The Amateurs

  And Jesus. Aerin recalled the Vera Grady story – she couldn’t imagine how Brett got through that. But Seneca’s mom’s story was even worse. From what Aerin remembered, it happened shortly before Helena disappeared, though it hadn’t been covered as extensively. The poor woman, a young mother with striking, ice-blonde hair and a stunning smile, had been found two days later, her body dumped under a pier. Aerin had also heard that the coroner had Seneca, who must have been fifteen at the time, ID the corpse. How was that even legal?

  She pushed through the front door of the café. Outside, the sky was gray and the temperature had dropped. Seneca stood at the edge of the parking lot, her arms wrapped tightly around her torso. When she saw Aerin coming, she pretended to be fascinated by a speed-limit sign. ‘I don’t want to talk.’

  ‘Fine with me,’ Aerin said. ‘You don’t have to talk about it ever again. I don’t want to know. I mean, maybe you haven’t noticed, but I’m not super into bonding.’

  It wasn’t true – Aerin would love to know how Seneca got through each day – but she struck Aerin as someone who compartmentalized parts of her life, freaking out when her neatly packed boxes overflowed into adjacent, neatly packed boxes.

  ‘I can’t believe Brett …’ Seneca’s voice cracked. ‘This was why I was leaving yesterday. I might not be useful on this case.’

  Aerin rolled her eyes. ‘I get it. You have baggage. But just because people know doesn’t change anything – you had the baggage an hour ago, too, and you were going to work on the case, right?’

  Seneca didn’t answer. Aerin blew air out of her cheeks. ‘Would it help if I told you that you’re the smartest one here? Way smarter than those idiot boys? Without you, we definitely won’t figure it out. So don’t bail.’

  Ugh. After saying all that, she almost wanted to take a shower. She hated groveling. It made her feel way dirtier than making out with random guys.

  Seneca hiked her leather bag higher on her shoulder. ‘Okay,’ she said in a stoic, they’re-my-feelings-and-no-one-else-can- touch-them voice that Aerin could definitely identify with. ‘But we’re done talking about it. Got it?’

  ‘Deal,’ Aerin said. ‘And if I catch anyone else talking to you about it, I’ll deck them.’

  Seneca almost smiled, and Aerin’s insides warmed. Even though she’d just said she wasn’t into bonding, she had a feeling that she and Seneca just kind of had.

  Aerin walked her over to an outdoor table and sat down. It was awfully cold to be outside, but she doubted Seneca wanted to go back and face the boys just yet. ‘Your thoughts about Kevin are interesting. Do you think his buddies were covering for him and lying about his alibi?’

  Seneca settled down next to her. The wind whipped her curly hair into her face. ‘There’s no proof Kevin was actually at the conference – only what his friends said. Who’s to say they didn’t all get together and concoct a story?’

  Aerin picked at a splinter of wood on the bench. Could Kevin’s buddies have all covered for him doing something awful? She’d kissed one of those guys recently, she realized – Tim Anderson, at a pool party last summer. It gave her a deep and sickening sense of betrayal that he could have looked into her eyes, touched her lips, told her she was beautiful, all the while withholding a cruel but critical detail about her sister.

  Seneca pulled out her phone. She tapped on a cloud icon, then passed it to Aerin. A story from five years ago was on the screen; it was about the Connecticut Youth conference, completely unrelated to Helena’s disappearance. There was a picture of the group from Windemere-Carruthers – yep, a couple of guys she’d kissed, Aerin noted, and then one nerdy-looking girl named Pearl Stanwyck who’d probably spent the conference either having sex with everyone or wandering around alone. Kevin stood at the center, a smug smile on his face. Next to him, his arm slung around Kevin’s shoulders, was James Gorman, the Connecticut senator the group worked with in the summers.

  ‘Kevin’s smile looks sneaky,’ Aerin said faintly. She hated looking at her sister’s boyfriend in a new light, too. He’d sobbed at the memorial service they’d had for Helena. She remembered how he’d volunteered with Helena at a hospice. ‘We mostly just hold their hands,’ Kevin had explained sadly during a family dinner. Helena had touched his shoulder, admiration in her eyes, and for a moment Aerin got why she liked him.

  Her stomach swooped. Talking about Helena was messing with her mind. She had moments of thinking Helena was actually back, a filmy apparition by her side. Aerin even found herself lapsing into routines from when Helena was alive, like crying ‘Boop!’ when toast popped, which Helena loved saying. This morning, toast in hand, she’d even turned around, anticipating Helena’s laughter.

  Seneca clicked over to the Windemere-Carruthers virtual yearbook and flipped through the pages. Besides more pictures of Kevin and the Connecticut Youth political group, there were also a lot of Kevin candids. Standing on the basketball court. Giving a speech in the auditorium. Leading a group of kids down a hallway. Hugging an overweight woman identified as Mrs. G., the school’s librarian.

  Seneca sat back. ‘He strikes me as the kind of guy who’d help an old lady cross the street, but who’d also want credit for the good deed.’

  ‘Totally,’ Aerin agreed.

  ‘What do you remember about him?’

  Aerin sat back. ‘He seemed … okay. Kind of stiff, almost like his joints needed oiling. I had a nickname for him – Puppet. Like a marionette. Helena didn’t find it funny.’ Her throat caught, remembering how Helena’s face had crumpled when she’d told her. When did you get so mean? she’d snapped.

  ‘I wasn’t kidding when I said he and my dad were tight,’ she went on. ‘When Kevin came over, he and my dad talked nonstop. Helena barely paid attention to them. And, I mean, she started dressing so differently, at the start of that summer. Like a hippie. Kevin would make fun of her outfits. I always wondered why she didn’t go for this guy from our school named Raj Juniper. He was tall and sexy and made his own shoes out of recycled tires.’

  ‘Maybe she dated Kevin to please your dad.’

  Aerin hugged her chest – her skin was getting goose bumps from the cold. ‘My parents fought a lot. Maybe bringing in Kevin was her way of keeping Dad happy.’

  ‘Your dad’s not around now, is he?’

  She shrugged. ‘He’s in New York City. It’s not like it’s far.’

  ‘But he’s not around around. Like, you don’t see him much.’

  Aerin felt a prickle of annoyance. When had the conversation turned left into Touchy-Feelyville? ‘It’s partly my fault. I hate New York, so I don’t go very often. It’s so dirty.’

  Seneca glanced at her, then flipped to Kevin’s senior page. Her eyes widened. ‘Look.’

  Aerin leaned over and looked where Seneca was pointing: his dedication, italic letters under his picture. It was in the form of a poem.

  You’ll thrive, pilgrim

  don’t get a big head

  what a pterodactyl laugh!

  You, sweeter than honey, deserve it all,

  loving H as a gas.

  Aerin snorted. ‘He should stick to politics.’

  ‘I know. But look: count every four words, starting with you’ll.’

  Aerin cocked her head. ‘Another skip code?’ she asked uncertainly. She started to count. When she finished, she gasped.

  You’ll get what you deserve, H.

  CHAPTER 11

  A few hours later, Seneca and Maddox pulled up to Maddox’s house, a huge blue colonial with three dormers, window boxes, a big front porch with two yellow rocking chairs, and a white wood fence. ‘It’s so … Connecticut,’ Seneca drolled. She couldn’t believe she could even make a joke right now, but then, masking what she was feeling wasn’t really anything new for her.

  She pulled her bags from the back of the Jeep and grabbed the bouquet of daisies she’d bought at the flower shop near Le Dexby Patisserie for Mr. and Mrs. Wright as thanks for letting her stay. Maddox led her up the
front path, through a foyer with parquet floors and a console table holding family photos, into a large, homey kitchen done up in yellows and reds. She put the flowers in water, and then they headed up a Berber-carpeted staircase to a door. Maddox nudged it open with his shoulder. ‘Here’s your room.’

  Inside was a long couch, a polka-dotted rug, cool, splashy art on the walls, and a small kitchen with a breakfast bar. Maddox strode through the space. ‘You got a little kitchen, and the TV has cable.’ He opened a door to the back. ‘Bathroom. Fresh towels.’ Seneca peeked her head in and saw a fish-print curtain. ‘And here’s the bedroom.’ He walked through another door to reveal a queen-sized bed with a striped comforter.

  ‘Thanks, this is great,’ Seneca said. ‘I’m kind of tired. I think I’m going to lie down.’

  Maddox nodded, but he didn’t move. Seneca’s arms twitched. It was weird standing here in a bedroom with him. She felt even more naked than she had at the café, having her whole past laid out on the table like a meal for everyone to enjoy. She moved to unzip her suitcase just as Maddox turned for the doorway, and they collided, Seneca ramming straight into his side.

  ‘Oops,’ she said through gritted teeth. She stepped away and so did Maddox, but not before his eyes met hers. A smile twitched on his lips. Her cheeks burned. His abs had felt so firm under his T-shirt – just thinking that made her feel embarrassed and disoriented. It still bothered her that yesterday at this time, she was still expecting a very different Maddy. A person who didn’t have washboard abs. A person whose abs she wouldn’t have noticed.

  Then Maddox crouched down and swiftly pulled something out of the bag he’d brought upstairs. ‘I almost forgot. Here.’

  He handed her a bottle of Red Stripe beer. It was still frosty with condensation. Seneca frowned at it. ‘I’m not really in the mood to party right now.’

  He shook his head. ‘It’s just in case you change your mind. I snagged it out of the fridge on the way up.’ He moved a step closer. ‘After the kind of day you had, I thought it might … help. And I remember you said it was your favorite.’ He shrugged and turned for the door. ‘Bottle opener’s in the drawer by the fridge. I’m going for a run.’ And then he was gone.

  Seneca stared at the closed door, and then at the beer in her hands. Maddox’s gesture was oddly touching, and actually just the thing she needed right now. Not a long talk, as so many others offered once they found out about her mom. Not a hug. Not a card or a shoulder pat. Well, good for Maddox for figuring it out. So why did it make her even more annoyed with him?

  She found the bottle opener, popped off the cap, and surveyed the room. On the fridge was a magnet with the University of Maryland terrapin mascot. Clearly Maddox had put it there for her benefit, and it gave her a guilty pang. On the shelf in the corner were mystery paperbacks – she’d read all of them already – and a copy of 14,000 Things to Be Happy About. Feeling angry suddenly, she turned it over so the cover faced the wall. Hopefully Maddox hadn’t put that there for her. After her mom was murdered, their elderly next-door neighbor, whom Seneca always called Bertie with all the Airedales, had given her that same book. No offense, Bertie, but reading about the delight of garden gnomes didn’t always do the trick.

  She felt her throat clench. You are not going to cry. But Brett had put a crack in her armor. All she could think about now was her mom. The one thing she tried so hard to forget.

  Taking a big swig of beer, she thought of that numbing day when her mom, Collette, went missing, those frantic calls to the police, her father stuck in Vermont because of snowstorms. After they found her car at that Target parking lot and her body by that pier, the news outlets spent a few days on her strange murder, but then moved on to Helena’s case. Seneca’s family didn’t get to go on Nancy Grace like the Kellys did. Their story didn’t make the New York Times. No one cared about the grieving black dad or the bi-racial daughter, even if her mom had been pretty and white. Instead, Helena and her perfect Connecticut family had swallowed up the spotlight, pushing her mom’s case to the bottom of a long list of unsolved crimes.

  Meanwhile, Seneca no longer had a mother. Her voice no longer woke Seneca up every day. Her face never appeared in the kitchen when Seneca arrived home from school. Seneca never even got to say goodbye. The last memory she had of her mother was of an unrecognizable face in a cold, sterile, hellish room.

  The grief had been too powerful to battle against, like a strong riptide sweeping her out to sea, surmounting everything else – eating, breathing, sleeping. For weeks, she’d huddled on her bed clutching her mother’s P necklace, the same one she still wore today. It stood for Pinky, Seneca’s mom’s nickname, earned because she was so petite and fine-boned. For more than a month, Seneca didn’t leave that bed. Didn’t move, really, except to use the bathroom. She heard worried whispers outside the door. Her father brought in a priest, a social worker, a therapist named Dr. Ying. He flew in Seneca’s favorite aunt, Terri, but even she couldn’t break her shell. Half comatose, she heard the term psychiatric unit being kicked around. She heard post-traumatic stress disorder. Bright lights were shined in her eyes. Gentle questions were aimed at her hourly. But she’d felt like she’d sunk about seven layers into herself. She was unable to tunnel out.

  Until one day, when she just sort of came out of it. Maybe the medication they’d been giving her had finally started to work. Maybe her body and mind had decided to dig to the surface and fight. She started to go to school again. Declared herself fine. There were some hiccups – she once lashed out at a guy in the cafeteria because she thought he was snickering behind her back, and she once got aggressively impassioned during an English discussion about Hamlet deciding whether or not to murder his stepfather/uncle. But she got through high school. Got into college. She was dealing.

  Well, sort of.

  There was a thud. Seneca’s phone fell from her lap to the floor. When she picked it up, the screen flashed to the last texts that had come in, including one from her dad. How’s Annie?

  Seneca drank more beer, feeling listless. She longed to tell her dad the truth … about everything. About how the pain of missing her mother had never left. How it was a hot, gnawing ache in her chest, and it was just growing worse. But she couldn’t do that to him. Lately, she’d thought about calling the therapist he’d found for her, but Dr. Ying would probably make her do random art therapy drawings or coo in an empathetic voice that she understood what Seneca was going through. How the hell could she? How could anyone?

  Okay, except Brett. And Aerin. But it seemed contrived to confide in them, like she’d really just come to Dexby to form a support group. She was afraid, too – afraid that if she started talking about her mom, she might never stop.

  The doorknob started to rattle. Seneca’s head shot up. The rattling persisted. Seneca stood, thinking about that dark figure looming at the hotel door. Could someone be onto them?

  The door swung open. Seneca’s whole body tensed. Then an Asian girl with long, dark hair, wearing an ultra-short candy-pink terry-cloth dress, white tights, and boots breezed in. Seneca breathed out. It was Madison, Maddox’s stepsister. She’d recognize her anywhere.

  ‘Excuse me?’ she called, peeking over the couch.

  Madison wheeled around and yelped. ‘What the –’ She came closer. ‘Oh! Are you Seneca? Maddy’s friend?’

  She had a cheery, high-pitched voice and exaggerated make-up. Her perfume smelled like peaches. Pixy Stix, Seneca thought immediately, playing her and Maddox’s game.

  Madison shot over to Seneca and grabbed her hands. ‘I’m Madison! I thought you were coming last night! You’re just visiting my bro for a little bit? Are you going to stay for the Easter Bunny party? You guys met on the Internet, didn’t you? What site? Personally, I want to try Tinder, but I heard the guys on there are pigs.’ She made a high-pitched eeee. ‘If you ever need time away from my brother, come by my room – I can give you a mani-pedi. I even have an LED light for gels. And look at those cuticle beds!
You need help. Do you mind if I smoke up?’

  ‘W-what?’ Talking to Madison was like trying to keep hold of a hummingbird.

  Madison whipped out a pink-and-purple glass pipe. ‘This is my secret place to smoke. Don’t tell my brother, cool? He knows, but he’s always lecturing me.’ She rolled her eyes. ‘He runs, like, three times a day. One day, at dinner, he said he ran a whole marathon on the track. That’s, like, a hundred miles.’

  ‘I think it’s twenty-six.’ Madison gave her a blank look. ‘Didn’t he get a scholarship, though? Maybe he needs to run that much,’ Seneca added.

  Madison conked herself on the side of the head. ‘I am such a bad hostess! Guests first.’

  Seneca stared at the outstretched pipe, then held up her beer. ‘I’m fine.’

  Madison shrugged, fished out a Zippo that was embellished with what looked like Swarovski crystals, and lit up. Seneca tried to reconcile this girl with the one she’d befriended on Facebook.

  Then Madison leaned closer. ‘So you’re not here for a hook-up, are you?’

  Seneca burst out laughing. ‘No way.’

  ‘Right.’ Madison nodded sagely. ‘I didn’t think so.’

  Seneca made an effort not to let her smile slip. Madison seemed awfully dismissive of the possibility. Had Maddox made some sort of comment that they weren’t compatible? Was she just not his type? Well, obviously. And yet – what, wasn’t she good enough for Mr. Track and Field?

  ‘So why are you here?’ Madison rushed on.

  Seneca blinked. She felt like she’d just walked into a cave full of vipers; any sudden move would set them rattling. ‘Track,’ she said. ‘We’re track friends.’

  ‘Then why aren’t you running with him right now?’

  ‘I …’

  Then Madison’s phone beeped. She checked it and shrieked. ‘Is that a penis?’