Page 7 of Love and Lies

“Well, I am three years older than when I last saw you.” I’d been seventeen then, and Malia had only really seen me as her best friend’s little sister. But Valerie’s death had changed everything. We’d been in contact the whole time since then, for which I was profoundly grateful—not just because hardly anyone from my old life seemed to care how I was doing, but also because Malia was a police officer, and therefore had access to crucial information.

“That’s true. I’m glad you didn’t cut your hair off like you threatened.” She grinned.

“And give my mother a heart attack as soon as I got back? I wouldn’t dare.” I’d grown bored with my hair back then and had often thought about changing it, but these days I liked my long, dark brown waves, since they were the only thing Valerie and I had had in common. With my blue eyes, narrow nose, and strong features I looked more like Dad, while my sister had been the beautiful, dark-eyed, Disney-princess double of Mom.

Malia looked through the paper bag, selected a pink-frosted doughnut, and then held the bag out for me. “What did your family say about your coming back?” she asked, biting into it.

I took one with sprinkles. “So far, not a lot. I wanted to surprise them by showing up unannounced at brunch today, but there was no brunch. Mom had an appointment, Dad is in Washington, apparently, and I haven’t talked to Lincoln yet.” My brother lived a few blocks away in one of our other apartments.

“So they’re really okay with your living here again?” Malia asked. She knew how hard I’d fought to come back before, without success. “Why the change of heart?”

I shrugged. “I told Mom at Christmas how much I missed New York City, and that I thought enough time had passed since what happened with Valerie. At first she wasn’t eager about the idea, but eventually she came around—under certain conditions.”

Malia’s right eyebrow shot up. “Conditions? More than usual? Your entire family consists of nothing but rules.”

“Yeah, and now there are a few more.” I counted on my fingers. “I have to live with them until I graduate, I’m not allowed to meet with anyone who has any connection to Valerie—except you, of course—and I’m only allowed to go to parties if I run it past them first. And on top of that, I have to attend any and all business functions that they want me to go to. In exchange for all that, I get to live here and go to Columbia.”

“You might as well become a nun,” Malia joked. “I’ll just call you Sister Helena from now on. I take it you’re not allowed to date?”

I grinned. “Actually, I was planning on grabbing the first half-decent guy off the street and bringing him home for sex while my parents entertain the mayor in the living room downstairs. Do you think that’d be allowed?”

“Hmm. Sounds like a gray area to me.”

We both laughed. It wasn’t funny really, but I had no choice other than to accept my parents’ conditions. I couldn’t do anything to clear Valerie’s name from England.

“Then I guess you’re not planning to call the lovely Ian?” Malia’s eyebrows took on a life of their own again. “He’s waited three years for you—don’t you think he’ll want to know you’re back?”

I shook my head. “If he really has been waiting for me, then there’s something wrong with him. Anyway, he’s at college on the West Coast, as far as I know.”

Ian was my ex—my first love, if you wanted to call it that. We’d been together for five months when Valerie died, and my life as I knew it had ended. My parents had shipped me off to England in a cloak-and-dagger operation, and from then on Ian had been nothing more than a contact in my phone. We’d had a couple of calls, but he was completely overwhelmed by my grief, so I’d ended it, and pretty soon I stopped thinking about him altogether. “My type has changed a bit since then, too.”

Malia laughed. “Oh yeah? So those nice young men in freshly pressed shirts that your mother picks out for you—don’t tell me you’re not a fan anymore?”

“To that I can only say a resounding ‘hell no.’ Cambridge was helpful on that score, for sure.” I laughed as well and took another doughnut while Malia regarded me with interest.

“Len, are you really here just because you missed New York?” she asked finally. I knew what she was getting at. A few months ago, I’d talked her into sending me information pertaining to the night Valerie and Adam died.

“What do you mean?” I replied innocently. “I mean, this is my home, so—” I broke off; a young officer had come in to get himself a coffee. He said hello to Malia, then his gaze landed on me, and his expression went from friendly to intrigued.

“All good, Ramirez?” my friend asked, in a tone that would have the most hardened criminals confessing their crimes.

“What? Yeah, of course.” He shot me a grin, then left the room.

Malia gave me a look. “Don’t worry, I won’t give him your number.”

“Shame—I thought maybe he’d be good for that thing with the mayor,” I quipped, although I wasn’t really in a joking mood.

It seemed Malia wasn’t either. “So what are you up to?” she pressed. “And don’t take me for an idiot, okay?”

I let out a breath and gave in. If I wanted to be able to count on my sister’s friend for what was to come, I’d have to tell her the truth. “I’m here to clear Valerie’s name. And to find out what happened that night.”

“You know what happened that night,” Malia said. She hadn’t been at the party—she’d been living abroad for a few months back then—but she’d read the case notes, obviously. “Everyone knows.”

I shook my head. “No. I only know what was in the papers and the police report—that the two of them were celebrating their engagement in a suite at the Vanity Hotel, that they were drinking, and that they took cocaine that was contaminated with lidocaine, leading to cardiac arrest.” I took a deep breath. I couldn’t say those words without getting angry. Not least at myself, since I hadn’t been at the party either; I’d been in bed, sick. If only I’d just taken a couple of ibuprofen and gone along… “And that the whole world thinks they were Valerie’s drugs. But she didn’t take drugs, not ever. It’s not her fault she and Adam are dead.”

“And so what is it you want now? To find out who’s really to blame?”

“Exactly. And then to prove that my sister’s name was dragged through the dirt unfairly.”