The Lucky Ones(79)

“I’m the mess,” Kendra said, and gave her the faintest of smiles.

“Mess?” Allison asked. “You?”

“I—Just a joke,” Kendra said. She turned her head, looked away and didn’t look back. “Why did you come to see me?”

“Roland wrote me a letter a couple weeks ago. Like I said, I hadn’t heard from him in thirteen years. He told me Dr. Capello was dying. Did you know that?”

She shook her head.

“I flew out to see him. I ended up staying longer than I intended. Roland and I are...we’re involved.”

“Oh,” she said. “You always did like him.” Kendra didn’t show the slightest flash of surprise or jealousy or guilt.

“Dr. Capello operated on Roland, didn’t he?”

“Better talk to him about that.”

This was getting Allison nowhere.

“You remember why I left?” Allison asked.

“Someone in your family took you in,” Kendra said. “After you fell.”

“Right,” Allison said. She thought about telling Kendra the whole story about the phone call to her aunt and Oliver and all of that, but she decided to wait and see if Kendra brought it up. It was hard to imagine this anxious and quiet young woman hurting anyone, but if she had a guilty conscience, maybe it would come out on its own.

“So, ah...” Allison continued. She hadn’t really planned this far ahead. She’d make a terrible detective. “Since I got back I was just curious how everyone was. You remember Oliver?”

“I remember.”

“Did you...” Allison didn’t know how to say it. “Are you in touch with him?”

“No, why?”

“I was wondering if you knew... Oliver killed himself right after he left the house. Had you heard?”

“No,” Kendra said. “But I’m not surprised.”

“You aren’t? Why not?”

Kendra shrugged and didn’t answer.

“Do you know a boy named Antonio Russo?”

She shook her head again.

“He used to live with Dr. Capello, too,” Allison said. “For a week or so. Before my time there.”

“He dead, too?”

“I don’t know. Why do you ask?”

“No reason.”

Allison sighed, frustrated.

“Kendra, I’m really sorry for just showing up out of the blue. I’m trying to figure something out, and I was hoping you could help me.”

“I don’t think I can,” she said. “I wish I could.”

“Maybe if you told me a little more?” Allison said. “I guess we don’t know each other very well anymore, but—”

“It’s not you,” Kendra said. “Don’t think it’s you. I’m not mad at you. You and me, we were good. It’s... I can’t talk about this.”

Kendra finally looked at Allison again.

“I suppose they didn’t tell you about me,” Kendra said.

“Well, Roland told me you two used to be a couple.”

“When we were kids,” she said. “Just dumb kids.”

Allison decided to try a new tactic.

“Someone maybe tried to kill me,” Allison said. Kendra’s eyes widened again. She sat up straighter.

“My Lord. Recently?” Her shock was as genuine as her question. Either Kendra had nothing at all to do with the fall or she was the best actress in the world.

“No, in the house,” Allison said. “When I was a kid. My fall wasn’t a fall, I don’t think.”

Allison told Kendra about the phone call, about Dr. Capello telling her he thought Oliver was to blame, how unlikely that was as Oliver had left before any of it happened.

Kendra listened intently, asking no questions. When Allison came to the end of the story, she looked at Kendra and with her hands open and her voice pleading she said, “Please, if you know anything at all, tell me.”

“They told me you fell,” Kendra said. “That’s all I ever knew about it. Except... Roland thought you wanted to leave after because of him.”

“You don’t know anything else about it? About Roland? About Dr. Capello? Anything?”

Kendra took a long, slow breath before raising her hand and, with her index finger extended, indicated the roof of the house and the four walls.

“Dr. Capello bought me this house,” Kendra said. “That’s why it’s hard for me to talk to you. I wish I could. I do.”

“I’m sorry, I’m not following you,” Allison said.

“There was an agreement. I can’t break the agreement.”

An agreement. Where had she heard something like that before?

McQueen.

“A nondisclosure agreement?” Allison asked.

Kendra paused, then nodded.

Allison inhaled sharply. Why would someone with nothing to hide make someone else sign a nondisclosure agreement?

“I like my house,” Kendra continued. “I spend a lot of time in the house. I work from home. I don’t go out very much. I freelance. If I don’t work, I don’t make money. Sometimes I’m too sick to work. I don’t want to lose my house.”

“It is a very pretty house,” Allison said. “I wouldn’t want to lose it, either.”