I reach for the doorknob. It’s loose in my hand, the door unlocked. Without hesitation, I swing it open and look inside.
The room is bathed in red and gold light. The red is from the nightstand lamp. The gold comes from several candles that sit beside it. Music plays from an old CD player that’s been pulled from the storage closet. Peggy Lee, purring out Fever.
In the soft half-light, I can make out Sam on the edge of the bed. At least I think it’s her. She looks so unlike her normal self that recognition is slow to arrive. She wears a dress far different from the grungy black one she first showed up in. This one is red, with capped sleeves, an A-line skirt, a scooped-neck that gives a tantalizing peek of cleavage. Matching heels are on her feet. Her hair is pulled up, exposing her pale neck.
She’s not alone.
A man sits beside her in a crisp black polo shirt and khakis. I have no trouble recognizing him.
Coop.
His hand is on Sam’s neck, caressing the pale skin just beneath her chin. Sam is touching him, too, her index finger riding the swell of his left bicep. They lean into each other, faces turned, on the verge of a kiss.
“What—”
What the fuck is going on?
That’s what I mean to say, but only the first word comes out. Sam drops her hand from his arm. Coop’s hand remains at her neck, his whole body stilled by surprise. I haven’t seen him so shocked since our first meeting outside Pine Cottage. He wears the same expression he did that night. It’s not as extreme, not as horrified. But it’s there. A slightly smudged copy of the original.
“Quincy,” he says. “I’m so—”
“Get out.”
He manages to stand and steps toward me. “I can explain.”
“Get out,” I say again, growling the words.
“But—”
“Get out!”
Suddenly I’m upon him, scratching at him with one hand while unleashing a series of slaps with the other. My hands soon turn to fists, flying at him, not caring what part of him I hit as long as I hit something. And I do, landing blow after blow as Coop merely stands there and takes it. But then Sam swoops in, a flash of red, all but tackling me against the wall.
“Go!” she hisses to Coop.
He pauses at the door, watching me wail and thrash and pound my head against the wall, each thump harder than the last.
“Get the fuck out!” Sam yells.
This time, Coop obeys and slips out of the room. I slide down the wall, weeping. The betrayal is so sharp that I double over, arms folded across my stomach. It feels like a sharpened blade is pushing into my gut, stabbing me again and again and again.
Pine Cottage, 10:56 p.m.
Quincy, drained of tears, left the room in search of Janelle. She needed that combination of abrasiveness and pity only Janelle could provide. She was like human sandpaper in that regard. Rough and soothing in equal measure.
In the great room, she found Ramdy stuffed into one of the armchairs. Amy sat on Rodney’s lap, one lithe arm around his neck as they made out. They reminded Quincy of swimmers, mouths open, gasping.
“Where’s Janelle?”
The female half of Ramdy surfaced, catching her breath, annoyed to be so disturbed. “What?”
“Janelle. Have you seen her?”
Amy shook her head before diving back under.
Quincy then headed outside, creaking across the deck. It was a clear night, the full moon coloring the trees pale gray. She paused on the deck steps, listening for signs of Janelle. Footsteps on the grass, for instance. Or the throaty laugh that was so familiar she could pick it out in a crowd. She heard nothing but the last of the season’s creepers in the trees and the distant, forlorn hoot of an owl.
Rather than go back inside, Quincy kept walking, drawn into the woods. She found herself following the same path they had trod earlier, the leaves still tamped down. It was only when the forest floor began to rise that Quincy thought about turning back. By then it was too late. She needed to push on, even though she wasn’t sure why. Call it a hunch. An instinct. A certainty, even, surging with the blood inside her veins.
The large rock peeked into view as she neared the top of the incline. Its sheer size created a break in the canopy of tree branches overhead. It was like a hole in an umbrella, silver moonlight pouring through it, raining down on two people atop the rock.
One of them was Janelle.
The other was Craig.
He lay on his back, shirt off and balled under his head to form a makeshift pillow. His pants had been shoved to his ankles, circling them like manacles. Janelle sat on top of him, riding him. Each thrust moved the skirt of her dress. An ebb and tide of fabric across Craig’s bare thighs. The top of her dress was pulled down, exposing breasts so pale they practically glowed in the moonlight.
“Yes,” she moaned, the word a wisp mingling with the night air. “Yes, yes, yes.”
Betrayal clenched Quincy’s stomach, like there was a hand there holding her insides, squishing them as it curled into a fist.
Yet she couldn’t look away. Not with Janelle moaning like that, her movements more desperate than passionate. It was all too beautiful and painful and grotesque.
Then the sobs came, burbling out of her. Quincy slapped a hand over her mouth to block the sound. Even though she shouldn’t have cared if they heard her. Even though all she wanted to do was scream to the sky, her banshee’s wail riding the breeze.
But the angry fist inside her kept squeezing, increasing her anger, her pain. She slipped back through the woods, fresh tears forming where the earlier ones had dried. She could still hear Janelle as she slid down the incline, her repeated moans like a taunting bird in the branches.
Yes, yes, yes.
CHAPTER 33
“Why?” I say, still on the floor.
Sam ignores me, instead crossing the room to silence the CD player. Then it’s on to the knapsack, where she pulls out her black jeans and begins to slide them on under the skirt of the red dress.
”Why?”
“Because it needed to be done,” Sam says.
“It didn’t,” I say, rising to my knees. “You just felt like it did.”
Because she knew how much it would hurt me once I found out. And I was certain she intended to make sure I found out. This was just another way to mess with me, to wake me up, to make me angry.
I claw at the wall, using it to help me rise to my feet. Still unsteady, I lean against it, leveling my gaze at Sam. She’s removed the dress and is now yanking her Sex Pistols shirt over her head. Then she sits on the bed, replacing the fuck-me heels with her combat boots.
“You’re sick,” I tell her. “You know that, right? You can’t stand to think that one of us could have a normal life. That at least one of us could actually be happy.”
Sam goes to the window, throws it open and lights a cigarette. Puffing out smoke, she says, “You have me all figured out, don’t you?”
“I do. You came here and saw that I was normal and stable and decided that you had to fuck it all up.”
“Stable? You sent a guy to the hospital, babe. He’s still in a goddamn coma.”
“Because of you!” I shout. “You wanted me to do it!”
“Keep thinking that, Quinn. If you need that lie to be able to live with yourself, then keep on believing it.”
I look away, not sure what to believe. It feels as if gravity has failed, and everything once secure and settled in my life is now tumbling in mid-air, suddenly just beyond my reach.
“Why Coop?” I ask. “It’s Manhattan. There are a million guys you could have picked. So why him?”
“Insurance.”
“For what?”
“That detective came by again this morning,” Sam says. “Hernandez. She said she wanted to talk to you. When I told her you were away, she said she’d be back and that you shouldn’t have left town.”
Because my running off with my lawyer boyfriend made me look suspicious. Of course it did.
“I didn’t know what to do,” Sam says. “So I called Coop.”
I suck in my breath, suddenly numb. “You didn’t tell him about the park, did you?”
Sam rolls her eyes while hissing out smoke. “Hell no. I told him that we should get to know each other better. That he should come to the city if he could. He did.”