Drop Dead Gorgeous (7 page)

“I’m off to school in just a few days. I’m headed to Tallahassee, and Mandy will be in Denver by September.” He shrugged, staring at Lori again. “Besides, she’s always been something of a wild woman, huh?”

Lori arched a brow. “You’re furious.”

He shrugged. “Not really. She’s—she’s just kind of a
…
” He paused, hesitating, then shrugged. “She’s just kind of a slut, and I can’t change that. While
…
God, Lori. I’m sorry about the other night. Really sorry.”

Her face burned. She looked straight ahead. He wasn’t going to tell her that she had changed his life, that he’d discovered he couldn’t live without her. He was just sorry. He’d behaved badly.

She didn’t speak.

He c
ontinued. “I was just so hurt…
”

He had been hurt. Crushed. Five months ago, his brother Daniel had been reported MIA. He’d been assigned to a base in the Middle East, and had disappeared during a training mission. His status had been changed just the day before she’d come to see him. Daniel Black’s death had been confirmed. His body had been found in the desert—he’d been shot in the back of the head. Sean, who never drank, had been drinking. When she’d arrived, he’d been crying. Sean, who never cried.

Mandy hadn’t
been with him. She’d had to go to some function at the Historical Society
with her
folks. Sean’s father had been out
with
old military friends, and his brother Michael had been with his own girl. Lori hadn’t been able to stay away. So they’d been alone. For hours and hours, and he’d talked, and talked, about how he’d loved Daniel, how Daniel had wanted to make a difference, how he’d told his brother that the service would pay for his education and help them all along. They’d get their father a fine new home eventually, pay him back for just loving them all and trying to do his best for them at all times
…

“I’m sorry,” Sean said again, shaking his head. “So damned sorry. I’d never want to hurt you, Lori.”

She flipped her hair back again. “Don’t be stupid, Se
an. You can’t hurt me. I mean…
just as long as you never say anything. I wouldn’t want Brad to know what happened—or my folks.” He arched a brow, staring at her hard, and there was a disappointment in his eyes that caused a savage twisting of her insides.

“Lori, I think that we really need to talk. I have to
say
good-bye, and I want you to know—”

“Oh, God, please, I don’t want to talk—”

“Lori—”

“I don’t want to remember!” She leapt to her feet. “I don’t want to talk—and I don’t want to be caught alone together. Go find your wild girlfriend. Say good-bye to
her.
” Oh, God, she was going to burst into tears. He was
sorry for her. Sorry. He pitied her. She was in love with him, and he pitied her. She couldn’t bear it.

“Lori—”

“Damn you, don’t be sorry! Mandy’s going to Denver, you’re going to Tallahassee, and I’m off to New York. All decided. Just leave me the hell alone!” she told him, and she jumped up and spun on her heels, almost running toward the water.

She plunged into it.

Everyone was involved in the keep-away game—even the other girls. Even Jeff—who seemed to be okay with his sister’s constantly outrageous behavior.

But when Mandy saw Lori, her laughing humor suddenly seemed to fade. “All right, that’s it, everybody’s had a good time, and every one of you pricks has managed to cop a feel. Now, give me the damned thing!” she demanded, when her bikini top landed in Brad’s hand. Her mountainous breasts bounced at surface level as she tied the top back on. “Assholes!” she accused the guys.

“Hey!” Andrew protested.

“What do you want from a cunt?” Ricky demanded.

“Ricky, come on, now,” Jeff said uncomfortably.

“Fuck you all,” Mandy told them.

“Ooh—sit on my face, baby!” Brad told her.

“Don’t you wish, frat-boy!” Mandy taunted. “What’s the matter, the prom queen won’t let you get it up, honey?”

The group hooted and catcalled, with only Lori feeling sick and crimson.

Then they all fell silent, one by one, as Mandy, then Brad, and then the others saw Sean standing at the jump-off point. His blue eyes were nearly black. A blue vein beat a furious pulse at his throat.

“Sean
…
” Mandy breathed placatingly. She swam hard, crawling quickly from the water, approaching him. But when her hands fell on his shoulders, he turned away.

“Sean!” she cried, grabbing him again.

But he shook her off, and walked away.

Laughter was gone. They all emerged from the water. Brad stared at Lori, but she turned away from him, hurrying into the pines. She sat in the shadow of a group of trees, shaking.

She heard snatches of different arguments. Male voices, female voices. Then silence. She leaned back against a tree while the sun burned down around her and the morning ticked slowly by.

At last she emerged. Sean didn’t love her; Brad was an asshole. She could live with that. She was nearly eighteen; nearly an adult. Time to move on.

Except that
…

Fear rushed through her once again.
What if
…

Then she heard the screaming. “Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God, someone help!”

The first person she saw was Jan, who had been looking for her and was walking toward her on the path. Jan looked at her, lifting her
shoulders. They stared at one another, then Lori leapt up.

They recognized that it was Ricky Garcia crying out. They both started running down the path that led to the water, and then around the rooted trail that skirted it. They could see Andrew, Jeff, Ted, and Ricky on the shore, with someone stretched between them. Then they could see Sean, racing like a madman toward the group of them, falling down beside them.

It was Mandy on the ground, and at first, as they came around the large rock pit, Lori thought that Sean was trying to kiss her and hold her. Then she realized that he was giving artificial respiration to her.

“Oh, Jeez!” she cried to Jan, grabbing her by the arm and starting to run hard.

They piled up against Brad and Ellie as they reached the far side of the water where the others hovered over Mandy. Mandy’s lips were blue; her face was stark white against the background of her deep auburn hair. They heard sirens, an ambulance coming. Lori felt her brother by her side then, putting an arm around her. “Susan’s called 911; help will be here any minute.”

“What—what happened?” Lori said.

No one answered. All eyes were on Mandy and Sean.

Sean eased back for a moment, drawing in a deep breath, his face drawn, eyes glistening.

“Oh, God!” Ellie moaned. Ellie was Mandy’s b
est friend. “Oh, God, oh, God…
”

“No!” Jeff Olin shrieked, covering his face
and slamming down to the ground on his knees.

“She’s dead,” Ricky said incredulously. “Jesus H. Christ, she’d dead.”

“She can’t be dead!” Brad cried. “She can’t be—she’s seventeen, she’s a kid. Where the hell are the damned paramedics?”

Sean started up with CPR again. Then the sirens screeched closer, and in a matter of minutes, professionals in neatly pressed blue and white uniforms were pushing through the crowd of kids. A man knelt down by Sean. “I’ll take it over from here, son.”

Sean rose, and stood numbly. More of the paramedic crew arrived; a syringe was shot into Mandy’s arm. Within minutes she’d been situated on a stretcher, and they were carrying her away.

The kids followed.

They were all there as she was loaded into the ambulance, Jeff barely coherent as he explained he was her brother and that he had to ride with her.

The ambulance pulled away.

The rest of them watched—Lori and her brother, Andrew, and their cousin, Josh. Michael and Sean Black. Ricky Garcia, Ted Neeson, Ellie LeBlanc, Brad Jackson, Susan Nichols, and Jan Hunt. All watching as the ambulance drove away.

“All right, who wants to tell me what happened?”

They all spun around. A tall, heavyset,
white-haired man stood behind them. He’d come in an unmarked car right after the paramedics; until now they’d all been too stunned to pay him any attention.

He wasn’t wearing a uniform, but he had “cop” written all over him.

Lori stared at
him numbly.

“She—she was tangled up in some vine thing down there by one of the rusted-up old cars. I dragged her up, I called for help
…
Sean came running,” Andrew said.

“All right. I’m going to take down all your names, and then you get in your cars and go home. I’m off to the hos
pital, but…
I’m going to need statements from all of you,” he said, walking past them.

“But
…
but she’s going to be all right, isn’t she?” Brad demanded.

The man stopped and turned around, staring at them. He shook his head. “You’re all big kids, aren’t you? Big, wild, independent kids, doing what the hell you want, thinking you’re grown-ups. Well, then, you’re big enough to know the truth. I’ve seen a lot of death, and I’m sorry to say your friend is already dead. That’s bad. Real bad. But now, one of you might have made it happen. That’s worse.” He pointed at them, moving his stretched-out arm from right to left.

“Dead—
deeeaaad
!
” Jan gasped, and she started to cry.

“Oh, God, Mandy’s dead, and he’s looking at us—” Susan stuttered.

“And next thing you know,” Ricky wisecracked, “he’s going to be telling us that none of us better dare leave town!” There were tears in Ricky’s eyes, belying his tone.

“Yep, son, you’re right,” the cop told him.

“Dead! Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God!” Ellie kept moaning, and she sank to her knees, screaming hysterically. “Mandy is dead,
Mandy is dead, Mandy is dead…
”

Some of them didn’t cry until later. Shock, said the therapist the Kellys hired to help their children through the trauma of the incident.

Shock
…

How could they help it? Police divers found one of the vines from below, and proclaimed that there was a strong possibility that someone had purposely tied it around Mandy’s ankle, and left her fighting desperately for her life beneath the water’s surface. She had rubbed her ankle raw in her pathetic efforts to live.

By the time the cops were in the middle of their questioning, the kids all had lawyers, and none of them knew what they had said or done anymore—much less what they had felt.

In the upshot Sean was arrested. He had quarreled with Mandy, he was furious with her. She had humiliated him, she had threatened to ruin his life. He had been suspiciously near Mandy; he had motive, he had opportunity, and the strength to carry out the deed.

They refused to let him out on bond—partially because of his brother’s record, and
partially because he couldn’t hire a hotshot lawyer like the others. He sat in jail until his trial, when a jury found him not guilty—due to a lack of any real physical evidence.

When they let him out, he was no longer a boy, or even a young adult; in a matter of months, he had become a hardened and cynical man. He packed his bags, and left town.

His father and brother mourned.

And Mandy’s folks, and all her family, would grieve until their dying days.

But for the parents of the other kids who’d been at the rock pit that day, it was over.

Come to an inevitable end. And it was time to move on.

Sure, Sean had been one of the most popular kids in school, but what could you expect? He’d really been nothing but a no-good kid from a broken family, and in the end bad blood had told all.

So Sean paid
…

But from the very beginning, Lori suspected that they were all keeping secrets about that day.

She knew damned well that she kept one herself.

L
ori woke, flying up to a sitting position in bed as if she’d heard something, as if she’d been startled awake. Her room was in semidarkness; a night-light burned in the hall. The house was quiet. Yet she had sworn that something
…

It had just been the dream. She hadn’t been able to escape the past, not by telling herself she wouldn’t remember, not by seeking oblivion in sleep.

Fifteen years ago
…
it had all been nearly fifteen years ago, Lori reminded herself again. She was in a new home, back in the city where it had happened. Maybe it was natural to start off with a wretched night’s sleep.

Lie back down! a rational voice in her head commanded. There’s nothing wrong.

But she jumped again, hearing a pounding on her front door.

It was so late! Maybe it was Gramps. Her folks. She was at home again, something could be wrong with her mother, brother, father
…
Gramps.