Trina looked up. “Why do you say that?”
Addy shrugged. “I don’t know. Just a feeling. When I came over to water the plants, there were a bunch of clothes scattered all over his bed, and they were the kind of things you’d wear on a date, you know? Not business casual. And there was a receipt on the kitchen counter—it was right by the note he’d left me about which plants to water, that’s why I saw it. I wasn’t snooping—for two bottles of really expensive champagne that he’d bought on Friday just before he left. So, I figured he was going away with someone.”
“How expensive?”
“What?” Addy looked even more uncomfortable.
“How expensive was the champagne?” There was nothing under the bed. Trina lifted the mattress slightly and slid her fingers between the mattress and box spring.
“Like, three hundred dollars for two bottles.”
The upstairs neighbor must have been doing an indoor workout, because the ceiling started to bounce slightly and the bedroom filled with the percussive noise of someone jumping.
Trina’s fingers felt something sleek and hard shoved between the mattress and the box spring. She pulled it out, and sure enough it was a laptop. Dermot had felt the need to hide it underneath his bed, which made Trina think it was probably not his normal day-to-day computer. Trina could only assume the police had missed it because Dermot’s main laptop was easily found somewhere else in the apartment.
Addy had been looking down the hallway, and when she turned and saw what Trina found, she blanched. “Where’d you find that?”
“Underneath the mattress. Let’s go.” Trina stood up, placing the laptop neatly underneath her arm. She’d check through it from the safety of her apartment.
“Are you allowed to take it?” Addy asked.
“As much as we’re allowed to come into an apartment that isn’t ours.” Trina moved by Addy and headed down the hallway.
“I told you…” Addy started to cut in, but Trina stopped her.
“Hey, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be rude. You’ve been really kind.” Trina forced herself to look Addy in the eye. “Thank you.”
Addy uncrossed her arms and started to say something, her face softening, but a sound interrupted her.
Keys jangled in the door, and from their position in the hallway they heard the front door open as heavy footsteps sounded against the tiles. Somebody else had keys to Dermot’s apartment.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX LAURA
Two women stood in Dermot’s apartment. The younger one looked terrified to see Laura and Rosie step through the door, her arms wrapped around her chest with fingerless gloves that Laura remembered the artsy kids at high school used to wear. The other was older, and Laura decided she would be pretty if she didn’t look like she hadn’t slept or eaten a real meal all month. Rosie put her hand on the small of Laura’s back and scooted around to stand in front of her.
“Who the hell are you?” Rosie asked, standing with her legs slightly apart and her shoulders squared. For such a tiny woman, she looked tough as nails. She balled her hands into fists, and for a second Laura thought that she might actually punch someone, just to prove her point.
“I know you,” the older woman said, looking at Laura.
“Let’s get out of here.” The frightened one moved towards the door. “I’m sorry about all this. Dermot gave me a key to his place to water his plants. I was just trying to help.”
She held out the key in the palm of her hand, extended towards Rosie.
“Nobody’s going anywhere,” Rosie said. “Answer the question. Who are you?”
“Are we making introductions now? Fine, I’ll go first. I’m Trina, this is Addy.” The strung-out woman gestured to the younger one. Laura noticed Trina’s other hand held a silver laptop.
“I know you, too,” Laura replied coolly. “You’re the woman who was with Dermot the night he died. I saw the two of you together.” As soon as she said it, she wished she’d just kept her mouth shut.
Trina’s eyes narrowed. “Seems like we have something in common. We were both there the night Dermot was killed.”
Laura hadn’t realized she’d been seen. She’d been watching, hoping the signs she read were wrong, and that Dermot wasn’t going to go through with it. Laura followed the two of them from the wedding party up to the room he’d asked for, wishing he’d turn around at any point to say he couldn’t do it. In fact, Laura was certain he would. He was drunk that night, but he wasn’t cruel. Deep inside, he knew he loved Laura and that they should be together. That he’d never want to do anything to hurt her. She had to believe that.
And then Dermot and Trina disappeared behind the hotel-room door, and Laura was left alone in the hallway she’d vacuumed just a few hours ago for minimum wage, with nothing waiting for her at home but a pile of dirty laundry and her brother barking orders to make him a sandwich.
“Whoa, what are you talking about?” Rosie took a step further into the apartment. “Are you implying that my pregnant friend had anything to do with what happened to Dermot?”
That word—pregnant—sucked the air out of the room. Everyone went quiet, Trina and Addy still pushed together at the end of the hallway and Rosie standing guard in front of Laura like a pit bull ready to pounce.
Laura should have waited, done the test at home and hid the garbage in her purse. Or done it at the bathroom at the McDonald’s, maybe. But she had to know, and Rosie was there, ready to be such a nice friend, and Laura had forgotten that Rosie, like most of the people in Laura’s life, had problems thinking through the consequences of her actions.
Trina wouldn’t look at Laura. Addy seemed less nervous, at least.
“I think we have some things to talk about.” Addy moved from her spot by Trina and sat on the couch, adjusting a pillow behind her back and then leaning forward, her hands in between her knees. She took a deep breath, sucking it in through her nose and blowing it out through her mouth.
Rosie, Laura, and Trina all watched her.
“I get panic attacks sometimes,” Addy explained. “I have to think through the situation, focus my thoughts, and breathe deep. I can usually make it go away.”
“I’m sorry we made you panic,” Laura told Addy. “We just didn’t know what was going on.”
“Still don’t,” Rosie cut in. After Laura told Rosie she wasn’t sure who the father of her baby was, Laura also told her about Dermot. How she’d loved him. How much she missed him. How she didn’t have anything to remember him by, not really.
Rosie had raised an eyebrow at that. “Except for maybe a really big thing,” she’d said, looking pointedly at Laura’s still-flat stomach.
Rosie convinced her that the two of them should go over to Dermot’s apartment. Laura made a key for Dermot’s place a while ago.
“What are your names?” Trina asked.
“I thought you knew who I was.” Laura couldn’t help it. She didn’t like this woman. Not one bit.
“Yeah, but I don’t know your name.”
“Maybe we should keep it that way.” Laura snatched a glance at Addy, who was breathing deep again. She didn’t like hurting people. “It’s Laura. And this is my friend, Rosie.”
“Okay, so we have that cleared up. How about you tell us why you have a key to Dermot’s apartment?” Trina looked pointedly at Laura.
Again, Rosie decided to fix the situation herself. “She was Dermot’s girlfriend. Of course she has a key.”
Laura doesn’t correct her. What would be the point?
Trina moved over to the couch and sat down. She looked very, very tired all of a sudden, her eyes pinched at the corners and her skin pale. “Oh,” was all she said.
“Yeah, so like I said, we have some stuff to talk about.” Rosie pulled up a kitchen chair and angled it across from the couch. “You sit here, Trina.” She gestured to the hard chair. “Let my pregnant friend sit down on the soft couch.”
Laura took a seat, and after Rosie grabbed a chair for herself, she started their little discussion group.
“So why are you taking my dead boyfriend’s laptop?” she asked Trina.
