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“Why else would you be here?”
Without Piper, there is no world where Noelle’s interests overlap with mine.
“Just let me in,” she presses. “Please. It’s important.”
After a beat of hesitation, I hold open the door and usher her in. “Make it quick.”
99
TIMOFEY
Noelle is still glaring at me, even as she shifts nervously from foot to foot in the foyer. “I don’t want to be here,” she announces.
“What a coincidence. I don’t want you to be here, either.”
She narrows her eyes. “I’m the only one with a good reason to dislike you. You don’t even know me.”
“I know enough,” I snap. “You are here to slap my wrist for hurting your friend even though none of you have done a thing to take care of Piper the entire time you’ve known her. At least I’ve been trying to help her out.”
Noelle looks down at the floor for a moment. Is that contrition? I wouldn’t have expected anything I said to break through to her, but she looks genuinely guilty.
As soon as it flashes across her face, it’s gone again. “I told you, this isn’t about Piper. It’s about Emily.”
The words are so unexpected that I actually take a step back. “You don’t know a thing about Emily.”
“Piper told me about her. She asked me to—”
“Piper may have asked you to type some things into a search bar, but that isn’t the same as an actual investigation.”
“What about the FBI?” she asks, eyebrow arched. “Is that an official enough investigation for you?”
“You’re not in the FBI.”
“No. But my boyfriend is.” She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a piece of paper. “And he uncovered something.”
I want to tear the paper from her hands right now. But I’ve lived long enough in this world to know you should never show your cards.
“Why the fuck should I care? It won’t bring her back.”
Noelle sighs “Listen, I’m sure you’re used to people in your life leveraging information against you. You’ve been betrayed and blackmailed. Well, that isn’t what I’m here to do.”
I cross my arms. “Then why are you here?”
“Because…” She shrugs. “Because Piper came to care about you. I have no idea why, but she really cared about you.”
I ignore her use of the past tense. The possibility that Piper doesn’t care anymore is harder to take than I’d like to admit.
Noelle holds the note out to me. “She would want you to have this.”
“What is it?” I ask, already reaching for the note.
But the second I unfold the bottom third, I know.
It’s Emily’s handwriting.
The letter looks like it is a photocopy of a taped together piece of paper. But the sloppy print letters and heart over the “i” in her name tells me it’s legit.
“The note was found in her apartment after she died,” Noelle explains. “My boyfriend, Wayne, looked into the case after I asked him to. A colleague told him about the letter. I had to do some not-quite-legal things to get my hands on that, but…well, everyone deserves closure. Even murderous, manipulative bastards like you.”
