehash the past, including the night Olivia had been killed.
We knew now who killed Olivia, and how, but we still lacked a definitive motive. A few pages deeper, we found what might pass for one – heartbreak.
After we confronted Olivia about all of her lies, and she became persona non grata in our circle, she found a new best friend in Wendi. In reality, Wendi probably just wanted to take advantage of Olivia’s fragile psyche and have fun doing more psychological damage, but somewhere along the line Wendi had fallen in love with Olivia, which I got, because even after all the betrayal, there was something so intriguing and charming about Olivia. They’d briefly enjoyed a sexual relationship, and Wendi was prepared to go full-blown lesbian again for her new love.
I imagined that was why when we received the pictures from the orgy, none of them included Wendi. During their whirlwind romance, Olivia must have destroyed the images with Wendi in them to assure they never came back to haunt her.
Eventually, Olivia decided girls weren’t really her thing, which sent Wendi into a rage. Nobody dumped Wendi Rochester-Hodge. Her anger simmered until graduation day.
It was difficult to read. Even knowing what we knew.
“God you can tell she was an English major,” Hollis said after we were done. “She’s a little verbose for my tastes.”
“Yeah when I read about someone masturbating to the thought of murdering my friend, I’d prefer the writer to be a little more concise. So much passive voice, am I right?” I joked and Hollis shook her head.
“You’re so sick,” she replied, but she was smiling.
“Nope,” I said, closing the journal. I had no desire to ever open it again. “Wendi Hughes is the sick bitch here. And it’s time for her to pay.”
* * *
Rufus had been surprised how easy it was to break into the secret world of Wendi Hughes. He’d been prepared to have to do a lot of paying people off and digging through her past to get to someone who would be close enough to Wendi to obtain her erotic murder log. He’d said it might take months. He’d even interviewed men who were Wendi’s type, men who would be willing to play the part of eager orgy partner and lover in order to get on her turf.
And even then, he suspected it would still be difficult to get what we needed. He’d had back-up plans of course. If the journal wouldn’t work, there was the trusty blackmail method. There was the hope they could catch her on tape incriminating herself.
But in the end, it hadn’t been hard at all.
You don’t become Wendi Hughes without burning a lot of bridges that are eager to rise from the ashes to take you down. When you have to force people to be loyal to you, that’s what happens. If you give them the slightest crack to squeeze through, they’re happy to take it.
Wendi hadn’t changed much since her days at Martha Jefferson. She still loved sex with strangers, men or women or both, which by itself was nothing to be ashamed of, unless you were the prominent wife of one of the most conservative politicians in the nation.
Wendi was living a secret, sordid life that would have made the darkest of pornographers blush. And in her wake, she’d broken many promises and told many li
es. She’d made the mistake of being flagrant in her betrayal, so assured of her power against the powerless. And she’d been right. Wendi had her own Rufus’s and her own team that made it almost impossible for her to be touched. Her husband represented the interests of truly powerful men and corporations and Wendi knew that.
She knew how the world worked, just like I did.
Rich people have different rules than the rest of the world.
But Wendi, unfortunately, had broken the wrong heart. Her latest lover, Miguel, was a fresh man scorned. He’d been with Wendi for almost two years, but he’d become disenchanted with her and wanted to end things.
Wendi didn’t like this. She was the only one allowed to end things as we all knew. It had been why she’d pushed Olivia off that rooftop.
She couldn’t push Miguel off a rooftop, but she could still hurt him in other ways, ways that might drive him to want to jump himself.
Rufus was lucky. He caught Miguel at the right time. Wendi had threatened to have Miguel deported back to his home country of El Salvador, a country cloaked in turmoil, one Miguel had narrowly escaped. Obviously when Wendi had threatened to have him deported along with his mother and grandmother, Miguel felt trapped.
He had no choice. He was now at Wendi’s mercy. And it only made her more demanding of his time. Their relationship had turned into a giant psychological game where Wendi toyed with Miguel, always hanging the deportment over his head.
They were still lovers, if you could call it that, which I personally didn’t.
But it meant Miguel still had access few people had. However, Rufus couldn’t count on it being for very long.
So, Rufus pulled his own strings. He arranged a fast path to citizenship for Miguel and his entire family, one that Wendi couldn’t touch even if she’d wanted to. I also insisted on a settlement for Miguel, enough money to allow him to start over in a new place.
But there was one condition: Miguel had to deliver.
And had he ever.
* * *
“So how do you think this will go?” I was clutching Hollis’s hand as we glided on my private jet over what looked like Kansas below us.
I was nervous. I trusted Rufus implicitly and knew this would go our way, but I was still terrified. So much was at stake for so many people.
“I really don’t know.” She squeezed my hand. “But no matter what, at the end of this? We still have us. And Sheridan. And Brooke. We’re going to need each other. More than we ever have before.”
I nodded. “Yeah. We also need this to work. For Brooke. And for Olivia.”
I looked over at Hollis to see her reaction.
“Olivia was a bitch,” Hollis sighed. “She was a terrible person. But she was also one of us. We knew her like she knew us. She had a family and a future. As fucked as she was, how do we know she wouldn’t have become a different person in the end?”
I sat back and took Hollis’s words in. Wasn’t it the truth though?
None of us are the girls we were at 22.
And thank God for that.
* * *
Rufus had arranged a meeting on Wendi’s own turf so that she’d feel assured and in control. That was important for this plan to work.
Wendi would walk into her office expecting to meet with the President and CEO of a made-up company called YAF Enterprises about a potential donor dinner to raise money for her husband’s reelection campaign.
Nothing gets politicians to show up like money does.
She walked into that office looking like a million dollars. Maybe even a billion. I couldn’t help but smirk, knowing that she’d leave that office a different person. Forever.
She didn’t notice Hollis and I at first. We sat in stiff, upholstered chairs deep in the corner of the office next to her framed degree from Martha Jefferson and her framed photo of her with her husband cutting the ribbon at the re-opening of The Brentmore.
“I’m sorry for keeping you waiting!” her syrupy voice filled the room as she strolled in. “I’m excited to hear…”
By then she realized we were there.
“What the fuck is going on?” The syrupy voice was gone, and the real Wendi was back. “I’m calling security.”
Rufus held up his hand. “You’re going to want to wait on that, I think. Unless you want this handed over to The New York Times. I have an associate waiting for my phone call depending on how this meeting goes. And if there’s no call by an appointed time, he goes directly to The Times It’ll be the story of the decade.”
He held up the journal.
She feigned ignorance at first. “And why would I care about that?”
But her chin was quivering, and her eyes darted around the room.
The bitch was scared.
“Let’s not waste time pretending you don’t know what this is,” Rufus said, smoothly placing the journal back inside his jacket pocket.
“It’s stolen property,” she stated, her eyes on me and Hollis now. “Pathetic, girls. This is your way of trying to get back at me? And I thought you two were smart. Hollis, you’re supposed to be an attorney.”
“I’m just here for the show,” Hollis retorted.
“There’s no show.” Wendi scoffed, but I could sense we’d caught her off guard and Wendi had never been good when she wasn’t in control. “What, you’re here to blackmail me?”
“Yes.”
I stood up now and Wendi reflexively took a step back.
“Fortunately, you write a lot of letters to your husband’s constituents,” I said, pulling out a folder with over sixty letters in Wendi’s own handwriting. “It’s your way of making it personal. Very savvy stuff, Wendi.”
She shook her head. “So what?”
“So your handwriting is very consistent and we just happened to analyze your journal with the many letters you’ve written over the years,” I stated. “Wouldn’t be hard to prove this journal is yours. Along with certain… information you documented that was easily corroborated by the subjects and witnesses of said events you wrote about. You’ve really connected with the people, Wendi! So many people were eager to talk to my friend Rufus here.”
He nodded at both of us but didn’t say a word.
Her slim shoulders slumped.
“It could never be used in court,” she said, her voice weak.
I couldn’t help but laugh. “Come on, Wendi. You can’t really think that’s the end game here? We’re well aware taking you to court would be a fruitless effort. It’s tempting, obviously, and it would certainly stain your reputation, but you’ve got a great PR team. They could get you out of it. There’s a shit ton of reasonable doubt connected to a case with a journal as its sole evidence of wrong-doing. We all know that.”
“Fine. Then what is this about? Do you really need money that badly, Amanda? I thought you had your shit together, how sad. And at your age too.” Wendi couldn’t resist herself, but this time it didn’t bother me. I stopped caring about the Wendi’s of the world long before my Martha Jefferson days.
“That’s what’s going to be tough for you, Wendi.” Hollis was up now, next to me. “It’s not about money. Not this time.”
We were side by side again.
“Hollis, you stopped being scary the second you graduated and were of no use to anyone anymore,” Wendi mocked. “How does it feel to peak at 19?”
“Pretty good,” Hollis said. “Better than you think, actually.”
Our clear disinterest in her insults made her understand how truly in trouble she was.
“So?” she was cowering now, just like the girl we used to know.
This was fun.
“Here’s the deal.” Rufus was in charge again, which was a good thing. My heart pounded and I could feel my hands shaking. I needed to let the professional handle this.
“You, Mrs. Hughes,” he started. “Will be calling your realtor tomorrow.”
“Excuse me? Why would I do that?”
“Because you’re putting The Br
entmore up for sale,” he replied. “You need to sell it fast, for your own reasons of course. You’re going to sell it to YAF Enterprises at a bargain bottom price. You’ll take a loss, but that’s okay. You’ll be grateful to take the loss, trust me.”
Wendi looked confused, but she didn’t say anything.
Rufus continued, “You will also persuade your husband to drop his bid for reelection. After a lot of sleepless nights and hours of fervent praying, you’ve decided politics isn’t where God needs you right now. You’re not sure where He needs you, but it isn’t in DC. I don’t know, you’ve got speechwriters, they’ll drum up something good.”
Wendi laughed now. “Right. As if that’s going to happen. Trust me, whatever you have on me I have people who can make it disappear. Who can make YOU disappear.”
She was confident again and I could see the wheels turning in her head.
“I’m not throwing away our life’s works and ambitions for a couple of bitches I used to go to college with,” Wendi spat. “Bring it. I beg you to. If a journal is all you’ve got, you’ve got nothing. And now you’ve made a real enemy. You’ll wish every day you’d been the one I pushed off the fucking building.”
We were stunned that she’d said it out loud in front of Rufus.
She grinned. “Are we finished?”
“Oh, I guess I forgot to mention something,” Rufus continued. “The journal is just a down payment of good faith. You see, we met a friend of yours. He got us the journal, which was great, but he also gave us access to your home. Enough access to do a little recon, as we say in the business. It’s illegal as hell, but sometimes you do what you have to do. I mean, extortion is illegal too, yet here we are.”
The last part he said loud enough for our special guest to know it was their cue.
Brooke walked through the door then. She held an iPad in her hands, the screen pointing out at Wendi.
The Girls On the Hill: A Psychological Thriller Page 17