You Are Not Alone(55)
She’s still looking at me a little funny, as if maybe she can’t quite place me yet. I’m about to bring up the connection, then I imagine how our conversation would go: I saw you at a memorial service.… No, I didn’t know Amanda, but I’ve become friends with her friends … who I think are your friends, too?
It sounds weird.
When I step onto the sidewalk, she’s still in front of me. But she isn’t moving in either direction. She seems to be waiting. So I just turn to the right and head for the subway.
I don’t look back. But I swear I can feel her eyes on me.
* * *
By the time I’m climbing the steps out of the Thirty-third Street station, I’ve mostly put her out of my mind. I’m excited for what I’m going to do tonight: cook a healthy dinner, then activate my dating profile.
I chat with my mom as I walk down the street, telling her more about the research position at Quartz and promising to come home for Thanksgiving. I even feel ready to endure a weekend with Barry.
But the oddest thing happens; I guess it’s muscle memory, or some pattern in my brain that needs rerouting.
I walk into my old building before I remember I don’t live here anymore.
I don’t even have the keys; I gave my set to Jody.
I stand in the lobby, looking around for a moment. Then I push back out the door.
The woman I was when I lived here is gone.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
CASSANDRA & JANE
“DATAGIRL,” JANE SAYS AS her fingers move across her laptop’s keyboard. “Stacey said Shay activated her profile less than an hour ago.”
The sisters are secluded in Jane’s Tribeca apartment, a few blocks away from Cassandra’s residence. They’re still in work clothes, though they’ve kicked off their heels, and the delivery sushi they ordered for dinner is laid out on the kitchen’s granite island. Neither woman has touched it.
Cassandra’s slim black pants slip down low on her hips as she paces in loops from the living room through the open kitchen and back again. Jane’s cat—the one Amanda used to adore—leaps onto the couch and rubs her head against Jane’s leg. Hepburn has been unusually affectionate lately, as if sensing her owner’s distress.
“Found her,” Jane says.
Cassandra moves toward the sofa, and Jane tilts the screen so they can view it together. “Nice pic,” Cassandra remarks, her tone holding an edge.
In the profile photo Shay uploaded onto Cupid, she’s exuberant. She’s trying on a floppy straw hat and laughing, her face tilted up toward the sun.
That shot of Shay is strikingly similar to one of Amanda doing the exact same thing, at the same kiosk, on the High Line last spring. Jane took that picture as well. Amanda posted it to her Facebook page a couple of months before she died.
It was easy to maneuver Shay: After they’d led her onto the High Line, Cassandra had paused at the kiosk. She and Jane had grabbed a few hats, Jane pushing a straw one into Shay’s hands before directing her on how to pose.
It could prove invaluable later to have public evidence of Shay’s unrelenting desire to replicate elements of Amanda’s life.
But it won’t be enough.
An even more urgent element must be established: The other women in the group must be led to believe Shay is obsessed with Amanda—and that her preoccupation has only been growing since Amanda’s death.
Earlier tonight, the sisters tried to plant the seeds establishing Shay’s fixation by sending Beth and Shay on a collision course. Jane made separate dates with them to meet at the same CrossFit class. Jane canceled a few minutes before it began, pleading a fabricated work emergency.
Both women thought they alone were to meet Jane at the exercise studio.
The best-case scenario, the sisters had agreed, would have been for Beth to notice Shay—to recognize her from Amanda’s memorial service or from the photograph Cassandra had distributed before it. Even if Beth hadn’t remembered Shay, she might still have been spooked by Shay’s resemblance to Amanda.
It seemed unlikely the opposite would happen, that Shay would recall Beth from the service and approach her. But if she did, the sisters could use this to their advantage as well: It would be evidence of Shay’s dangerous obsession.
Unfortunately, the text Beth sent immediately after CrossFit made no reference to anything unusual occurring: I’m never going to forgive you for signing me up for this torture and then backing out. I can barely walk!
The sisters need to come up with something else, quickly. The police surely homed in on the discrepancy between the story Daphne told them and the one they heard from Kit. Daphne may not hold up well if she is summoned for further questioning.
All that they’ve built could be destroyed.
Cassandra collapses on the deep chenille cushion next to Jane, tucking her feet beneath her. She reads from Shay’s profile:
“‘Looking for someone who is active, but is also happy relaxing on the couch, sharing a pizza and talking, or watching a movie.… It would be great if you were at least as tall as me (I’m five feet ten, but I rarely wear heels).…’
“She wants a guy like Sean,” Cassandra remarks, then continues:
“‘My friends say I’m kind and smart—a great catch. Who am I to argue with them?:) If I sound like someone you’d like to meet, maybe we can start with a friendly drink and see where things go.…’”