And Now She's Gone(89)

“We’re tired,” Clarissa, Zadie, and Gray said.

“We’re not,” the five young women said.

“Stay with us, Jen,” blonde Haley pled.

Jennifer swiveled to face her buffalo-headed date. “Come as a group, leave as a group.”

Gray knew Jennifer must have been exhausted.

The quartet wove through the crowds, stumbling past craps tables and old people pulling oxygen tanks. A band in one of the clubs was jamming out “Play That Funky Music,” and even though Gray was tired, she couldn’t keep her head from bopping to that funky bass line.

Over the music and slot machine noise, Jennifer told them about her new friend, Dylan.

Dylan’s only twenty-four, can you believe it?

Dylan’s a hedge fund broker, already pulling in a million five, can you believe it?

Jennifer Bellman fit perfectly in this city of secrets, and Gray had already tired of her and the bright lights and the cigarette smoke and the expense. None of that had changed in her time away, and now, more than ever, she yearned to be back in Monterey, out on the deck of the only place she’d ever truly considered home.

Room 911 would suffice for now. It was just as Gray had left it, with the curtains open and the neon lights coloring the dark desert sky. She changed into jeans, a thick hoodie, and a black baseball cap. A pair of platform Chuck Taylors made her an inch taller, and the Elvis Costello glasses hid most of her face. She slipped the Miyabi Evolution slicer into the Louis Vuitton backpack but left her phone on the nightstand—didn’t want it pinging off cell phone towers and placing her anywhere except here.

Before opening the door, she peeped out of the peephole.

No one there.

She slipped the backpack straps over her shoulders, then slipped out of the room. She crept to the elevator, strolled through the sweet-smelling, still-crowded lobby, and hailed a cab at the valet in front of the hotel.

“Where to, young lady?” The driver was a dark-skinned man with a broad, flat nose hooked over his mustache. His car smelled of Brut and curry.

“Five ninety-five Trail Spring Court, over in Summerlin.”

The cab rolled west, leaving behind the crowds and the lights of the Strip.

Gray thought about Sean’s text messages and the pictures he’d sent. With cautious fingers, she pressed on the cheekbone he’d nearly shattered, the cheekbone that still ached anytime the Santa Anas picked up or an El Ni?o system lingered over California.

Back then, Sean had presented her with the deed to the house on Trail Spring Court. The Spanish-Californian had a ceramic-tile roof, hardwood floors, a formal dining room, a big backyard, and a whirlpool tub in the master bathroom. He hadn’t bought it, not yet. “I just got the money together to put a huge down payment on it. I just mocked up this deed in Word.”

Natalie’s heart had broken. He’d taken her Jeep and sold it without her permission, and now this? She would have liked to have seen the house first. Because what if she hated it? What if it wasn’t her? She’d wanted to tear up that fake deed.

“I can’t believe you’re crying right now,” Sean had said.

She’d stammered, “It’s just … It’s just…”

“And what the hell do you know about houses?” he had snarled. “You grew up in the fucking ghetto.”

Back then, her friend Zoe had asked, “Is your name even on the real deed? On the title?”

“On the what?” Wide-eyed and beautiful, Natalie had gaped at her friend as though five hundred thousand dollars spent on a house in the desert was merely twenty cents, as though a “title” was a rare Yangtze River dolphin that she needn’t care about since it was so rare.

And now she was returning to that house in the desert.

Was she really gonna do this?

Was she really gonna kill him?

The driver stopped at the security gate of the Paseos. “You have an entry code?”

Gray closed her eyes. Shit. She hadn’t thought … “Six one four seven.”

The gate creaked open and the taxi rolled past.

Relieved, Gray asked the driver to stop at the beginning of the cul-de-sac where she’d lived. From there, she saw the two-story house that, according to land records, Sean still owned. No one loitered on the sidewalks, not at this time of night, not in the Paseos. Many things had changed in Vegas, but some things—like fancy Summerlin neighborhoods—had not.

The driver looked at her reflection in his rearview mirror. “Want me to wait?”

She peeled off twenties to pay her fare and his tip. “You wouldn’t mind?”

“Got nothing else to do ’cept wait.”

“I’ll meet you at the Chevron back on Desert Foothills.”

“That’s almost a thirty-minute walk.”

“Got nothing else to do ’cept walk,” she said.

He gave her his business card. “I’ll be there.”

“Yep, but if I’m not there,” she said, pulling out her set of keys, “or if I haven’t called you by four o’clock, just go.” She hoped the gas station had a public telephone.

“Got it.” He added, “You be careful, young lady.”

She passed dark house after dark house until she reached 595.

The property still looked good, thanks to homeowners association demands. Its desert landscaping hadn’t changed. Neither had the pink sandstone pavers in the drive and walkways. Her eyes skirted the house’s eaves in search of a security or doorbell camera. Nothing. No lights were on.