“But neither do you,” I remind him.

“That’s different,” he says.

“I don’t see how,” I say. “I mean, except that I’m younger than you.” But what’s seven years, really? Prince Charles and Lady Diana were twelve years apart…and okay, that didn’t turn out so well, but how likely are we to repeat their mistakes as a couple? If Cooper and I ever were to become one, I mean. Neither of us even likes polo.

“Besides,” I say, remembering what I’d seen out of the ambulance window. “I do have a family. Sort of. I mean, there’s Rachel and Magda and Pete and Patty and you—”

I didn’t mean to add that last word. But there it is, floating in the air between us. You. You’re part of my family, Cooper. My new family, now that my real family members are all incarcerated or on the lam. Congratulations!

Cooper just looks at me like I’m crazy (how unusual). So I add lamely, “And Lucy, too.”

Cooper exhales slowly.

“If you really feel strongly that what happened wasn’t an accident,” he says at last, pointedly ignoring the We Are Family speech (don’t think I don’t notice), “and you really think someone is trying to kill you, then I suggest we go to the police.”

“I tried that,” I remind him. “Remember?”

“Yes. But this time I’m going with you, and I’m going to make sure—”

His voice trails off as a petite, attractive brunette comes rushing up to the waiting room desk, all breathless and leather-skirted, her left hand weighted down by a massive diamond ring.

Okay, so I can’t actually see the ring from where I’m sitting. I still know who she is. I’ve seen her with her mouth around my ex’s you-know-what. Her image will be forever burned onto my retina.

“Excuse me,” she breathes to the stony-faced receptionist. “But I believe my fiancé is here. Jordan Cartwright. When can I see him?”

Tania Trace, the woman who’d taken my place in Jordan’s heart and penthouse—not to mention my position on the music charts.

“Funny,” Cooper observes. “She looks as if she’s handling the pain quite well.”

I glance at him curiously, then remember that he’s referring to something I’d told him some time ago, after I’d first moved in.

“Oh sure,” I say. “Because she’s strung out on painkillers. But I’m telling you, Coop, you can’t have that much plastic surgery and expect to live a pain-free life. I mean, she’s been almost completely reconstructed. In reality, she’s a size eighteen.”

“Right,” Cooper says. “Looks like my brother’s in good hands now. Shall we go?”

We go.

And none too soon, if you ask me.

19

Shout out to my

Homegirls

Shout out to my

Friends

Shout out to the

Ones who love me

On those I can depend

Shout out to the

Girls out there

Who buy their own

Damned diamond rings

Shout out to you sisters

I’m with you to the end

“Shout Out”
Performed by Heather Wells
Composed by Dietz/Ryder
From the album Summer
Cartwright Records

The first person at the Sixth Precinct I tell my story to is a pretty but tired-looking woman at the front desk. She has her long black hair in a bun, which I assume is regulation hairstyle for policewomen.

I make a mental note not to major in criminal justice.

The woman directs us to a pudgy guy at a desk, to whom I repeat my story. Like the receptionist, he looks bored…

…until I get to the part about Jordan. Everybody perks up at the mention of Easy Street.

The pudgy guy has us wait a few minutes, and then we’re ushered into someone’s extremely tidy office. We sit across from a very neat desk for a minute or two before the owner of the office walks in, and I see that he is none other than cigar-chomping Detective Canavan.

“You!” I nearly shout at him.

“You!” he nearly shouts back. He’s holding a Styrofoam cup of coffee and—what else?—a doughnut. Krispy Kreme glazed, from the look of it. Lucky duck.

“To what do I owe the pleasure this time, Miss Wells?” he asks. “Wait, don’t tell me. This wouldn’t happen to be about somebody crowning a Backstreet Boy, would it?”

“Easy Street member,” I correct him. “And yes, it would.”

Detective Canavan sits down at his desk, removes the unlit cigar from his mouth, tears off a piece of his doughnut, and dunks it in his coffee. He then puts the coffee-soaked piece of doughnut in his mouth, chews, swallows, and says, “Pray enlighten me.”

I glance at Cooper, who had remained silent at my side through two recitations of my tale. Seeing that he isn’t going to be any help this time, either, I launch into it for a third time, wondering, not for the first time, what it is I find so attractive about Cooper anyway, since he can be so uncommunicative sometimes. Then I remember the whole being-so-hot-and-kind-and-generous-to-me-without-asking-anything-in-return thing, and I know why.

Detective Canavan clasps his hands behind his head as he listens, tipping his chair back as far as it will go. Either he has forgotten his Mitchum for Men or he is just a very profuse sweater, because he has large perspiration stains underneath his arms. Not that this seems to bother him.

“So,” Detective Canavan says, to the water-stained ceiling panels, when I’m through talking. “Now you think the president of New York College’s kid is a murderer.”

“Well,” I say, hesitantly. Because when he puts it that way, it sounds so…dumb. “Yes. I guess I do.”

“But you got no proof. Sure, this guy here’s got a condom. A condom we could probably prove is his. But which wouldn’t be admissible in court. But you got no proof any crime has actually been committed, with the exception of this planter over the side of the terrace, which could have been accidental—”

“But those planters have been up there for years,” I interrupt. “And none of them ever fell down until today—”

“Coroner’s report on both dead girls states cause of death was accidental.” Detective Canavan quits gazing at the ceiling and looks at me. “Listen, miss—is it still miss?”