Elin Hilderbrand - Silver Girl

Well, Dev said, they were investigating Leo because another trader-a well-respected, ten-year veteran on the legitimate floor named Deacon Rapp-had told the SEC and the FBI that Leo was involved in his father’s Ponzi scheme. Deacon testified that Leo was in “constant contact” with colleagues on the seventeenth floor, which was where the Ponzi scheme was headquartered. Freddy had a small office on the seventeenth floor, as well as a secretary. This came as a shock to Meredith. She had known nothing about the existence of the seventeenth floor, nor the secretary, a Mrs. Edith Misurelli. The Feds couldn’t question Mrs. Misurelli because she had apparently been due months of vacation time and had left for Italy the day before the scandal broke. No one knew how to reach her.

Dev sounded especially sorry when he told Meredith that she absolutely could not be in contact with either of her sons until the investigation was cleared up. Any conversation between Leo and Meredith might be seen as evidence of their mutual conspiracy. And because Carver and Leo were living together in an old Victorian that Carver was renovating in Greenwich, Meredith couldn’t call Carver, either. Burt and Dev had met with Leo’s counsel, and both parties agreed there was too much chance for cross-contamination. Meredith should remain in one camp, the boys in another. For the time being.

“I’m sorry, Meredith.”

Dev said this often.

Meredith peered at Connie, who had scrunched her long, lean form to fit across the backseat. Her head was sunk into the pillow, her strawberry-blond hair fell across her face, her eyes were closed. She looked older, and sadder, to Meredith-her husband, Wolf, had died two and a half years earlier of brain cancer-but she was still Connie, Constance Flute, née O’Brien, Meredith’s oldest, and once her closest, friend. Her friend since the beginning of time.

Meredith had called Connie to ask if she could stay with her “for a while” in Bethesda. Connie had artfully dodged the request by saying that she was headed up to Nantucket for the summer. Of course, Nantucket. July was now upon them-a fact that had effectively escaped Meredith, trapped as she was in her apartment-and Meredith’s hopes tanked.

“Can you call someone else?” Connie asked.

“There isn’t anyone else,” Meredith said. She said this not to invoke Connie’s pity, but because it was true. It astounded her how alone she was, how forsaken by everyone who had been in her life. Connie was her one and only hope. Despite the fact that they hadn’t spoken in three years, she was the closest thing to family that Meredith had.

“You could turn to the church,” Connie said. “Join a convent.”

A convent, yes. Meredith had considered this when casting about for options. There were convents, she was pretty sure, out on Long Island; she and the boys used to pass one on their way to the Hamptons, set back from the highway among rolling hills. She would start out as a novice scrubbing floors until her knees bled, but maybe someday she’d be able to teach.

“Meredith,” Connie said. “I’m kidding.”

“Oh,” Meredith said. Of course, she was kidding. Meredith and Connie had attended Catholic schools together all through their childhood, but Connie had never been particularly devout.

“I guess I could pick you up on my way,” Connie said.

“And do what?” Meredith said. “Take me to Nantucket?”

“You do owe me a visit,” Connie said. “You’ve owed me a visit since nineteen eighty-two.”

Meredith had laughed. It sounded strange to her own ears, the laugh. It had been so long.

Connie said, “You can stay a couple of weeks, maybe longer. We’ll see how it goes. I can’t make any promises.”

“Thank you,” Meredith had whispered, weak with gratitude.

“You realize you haven’t called me in three years,” Connie said.

Yes, Meredith realized that. What Connie really meant was: You never called to apologize for what you said about Wolf, or to give me your condolences in person. But you call me now, when you’re in heaps of trouble and have nowhere else to go.

“I’m sorry,” Meredith said. She didn’t say: You didn’t call me, either. You never apologized for calling Freddy a crook. Now, of course, there was no need to apologize. Connie had been proved right: Freddy was a crook. “Will you still come get me?”

“I’ll come get you,” Connie said.

Now, Meredith wanted to wake Connie up and ask her: Can you please forgive me for the things I said? Can we make things right between us?

Meredith wondered what the federal marshals would think about the mirror she’d smashed in the master bath. In a fit of rage, she’d thrown her mug of peppermint tea at it; she had savored the smack and shatter of the glass. Her reflection had splintered and fallen away, onto the granite countertop, into Freddy’s sink. Goddamn you, Freddy, Meredith thought, for the zillionth time. The ferry rocked on the waves, and Meredith’s eyes drifted closed. If there were beating hearts beneath the federal marshals’ black uniforms, then she supposed they would understand.

CONSTANCE O’BRIEN FLUTE

They had agreed not to speak about anything meaningful until Meredith was safely inside the house on Nantucket. Connie needed time to digest what she’d done. What had she done? She had six hours in the car from Bethesda to Manhattan to repeatedly ask herself. The roads were clear of traffic; on the radio, Connie listened to Delilah. The heart-wrenching stories of the callers boosted Connie’s spirits. She knew about loss. Wolf had been dead for two and a half years, and Connie was still waiting for the pain to subside. It had been nearly as long since Connie had spoken to their daughter, Ashlyn, though Connie called Ashlyn’s cell phone every Sunday, hoping that one time she might answer. Connie sent Ashlyn flowers on her birthday and a gift certificate to J. Crew at Christmas. Did Ashlyn tear up the gift certificate, throw the flowers in the trash? Connie had no way of knowing.

And now look what she’d done. She had agreed to go to Manhattan to pick up her ex-best friend, Meredith Delinn. Connie thought ex-friend, but inside Connie knew that she and Meredith would always be tethered together. They had grown up on the Main Line in Philadelphia. They attended Tarleton in the 1960s, then grammar school, then high school at Merion Mercy Academy. They had been as close as sisters. For two years in high school, Meredith had dated Connie’s brother, Toby.

Connie fingered her cell phone, which rested in the console of her car. She considered calling Toby now and telling him what she was doing. He was the only person who had known Meredith as long as Connie had; he was the only one who might understand. But Toby and Meredith had a complicated history. Toby had broken Meredith’s heart in high school, and over the years, Meredith had asked Connie about him, the way a woman asks about her first true love. Connie had been the one to tell Meredith about Toby’s voyages around the world captaining megayachts, his hard-partying lifestyle that landed him in rehab twice, the women he met, married, and abandoned along the way, and his ten-year-old son who was destined to become as charming and dangerous as Toby himself. Meredith and Toby hadn’t seen each other since the funeral of Connie and Toby’s mother, Veronica, six years earlier. Something had happened between Meredith and Toby at the funeral that ended with Meredith climbing into her waiting car and driving away before the reception.

“I can’t be around him,” Meredith had said to Connie later. “It’s too painful.”

Connie hadn’t been gutsy enough to ask Meredith exactly what had happened. But she decided it would be wisest not to call Toby, as tempting as it was.