The Wife Who Knew Too Much(37)

The Uber arrived, and I ran to it. The air-conditioning was on full-blast, giving me goose bumps in my damp clothes. The driver was an older guy with gray hair, wearing heavy cologne. The pregnancy had increased my sensitivity to smells, and the cologne combined with the pine-scented air freshener hanging from the rearview mirror made me gag.

“I took lot of people to this party tonight. Some I recognized from TV,” the driver said.

“Party?” I asked.

“You’re going to Windswept, right?” he said, gesturing at the destination on his phone. “To that celebrity party.”

Shit. Nina Levitt’s annual Fourth of July party. How could I forget? I’d been reading about it in the gossip columns for years. Since Connor hadn’t mentioned holding it this year, it had slipped my mind. This was a freaking disaster. No. Wait. It was an opportunity. A stroke of luck. Hundreds of people got invited to this thing. I could slip into Windswept with the other guests and walk around unnoticed, looking for Connor.

I finally had a plan. For the first time since setting off on my journey, I felt hopeful, even glad that I’d come. I’d never been to the famous Hamptons before, and I craned my neck from the backseat of the SUV, ogling the ritzy surroundings. We were now ten minutes from Windswept, cruising through the downtown. The sidewalks ponded with rain. Red-white-and-blue bunting and American flags hung limp and sodden from every quaint storefront. But even in this weather, the town managed to look storybook gorgeous.

Then I noticed that the driver kept glancing in the rearview mirror.

“What are you looking at?”

“Same car behind us the last ten minutes, making all the turns,” he said.

With a jolt of fear, I twisted around to see. It was that Ford Fiesta again. Its headlights glared at me, and its windshield was obscured by rain, so I couldn’t see the driver. To spend several hours at my motel, get in an Uber, and find the same car behind me? No way that was a coincidence. Someone was following me.

“Is it the paparazzi? You’re famous, right? An actress? Yeah, I recognize you,” he said.

“I wish. Can we lose him?”

“Why? You know this guy?”

“I have no idea who that is. It’s just creepy.”

“Ah, he’s probably just on the same Google Maps route as me. Happens all the time. The phone takes you a weird way, and everybody else goes that way, too. Look, he just turned off. Gone now.”

True, the car was no longer behind us. I wanted to believe that meant it hadn’t been following me, but that seemed unduly optimistic. I kept checking behind us, waiting for him to come back.

“Wait, I got it now. You’re a model, right? To show up so late, you gotta be someone special,” the driver said.

“I’m nobody. I’m late because of the rain.”

“This late, they might not let you in. An hour ago, I took somebody else, and the front gate was already closed,” he said.

“There’s a gate?”

“Of course. And guards checking names off the list. High security for a party like this.”

How could I not have reckoned with Nina Levitt having security? What if I got caught trying to crash? Connor might find out. He’d think I was trailer trash. I looked ahead, straining to see the houses. The rain was letting up, but the street was dark and parked up heavily with cars on both sides. Fabulous cars—Porsches and BMWs and Mercedes, every last one beautiful and new. I couldn’t see the houses. On either side of the road, high walls blocked my view. When the Uber’s headlights shined on them, they looked like they were made of leaves.

“Where are the houses? Are those—walls?” I asked the driver.

“Hedges. They got tall hedges around the houses out here, so nobody can see in.”

“Windswept, too?”

“Part of it, yeah.”

“If the gate’s closed, and there are hedges, how will I get in?”

“Is there a number to call, on your invitation?”

“I forgot my invitation at the hotel.”

He glanced at me suspiciously in the rearview mirror. “It’s not a smart idea to crash.”

“I’m not crashing,” I said, but my voice sounded like a guilty child’s, and the driver wasn’t fooled.

“You crash, they’ll arrest you for trespassing.”

At that, I blanched. When he saw the look on my face, he stepped on the brake.

“You should get out here,” he said.

“Please. Take me to Windswept. I’m paying for the ride. What happens after that is my problem.”

“No, look, I was young once, too. I get it, you want to have a good time. You won’t get in the front gate if you’re not on the guest list. But the beach is right there.”

He gestured. Between the parked cars lay a narrow, sand-covered path. As the moon broke through the clouds, I saw the wide swath of empty beach beyond.

“You can walk down the beach to Windswept. It’s maybe five minutes on foot. Sneak into the party the back way,” he said.

That was probably wise. Not only so the guards at the entrance wouldn’t ask to see an invitation, but so Nina—who, I had to assume at this point, had seen a photo of me—wouldn’t spot me.

“You’re sure it’ll work?” I asked.