Good Rich People(33)

“There’s no one here,” Demi says.

“It’s the best kind of place.” Elvira and I used to walk around here alone, undisturbed. In some version of the world, we are still walking. I stop at the place where the fence now curves up like a skirt. “Here we are.”

She shakes her head, nervous eyes still scanning the periphery. “Where?”

“If we lift the fence”—I bend down to demonstrate—“we can walk down to the lake.”

Demi remains frozen. “I don’t want to.”

I release the fence. It jangles harshly back into place. “But I thought you said—”

“I should really go back.” What is her problem?

“It’s totally safe.” I wipe my temple with my wrist. “There’s nobody around. You said it was beautiful. You said it was inaccessible. Don’t you want to go there? Just to prove you can?”

She sets her jaw. “We’ll get caught.”

I smirk like a fiend. “I never get caught.” I turn back to the fence. “You first. You’re smaller.” I wrench the fence up high enough for a person to crawl through. She hesitates, looks left, then right. “Hurry!” I order. “It’s heavy.”

She looks both ways again.

“Stop being so paranoid.”

“Fine.” Her voice grounds down. “Hold it up.”

I use my hip to lift the fence as high as I can so she can crawl through safely. I needn’t have worried. She can make herself tiny. She slips through the crack like a forgotten secret.

She stands on the other side facing me. Behind her, the water twitches. The sun casts shadows. I drop the fence. “Shit.”

“What?”

I can practically see her heart beating in her chest. “I have to change my tampon. I’ll be right back.”

“But!”

“Just stay there; I’ll be right back!”

As soon as I am out of sight, I block my number and make the call. “Hello? Security. Yes, I saw a woman cut through the fence and walk down into the reservoir. I know this sounds crazy, but I think she had a gun!”



* * *





I WALK AS quickly and quietly as I can to the trailhead. I am cresting the last turn when I hear the rumble of tires. A security truck rolls toward me, seemingly in no hurry to arrest Demi.

Instead of passing me by, the truck comes to a stop. I drop my chin and keep walking.

“Young lady!”

My back tightens in a line. “What do you want?” I snap. I want to tell the security guard he should be hurrying before Demi gets away, but I don’t want him to know I’m the one who called. I don’t want to be used as a witness. I don’t want to be implicated at all.

His car door dings as he steps out. What the hell is he doing?

He hitches his belt. “We’re investigating a distress call.”

“I’m not distressed. I’m fine. Thank you.” I move quickly away from him. He steps in front of me, blocking my path. He is all belt, a sour expression. I am his bad day.

“I’d just like to see what’s in your pocket there, if that’s all right.”

Shit.

The metal cutters are still in my coat pocket.





DEMI



Murderer.

No one ever prepares you to deal with death. Death is a secret you keep until you die. It is the only thing that unites us all and yet we never, ever talk about it.

No one tells you how to get rid of a body.

In movies, they drag them across the floor, leaving behind a wide trail of blood. They shut them in trunks. They drive out to deserts, toss suitcases into rivers, call out teams of villains with attractive distorted features to do their dirty work. They leave evidence that no one finds, because there is a team to clear the set between locations. And the corpses are gorgeous, bruises and scars carefully applied by a team of artists to match an overall aesthetic: the magnificent, the haunting dead.

Demi looks alive. She looks asleep, even if her eyes are open in a thin white seam. It’s only when I touch her skin that I feel that unnatural chill. It feels like a mistake, like something I did. You’re the cold one. You’re making her cold.

I move my hand, searching for warmth: at the base of her neck, on the crown of her head, on her wrist beneath her jacket. I jump, having accidentally brushed her exposed stomach, a place I would never touch if she was alive. A place she wouldn’t want me to touch.

She’s dead. She’s dead, you idiot. Don’t act like you didn’t guess it.

I try to use my imagination but I don’t have one anymore. You have to have hope to have an imagination and I don’t have that; the last of it just dropped down through the floorboards.

All I have are the facts.

If I call the police, I will be blamed for something. It’s what police do, my dad always taught me. They wait for you to stick your head out, to show them where you are, and then they say, You’ll do, and they throw you in with the rest of the people who couldn’t keep quiet.

Never call the police. Dad bored that into my brain. Besides, the police can’t save her. They can hurt me.

And I can’t leave. Leaving would only make things worse. They would track me down. I don’t know this woman, but I know enough to know she’s rich, and rich women don’t die without someone being held accountable.