But, again, his yacht, his responsibility; he’d been the last one to see Erica alive, aside from the murderer, and he was of questionable character, cheating on the woman he supposedly loved with a gorgeous model. He was also disgustingly rich—even he knew it—and young, handsome, with a reputation for being a bratty prick among certain social circles, a perfect example of someone suffering from what the media had recently dubbed, “affluenza.”

Yeah, he was the perfect pretty boy that the cops would just love to make an example of, no matter how innocent he was. Better that he and Wade try to control the situation here before the authorities got involved.

Save yourself first. That seemed like the best kind of plan.

Jenn pleaded at him with her eyes. “Alex?” she said again.

He shook his head. “We’re staying put.”

“Hey, no, you can’t do that,” Mark said, moving toward him.

“Back off.” Alex put his hand up and stopped the smaller man, palm meeting chest. A soft thud.

“But we voted. Seven to two, you little shit.”

Alex clenched his teeth, jaw muscles flexing. “Doesn’t matter.”

“And why’s that?”

“Because I have the keys.” Alex held them up, taunting Mark and the others.

Mark lunged for them as Chet moved swiftly across the deck. “Give me those,” Mark said. “We are not—”

Alex shifted his weight to the side, planted a hand on Mark’s shoulder, and shoved, sending the smaller man down. He turned, cocked his arm, and hurled the keys into the ocean. “We’re not going anywhere.”

The others stared in abject silence.

Alex kept his face flat and determined, thinking any hint of an expression might betray the fact that he knew exactly where the spare set of keys were hidden.

PART EIGHT

Jenn sat beside Alex as he brooded in his captain’s chair, holding a bag of ice to his jaw. Mark, as scrawny, henpecked, and weak as he appeared to be, had caught him with an unexpected roundhouse that sent Alex to his knees. He hadn’t been looking and hadn’t expected the cowed husband of a domineering wife to take a swing.

After he had thrown the keys in the ocean, it took Jenn and Wade a full half hour to convince the others that they needn’t throw Alex in after them. She wasn’t on his side then, and still wasn’t now, but she felt she owed him a defense, had maybe even pushed him too far. She’d backed him into a corner, and he’d reacted, not how she would’ve expected, but then again, he’d always been impetuous.

She stood up and tucked her chilly hands into the warm pockets of her jean shorts. The approaching storm had set the yacht noticeably rocking now, bringing with it a cold wind and deepening shadows. She felt sturdier on her legs, able to balance herself better, shifting her weight with each undulation.

She said, “Wade says there’s a knife missing from a rack on the middle deck. Thinks it’s what they used.”

Alex didn’t respond.

Jenn glanced down at her feet, trying to think of something comforting to say to him, and noticed that her pink toenail polish had chipped. She felt a brief moment of annoyance, and then a surge of remorse. It was such an innocuous thing to be irritated over. Her soul sister, her jealousy inducing, gorgeous, fortunately gifted by the universe soul sister, friend since the days of pureed beets and pears, lay lifeless in the bowels below.

Death, rather than life, incubated in The Harlot’s belly.

The despair over Erica’s death had taken her breath away earlier, beaten her emotions into a pulpy blend of regret and anger. She understood that she alone was responsible for the death of her friend. She’d invited Erica along, in addition to the rest of the gang, so it was her fault.

Jenn stared past Alex and his vacant gaze, out into the ocean where the sunlight was slowly being swallowed up by the gathering rainclouds. What lay out there was so expansive and empty, emptier now that Erica was gone. Jenn would have to live the rest of her life knowing that their last moments together had consisted of her bitter envy and subsequent apologies.

Grief, earlier slithering in her stomach like an oily nest of snakes, had been replaced by mistrust and suspicion. She would mourn later, back on land when she could wear black and watch a coffin being lowered into the earth, but for now, there was a murderer among them.

And for that, she was also responsible since she’d invited them all along.

Alex shifted in his seat. She thought he might speak to her. He didn’t.

She sighed, but her sign of discontentment was lost in the wind. She wanted him to say something, anything, to break the waves of silence washing over her.

She wondered who and why. None of them had come out and said as much, but of course they all suspected her. Her drunken, violent act of resentment would make her the prime suspect once they got back on land, and once the police began questioning the others.

Eight stories. Eight people. All corroborating the same scenario.

Come to think of it, maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing that Alex had thrown the keys in the ocean. It delayed the inevitable.

No matter what they thought, no matter how vigorously they pointed fingers—friends ‘til the end or until a man with a badge asked questions, whichever came first—she hadn’t done it. She’d fallen asleep on the floor of Chet and Karen’s room because they had been the last ones to comfort her and listen to her profuse apologies.

Not fallen asleep, but passed out in a drunken stupor and later awakened by the married couple’s raucous snoring. She had no idea what time that might’ve been, but she had wondered if Erica was already dead while she lay awake and tried to get back to the dream about having a writing bungalow overlooking the ocean.

Alex cleared his throat and threw the bag of melting ice down at his feet. Water splashed on his deck shoes. So low that she could barely hear him over the waves slapping against the hull, he said, “It wasn’t me.”

“I know,” she replied. “It wasn’t me either. You believe that, right, that I could never do anything to hurt her?”

“I believe you,” he answered, but there it was, that accusatory tone, the one she knew she’d have to get used to until she could prove her innocence. He’d tried hard to mask it. Maybe it wasn’t there. Maybe she was already projecting. No, it was, but she pretended it wasn’t.

“Who do you think it could’ve been? We know it’s not either one of us, and with Sharon and Laura’s video…”

Alex stood and walked to the edge of the ladder. He glanced down below, trying to see where everyone had gone, and Jenn followed his stare. Not a single person had left the middle deck. None of them wanted to be accused of tampering with Erica’s body. They sat in small cliques; Sharon and Laura up near the bow, huddled together. Mark and Terri stood at the stern, arguing, while Chet and Karen tried to ignore them where they sat on one of the nearby benches built into a bulkhead. Wade leaned over the railing on the starboard side, looking down into the water while the breeze lifted the wide brim of his hat.

He said, “And you’re positive about her and Laura?”

She nodded. After Mark had punched Alex, and Alex had subsequently stormed off to pout, alone, Sharon and Laura insisted they had proof of their innocence, an undeniable alibi, but they’d been reluctant to share it. When pressed, they were absolutely insistent that they wouldn’t say what or how, only that they had proof and that would have to be enough until they could speak to the authorities.

The bickering and protesting reached a cacophonous crescendo with Mark finally making the point that sealed the reveal of their evidence.

“You have to explain yourselves. If the two of you have absolute, rock-solid proof, then we have two fewer people to worry about, okay? What are you so worried about? If I were innocent, I’d want everyone to know.”