Page 54 of I Need You to Read This
Alex could run now. She could leave the house and dash across the lawn and knock on their door. But what would she say? That she has illegally entered a dead woman’s home searching for clues to implicate her boss in murder? She’d be lucky if they didn’t call the police immediately.
A creak comes from the kitchen, and her heart constricts. There has got to be an explanation. This is Lucy after all. Not some stranger. She should let Lucy be the one to tell her what it is. So, instead of running, she turns toward the dark kitchen. Her ears prick as she reaches the doorway. There is no sound at all now except her own lungs filling and emptying and the scrape of her footsteps as she moves through thehouse. She shouldn’t jump to conclusions about her sweet assistant. She’ll just ask her what is going on.
“Lucy?” she calls into the kitchen, trying to sound as casual as possible. She remembers some advice from one of Francis’s letters:People are not inclined to open up if confronted.She’ll start slow. “Hey, Lucy, are you still back here?” She tries to keep her voice light despite the tremor that has taken hold of her body.
“Alex?” Lucy’s voice cuts through the dark. It is deeper than normal, raspy. “Were you talking to someone?”
Alex puts a hand on the center island to orient herself as she follows it around the side of the kitchen. She moves the light of her phone toward Lucy’s voice. Lucy stands at the edge of the counter.
“Jonathan called. He wanted to tell me that he found something in Howard’s agenda that we’d missed,” Alex lies, not wanting her to know that no one is coming. “Howard should actually be here sooner than we thought.” She can see Lucy’s silhouette shuffle uncomfortably at the news. Lucy frowns down into the glow of her phone for a moment and Alex can see the black shine of fear across her eyes.
“Was that it?” She is barely audible.
“They had gone on dates, apparently. Francis and Howard were lovers, not enemies.” She watches Lucy carefully.
“Oh, wow, that’s a surprise,” she chokes out.
“Lucy, it makes me question whether he really was interested in young girls like you said.” Lucy takes a big step back.
“Jonathan also told me that Francis Keen never had an assistant.” Now Alex doesn’t even have to see her expression; she can feel the panic coming from Lucy as she backs away. It vibrates through the room, bounces off the floors, filling Francis Keen’s kitchen with anxious terror.
“That’s strange.” Her laugh is hollow.
“What is going on, Lucy? Why would someone lie about being an assistant?” She comes up against the far end of the counter.
Alex takes another step toward Lucy, closing the space between them. “Lucy, you can tell me what’s going on. I am not going to be mad at you. I’m sure you had a reason, I just need to know why.”
Lucy’s flashlight comes on suddenly. As its blinding beam swings through the dark, Alex has the sick feeling that she has made a terrible and irretractable error in judgment.
“Oh, do you?” Lucy says, her voice hard. She steps toward Alex now, shining the light directly in her eyes. Blinded, Alex steps backward.
She should have known. It all comes crashing in on her. The way Lucy always took the stairs and never the elevator, slipping back behind the newsroom. Skittering through the old part of the building. She’d never even seen her assistant with anyone else in the office, only on her own.
“How did you get in?” Alex asks.
“It’s easy to get a job in the mailroom these days.” Lucy smiles smugly. “No one wants to do the dirty work anymore. I just applied. Got hired on the spot. They practically begged me to start right away.
“From there it was all about finding the perfect moment. When you were just vulnerable enough. I had to break you down a bit first. It wasn’t exactly hard to do. You were so jumpy already. Always thinking someone is out to get you, aren’t you, Alex? Maybe you’re the one who is actually causing the trouble though, ever think of that?”
“What do you mean?” Alex backs away.
“You gave me quite the gift with Howard.”
“Howard? You were always so scared of him. And those young women. You said Howard was a predator, that he tried something.” Alex thinks of her boss, stumbling drunk in the hallway, of the young woman he’d taken advantage of. Of Lucy afraid for her job.
“What was I supposed to do? I was trapped. I had to come up with something. You would have found out I was lying. It would have ruined everything.”
“Why are you doing this? Did you kill Francis?”
“God, no. Why would I kill Francis?” Her face screws up. “I never even met Francis Keen.”
“But why did you pretend to know her?” Alex asks, shielding her eyes.
“I wasn’t trying to get closer to Dear Constance, although I hate that column more than just about anything. No, I wanted to get close toyou.” Her voice turns now from derision to pure anger.
Alex stumbles back, trying to understand what is happening. “Why me? We have never even met.” Her fingers grab at the air behind her.
“We have, though. Don’t you remember?”
