The Deadly Sister (16 page)

W
hat could Veronica and Cheyenne possibly have hidden behind that door? My imagination didn’t go anywhere; I was too overwhelmed. I stood and watched.

“You can’t tell Maya what you’re about to see,” Cheyenne said as she pulled out the key I’d seen on the chain around her neck. I didn’t say anything. No way was I making any promises.

Veronica hovered near the kitchen as Cheyenne fitted her key into the heavy lock. She pushed the door open.

I’d braced for something sinister and unholy. But it was, perhaps, the most radiant room you could imagine. The walls had been papered a yellow halfway between butter and yolk; a small window at the end faced a box of paper tulips. Shelves, pink and blue, had been decorated with knickknacks that must have been bought in one swoop from the same cutesy store: rabbits, Buddhas, and clay globes all shone with the same high gloss. On the bed grazed a motley pack of stuffed animals, a tiger curled sleepily around a panda on the pillow. I stepped into the cotton candy of the room and swiveled.

“Isn’t it great?” Veronica called from the hallway. “Won’t she just love it?”

“It’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever seen. And won’t
who
just love it?” I whispered to Cheyenne.

“Maya,” she whispered back. “Veronica wants her to move in with her. I helped her set up the room after my shift. And there’s no better time for Maya to come than now, right?”

“What? Does Maya know about this?”

Cheyenne shook her head. “Veronica wanted to get the room perfect and then surprise her.”

I sat down on the bed. It sighed potpourri. “So she wanted to take her from my mom and dad.”

“They barely had her, anyway, right? Veronica wanted to see her have a stable place, an actual home to turn to instead of druggies’ couches. A parent figure she’d still be open to.”

“And you were helping her in this insane plan?” I asked.

Veronica’s cats, intrigued by the smells in the new room, came in and started tapping their noses against the carpet. “Look,” Cheyenne said, “I was tired of seeing Maya rule you. I didn’t want her to keep taking up all of your time, and I wanted to see her have something stable in her life. You might not think I’m that tight with her, but I’ve grown up alongside Maya, just by knowing you. Don’t shoot me down for trying to do what’s best for both of you.”

“Why didn’t Veronica just come to me?”

“Because she knew you wouldn’t have helped. And”—she held up a hand against my protest—“
you
know you wouldn’t have helped. You’d have been weird about it. You can’t deny it.”

“Actually,” I said, “it’s been becoming clearer and clearer that you really
don’t
know me. There’s no way I would have been weird about it. I’d have been relieved that other people were trying to help. And you needed me on the inside on this—do you think there’s any way my parents would have been okay with Maya moving here without me working on them first? I’m the link between her and my parents. Without my blessing, she does nothing.” What got me most was Cheyenne’s tone. As if (supposedly) knowing my inner thoughts made her superior to me.

“It was all with the best intentions,” Cheyenne said. “But what’s going on right now is precisely why I never told you. I knew you’d react just like this.”

“They’re not the best intentions, even if you think they are,” I said, pressing the door closed behind us. A cherub mobile tinkled. “Veronica might be really friendly, but she’s also the loneliest woman ever. And she’s doing all this so that she’ll have someone living here with her.”

“So what?” Cheyenne said, taking the spot on the bed I’d just left. “So it fills two people’s needs at the same time. Three, if you count having responsibility for Maya off your back. What’s so wrong with that?”

I couldn’t find words to explain why it felt wrong. I guess I thought people should be entirely altruistic or entirely selfish, not some sloppy mix of the two. I didn’t say anything, because I knew, even as I thought them, that my views weren’t rational, and I could sense Cheyenne lording her implied victory over me. The same qualities that made me
cling to her when I was in trouble made me hate her when she surprised me.

“It’s so wrongheaded,” I said.

Cheyenne wrinkled her nose. “Wrongheaded? What kind of pretentious word is that?”

That only got me more angry. I’d captured exactly what I wanted to say: that this scheme was both dumb and done for the wrong reasons. “Look at the way you guys have decorated it,” I said. “Yellow wallpaper. Stuffed animals. Maya’s fifteen. She’s got piercings in places you don’t want to know. Did you really think she’d like this room?”

The door creaked open. Veronica had been listening in; I’d suspected as much. “I don’t think you’re giving your sister much credit,” she said, tilting into the room and laying fingers on all the trite garbage she’d bought. “Just because Maya expresses her dark side easily doesn’t mean that she doesn’t have a light core. In fact, it would indicate the opposite—we’re all in dynamic opposition, the conscious presentation giving the lie to the soul.”

I rolled my eyes in Cheyenne’s direction. “No wonder you two get along so well.”

“She’s right,” Cheyenne said. “Maybe Maya’s looking for a little something in her life that’s earnest and kind. Something she can scoff at on the outside and be grateful for on the inside.”

“Fine, whatever,” I said. “But she can’t hide here—it’s too risky. So your lame idea is automatically nixed.”

I wanted out of there. I hated what Veronica had
implied—that what everyone seemed to be was a lie, that sweet people were afraid of some core cruelty, that mean people were protecting some fragile inner kindness. And yet her words had jabbed through and had me questioning myself. The kindness behind Veronica’s impulse to create Maya a room of her own, however misguided, had moved me deeply. I did much better with harshness; harshness, I knew how to handle.

What was it in me that sought it out, that kept returning to the darkest places? I broke things down, over and over, even as the outside me accepted everyone with generosity and openness. I was a generous cynic, an honest liar.

I bolted from that secret, childish room. “I’m sure Maya would love it,” I hissed from the doorway, “if she weren’t doomed. But she’ll never live here with you, Veronica, because she’ll never be anywhere but prison. No matter what any of us do.”

S
o now Cheyenne had an alibi—and a much better one than Brian’s or Maya’s. This should have made me relieved—my best friend wasn’t a killer!—but instead it left me only sad and disoriented.

I left the house without any idea of where to go or how to get there. I’d walked as far as the subdivision entrance when a police cruiser pulled up alongside me.

I watched Detective Alcaraz get out. He had his arms folded, but he released them and held them forward, palms up. Like he had to prove to me that he didn’t mean any harm, like I was an armed criminal. “There’s no point in trying to escape.”

“I’m not going to try to escape,” I said sullenly.

“Will you come to your grandmother’s house with me and talk, then?”

It was almost reassuring, settling into the front seat of his cruiser, smelling fabric and smoke and cardboard. I numbly drank in his details. He must own at least two different kinds of police shirts; the one before had been too tight, but this one was loose, the collar hanging low on the back of his neck, revealing a fringe of dark back hair. Alcaraz parked in Veronica’s driveway and walked me into her living room. I was already so emotional, it had me on the verge of tears
that he trusted me not to turn and flee. Maybe he was aware of how futile my running would have been.

“Did you do this? Did you call him?” I hissed at Veronica as I walked inside.

“No,” she said, staring at Alcaraz in alarm.

“Really! He just showed up?!” But Veronica looked genuinely confused. If she hadn’t called him, who had?

Alcaraz sat down on the couch. “Yes. I just showed up.”

“Are you here to arrest me, or something?”

“Why don’t you take a seat, Abby?” Veronica said.

I remained standing.

“What would I arrest you for?” Alcaraz asked.

“I helped Maya escape,” I said flatly. “But I’m gonna bet you already know that.”

“I’ve got larger concerns than a girl looking out for her sister,” Alcaraz said. “What you need to realize, though, is that the best way to
continue
to protect her is to help us find her. Remember those seventy-two hours I mentioned last time we spoke? They’re long up. Soon the Feds will swoop in and start beating in doors. After that everyone’s options become very limited. Do you understand what I mean? We’re in our final moment.”

I glanced at Veronica, pale and nodding from a bar stool in the kitchen. “Where’s Cheyenne?” I asked. Veronica gestured my attention back toward Alcaraz. I glanced at the closed door to that spare room. My best friend was hiding from me.

“Abby?” Alcaraz asked. “Have you been listening to me?”

“Yes, sir,” I said. I had intended for my words to come out politely, but they definitely didn’t.

“We need you to turn your sister in,” he said severely. “You have to know where she’s hiding. I need you to go get her and bring her to me.”

“No chance,” I said.

“I don’t think you understand,” he said. “If you don’t agree to what I’m asking right now, I’ll name you an obstruction to justice and bring you into custody.”

“Custody!” Cheyenne said, emerging from the secret room. “You didn’t say anything about that. You can’t.”

I leaped to my feet. “You make this happen, Cheyenne? You call the police here for the good of everyone? Not going exactly as you planned, eh?” I spat.

“Sit down,” Alcaraz said, at the same time Veronica said, “Cheyenne’s only trying to do what’s best for you and Maya.”

“I’m tired of ‘what’s best!’” I shot back. “If what’s best had happened, then Jefferson wouldn’t be dead. No one would be under questioning for anything. So no one pretend to have any idea what I should be doing right now. And did you know who called in that tip about the body? It was someone in this room. It wasn’t me, and it wasn’t Veronica.”

“Abby, stop,” Cheyenne said.

Alcaraz looked at Cheyenne and me shrewdly. “How’s this for ‘what’s best’? Do what I tell you or I throw you both in jail.”

“This is why you called him?” I said to Cheyenne. “To get us thrown in jail?”

“You’re in way over your head,” Cheyenne said softly.

I gestured toward Veronica. “She’s seventy. And now she’s going to end up spending the last years of her life in jail. So that was a real good thing you did, Cheyenne. Thanks so much for that.”

“Look,” Alcaraz said, “no one needs to go to jail, if you cooperate fully. Forensics has come back telling us that Jefferson was high when he died. We know your sister had access to drugs, that she was a dealer—”

“
He
was the dealer! She worked under
him
.”

“We know that, too,” Alcaraz said. “We’ve also received footage from the gas station across from the high school showing Maya cleaning out Jefferson’s car.”

“You
what
?” I asked. “Where did you get that?”

“I’m not about to list any police sources to you at this juncture, Ms. Goodwin. Just assume it’s anonymous.”

I was fighting a multiple-front war, weighing every piece of evidence based on how it affected Maya and Brian and me and Cheyenne all at once. It would be so easy to make a slip; it would be hard enough with just one set of factors and variables, but with many…What I needed now was to buy a little time, to hold off Alcaraz until I could set my latest plan into motion.

“What do you need me to do?” I asked softly.

I
entered via Medusa’s Den, since I’d be able to come in that way without having to buzz up—this would all go much easier, I figured, if Blake and Keith didn’t know ahead of time that I was coming. I didn’t recognize the front desk attendant, a girl with brown ropy dreads. “Is Keith around?” I asked her, like maybe I came there every day.

“Yeah,” she said, thumbing toward the back stairs. “You want me to go get him? You have an appointment?”

“This isn’t about a tattoo,” I said.

“Piercing?”

“Nope.”

“Head on up,” she said, returning to doodling in the appointment book.

Each stair made a different creak, sent out a fresh warning.

I didn’t knock.

There was only Maya in the room, at the table in her underwear and leaning over a pipe. She didn’t hear me coming in; she was intent on the task at hand. “Oh, Maya,” I said. “What are you doing?”

She jumped to her feet. Her hands were in her hair. Her skin was fair and shiny, like she hadn’t slept in ages. “What are you doing here?” she asked.

“Is anyone else around?” I asked.

“Yeah,” she said. “Keep your voice down. They’re sleeping.” That’s when I saw that, yes, two bodies were under the comforter.

“Maya,” I said, clutching her close to me and speaking softly and steadily, “you need to get dressed and come down with me. And put that pipe away. I can’t
believe
you’re using again.”

“Why do I have to get dressed?” she said, staring at me uncomprehendingly.

“Just do it,” I said. “You’re going to have to trust me on this one.”

“Um, no,” she said. She was really, monstrously high. “And you can’t make me trust you. Trust doesn’t work like that. Trust is a lot bigger. Like an ocean. You can’t just turn on the tap and expect the water level to change.”

I rolled my eyes. Maybe it would be easier for her if the police found her high. If they then assumed that she had been drugged when she killed Jefferson. Was that grounds for temporary insanity? At the very least, her vulnerability would make them go easier on her.

“Come on, Maya,” I said. “Get dressed and come with me.” We only had a few minutes until the police would barge in. It would all go much better if I emerged with her, blinking in the daylight, the girl who went into the drug den and retrieved her little sister. But if she refused to come down, I’d have to become the sudden betrayer, cowering in
the corner as the police slammed in, guns drawn and pointed.

“Abby?” Maya said, evidently hitting a pocket of clarity within her highness as she saw my expression. “What’s happening to you?”

I was sitting on the floor. I couldn’t make myself look anywhere. I mean, my head was moving around, but I couldn’t
look anywhere.

“Abby?” she repeated, louder. “What have you done?!”

“You never should have come back,” I mumbled. “You never should have believed me.” It felt like I was suffocating.

“Jesus. Jesus!” Maya yelled, dashing around the apartment and rooting clothes out of drawers, whisking through papers and old magazines on the counter, collecting whatever stray money fell out.

Blake sat up in bed. Keith, groggy, was reaching around the floor for a shirt. “What the hell’s going on?” he said. “I don’t have to work for hours.”

“Abby’s screwed us over,” Blake said, suddenly fully awake and staring at me.

“The cops!” Maya said. “She called the cops on us.”

My knees were next to my nose. I guess I’d pulled them there. I nestled my face into the dark space between. All around me I could hear commotion: Keith’s curses, Blake’s shrill commands, Maya dashing, little footfalls and gasps.

Then, the click of ammunition.

I looked up. Keith was standing by the window blinds with Maya, peering through one of the tiny blank spaces where thread passed through the slats. Blake was standing on one side of the door with a gun, a shiny black thing as long as a forearm, the kind made for wars in foreign countries. “They send you up here as the scout?” she seethed through clenched teeth.

She thought I was less directly involved than I was. I didn’t dare to think what she’d do to me if she knew I’d orchestrated all this. “I wanted Maya to come down with me quietly,” I explained, “so nothing like this would happen.”

“I don’t think you have any idea what you’re trying to do,” Blake said. “First you want to find someone who will get your sister off the hook, and now you’re turning her in. I
helped
you, you realize that? Helped you bring the police here. I should end you.” She hefted the gun in her hand. Not pointing it at me, but definitely entering it into the conversation.

Even though I was terrified, I didn’t feel like my life was in danger. If she was panicked about getting busted, she’d be a fool to add murder to the list. But she was pissed. Crazy pissed.

“What’s happening out there?” Blake called to Keith, her voice taking an ever-sharper edge.

“Four of them,” he said. “Just in front of the entrance.”

“And the other side?”

“I can’t see. There’s a car parked in the way.”

Out of nowhere, a garbled pop song. My phone was ringing in my pocket.

“Your cop friends calling?” Blake barked.

I shook my head timidly.

“Pull it out,” she commanded.

I did.

“Look at the screen.”

Alcaraz.

“Answer it,” Blake said.

It took me a few tries to get the phone open. I kept thinking about the gun, such a heavy weight in her hand. “Hello?” I asked.

“You okay?” Alcaraz asked.

Blake motioned that I should give her the phone. I did, and she started shouting. “You thinking of coming in here,” she said, “then you better get ready for a couple of dead teenagers. We know exactly what’s happening. We’re armed. Tell your boys to back off.” She made a motion to Maya, as if to say
Don’t worry,
but it was too late for her—Maya was totally bugging out, clawing at Keith’s shirt.

I watched Blake listen to Alcaraz’s response. Her expression turned from angry to confident, victorious. She hung up the phone and put it away in her own pocket. “They’re not going to be coming up anytime soon,” she said. “He’d already be up here if they were going to risk barging in.”

A thought appeared behind the thrums of my heart:
The police have found out something new; that’s why they’re backing off.

“Then can you put the gun away?” Maya wailed. “And don’t point it anywhere near my sister.” She and Keith watched Blake fearfully.

Instead of putting the gun away, Blake pointed it directly at me. “Actually,” she said, “I think it’s precisely time that a gun was pointed at your sister.”

I put my hands forward, as if to deflect any bullet that might come toward me. I couldn’t help but imagine how the physics would work, a steel ball splitting my palm, passing lengthways up my bones, leaving my arm in two drooping red halves as it pierced my chest. “Please,” I said, “put the gun away. You know that the police aren’t going to come up now, right? So there’s really no need for violence.” I risked a look in Keith’s direction. “Keith, could you make her believe that?”

But he didn’t say anything, only stared at me curiously. “What are you onto?” he asked Blake. “What have you figured out?”

She didn’t answer. I could feel that bullet passing up my arm again. But this time, it wasn’t doing physical damage. She was laying my thoughts open, splitting me in even halves and letting the hidden pearls stream out.

“Why the hell won’t she
say
anything?” Maya wailed.

The room was full of the quiet of four raging pulses. Blake didn’t lower the gun. Keith looked at me curiously, his arms crossed. Maya trembled at his feet. “Now,” I said to Blake, “is not the time for stupid games.”

“I’m afraid that now,” Blake said, “is the only time that will work. When else will we get you to fess up?” She wiggled the gun. “So start talking.”

“What are you
on
about?” Maya cried. I was paralyzed, but Maya got to her feet and took a step toward her. Where did this sudden courage come from? “You’re crazy. Put the gun down, okay?”

“You seem to forget that I knew Jefferson Andrews. You couldn’t call us friends, but when you’re in a profession like ours, you’re able to tell your coworkers things you couldn’t say to your closest friends.”

“Blake,” Keith said evenly, “the police are outside. I understand what you’re trying to do, but maybe this isn’t the time.”

“Are you kidding me? How are you two so blind? This is the
only
time. The police aren’t going to come in anytime soon, but they’re also not going to go away until they have a suspect in custody. And we’re going to give them one. Just not the Goodwin girl that they expect.”

“Stop,” Maya said. “I don’t want to hear whatever you’re about to say.”

“Why not, Maya? Why do you have to be the one to take the fall? Why not your sister here? It’s the advantage of being the one who does all the detective work, isn’t it, Abby? You get to choose what everyone sees. But I could tell them that Jefferson let me know all about you. I could tell them that Jefferson was scared of you.”

I was going to point out that Jefferson had no reason to be scared of me—but it didn’t look like Blake was up for an argument. I would have said anything, confessed to anything, to get her to point that gun away from me. I opened my mouth to speak, but Blake continued before I could say anything: “She’s got our money, I’m sure of it.”

“Slow down, Blake,” Keith said. “I doubt Abby has Jefferson’s money.”

“Tell me you’re kidding! I told this little wench all about the fifteen grand he shafted us out of, and she’s done nothing but snoop around since then. Where are you keeping it?”

“It’s not her fault that you trusted a stranger,” Maya said, taking slow steps toward Blake. “One of your other runners must have taken it. So back off.” My sister, standing up against a drug dealer with a gun. To protect me.

“Look clearly at what your sister is doing,” Blake said to Maya. “She’s giving you up. That’s why the police are out front,
sweetheart
.”

Keith had slowly crept his way to Blake and now put his arm around her. “Honey, if the police aren’t coming up anytime soon, let’s put the gun away. Okay?”

She paused a moment, then hurled the weapon onto the couch. “Fine.”

“The police have more guns than we do, anyway,” Keith said, nuzzling her neck.

A glimmer of a smile came over Blake without her ever moving her mouth, like a curtain rustling and cracking moonlight into a room.

“Are you going to freak out if I stand up?” I said.

Maya was already there, helping me onto my feet.

“Now,” I said, “you’re going to let us go downstairs.”

“An excellent idea,” Keith said. “We’d be thrilled to let you handle the police on your own.”

“Abby,” Maya said, “I can’t go down there.”

“Yes, you can,” I said, wrapping my arms around her. “I’m the one who brought the police here, remember? Don’t worry, I have a plan.”

She stared at me nervously. I saw her resisting giving up control, even though we’d lived our whole lives with her in the backseat. But she’d have to continue to trust me, the way I was starting to trust her. She didn’t have any other choice.