Like a Sister(96)

I hung up and stood there. What was she doing? The lack of lights confirmed what I already knew. She’d used me. After five minutes, it was clear that whatever she was after, she hadn’t found it. She had to know I’d be home eventually, and she wouldn’t have done all this if she’d wanted to be here when I arrived.

That meant I had to be covert. I opened the front gate just enough to slide through. As I walked by our blue recycling bin, I instinctively grabbed an empty vodka bottle. I tried my front door. She hadn’t locked it behind her. I sure as hell did when I got inside.

It was strange, creeping into your own house. I didn’t bother to turn on any lights. It was so black I couldn’t even make out the basement door down the hall. I listened. But that was the thing with older houses. They were as sturdy as an offensive lineman. Erin could have been dancing to Beyoncé at full volume. I wouldn’t have been able to hear shit. I paused on the ground-floor landing just outside Aunt E’s apartment. Another quandary. Should I start with my place or hers? Desiree’s phone was upstairs. Erin’s stuff was down.

I chose Aunt E’s door since it was literally within arm’s reach and I could get Kitty. For the first time ever, it was locked. But was it Aunt E’s or Erin’s doing? I had a key to Aunt E’s apartment. It was in my bag with everything else. So I went upstairs, tried a different door with the same result. Locked.

Shitnuts. I went back downstairs to wait Erin out. My phone lit up. In the darkness, it felt as bright as a spotlight. Ms. Paterson again. I ignored it, not because I didn’t want to talk to her but because in the light I noticed the basement door. It was cracked open.

There was nothing down there but forgotten furniture and a washer and dryer. I crept down the hall, my eyes adjusting. When I got to the door, I slowly peered down the stairs. A beam of light as thin as she was slashed through the darkness. I could hear her moving stuff. I turned on the light abruptly and the noise stopped. She appeared at the bottom of the stairs, not looking surprised—or embarrassed—to see me.

“What are you doing, Erin?”

A clichéd question but also a valid one. She had the nerve to smile at me like I’d caught her searching for her Christmas gift.

“Looking for the video.” Even from twenty feet away, she could tell I was confused. “Naut’s laptop, Lena. Freck left it here.”

“Right.” I rolled my eyes. “When she stopped by for her weekly tea party?”

“During the first weekend in May.” She repeated herself. “First weekend in May.”

Then she disappeared back into the basement’s abyss. First weekend in May? Then it hit me. That was when we’d had our break-in. Even at the time, it’d felt strange. Random. Someone had picked the front door lock but bypassed Aunt E’s apartment to head straight for the basement. We’d only realized it’d happened the morning after.

Was that why Desiree’d been coming up here? I’d spent the last nine days feeling guilty my sister had needed me when she’d just wanted to break into my house—again—to pick up the blackmail she’d stowed for safekeeping. I didn’t want to believe it. Maybe Erin was wrong. She was a liar, after all.

When I got downstairs, Erin was halfway in Gram’s old china cabinet.

“Appreciate you turning on the light,” she said.

“You have two minutes before I call the police.”

Erin didn’t stop moving. “We’re doing that one again, Lena? You have any idea how much Naut would pay to get that laptop back?”

“I don’t care.”

“Right. I forgot—you’re still doing the poor little rich girl act.”

“We’re doing that again, Erin? At least I know you were genuinely upset about your phone not recording his confession.”

She finally stopped, turned around. Held her hands up in surrender. “I’m sorry. How about we do this? You still need to find the laptop. We can look together. Give it to the police.”

“Or they can help us look.” I meant to dial 911, but it was awkward trying to do it with one hand, holding the bottle in the other.

“Need help?” Erin stepped closer.

“No—”

She pushed past me, knocking me over, and headed up the stairs before I even realized what was going on. I didn’t just lose my balance. I lost the phone and the vodka bottle too. It didn’t help she’d turned the light out on her way. I didn’t waste time looking for them, just ran back up too. By the time I got outside, the Caddy was turning the corner.

Shitnuts.

I needed to call the police, but my phone was still inside—somewhere. Hopefully my bag and keys too. I rushed back in, shutting the door behind me and heading down to the basement again. It was useless. I might as well have lost my phone in the Atlantic. The room was huge, the entire length of the house, and packed to the gills. I started in the direction I thought I’d heard it fall, where Gram and Aunt E had left a dining room table covered in Mel’s old records. They were spread on every surface, including the floor. I started low and made my way up. I didn’t find the phone—or what I really was looking for.

The laptop.

I continued through Mel’s record collection, holding my breath, hoping not to find it. And I didn’t. But I still had an entire basement to go. There were millions of places for Desiree to have hidden it. A cursory glance counted two dressers, yet another dining room table, and every toy Desiree had received in her lifetime.