What's Done In the Dark(49)

“What’s up, sis?” she asked as she got out of the car.

“Um, where did this come from?” I asked, eyeing the silver Mercedes.

She grinned as she ran her hand over the hood. “Nice, huh? This is my man’s car.”

“What man?” I said. Fran couldn’t keep a man for longer than two months, so I had no idea who she could be talking about.

“My new boyfriend.” She smiled. “Actually, it’s his wife’s car.”

“What?”

“Long story. I’ll have to tell you about it some other time.” She slid her shades on and pushed the remote to set the alarm.

“Girl, have you lost your mind? Are you trying to get killed driving some other woman’s car?” I said.

“The car is at the center of an ugly custody battle, so I’m driving it until they work all of that out.” She eyed me over the top of her shades. “But I know you’re not about to judge me.”

“You’re right,” I said. I had my own problems. I couldn’t lecture my sister on her drama.

“So, what’s up with you?” she asked as we made our way inside.

“I need a drink. I’ll tell you in a minute so I don’t have to repeat it for Mavis.”

“I hope you’re treating for the drink,” she said, holding the door open.

We spotted Mavis, and she looked surprised to see me.

“What are you doing here?” she asked.

“Felise called and wanted to meet us,” Fran said, sliding into her chair.

I hugged Mavis and had barely sat down before I instructed the waitress to bring me a Wave margarita.

“Okay, what’s going on?” Mavis asked as soon as the waitress walked away.

“Someone knows I was at the hotel,” I said, coming right to the point.

Both of their mouths gaped open.

“Who?” Fran said.

“Do either of you remember Sabrina Fulton? I went to college with her. She was my roommate freshman year.”

“Oh, yeah, I remember her,” Mavis said.

I then proceeded to fill them in. From the funeral to this morning.

“This is un-freakin’-believable,” Fran said once I was done. She had that gleam in her eyes like she was ready to go jump someone.

“Don’t even look like that,” Mavis said. “We’re too old for violence.”

“So, I’m supposed to just let some chick blackmail my sister and I don’t do anything?” Fran asked.

Mavis ignored Fran and turned back to me. “Did you make it clear that you won’t be bullied into subsidizing her lifestyle?”

“I did, but somehow, I don’t think she was paying me any attention.” I sighed. “I gave her the grand to go away. I can’t believe I’m in this position.”

“Wow,” Mavis said.

The waitress set my drink down in front of me, and I immediately began sucking it down.

“Hey, slow your roll,” Fran said.

“Yeah. All that drinking is what got you into this position in the first place,” Mavis added.

I rolled my eyes at her, and thankfully, she didn’t say anything else.

“Well, maybe she really will go away,” Fran said.

No sooner had the words left her mouth than my phone beeped, letting me know I had a text.

I didn’t recognize the number it was coming from, but it appeared to have some kind of video attached. I almost deleted it, but then I saw the name: “Steven and Felise.”

The entire back of my neck prickled, spreading up over my head, as I opened the video and pressed play.

“What are you looking at?” Mavis asked, leaning to look over at my phone.

“It–it’s a video.”

“What kind of video?” Fran asked.

I no longer could speak. I simply set the phone down and turned it so my sisters could see the video of me and Steven sitting a little too close for comfort at the bar. In the corner of the video was a date stamp: 06-01-2013. None of us said a word as the next text came in. This is just a snippet. The terms just changed. Stay tuned. SF

An hour ago, I’d thought I was all cried out. But this video brought on a whole new onset of tears. I had suspected that giving Sabrina that money was a bad idea. At this moment I knew without a doubt that my nightmare was only going to get worse.





34


Paula


“KNOCK, KNOCK.”

My sister lightly tapped on my door and pushed it open at the same time. “Are you okay?” she asked, sticking her head inside.

Charlene and I were so far apart in age (I was ten when our mom had her) that we were never really close. But she was “in between jobs as usual” so she’d come when I called and hadn’t left since. Despite the fact that she didn’t know a thing about raising kids, she was still a tremendous help.