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I don’t wait for the elevator, I run down the stairs, lean against the side of the building and fold myself in two, my head in my hands, and wait for the dizziness to pass and for my heart to slow down. I feel so stupid. I saw that photograph in the gallery many times. I saw it up close, and I’ve never, ever thought it was Jack. It looks nothing like Jack. Why did I believe it was? Because Bronwyn told me. Bronwyn who saw it for half a minute in a room full of people. What else did she make me believe? That Jack and Summer were making out in the living room at Charlie’s birthday party. That they seemed close, creepily so. She just opens her mouth and I swallow whatever lies come out of it—hook, line, and sinker.
Eventually, I push myself off the wall and flag another taxi, and because this is not my day, I find out my Visa card has maxed out when I try to pay. I don’t know why I’m surprised. I fumble for the right cash in my purse and hurry to the gallery.
Summer watches me enter, her eyes wide with confusion, bewilderment, her mouth gaping. I clock her cellphone in her hand.
“Can we talk?” I blurt, closing the door after me, but someone catches her attention, and she is too polite to fob them off. It’s a good thing. It gives me time to drop her keys back in her bag and shove the paper bag down the back of a shelf. I wait for her at the desk at the back, my hand pressed between my eyes.
“What the hell is going on, Laura? Dexter just called me, he said you let yourself into my apartment?”
I swivel on my chair to face her. “Sit down, please.” I point to the other chair.
“Why?”
“I need to ask you something. Please.”
She hesitates, but she drags the other chair. I motion for her to sit closer and take her hands in mine. She tries to free them, but I hold on. “Listen, I know this is going to sound very strange, but I have to ask. Have you ever texted Jack?”
I study her face closely. “Your Jack?”
“Yes. Have you ever texted him?”
“No! Of course not! Why on earth would I do that? I don’t even have his phone number! What’s wrong with you, Laura? You’re scaring me, you know? You’ve been acting really crazy.”
I keep nodding until she stops speaking, and then I put my hand out. “Would you be really angry with me if asked to have a look at your phone?” I ask, because I have to be sure. There is no room for doubt. Somebody is messing with my brain, and I need to be absolutely sure that it’s not her.
“Would I mind? Damn right I would! You’re going to tell me what the hell is going on? And how did you get in my apartment anyway?”
“I can’t explain everything right now, but I am asking, please, to unlock your phone and open your texting app and show me.”
“You have no right,” she snaps.
“I know, I’m asking. Please.”
She relents with a sigh, probably because she thinks I’ve lost my mind and I need to be convinced that she’s telling the truth. She taps angrily on the screen and thrusts her phone at me, opened to the messaging app.
“Thank you.” She’s still holding it as I scroll through her past messages and sure enough there are no texts to Jack. There were no texts sent on the day we were at the restaurant together that read,I miss you, come over later?No texts in her history that look remotely like they were for Jack. There are a hell of a lot of texts addressed to Dexter, though, and some of them are racy enough to make me blush.
“Thank you,” I say, handing it back. “I really appreciate it.”
She snorts, gets up and almost slams her chair back against the wall.
“You actually thought I was screwing him? Is that why you went to my house? Did you think he was there? What the hell, Laura! Seriously! Do you have any idea how insane you are? I should never have gone along with your stupid schemes. I was doing you a favor, and you know what? You’re a nut job. You really are.”
She goes on like that for a while, making me wince, and I mumble that I know, yes, she’s absolutely right, it was stupid to ask her to get involved and I can understand why she thinks I’m a nut job. Her voice is getting progressively louder and higher, and I glance over her shoulder to see if any of our visitors are noticing. They are. People are beginning to crane their neck.
“Please, if you could keep your voice down, Summer…”
“You’re going to tell me what the hell is going on?”
“Not yet, but I apologize for everything. I really do. I’m an idiot.”
“Yeah, you won’t get any arguments from me on that score. And you know what else?”
I shake my head.
She flaps a hand in front of her face. “Forget it. Go home, Laura.”
I don’t go home, not yet. She walks back to the front of the gallery, high heels clacking against the timber floor, and I sit there for a moment, then shakily grab the mouse and load up the video of the theft from the security provider dashboard.
