Page 26 of Everyone Is Lying to You

If the cops were smart, or if they had any handle on what kind of room they were walking into, maybe they would have told the hotel to shut down the Wi-Fi before busting through those doors, but they hadn’t had that foresight, and within thirty seconds, texts and emails and DMs are shooting around the country, maybe the world, searching for Rebecca Sommers. Everyone is greedy for information and for eyeballs.

“I’d like you little ladies to sit tight,” the officer on the stage drawls as the moderator from earlier, the one in the flouncy buttery dress, swishes back onto the stage to regain a modicum of control over a situation that has gone entirely sideways.

“It won’t be that much longer,” she promises in a carefully controlled tone. “And I’m so sorry for this interruption. The MomBomb staff is diligently working with these gentlemen and we will all be able to adjourn to this morning’s breakout sessions shortly.”

I look down at my own phone, hoping for a dozen missed calls from Bex, or at the very least a text from her. Nothing. When I glance back up a cop is behind me. Had he been reading my screen?

“Miss Jackson,” he says to Olivia. “We need you to come down to the station.”

“Why?”

“We need to ask you some questions.”

“I can meet you there in an hour,” Olivia says in a smooth and practiced tone.

“We would prefer you come with us.”

“I don’t think so.” She stands and makes her way out of the ballroom, the officer trailing behind her like a puppy.

“No one leaves,” another cop says into the microphone from the stage.

I comb through Bex’s social media accounts, but she hasn’t posted since last night, when she’d made a reel of her beautifully manicured toes dangling in the infinity pool in my room, the purple mountains and orange sunset glowing in the distance. Cursive words were sprinkled over her milky white calves:Living the Good Life and Catching Up with an Old Bestie. Our Friends Are Our Everything. There were already thousands of comments.

Preach sister

Friends, God, children, and chocolate…also our husbands…lol

I aspire to be as calm and present as you

Thank you for your inspiration

Sexy toes!

Funny how everyone believes everything they see on social media

Where are your kids?

When can I hang out with you?

I want to be your bestie

What is your toenail color?

My dream life

The way I would love to live

The naked longing for a fantasy in most of the comments makes me intensely sad.

Because she tagged me in the reel, I’ve amassed thousands of new followers in the past twenty-four hours and the numbers keep climbing.

Much to the chagrin of the conference’s organizers, MomBomb does not continue as planned. The breakout sessions don’t happen, and more police officers show up to keep us all penned in the ballroom even though they probably don’t have the authority to do it. Lunch is eventually served. Waiters traipse from table to table with blue cheese iceberg salads and lukewarm salmon as if nothing were amiss.

“Holy shit,” the henfluencer finally clucks about an hour into our captivity.

We’d hardly spoken since the disruptions. No one was talking much, but I figured all the influencers were communicating on their phones. I saw nothing but bowed heads and fingers flying furiously over screens. No one touched their salmon.

“Grayson Sommers is fucking dead,” she announces. “Holy shit. Someone killed him.”

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