When Life Gives You Lululemons (28 page)

“Or if he's cheating on her?”

Paul shook his head. “He's just a local guy, I'd barely call him a
friend. I'm not saying he is or he isn't cheating, just that he's not telling me about it either way. Why?”

“No reason.”

“Whatever is going on, don't get involved. These things never end well.”

“That's exactly what Emily said.”

“Well, then she's smarter than I give her credit for.”

Miriam considered Emily's noninvolvement policy. If Paul were cheating, she would want to know . . . wouldn't she? Although she could think of a few scenarios in which she actually might not want to know. How could she decide whether Ashley would or wouldn't want to know? She sighed, which Paul didn't seem to notice, and they drove the rest of the way in silence.

  •  •  •  

L
ater that night, as Miriam was tucking Benjamin into bed, he asked her to get under the covers and snuggle with him. How long had it been since he'd allowed this? she wondered. Six months? Longer? She nuzzled her face into his neck and breathed in his smell. Some days, as a stay-at-home mom, she wanted to slam her head against a wall from the monotony, but she couldn't deny the comfort from moments like this—moments she rarely had when working eighty-hour weeks.

When she closed his door behind her, Paul was waiting in the hallway.

“Twins down?” she asked.

He nodded. “I'm going to hit my computer for a couple hours. I have some work to catch up on.”

Miriam was quiet for a second. “What about dinner? I brought home enough rolls from Yama to feed ten people.”

“I'm not really hungry.”

Time to trawl your Ashley Madison account?
she thought. Forcing herself to act normally, she stood on tiptoe and wrapped her arms around
his neck, hoping for a quick make-out, but he wriggled away and murmured something about a call.

“Even our son lets me kiss him,” she murmured, but he pretended not to hear and walked downstairs. She was standing there, unsure what to do next, when her phone rang.

“Miriam?” Emily's voice was breathless, panicked. “You need to come quickly. I'm at Karolina's house. Now!” The call disconnected. Miriam immediately tried calling both Emily and Karolina and was met with voicemail.

Christ. Had Karolina swallowed a bottle of pills or something? Should she call the police? No, Emily was capable of dialing 911, this was obviously the kind of emergency that required a friend. She dashed off a text to Paul, grabbed the Yama bag from the fridge, and jumped in her car.

She barely remembered the drive to Karolina's. She tore through the front door and saw Karolina in the foyer, looking stricken.

“Oh, honey. I'm so, so sorry,” Miriam said, hugging her. Karolina stood eerily rigid.

“What are you doing here?” Karolina asked.

“Oh, Emily called and said you two needed . . . would like . . . some company.” She held the bag aloft. “I brought city sushi.”

Karolina scrunched her perfect nose. “Um, okay. The fill-in cleaning lady took pity on me and made some salmon tonight. Did you know the caretaker couple who used to live here moved to Arizona with their daughter full-time? I didn't want the company, but now that they're gone, I want them back.”

Miriam looked at her friend. There were the faintest dark circles under her eyes, but otherwise she looked as gorgeous and chic as usual in a pair of tight joggers, a cropped sweatshirt that exposed her navel and slid off her shoulder, and an adorably messy bun. “Well, you look okay . . . ,” Miriam mumbled.

“Thanks, I guess?” Karolina said.

Emily appeared in the doorway behind Karolina and put a finger to her lips.

Karolina swiveled her head from one friend to the other. “What's going on?”

Emily said nothing. Karolina turned to Miriam. “Why are you here? What's so awful that you two are acting like this?”

Miriam's stomach dropped. She could
kill
Emily. “You bitch!” she said, pointing to Emily.

Emily shrugged. “This is something she should hear from one of her oldest friends, not some chick she just met.”

“Oh my God, you two are scaring me! Is Harry okay?”

“No, no, it's
not
about Harry. But why don't we pour some wine and get this sushi laid out and we can all talk like reasonable people?” Miriam said in her most soothing talking-to-toddlers voice.

But Karolina wouldn't budge. “Nobody's moving until I know what's so horrible that you both had to come here to tell me.”

“Graham had a vasectomy five years ago,” Miriam blurted. It seemed to fly out of her mouth against her will.

A long moment of silence followed.

“No he didn't,” Karolina said, sounding less angry than confused.

“Yes he did,” Emily said.

Miriam could see Karolina's eyes fill as she looked her straight in the eye. “It's true,” she said softly. “I'm so sorry. I spoke with the doctor's office, trying to reconcile an old bill. They told me the exact date, time, and surgeon who performed it.”

“That's impossible,” Karolina said. “He was tested two or three times. And they always said his sperm were fine and that the problem must be . . .”

There was a brief pause while she appeared to process this, and then, without any warning, Karolina vomited on the floor. Emily must have seen it coming because she jumped backward like a gymnast, but Miriam hadn't and her sneakers were covered. She slipped them off and peeled off her socks for good measure before taking Karolina's hand and
leading her to the living room. “Here, sit. I'm going to clean that up and get you some water.”

“I'll help,” Emily said, and then promptly headed for the pantry to grab some bottled water, leaving Miriam to mop up the puke.

When they returned, Karolina was perched on the edge of the couch, looking slightly green. She accepted the water but made no move to open it.

“I tried Clomid and herbs and took my basal temperature and acupuncture and tested my discharge consistency, for God's sake! Seven IUIs, two egg retrievals, and three rounds of IVF. Four years of my life were spent in doctors' offices, getting poked and prodded and injected, and so many people stuck their hands inside me that I barely even noticed anymore. All of those people must have known Graham's sperm was useless, and they lied for him! I saw a fortune-teller for two hundred dollars an hour. A shrink. And the whole time, Graham
knew
none of it would work?”

No one moved.

Miriam patted Karolina's arm. “Let's talk it through.”

“Talk?” Karolina said, looking directly into Miriam's eyes. “No. I don't want to talk anymore. I need to go upstairs and start preparing for jail, because I'm going to find a knife and cut the balls off that motherfucker.”

K
arolina bolted upright in bed. The clock read 2:22 a.m.
Make a wish!
The thought popped into her head automatically.
I wish he dies.
Suddenly it didn't seem hard to understand how regular, law-abiding people became cold-blooded killers. She and Graham had fought before, and Karolina had felt every degree of anger toward him, but this was different. This was
hate
.

Shouldn't two Xanaxes last longer than two hours? She should have been mercifully blacked out until at least five. But it was as if the pills had amped her up instead of knocking her out: her heart was pounding arrhythmically, and her entire body was covered by a thin layer of sweat. How on earth was she expected to
sleep
when that monster had literally ruined her life?

What happened next wasn't so much the result of a conscious or
even rational decision; Karolina barely remembered showering or pulling on jeans and a sweater, and she wasn't entirely sure she was even awake as she rooted around in the kitchen, looking for car snacks and bottles of water and stuffing them in a backpack. Which was probably why she almost had a heart attack when the lights blazed on around her.

“What the hell are you doing?” Emily asked, squinting. She was wearing a half-tee and a Hanky Panky thong and had a satin sleep mask pushed up on her forehead.

Karolina whipped around. “Leave me alone.”

“Gladly,” Emily said.

“It's none of your business.” Karolina took a Diet Coke from the fridge.

“If I knowingly let you murder him, it's going to ruin my life too. I'm not sure how, but I'll definitely get arrested for being an accessory or something. So please, can we back off the psycho routine and cycle it down to regular crazy?”

Karolina stopped and stared at Emily. “Do you really sleep in a
thong
?”

Emily glanced down. “What else would I sleep in?”

“I bet Regan sleeps in a thong too. No, no, that's not right. She probably sleeps in one of those
Little House on the Prairie
nightgowns that make you look like a teenaged virgin. A totally innocent schoolgirl except for the fact that she's sleeping with my sociopath husband.” Merely saying the word “husband” made her heart beat faster.

“Seriously, why are you packing a bag at three in the morning?”

“It's none of your business.” Karolina tried to slide past Emily and through the doorway, but Emily put her arm against the frame.

“You've already said that. You can't go kill Graham. That's bad optics. The new Quinnipiac poll has your popularity above Bella Hadid's! Remember—feelings over facts! People care how you make them
feel
. Killing Graham is not a feel-good ending to this story, at least not to the general public.”

Karolina's laugh sounded borderline maniacal. “I'm not going to kill him. I just need to . . . talk to him.”

“Uh-huh. Talk. I'm sure. And have you thought about how Harry is going to react when you break into their house in the middle of the night and go ballistic on his father?”

Karolina stopped. She hadn't considered Harry. Emily led her by the arm to the kitchen table and poured her a glass of cold white wine.

“Shouldn't you be making me chamomile tea or something?”

“Oh, yes. Tea really helps everything.” Emily sat next to her with her own glass of wine. “The only reason I'm not giving you vodka right now is because I saw you munching Xanax like gumballs a couple hours ago. And I don't need your overdose any more than I need Graham's murder.”

Karolina somehow managed to laugh. Emily could make anyone laugh.

Emily said, taking a slug of wine, “You were fully going to get in your car and drive to Bethesda and show up in your old house like a total stalker and what? Shoot him? Cut his throat?”

Karolina sighed. “I hope you know me well enough to realize that if I were going to murder Graham, I'd at least hire someone.”

“Well, that's a relief.” Emily smiled.

They each took another sip. Karolina could feel her pulse slow.

“It's time to tell me that dirt you weren't willing to divulge before,” Emily said.

“It's too awful to be delicious. It's really, really sad.”

“Noted. Now tell me anyway. I can work with awful.”

“You have to swear not to—”

“Stop it!” Emily said. “Next time you have one single impulse to protect him, I'd like you to remember in vivid detail shooting yourself full of hormones and going under general anesthesia to harvest your eggs so they could be fertilized with sugar water.”

Karolina dug her nails into her palms.

“Exactly,” Emily said. “Now dish.”

“Graham was involved in a fatal car crash in high school,” she said quietly. “I only know what he told me, since there's nothing written about it anywhere, but he was seventeen and had just gotten his license. He was driving home from football practice and a four-year-old girl bolted from behind a bush. He didn't even have time to step on the brake. It was instantaneous.”

“No!”

“The parents were family friends and they were all out on the Hartwells' porch having cocktails when the little girl ran in front of the car.”

“Oh my God.”

Karolina nodded. “All I know is the girl's parents decided not to press charges. The whole thing was a terrible accident.”

“They didn't press charges?
In the death of their daughter?
I'm no lawyer, but I don't think that's even their choice. Shadesville. This reeks. There was definitely a deal cut.”

Karolina took a sip of water. “I really don't know. He didn't give me a lot of detail. Apparently his parents pulled a classic stiff-upper-lip WASP move and told him to buck up and move on. That he was innocent. That it was a tragedy but it wasn't his fault.”

“That'll fuck you up,” Emily murmured.

Karolina nodded. “He needed counseling. And what did he get? A ride to football practice the next day and a lecture from his father on ‘staying focused.' ”

“They sound like lovely people,” Emily said. “Now I'm
certain
they paid hush money.”

“Graham did say his mother visits the little girl's grave on the anniversary of the accident every year. Has never missed one. A few times she's run into the girl's mother there, and they don't really talk, they just cry together. It's so, so awful.”

Emily was silent, but Karolina could see exactly what she was thinking. “You're not using this in your takedown plan,” Karolina said. “It's nothing more than a terrible tragedy.”

“The Hartwell family—American
royalty, if we ever had it—are likely complicit in a cover-up of epic proportions. Who was bribed? What were the circumstances of the accident? Why on earth has nothing ever been reported about the accident? You think the public wouldn't be
interested
?” Emily took another sip of wine, appeared to consider something, and then drained her glass. “What's our goal, Karolina? It's Harry. It's custody. To clear your name. But we won't get there without leverage. Graham and his people are too connected. And . . . there's something else I have to tell you.”