Zoey got dressed again, then went back out to the den where she
There was a niggling part of her brain that reminded her that the man had just dropped—she was going to be conservative and guess $500—on an outfit because he ripped the zipper of her jeans loose. If she told him that working on his research and performing for him to release his own stress, she was pretty confident that her rent would miraculously end up paid. Probably for a few months, too, because it was easier to write the check for a round number, or some other crazy billionaire logic. She didn’t doubt his willingness, and she didn’t think he’d expect her to be obligated because he helped her. But it still went against the grain to let him help her in a more tangible way. It already made her twist up in knots that he was willing to even introduce her to the right people to get a more permanent journalistic position.
She went back into the den, and had actually picked up her coffee and flopped gracelessly onto the couch before she realized that there was someone else sitting there next to her. She gave a little shriek as her eyes fixed on Alex’s younger sister, who was huddled in the corner of the sofa, trying to look as small as she could pull off. “Holy shit, sha,” Zoey gasped, putting her hand on her chest and feeling her heart slam against her ribs.
“Uh. Hi!” She saw the moment shift when Claire decided to try and scam her, and she prepped herself for a good story. Claire must have seen Zoey’s understanding, because instead of spinning a story, she just giggled. “You probably won’t believe me if I tell you school got canceled, will you?”
The girl was had changed out of whatever school uniform she might have put on this morning, and was wearing jeans and a T-shirt branded with the symbol of Ms. Marvel. A kid after my own heart, Zoey thought to herself, and sighed. “Is the school going to call Alex about your cutting?”
Claire shook her head, her eyes still tentative. “Nope. They’ll call Mom, and she won’t care. She figures that shopping is more important than calculus anyway.”
“You do realize that she’s wrong, yes?”
“Yeah,” Claire rolled her eyes. “Clearly. But I’ve already got my college admissions sewn up, I’m not skipping enough to blow my grades, I just—” Her teeth closed on her lower lip, and her eyes darted to the side.
“Hey,” Zoey said, reaching out. She touched the back of the girl’s hand almost gently, and was surprised when Claire turned hers palm up, winding her fingers through Zoey’s. She let the girl cling to her, and tried to project reassurance and calmness. “I’m not going to rat you out to your brother. It’s not my place. But maybe there’s something he—I—we can do to help?” It was awkward thinking of we but it seemed the right thing to do in that moment.
“I don’t want them to find me,” Claire said, her voice very quiet.
Zoey worked hard to keep the shiver running down her spin out of her face and her hand. “Who is looking for you?”
The way she said it made the shivers even harder to hide. “Claire? I want to ask you something really personal. I know you barely know me, but—”
“He didn’t rape me,” Claire said. “Honest. He’s never even touched me. Not like that. But sometimes, he stares at me, and his eyes are so cold that I feel slimed, you know?”
“I do know,” Zoey said. “Have you talked to Alex about this at all?”
Claire’s gaze grew even more cautious.
Zoey found herself smiling. “Did he do the whole ‘I’ll kill him’ routine?”
It was a somewhat odd moment to bond over, but Claire’s expression broke into a grateful smile. “I hate the way the creep stares at my ass, but I don’t want my brother in jail over something that hasn’t even happened, you know?”
“I do,” Zoey said. “But at the same time, if you’re afraid of him showing up at your school and causing trouble there, more needs to happen, you know? You can’t skip forever.”
“New plan,” Claire said. “Sophia makes the most amazing tiramisu you’ve ever tasted. Want to help me raid the fridge?”
Zoey didn’t want to let it go, but she also couldn’t force the girl to tell her anything, or decide on a course of action. She was nothing to Claire, not really. Just a friendly face, some girl her brother had brought home the night before. And really, Claire might just be being nice so that Zoey would feel less compelled to tell her boyfriend that his little sister had spent the day in the penthouse instead of in class. But she’d also shared many secrets herself over a meal, and she could think of worse things to do than indulge in some serious tiramisu binging. “Will you be in trouble if Sophia sees you?”
Claire gave the kind of shrug that only a 17 year old could pull off. “Maybe? I promised Sophia that I’d go to school today, but I just couldn’t get myself together. When I got close, there were all those black town cars, and no way to tell which one he might be in, and I just—I turned around. I didn’t mean to, but I was back here before I knew where I was heading.” She chewed her lip again, and she looked so much like her brother that it squeezed Zoey’s heart just a little. “Don’t tell Alex on me?”
“I’m not going to lie to him,” Zoey said carefully. “There’s other things happening. I don’t want to go into it, but he needs to know that you’re concerned, and why. I promise, though, if I do tell him, it won’t be a story about how his irresponsible sister skipped class to goof off. Okay?”
“Good enough,” Claire said. Whether it was because she meant it, or she just thought she couldn’t get anything more in terms of agreement, she had no way to know.
Claire had obviously spent more time in the penthouse than Zoey had; the floor plan was fairly open, but Claire still ducked through the rooms to get to the kitchen in record time. Sophia was somewhere else, and Zoey could see Claire breathe a sigh of relief, even though she didn’t say anything in particular. While Claire started rooting around in the (incredibly large and insanely fancy) refrigerator, Zoey took it upon herself to refresh her coffee cup. She normally tried to stay at two cups before noon, but it had been a long night, and she didn’t want the coffee to feel unloved. There was nothing worse than a sad pot of caffeinated bliss.
Claire took down plates that were the kind of china that Zoey didn’t even trust herself to handle in stores, and cut two generous slices of the tiramisu. “Come on,” she said, and led Zoey back to the nook where she and Alex had eaten breakfast.
The tiramisu lived up to Claire’s description of it. Light and fluffy, moist and delicate, flavors carefully balanced. “Holy God in heaven,” Zoey said, an expression her mother had used and Zoey had tried for years to finish striking from her vocabulary.
“I know, right?” Claire giggled. “So, dish with me.”
Zoey felt that painful blush creeping up her cheeks again. “What about?”
Claire laughed and wrinkled up her nose. “Gross!No, not what I meant. I do not want to know about how my brother gets his freak on. Just—I don’t think he’s ever had a girl spend the night. Like, ever ever. So what gives? Is this a romantic thing, or is there something else going on?”
Zoey took another bite of the fantastic tiramisu to cover up her discomfort. She doubted it would make a difference. It wasn’t like she and Alex had discussed what he was or was not going to tell his sister about what they’d found out. She had a disturbing feeling that he wouldn’t really want them talking at all, at least not yet. If he guarded his private life as closely as everyone said—well, it made her feel like even more of a voyeur. It wasn’t a comfortable feeling.
“I have a right to know what’s going on,” she said, her voice quiet. “Mom never tells me anything, and Alex always says that I’m too young to worry about running the company. They both act like I won’t have access to all of this stuff anyway, when I turn 18 in six months. It’s infuriating. They’re always all 'Claire, act your age,' but when I try to, they tell me off and send me to go play at the little kid’s table.”
The obviously rehearsed rant was made so much better by the fact that it was paired with a particularly well developed pout. Zoey stifled the urge to giggle. “I hear you,” she said, carefully. “It always seemed that adults were keeping me from doing all the fun stuff.”
“Yeah, yeah, and now that you’re older, you just wish you could be a kid again. I’ve heard this speech before.” Claire stabbed the dessert on her plate with far more viciousness than it deserved.
“No, actually,” Zoey said, letting that careful expression stay in her tone. “What I was going to say was is that it wasn’t just the fun stuff that adults kept me away from. There was a lot of hard stuff, too. I thought I’d seen all the wretchedness the world had to offer when I was 17, and in fact, I’d just seen the barest edges of it. But I’d rather deal with that than being 17 again, because now I can try to do something to change things.”
There was a light in the girl’s eyes now, Zoey recognized it easily. It was the same light she’d seen in the mirror when she was 17. The intelligence and confidence of a strong and brave young woman, not yet tempered by the kind of pessimism that results from realizing that incremental change might be the only kind that lasted. Zoey was wiser at 25 then she had been at 17, but she didn’t doubt for a second that Claire was braver than Zoey ever would be again.
“He likes you,” Claire said. “You should know that.”
Again, the urge to bury her face in her hands and giggle like a kid. “I do. I—he’s said as much, and I believe him.”
Claire nodded. “Don’t hurt him, and you and I are solid. Make him cry—for bad reasons, anyway—and I will claw your eyes out. Deal?”
“Deal,” Zoey said. She held up her fork, and Claire clinked hers against it like they were whine glasses.
“The good news for you is that I like you, too. So I will also offer to claw his eyes out if he makes you cry. Basically, be nice to each other.”
“I like this plan,” Zoey said. After a moment’s hesitation, she added. “It’s early days yet, though. Don’t—God, I’m sorry to be this crass—”
“Don’t get attached to you. I get it. Daddy went through girlfriends like shampoo bottles. Alex did too, for awhile, but he’s been different lately. Even before Daddy died. He wants something better than what our parents had, I think.”
Zoey wasn’t entirely sure of what to say. The buzzing of her phone in her pocket saved her. “Excuse me,” she said. She pulled her phone out and saw Helen’s picture on the screen. She swiped to answer as she stood and ducked outside onto the huge balcony that overlooked the city. She saw Claire shrug and dig into her tiramisu with more gusto than she had with someone watching her.
“Helen?”
“Zoey, where are you right now?”
“I’m—” She took a moment to squeeze her eyes shut, take a deep breath, and then hiss it out slowly. If anyone was going to read her the riot act, it would be Helen. “I’m at Alexander Blankenship’s penthouse.”
“Oh thank God,” Helen said. “I was worried that you’d had to barricade yourself in that hole of a studio to keep the reporters from crawling in the window.”
“Um. What?”
“What do you mean, what?”
Zoey took another deep, much less patient breath. “Helen, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Give me a clue, huh?”
Helen laughed then. “You haven’t even been to your own website yet, have you? Is he as good as the rumor mongers say?”
Anyone else, and Zoey probably would have hung up the phone. For Helen, she managed a sigh. “I haven’t, and yes. What’s going on?”
“The two of you were caught on film, snogging, and the picture is everywhere already. I’ve gotten tons of calls because your bio lists me as an editor of yours. I’m shocked no one’s started blowing up your cell phone yet.”
Zoey felt a chill run through her. “What have you said?”
“Nothing, love, obviously. No comment all the way. But I can’t swear that anyone at your rag will be half as decent.” There was a long pause. “And we’ll need to discuss the feature. About him, and AEGIS.”
She’d known that this was coming, but it still hurt to have Helen bring it up. “I know. I know I can’t do it now. But I’ll get you everything I’ve found so far.” She glanced in at Claire, and made sure that the girl wasn’t paying any attention to her. “There’s a lot more going on, Helen. I—I want to tell someone, but you can’t run with this until I give you the okay. Please. It could affect the safety of some little kids.”
Helen’s silence was long and drawn out, and Zoey crossed her fingers. Helen wouldn’t lie to her. If she said that she’d hold the story, she would, as long as possible. But there was no guarantee she’d wait. “I’m already hearing rumors about AEGIS today,” Helen said, finally. “Does it relate to the company itself?”
“Not directly,” Zoey said.
“Tell me,” Helen said. “I’ll prep something myself, keep the cat in the bag as long as possible, but—Zoey, if I think someone’s going to scoop us, I’ll post it. Deal?”
It was the best deal she was going to get out of her friend. The world of journalism had gotten cut throat in the past decade, ruled by news aggregators and click-bait headlines, but Helen did the best she could to stay true to a code of journalistic ethics that had meant more before either she or Zoey had been writing. “Deal,” she said. “I can’t give you anything specific yet, but I will when I can. Just—take a look at Arturo Soprano and Thalia Nicolaevna. Look for connections between them for me, and I’ll trade you more when I have it. Okay?”
“I know those names,” Helen said. Zoey could hear her friend clicking at her keyboard. “Soprano owned a construction company, right? And he suicided. So did Nicolaevna, but she was a society type.” There was a long silence, and more clicking of keys. “Are you saying they’re tied together somehow?”
“I have reason to believe it,” Zoey said.
Helen pushed out a long breath. “Zoey, love, you have got to go to the police with this. This isn’t some movie about the plucky Girl Friday who solves the mystery, yeah? You need to be protected.”
“I am protected,” Zoey said, without hesitation.
“Blankenship.”
“Yes.”
“How long do you think that’ll last?” The skepticism in the question hurt, but at the same time, she could hardly blame Helen for asking.
“I don’t know, Helen. But I’m not walking out just because the press has noticed us. If that were the case, I shouldn’t have even bothered.”
She could imagine Helen sitting still, rubbing at her temples with one well manicured hand. “I know you’re right, love, but I can’t help the worrying.”
“Worry about it if Mama finds out.”
“You think she’ll be upset?”
Zoey knew exactly what question Helen was asking, and she skirted it as neatly as she could. “That I’m dating a New Yorker, and not a nice Southern boy? I think she’ll be livid. Right up until she starts planning our wedding for us.”
Helen chuckled again. “Keep in touch, all right? And use your head about this boy. He didn’t get that playboy reputation by helping old ladies cross the street, you know.”
Zoey laughed, and disconnected the call. The thing was that while she knew Helen was right, and that Alex had earned his reputation fair and square, she also knew that rags like hers had done everything they could to make it all look more scandalous than it was. Thousands of articles, every time someone even semi-famous dared to show their face in public, commenting on their size, their status, whether or not they were coupled up yet. It never stopped. He’d been very clear with her that his numbers were a lot smaller than the media made them look. If she didn’t trust him to tell her at least that much truth, than why even bother to be here with him? In his house, eating his food, making friends with his sister?
Zoey slipped her phone back into her pocket and headed back into the penthouse. “Sorry, work stuff,” she said. “What’s your plan for the rest of today?”
Claire gave Zoey an under-the-eyelashes glance. “I’m actually thinking of nerding it up, telling my teachers I’m sick and getting my work so I can keep up.”
Zoey had to laugh. “Impressive.”
For just one moment, the soft lines of Claire’s face hardened into unbreakable stone. “I will not grow up and rely on anyone,” she said. “I’m my own. No one else’s.”
It was the kind of declaration that a person could only make at 17, when they hadn’t realized yet that it was impossible not to rely on other people, and that the trick was to make sure you only relied on the ones worth trusting. Zoey thought about pointing that out, but she had a strong feeling that it would just make Claire feel more upset, not less. “I hear you,” she said. “I do need to get some work done today. Want to crash in the den with me?”
“That sounds great,” Claire said. “I bet Sophia will show up with snacks within the hour.”
“She’s an amazing cook.”
“Yeah, there’s a reason Alex put in a bunch of gym equipment.” Claire forked in the last bite of tiramisu. “She’s really really good at dessert.”