The Better Sister Read online

  When our huddle finally broke up, Ethan looked toward the judge’s bench expectantly. “What happens to me now?”

  “We’re going home,” I said. “Let’s get out of here and never come back.”

  37

  Nicky and I decided to drive Ethan straight to the city, despite the Friday traffic. It would be a while before he’d want to see the East Hampton house again.

  He slept—or at least pretended to—until nearly one in the afternoon the next day. By then, I was already back from Bloomingdale’s with a mix of size-large T-shirts, hoodies, and track pants. He seemed to have filled out in the last six months.

  “I thought you should have some fresh clothes.”

  “You just wanted to shop,” he mumbled with a grin as I handed him the shopping bags.

  Panda appeared from under the sofa, buzzed past him three times at lightning speed, and then circled back to brush gently against his ankles. The sound of his purrs filled the room.

  “Greedy Boy!” Ethan cried out, dropping the shopping bags to pull him into his arms.

  It had been Nicky’s idea to give the East Hampton housekeeper two days off in exchange for driving the cat to the city this morning.

  In addition to sleeping, Ethan needed to eat. Nicky and I cooked breakfast, lunch, and dinner the entire weekend, and were happy to see him snack in between. We binge-watched the entire season of Bosch that he had missed while in custody. We did a jigsaw puzzle. We marveled as Panda followed Ethan everywhere he went, even the bathroom.

  The one thing we did not do was talk about Adam. Or the verdict. Or the really important revelations that had come out during Ethan’s trial. Or Bill Braddock, his law firm, and the documents that were locked in the file drawer of the desk that the movers would be coming for on Wednesday.

  Finally, on Tuesday morning, I knocked on the door of his room when I heard signs of movement inside and asked him if we could talk. He was in the same exact spot on his bed where he’d curled up while Adam screamed at him. Dropping onto the corner of his bed and folding one leg beneath me, I started by asking him what he wanted to do about school. His detention center had supposedly been educating him while he was in custody, but I had no idea whether that work would translate into graduating on schedule. “I’m pretty sure I could shame Headmistress Carter into giving you extra assignments to catch up with your class—”

  “I’m not going back there.”

  I nodded. It was the response I expected. He never did like Casden. I had forced it on him.

  “Okay, we have time to figure it out.”

  “I want to go to Harvest Collegiate.”

  It was a public school on Fourteenth Street.

  “Fine, I’ll call and make the arrangements.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Also, I’ve been seeing a grief counselor, about losing your dad. Her name’s Anna, but she knows some men who do the same kind of work, both in the city and Long Island. I thought maybe it would be helpful for you, too.”

  He looked down at his hands. “You think I need a shrink.”

  “Nope, not at all. But you’ve lost your primary parent to a horrible crime of violence, not to mention what you went through the last six months. I’d be a total chode”—he smiled at the use of the word—“if I didn’t make it an option for you to talk to someone about that.”

  “I wasn’t going to use the gun, you know.”

  “I know.” Did I know?

  “I really was just trying to show off. Those kids are, like, I don’t know. They’re like adults. I just wanted to be different. It was stupid.”

  “It’s okay, Ethan. It’s all behind us.”

  “And I’m sorry about those posts on Poppit.”

  The guilt in his eyes made my chest hurt. “Really, it’s all right. I know you were trying to give me a wake-up call.”

  “I didn’t know you couldn’t leave—without leaving me, too, I mean. That’s why you put up with it, right? So you’d still be my mom?”

  I reached out and patted his arm. “It’s complicated, Ethan, but everything’s all right now.”

  “I took that stuff from the house, Mom—the Beats and the shoes and the speaker.”

  “None of it matters now.” Don’t tell me, I thought. I don’t want to know. I was still trying to figure out what to do with the evidence Adam had gathered against Bill.

  “Kevin was meeting up with someone for a deal, just like I said. And I didn’t want to get in trouble, so he dropped me at the beach. But then I was cold, and bored, and so I walked back to the house to get a hoodie.”

  “Ethan—” There was nothing I could say. If I told him to stop, he’d never trust me again. I needed to hear him out, whatever was going to come next.

  “I found Dad.”

  My face felt hot. I had to stop my hands from shaking. “Was he already—”

  He nodded. “Yeah. It was . . . bad.”

  I had no idea what to say. I sat in silence, waiting for him to explain.

  “I’m the one who trashed the house and broke the window and put those things in my backpack. But I swear, he was already gone when I got home.” His face was red, and his lower lip began to tremble.

  “Ethan, I don’t understand—”

  “I thought you did it.”

  My lips parted, but no words came out.

  “I saw how he was treating you. And I knew what an important moment you were having in your job. You didn’t want anyone to know what was happening. You were trapped. And so when I found him like that, I thought it had to have something to do with what was going on between the two of you. Like maybe he was hurting you again, and you were protecting yourself.”

  It’s always the spouse. Even Ethan thought so.

  “I didn’t hurt your father, Ethan. You know that now, don’t you?”

  He nodded. “I didn’t, either.”

  “I know,” I said, wrapping an arm around his shoulder.

  “So are the police even going to keep looking?”

  “Of course,” I said, even though I knew they wouldn’t. I shifted the conversation to something more hopeful. “You’re okay with staying with me? With Nicky around, too?”

  When he smiled, he actually looked happy. “Yeah. It’s gonna be good. I kind of like her.”

  “You don’t have to say ‘kind of.’ It’s not going to hurt my feelings that the two of you have grown closer.” I was struggling for words to explain how much had changed while he was gone, and then realized there was no rush. He’d see for himself that things would be different now that he was home. “In fact, I’m sorry you didn’t have more of a relationship with her sooner. She’s changed a lot since you were little, and I don’t think I realized that until all this happened.”

  “I wanted to know her better—even before. But Dad wouldn’t let me, and I didn’t want you to think I was, like, rejecting you or something. But, Mom, I did—”

  “Ethan, you don’t need to explain anything.” I gave him a hug. “It’s all going to be okay now. And Nicky’s going to be around for a long time. All right?”

  He paused, as if he wanted to say something else, but then the worry fell from his face. “I still can’t believe you’re sisters, though.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  I found Nicky in what would be her bedroom for the next four months. My desk and boxes were pushed into the corner next to the window bench to make room for a dresser for her clothes. She had her iPad propped open on the dresser to stream an episode of Real Housewives and was sitting cross-legged on the unfolded Murphy bed, cussing to herself as she tried to weave a string of leather through an impossibly small ring of wire.

  “That’s going to look cool.” She had shown us the sketch of the leather collar-necklace the previous night.

  “If I ever finish it,” she said, tossing the pieces onto the bed. “If I had all my tools, I would have been done last night.”

  “I was thinking about that. If you need to bring more stuff from C
leveland before your apartment’s done, that would be okay.”

  She looked genuinely surprised. “Yeah, sure.”

  “I should have offered before, but—” We had been preoccupied by other things. “I’m second-guessing what we talked about regarding Bill.” I found a spot on the bed next to her to sit, being careful not to jostle her jewelry-making setup.

  “I know you hate leaving anything in limbo, especially something this serious,” she said. “But it’s not your job to run around solving crimes right now, Chloe—not even Adam’s murder. Your job is taking care of Ethan.”

  I had shown Nicky the documents I found in my file drawer, and she had convinced me not to take them to the police for now. The way she saw it, Ethan had finally gotten home, and the last thing we needed to do was call attention to our family again. The government was already investigating the Gentry Group and had been worried enough about the potential connection to Adam’s murder to notify Nunzio of Adam’s contacts with the FBI. The day Olivia called an FBI agent to the stand to testify that Adam had offered to turn over incriminating evidence against not only the Gentry Group but other lawyers at Rives & Braddock, Gentry’s stock had dropped nearly 20 percent, and three major R&B clients had announced they were parting ways with their law firm.

  Nicky seemed convinced that the FBI would get to the truth, whether I gave them Adam’s notes or not.

  “But what if Adam’s murder is never officially solved? Ethan will spend the rest of his life under a cloud of suspicion. People are always going to wonder.”

  Nicky gave my forearm a small squeeze. “We talked about this, Chloe. Just lay low for a while. You know the DA’s pissed about getting their asses handed to them at trial. If you embarrass them again, they could start investigating you.”

  As far as we knew, Jake didn’t have an alibi for the night of Adam’s murder. There was nothing to stop the police from arguing that Jake killed Adam, and I was the one who put him up to it.

  Nicky could tell that I was still torn. “The documents will be safe and sound in your desk. If the FBI doesn’t connect the dots on their own, you can always come forward later.”

  She was right. I let myself push the thought away. For six months, I had focused on nothing except Adam’s murder. I needed to think about the future.

  Part IV

  Chloe

  38

  Three Weeks Later

  The smell of fresh pine greeted me when I opened the apartment door.

  It was the first time we’d gotten an honest-to-God Christmas tree in three years, and this year, we did it up right. Ethan and Nicky had lugged back a six-foot balsam fir from the Union Square Greenmarket while I served as the sidewalk lookout. And we had an even bigger blue spruce for the house in East Hampton, where we planned to spend Christmas Day.

  I tossed my briefcase and the mail on the bench in the foyer, kicked off my boots, and hung my coat in the front closet. As I turned the corner into the living room, I noticed a strand of garland draped on the hardwood floor next to two ornaments that had come loose.

  “Panda,” I called out as I tucked the decorations back into place. “Greedy Boy!”

  He appeared from beneath the sofa, buzzing past the tree like a ninja, only to circle the room and disappear under the sofa again.

  “You’re silly, baby.”

  The rest of the apartment was unoccupied, even the kitchen, despite Nicky’s text to me that morning about a recipe she was excited to make. She’d promised an “epic dinner” when I got home from work.

  I pulled my cell phone from my briefcase and composed a text. Where’s my dinner, woman?

  I waited as dots appeared on the screen, followed by Sorry. We ran late Christmas shopping and are getting groceries now. Eataly! Epic, I promise.

  I grabbed the mail from the bench and made my way back to the kitchen. I reached for a bottle of wine beneath the island and then opted for a martini instead. I had reason to celebrate. It was Friday night, and the bonus check I got that day made it clear my job at Eve was more than safe.

  The first sip of gin burned, but the second went down smooth. I hit the remote control to watch the news on the little TV next to the fridge, and then turned my attention to the pile of mail. There had been so many last-minute holiday-shopping catalogs that the mailman had to leave a rubber-banded heap with the doorman.

  When I reached the bottom of the stack, I found a brown mailing envelope addressed to Ethan. It was from the Cuyahoga County Clerk of Courts.

  What could Ethan need from the court system in Cleveland? I told myself it was probably something Olivia had asked for in the course of the trial and that, regardless, I’d find out for certain once Ethan came home.

  I made it through half my martini and two department-store catalogs before I opened the envelope. The cover document was a form letter, indicating the date of the request, the number of pages, and the amount charged. It showed a deposit of $25 in April to initiate an archive search, and then a recent charge for the balance owed for copying the resulting pages, forty-two in all.

  The case was Adam Macintosh v. Nicole Taylor Macintosh. These were the records from Adam’s custody fight with Nicky before they settled. I vaguely recalled a $25 court system charge I had found on our credit card after Adam died. I had assumed he had once again used our personal card for a work expense, but the transaction had been Ethan’s. He was looking into the circumstances that had taken him away from Nicky.

  I had read the file and was stashing the envelope into my briefcase when I heard keys in the door. I was still standing in the foyer when they entered, all four arms loaded down with bags.

  “Hey,” Nicky said, nearly bumping me with the door.

  “Hey,” I said, reaching for a few of the bags and setting them down on the bench. “I’m sorry. I forgot something at work that I need to do tonight. I just need to grab it, and I’ll be right back.”

  Nicky threw Ethan a skeptical look. “I think someone’s trying to get out of cooking.”

  “You’re the one with the epic recipe. We’re cool with takeout.”

  “Fine. I’ll do everything. But you,” she said to me, “better be back fast. And you,” she said to Ethan, “are gonna DJ while I prep.”

  My storage unit was by Hudson Yards. On the side of the brick building, the gigantic banner that carried the pithy ad of the month read “You’ll finally have enough space to pretend to do yoga at home.”

  The movers had followed my instructions and left the desk so that the drawers were directly next to the unit’s entrance and could be opened without rearranging anything. I opened the pencil drawer and felt around until I found what I was looking for—Ethan’s burner phone. I tried powering it up, but the battery was dead.

  I was halfway to the elevator when I turned around. I opened my desk file drawer and pulled out Adam’s file on Rives & Braddock while I was at it.

  By the time I got home, the pine of the Christmas tree had been replaced by the smell of butter and garlic. I found Nicky and Ethan in the kitchen. She was pulling stems from a pile of peppers while he read off songs from his iPad, asking what she wanted to hear next.

  “Oh god, I’m scared,” I said, eyeing her handiwork. I did not share Nicky’s tolerance for spicy foods.

  “Don’t worry. They’re shishitos. Not hot at all, I promise. Wait, where are you going?”

  “Just changing into chill clothes. I’ll be right back. I’ll even chop something.”

  I closed my door, threw my briefcase on the bed, and opened my nightstand drawer. I still had the charging cord for the burner phone Jake had given me. I plugged it into the phone I had found in Ethan’s backpack. It fit.

  I already knew what number I was going to find, but I needed to be sure. The screen lit up. It wouldn’t be long.

  39

  I waited until the following day, after Ethan left for a bowling party one of the kids from Casden was having for his birthday. I was surprised Ethan was on the invitation list, a
nd even more surprised that he had accepted.

  I unplugged the burner phone that was still charging in my bedroom, pulled the envelope from the Cuyahoga County Clerk of Courts, and made my way down the hall to Nicky’s room. She told me to come in after a quick tap on the door. She was carrying a bundle of clothes from the window bench. “Sorry, I was just straightening up.”

  “Nicky, you don’t need to clean your room for me. It’s your room.”

  “I’m cleaning for myself. I’ll never be as OCD as you, but I’m not a total pig.” She dropped the items on top of her dresser. “What’s up?” she said, gesturing to the envelope in my hand as she took a seat on the edge of her bed. She must have sensed from my expression that I wanted to talk to her about something.

  I flipped open the phone and read the number I had already pulled up on the screen. It was stored under “N.” A 440 area code. I thought nothing of it when I first found the burner in Ethan’s backpack—just another one of Ethan’s friends he didn’t want us to know about, I assumed. Cleveland had been 216 when I lived there. Apparently 440 had been added after I left.

  I had already tried calling the number the night before. The woman who answered told me she’d only had the number for a month.

  Nicky’s brow furrowed, and she bit her lip.

  “He was calling you a lot,” I said. “For months.” He had started to tell me when he finally opened up about what happened the night Adam was killed, but I had cut him off, assuring him that the tensions between Nicky and me were in the past.

  I had expected her to lie, because in my mind, Nicky always lied when backed into a corner. Instead, she admitted it. “He started reaching out to me about a year ago, saying he wanted to know me better. I’m the one who told him to get a burner phone, and I did the same. I was terrified that you and Adam would see he was calling me, and find a way to cut me out even more than you already had.”

  It wasn’t an irrational fear. Adam had had their custody agreement written with ironclad provisions that punished Nicky for any type of unauthorized contact with Ethan.