Dead to Her(58)

Up in Zelda’s apartment a candle burned in the window, only darkness beyond. The flame flickered yellow and orange and white and Keisha’s heart burned as angry as that flame. This was Zelda’s doing, she knew it. The conjure ball. The silver coins. Even the old lady, this was all down to Zelda. Maybe she had seen her at the crazy rave. What had been in that drink, other than probably some MDMA? Had all this started then with a potion slipped inside her? Zelda wanted Keisha gone. She wanted her destroyed.

She stood beneath the window, her glass in hand, swaying in the darkness as a black rage gripped her. “I know what you’re doing!” she shouted up. “I know how this works!” She laughed then, a surprise even to her, a burst of energy fused from fear and exhaustion. “You can’t curse a cursed girl though, so more fool you, Zelda!” Tears pricked the back of her eyes. “More fool you,” she repeated, more quietly.

The window didn’t open and no one shouted at her to shut up. Instead, after a few long moments, the candle went out. No shadow of movement, no hint of a figure leaning forward to blow the fire cold, it just went out.

As if someone had willed it.





36.

Despite Marcie’s determination to get her life back on track with Jason—to turn a blind eye to his lies and secrets for the sake of her own fabulous future position in the world—she was finding it hard. She was walking on eggshells around him again, but at least this time she knew it wasn’t anything to do with her, or Jacquie, or whoever was at the other end of those nighttime calls. All the computers at work had crashed spectacularly, losing all sorts of client information and files, and it was a clusterfuck, which was the closest to an actual explanation she could get out of him. A server meltdown or something. Whatever it was, it sounded serious and could slow down the audit, which in turn would slow down the buyout and the Maddoxes’ rise up the social ladder.

The unwelcome accidental reminder of her past on Sunday, and then the invitation to the Magnolia lunch yesterday, had made her take stock. She didn’t really want her freedom. It had just been excitement that was missing, and as far as she could tell, Jason taking over the partnership and her new role in the city would give her that, even if their love had soured. His return to moodiness with this computer business wasn’t helping. It was hard to like him when he was being this way.

At least he was barely home. He’d been at the office until late last night, and this morning he was up and gone before seven, leaving her alone in their vast bed. He hadn’t even tried to have sex with her, although she’d found she didn’t mind that so much anymore. Maybe polite separate lives was the way forward for now, even if it did feel empty. With Keisha, it had been so different.

Keisha, Keisha, Keisha. Always somewhere in her head despite Marcie’s resolve to banish her. She waited for the coffee machine to finish its gurgles and hisses and then poured a large cup. Keisha. Marcie hadn’t answered any of her recent texts. There was a neediness in them that unnerved her. Her moods changed too fast, and although Marcie was concerned about her, she also knew Keisha was unreliable. It was best for both of them to end it. It might level Keisha out too. Most important in Marcie’s thinking, however, was that Keisha couldn’t be trusted not to screw everything up, and after the whole coolant situation, all Marcie wanted to do was cocoon up with Jason—her flawed and secretive husband—and then emerge as a beautiful and brilliant social butterfly when the buyout was done. Keisha had been a reminder of how she herself had once been, wild, crazy, and fearless, but that girl was no more. She had no place here.

Maybe they wouldn’t even see the Radfords so much once William retired. That would be better. That would definitely make things easier. She was feeling strong. She could live without love if she had to, for the sake of wealth and power. Marcie hated seeing the young woman so fragile, and she knew that it was partly her fault, but wasn’t this cruel-to-be-kind approach the best way to move her forward fast?

The doorbell cut through the quiet and made her jump, the noise as oversized as the house, and tightening her robe around her waist she padded out to the hallway, irritated at being disturbed at the ungodly hour of eight thirty in the morning. No one called on anyone before at least ten unless prearranged, that was the rule of polite society. She pulled open the door ready to snootily send whoever it was away, but her breath caught in her chest.

Keisha. Keisha was here on her doorstep. Like Marcie’s thoughts had summoned her.

“You look like shit.” It was the truth. Keisha looked awful. What the hell was going on with her now?

“I can’t think straight. I can’t sleep.” She had no makeup on and she twitched as she picked at the skin of her bottom lip. Marcie had seen this kind of twitching before, back when she was a kid, and sometimes down at the Mission, but never around here. Not in this perfect part of town.

“My brain won’t work without Valium,” Keisha said. “I don’t know what to do.” She looked up, desperate. “Have you got some? Can you get me some?”

Marcie stared at her, this beautiful, childlike, damaged woman on her doorstep, this moth that lived hidden beneath the dazzling painted-on butterfly colors. This fascinating wreck of a human being. “You’d better come in.” What else could she say? She needed this thing between them to end but she had to manage her. Keisha in this state could say anything to anyone. And the last thing she needed was the new neighbors seeing this display on her doorstep. “Like, now.”