“Yeah, mos def.” Melanie pressed a few more buttons. “Here’s another one, from earlier that day, around five o’clock.”
Ellen and Melanie put their heads together, and read the previous text, which said:
$228 in tips, my best day ever! going to the mall 2 celebrate! see u soon! xoxo
“That’s so random.” Melanie shook her head. “It doesn’t sound like she was thinking about using.”
“It sure doesn’t.” Ellen thought about it. “Recovering addicts get sponsors, right? Did Amy have a sponsor?”
“Sure, Dot Hatten. She was here this morning. I don’t know if she got a call from her that night. I was too much of a wreck to ask her, and she might not say anyway. They keep everything confidential, like lawyers or something.”
“You don’t think she’d talk to me?”
“I know she wouldn’t.”
“Do you have her phone number, anyway?”
“No.”
“Where does she live?” Ellen could get the number online.
“Jersey, but if you want to know more about Amy, you should ask Rose. She was here before. She’s another friend of ours. She’s older.” Melanie wrinkled her nose. “She was in rehab with me and Amy.”
“Great, can I have her phone?”
“I have her cell number right here.” Melanie pressed a few keys on the phone, found a number, and rattled it off.
“Hold on, I have to get a pen.” Ellen rooted around in her purse, but Melanie dismissed her with a wave.
“You don’t need one. Give me your cell number, and I’ll text it to you.”
“Of course,” Ellen said, a reminder of her age, as she stood on the front step of mortality.
Chapter Sixty-seven
Rose Bock turned out to be a middle-aged African-American woman with oversized aviator glasses and a sweet smile. She wore her hair cut natural and had on a blue-checked Oxford shirt underneath a navy suit, looking every inch the accountant. Ellen had reached her on her cell phone, and she was in Philly, so they’d met at a burger joint full of noisy students near the Penn campus.
“Thanks so much for meeting me.” Ellen took a quick sip of a Diet Coke. “My condolences about Amy. Melanie told me that you two were close.”
“We were.” Rose’s smile faded quickly. “So how did you know her? You didn’t say on the phone.”
“Long story short, I adopted a baby that I think was hers. At least that’s what the court papers say.”
“Amy had a baby?” Rose’s eyebrows rose, and Ellen grew officially tired of the reaction.
“Hi, ladies.” The waitress arrived with a cheeseburger in a blue plastic basket, set it down on the table, then went off. Rose picked up the burger and smiled sheepishly.
“I can’t resist the double cheeseburger here. I traded one addiction for another.”
“Enjoy yourself.” Ellen managed a smile. “If you don’t mind my saying so, you don’t look like the typical drug addict.”
“Yes, I do,” Rose said, without rancor. “I was addicted to prescription drugs, Vicodin and Percocet, for almost nine years. I started with a back injury and never stopped.”
“I think of Vicodin as in a different category from heroin.”
“You shouldn’t. They’re both opiates and they work the same way. I might have been in a different income bracket from Amy, but we’re both junkies. It could just as easily have been me, lying there today in a box.” Rose picked up her heavy burger and took a bite in a way that looked almost angry to Ellen, but she wanted to stay on point.
“I’m trying to learn about Amy’s death. The family told me she overdosed accidentally, or that it was bad heroin, street heroin.”
“She didn’t overdose.” Rose shook her head, and laughter burst from a nearby table, a group of caffeinated undergraduates. “More likely, the junk was bad. Street junk gets cut with strychnine.”
Ellen shuddered. “Poison.”
“Yes.”
“Melanie told me that Amy still had her Subutex on her, which she didn’t take, and we both read her last texts, which were upbeat. Amy didn’t mention to Melanie that she was looking to start doing drugs again. Had she mentioned anything like that to you?”
“No, not all.” Rose finished chewing, then reached for her coffee and took a sip.
“I wonder why she didn’t call you or Melanie, if she felt tempted to do drugs again.”
“You wonder?” Rose winced, between bites. “I’m not her sponsor, but I am, I was, her friend. I would think she’d call me if she wanted to use. I’ll never get over this, until I go to my own grave.”
“I’m sorry. You can’t blame yourself.”
“That’s what my husband says, and thanks for it, but it doesn’t help.” Rose set the sandwich down. “I would have bet a thousand bucks on Amy. She had relapsed twice, but that’s part of the process, for some of us. She was finally able to get clean.”
“So she never called you, to say she was tempted?”
“No, never.” Rose’s face fell into pained lines. “We talked on the phone every couple days, and all the talk was easy. She got a new job and she was getting ready to reconcile with her family. So that she started using again, two days after we spoke, well, it was a real blow.” Rose shook her head.
“Melanie told me about a guy named Rob Moore, who Amy dated three or four years ago. He was abusive and she got away from him. You know anything about him?”
“Not really. Amy told me that she had a toxic relationship once, that much I know. I never knew his name. She talked about him in group. The therapists might know more, but they won’t tell you, that’s confidential.”
Ellen tried another tack. “Did Amy say where he was from or where he lived? Anything that he might have done for a living? I ask because there’s an outside chance that he’s the father of my son.”
“I wish I could help you, but I can’t.”
“Wait, maybe this will help.” Ellen picked up her purse and pulled out a flurry of papers, one of which was the photo of Amy and the man on the beach, then handed the picture to Rose. Luckily, she hadn’t cleaned out her purse after the Miami trip. She pointed at Beach Man. “I think this man might be Rob Moore. Did you ever see him?”
“No.”
“She ever show you a photo?”
“No, just told me that he was a jerk.” Rose handed back the picture, then paused, her eyes narrowing. “Hold the phone. Last week, she called me on my cell. I wasn’t there to take the call, but she left a message, saying something about a ‘blast from the past.’ ” Rose looked away, her lips parting slightly as she reached for a thought. “What was it she said? She had a visit from a blast from the past.”
Ellen met her eye, and her blood ran cold.
“Do you think she meant Rob Moore?”
“Maybe.” Ellen’s thoughts came fast and furious, but it was risky to tell her much more. “What did she say when you called her back?”
“She said she was fine. I forgot about the message, and we started talking about other things.” Rose’s mouth tilted down, and the realization dawned on her. “You think that this guy came back in her life, but she didn’t want to let on? Or she thought better of it?”
“I don’t know what I think. I’m trying to figure out what happened. What day was it that she called you?”
“Friday. I missed the call because I was at my son’s piano recital.”
Ellen thought back quickly. She had met with Cheryl on Thursday night, after which Cheryl sent Amy the email telling her that Ellen was looking for her. Friday would be the night after Amy got the email, assuming she checked her email with any frequency. Ellen felt an ominous tightening in her chest, trying to put two and two together on the spot.
“Why does any of this matter? Do you think Rob Moore had something to do with Amy’s using again?”
“I don’t know,” Ellen answered, feeling an odd momentum building within her. She wished she could tell Rose that she intended to f
ind out, but she was too stricken to speak. Too many things weren’t making sense, or maybe they were. She sensed it wasn’t speculation. That Amy’s death was connected to her visit to Cheryl. That she had set it all in motion. And that Rob Moore had everything to do with Amy’s death.
“You there?”
“Sorry.” Ellen fake-checked her watch, then rose. “Jeez, I’m late, I should probably get going, thanks so much.”
“Now?” Rose blinked in confusion. “We’re in the middle of a conversation.”
“I know, but I have to go.” Ellen grabbed her coat and purse from the seat. “I’ll follow up and let you know if I learn anything new. Thanks again.”
“You think we should call the police?”
“No,” Ellen said, too quickly. “I’m sure it’s speculation, but I’ll give it some thought. Have to go now. Thanks again.”
She turned and fled the restaurant.
Chapter Sixty-eight
Ellen hurried from the restaurant, her head swimming. She broke into a light jog, pulling her coat around her with a shaky hand. Her heels clacked along the frozen concrete, and she almost ran into two students who came suddenly out of a bookstore. She hurried ahead, ignoring their laughter. Her breath came in short, ragged bursts, fogging from her mouth. Her eyes stung, and she blinked the wetness away, telling herself it was the cold. She reached her car, fumbled for her keys, jumped in and turned on the engine, then lurched into the lane of traffic.
HONK! HONK! A van driver blared his horn, but Ellen didn’t look back. It was late afternoon and a premature night was falling, frigid as black ice. Cars clogged the street in both directions, their headlights aglow. She drove on autopilot, through a world that had gone topsy-turvy around her.
She had thought that Will was hers and would be forever. She thought that he had a young mother somewhere and a wandering father. She thought that they were gone for good, a young couple who made a mistake. But it had been a fantasy, created by a writer’s imagination. All of it was fiction. And now Ellen was deathly afraid of what was true.
Her hands gripped the wheel. Her heart thundered. She skidded to a stop at a traffic light, the burning red circle searing into her consciousness like a hot poker. She was too emotional to think straight. She didn’t know where to go or what to do. She couldn’t go to the police because she’d lose Will. She had been going it alone for so long, she couldn’t do it for another minute. She picked up her cell phone and pressed in a phone number.
“Please be there,” Ellen was saying, when the call connected.
Chapter Sixty-nine
“Come in, what’s the matter?” Marcelo swung open his front door, and Ellen hurried past the threshold, compelled by a force she didn’t understand completely, whether pulled or pushed inside she didn’t know. It had taken her an hour to get to his house in Queens Village, but the ride over hadn’t calmed her down. It had been all she could do to hide her panic when she’d called Connie and asked her to stay late.
“There’s a problem but . . . I don’t know where to begin.” Ellen raked a hand through her hair and found herself pacing back and forth in his neat living room, a blur of exposed-brick walls, glass tables, and black leather furniture. Marcelo closed the front door behind her, and she spun on her heels to face him. “I don’t even know where to begin.”
“It’s all right,” Marcelo said softly, his dark eyes steady. “Try the beginning.”
“No, I . . . can’t.” Ellen didn’t know why she’d come here. She wasn’t sure it was the right thing. She knew only that she needed to talk to someone. “I think I’m in the middle of something . . . I don’t know what.”
“Did you do something illegal?”
“Yes, and no.” Ellen didn’t know how to answer. She didn’t know what to think. Her hands flew to her face, and she felt her fingerpads burrow into the flesh of her cheeks. “No, but . . . I think I stumbled onto something . . . I wish I never started. It’s the worst . . . the worst thing that could happen.”
“What could be so bad?” Marcelo asked, disbelieving, stepping closer to her and taking her by the shoulders. “What is it?”
“It’s too awful, it’s just . . .” Ellen couldn’t continue, afraid to give it voice, as if she’d fall into an abyss, a darkness that would follow as inexorably as nightfall. She felt something tear loose in her chest, as if her heart were actually ripped from its moorings, untethered from everything that held it in place, everything that kept her alive, and she heard herself erupt in a sob that came from deep within and burst free. The next thing she knew, she was crying and Marcelo had put his arms around her, wrapping her in a strong embrace, and she could feel herself sagging against his soft shirt, hiccuping in the civilized office smells clinging to him, the remnants of her life before.
Marcelo was saying, “Whatever it is, we can figure it out. Everything is going to be all right, you’ll see.” He held her tight, rocking her slightly, and she heard him saying again that everything was going to be all right, and she listened to his words as if she were a small child, permitting herself to be told a fairy tale.
“I made a . . . a mistake, a terrible mistake.” Ellen looked up at him through her tears and she could see in his expression that he had let his guard slip away, and all that was left was a naked pain that must have mirrored her own. He stroked her cheek gently, brushing away her tears, and Ellen felt his other arm behind her back and leaned against it fully, letting him support her. His eyes met hers, so full of feeling that she felt a kind of wonderment, and she couldn’t remember anyone ever looking at her that way, and in the next instant he lowered his face and kissed her softly on the lips, once, and then again.
“Everything’s going to be all right,” he murmured. “You’re here now, and we’ll make it right.”
“Really?” Ellen asked, still wondering, and when Marcelo leaned down to kiss her again, more deeply and with urgency, she had her answer. In that moment she gave herself over to him and her own emotions, kissing him back deeply, drawing from him comfort and strength, escaping into the delusion of his embrace, just for now, for the few moments before he learned the truth and understood that everything was most decidedly not going to be all right, but that all of her worst fears were about to happen and there was nothing and nobody who could stop them.
And in the next minute Ellen felt her own hands reaching up Marcelo’s back, her fingers rough against the thin fabric of his shirt, pulling him as close as she possibly could, and he responded, holding her tighter, kissing her with more urgency, his breath quickening as they sank, fumbled, and stumbled together onto the couch.
Ellen felt him press her backwards against the leather, or maybe she pulled him up and onto her, almost embarrassingly eager to lose herself in him and forget about everything else. About Amy. About Carol. Even about Will. For a moment she wasn’t a mother anymore but simply a woman, and the heat of Marcelo’s kiss and the weight of his body chased every thought from her head and obliterated every worry. In the soft light, she saw him smile with pleasure as he helped her wriggle out of her coat and they shoved it slip-sliding off the couch and onto the rug.
“Here, allow me,” Marcelo whispered, and Ellen eased partway up and put her arms in the air, letting him pull her sweater over her head, and when her head popped out of the black neckline, she saw the softest expression cross his face, and he stopped for a second, halting the urgency of before, and his gaze traveled from her face, lingering at her neck and finally coming to rest on the black lace of her bra.
“Meu deus, voce tao linda,” Marcelo said softly, and though she didn’t know the translation, the way he said it communicated so much desire that it slowed her down and stopped her teenaged clawing. She eased backwards against the cool leather and lay with her head back and throat open, her chest rising and falling with need, her heart pounding in her ears, looking at him through tears that had stopped flowing, taking him in with her eyes.
“You are so beautiful,” Marcelo said, and f
or a second, they were both suspended in place and time, letting the frank lust of their first kisses cool and ebb away, and they regarded each other as two mature adults, each sensing that they were starting something real by whatever came next. Marcelo looked down at her with a grave smile, then he cocked his head in what could only be a question, silently asked.
“Yes,” Ellen whispered, raising her arms.
Marcelo lowered himself onto her in reply, and they kissed deeply and slowly, wrapping their arms and legs around each other, their tongues flickering and teasing, and in time, their clothes peeled off layer by layer until skin met skin, warmth met warmth, and heart met heart.
Until there was nothing between them at all.
Chapter Seventy
Ellen woke up naked, her limbs intertwined with Marcelo’s and her head resting on a musky patch of his chest. She wondered what time it was, disentangling herself. Marcelo had turned out the lamp at some point, leaving the room dim except for the glow of a streetlight, bleeding through the slats in the window shutters. She propped herself up on an elbow and squinted at her watch. Nine o’clock. Her life rushed back at her like a freight train, full of noise, power, and something else. Fear. Suddenly she knew what had happened, all at once, as if she had seen it in a nightmare.
Amy was murdered. So was Karen Batz. Rob Moore is killing everyone who knows that Will is really Timothy.
Ellen sprang from the couch, looking for her clothes. She wiggled into her skirt, slid into her sweater, jumped into her boots. Marcelo slept on, his snoring soft and regular, and she didn’t wake him to explain. She didn’t have a minute to lose. She grabbed her coat, found her purse, and fumbled for her car keys, her heart beginning to beat fast. She crossed to the front door, and something was telling her that she had to hurry home.
Right now.
Chapter Seventy-one
Ellen shut Marcelo’s front door behind her, clutched her coat closed, and hurried down the stoop into a snowstorm, keeping her head down. Flakes fell like hail, driven by an angry wind, biting the flesh of her cheeks as she hustled down the sidewalk. Snow covered the sidewalk, and she almost slipped on the way to the car.