Good Rich People(57)

It’s like I forgot Elvira was dead, how intensely it washes over me. “I guess we are,” I say, because I am not dumb enough to tell her what happened. “We’re just not as close. What about you?”

She looks unsure, like she is trying to decide if she can trust me, even with something as basic as this. “I had friends once. I guess I just started to feel like I didn’t deserve them. Like I was raining on everyone’s parade.” She sighs. “I think when your life is so different from everyone else’s, you start to feel like you don’t belong with anyone.”

My smile is genuine. “I know exactly what you mean.”

It’s really strange, connecting to a person you are going to kill. It’s probably not the best strategy to win.





LYLA



That night, Graham has birthday drinks with friends and I have to go to Margo’s house to oversee the party preparations. I have hired a crew to strip out all the valuables to protect them from any accidents. I want the party to be as out of control as possible. I want to impress Graham. We can’t be worrying about Monets and Fabergés and Biedermeiers.

I drop Demi off outside the house. She seems relieved that it’s over. She unbuckles her seat belt, starts to climb out of the car.

“Wait!”

She freezes halfway out of the car, leg dangling over the asphalt. I have this weird feeling, like I am dropping my daughter off at school. Like I should warn her about all the bad things when I am the bad thing that I would warn her about.

“I just wanted to say thanks. Thanks for coming.”

Her shoulders are tight. “No problem.” And she climbs out of the car.

She vanishes and I grip the steering wheel, feel a twisting in my stomach. I must’ve had five glasses of Mo?t, and I am stone-cold sober. What if I am sober for the rest of my life? What if that is what murder means? A kind of manic frenzy that keeps you awake forever. A hyperconsciousness that never ends. Eyes stapled open. Stomach in knots.

I tell myself it’s not. I promise myself I’ll sleep once it’s over.

I put the car back into drive. I climb up the hill to Margo’s. I haven’t seen or spoken to her since Bean’s accident. She must know Bean is missing. She must be distraught.

As I arc into the drive, I see Margo. She is dressed in a bounteous white nightgown that ripples in the breeze. She looks like Lawrence of Arabia wandering in the desert of her terrace. My housekeeper is beside her, arm looped in hers, her guide. What. The. Fuck?

I pull up beneath the terrace and leave my car with her valet, who looks troubled. “I think she’s losing it,” he says under his breath as he climbs into the car. He doesn’t speak to me directly, doesn’t look me in the eye, so for a second it feels like he could mean me. Or both of us. Or all of us.

I take a deep breath, straighten my dress and march up the steps to the terrace. The sky over our heads is dark and milky with clouds. The perfect setting for these two wanderers. There are chicken bones scattered all over the ground and what looks like bloodstains on the marble. My housekeeper is lighting sage. She has acquired several new necklaces and a heap of scarves.

I don’t know what she is doing here, but if I tell Margo she is my housekeeper, she will probably make me fire her. It’s so hard to find good help. Plus, Graham really does like her cooking. Luckily, my housekeeper looks just as shocked to see me as I am to see her, and I think she is just as keen to keep our connection secret.

Margo grips my housekeeper’s elbow as she waves the sage over her head. Margo has pressed pause on her skin routine and aged at least ten years. Deep lines squiggle in snakelike patterns across her face. There are dark circles under her eyes.

She loved Bean but it’s more than that. I remember what Graham told me about the last dog: clones and shock treatments. It’s about more than a dog. It’s about control. Margo is used to controlling everything: the light, the mood, the weather. She is so used to getting her way that she can’t stand to lose anything.

“Bean is dead.”

My stomach drops. “I— What? Why do you say that?”

“Viola told me.” She squeezes my housekeeper’s hand. I can’t remember her name off the top of my head but I don’t think it was Viola. It was something too pretty for her.

“I don’t know how she could know that,” I say through gritted teeth.

“She’s a psychic,” Margo says. “Don’t be fucking obtuse.”

I want to ask this next question privately but Margo is clinging to this woman like she will fall without her. “Where did you two meet?”

“She showed up at the house this morning. She said she had a vision of Bean. She described her exactly. Didn’t you?” Margo shakes her wrist encouragingly. My housekeeper killed the dog. Then she left it on our doorstep. Some housekeeper!

Now she’s using Bean to climb the ranks. It happens all the time when you have money. Your staff gets ideas about moving up. She killed the dog—maybe on purpose, maybe by accident—and where others would see a body, she saw an opportunity. Why be a housekeeper in a glass house when you could be a psychic in a castle? I don’t begrudge her it. I like a diverse résumé. But she had better keep cleaning my house.

Margo grips her arm, desperate, then wails, “She said Bean was crying out for me . . . in hell!” I don’t know what terrible things Bean could have done to deserve that fate.