Zetas Till We Die

by Amber and Danielle Brown

Genres: Women's Fiction; Crime Fiction; Psychological Thrillers; Suspense

Synopsis

“The Browns deliver their trademark mix of steamy sex and social commentary in an easy-to-binge package. This is bound to please fans of Shonda Rhimes.” —Publishers Weekly on Perfect Little Lives

SISTERS…FOR LIFE.

It’s been ten years since Priscilla and her Zeta Phi Zeta sorority sisters graduated college. Ten years since they were all in the same room together. Ten years since one of them died. And now Lupe’s killer has been released from prison on a technicality, days before their ten-year reunion.

Priscilla decides that the party must go on; Lupe would have wanted it to. And besides, an epic reunion bash might be the perfect distraction. Back together, the Zetas party like it’s 2012, and it’s wild, just the way it used to be. Maybe too wild. At least everyone makes it out alive this time…or so they think.

When one of them doesn’t return home after the party, Priscilla begins to realize that there might be more to Lupe’s murder and that someone is out for blood. With the murderer in their midst circling closer and closer, the Zetas are forced to confront what really happened the night Lupe died—and the secrets each of them swore to keep.
 

Release date: September 10, 2024

Publisher: Graydon House Books

Print pages: 400

Sample

TRANSCRIPT OF JURY TRIAL—DAY 16

Conducted on May 20, 2015

Case: California v. Wolfe

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Can you please remind the jury what you saw the night of May 7, 2012, as you returned home?

PRISCILLA: I was just getting home. Walking into the house and I saw him. Travis. His shirt was covered in her blood. Like soaked all the way through. At first I couldn’t tell what it was. It was dark. But when he got closer, I could tell it was blood. There was some on the tops of his pants too. He didn’t run or anything when he saw me. He just stared at me and then took off. I didn’t see him after that. I ran in to see what happened, where the blood was... Sorry. This is my first time seeing him again...after... Can I have some water, please?

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: And what did you see when you entered the house?

PRISCILLA: I remember...blood. Just a lot of blood. That’s all I could see at first. Just so much blood. I froze... I just...couldn’t believe it was Lupé...lying there like that. She wasn’t moving, her neck was... The way it was twisted, I could barely look. My mind was racing so fast. Everything just slowed down. I was there but not there.

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Understandable. Now, is it fair to say you may be misremembering some details due to your state of shock?

PRISCILLA: No. Not at all. I know what I saw. He came from inside the house covered in Lupé’s blood. I saw what I saw.

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Tell me what else you saw as you walked into the house. Was anyone else present?

PRISCILLA: Dionne and Alexis first. They were at the bottom of the stairs, kneeling down at Lupé’s side, trying to get her to breathe, to wake up, something. Zoë and Chanel were also there. Somewhere. Someone was on the phone with the police. I think it was her.

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Were they also covered in blood?

PRISCILLA: They took turns trying to give her CPR. They all had touched her by the time I got there.

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: And you never saw Mr. Wolfe physically harm Lupé that night, correct?

PRISCILLA: No, but he was the only one who just left when I showed up. Everyone else tried to save her. Tried to do something. Why would he run away if he didn’t do it?

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Based on the little you actually saw, it could have been anyone else who was present when you arrived who pushed her down the stairs. Is that fair to say?

PRISCILLA: No one else had any reason to kill Lupé.

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: What makes you so certain? Had you ever witnessed Mr. Wolfe threaten Lupé before?

PRISCILLA: No. But Travis—sorry, Mr. Wolfe—was constantly stalking her. I was worried for her. This guy always seemed to be around her and none of us knew anything about him or why he was so obsessed.

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: And when you say none of “us,” who exactly are you referring to?

PRISCILLA: My sorority sisters. Her best friends. Me, Chanel, Zoë, Alexis, Dionne and Val.

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: That night, were the doors locked?

PRISCILLA: We always lock the doors after eleven.

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: So there was no way Travis could have entered the premises on his own? If the doors were locked?

PRISCILLA: We figured he broke in through her window. He was always staring up at her room like he was trying to figure out a way to get into it.

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: And if he was there that night—

PRISCILLA: He was there.

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: If he was there that night, someone could have let him in, right? That is possible, correct?

PRISCILLA: Lupé would have never let him in. None of us would have. We were all worried for her.

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Lupé’s bedroom was on the second floor, was it not?

PRISCILLA: Yes, but—

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: It would have been nearly impossible for him to scale the building and break in through the window without anyone hearing or seeing anything, right?

PRISCILLA: I...

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: No further questions, Your Honor.

 

1

Lupé

November, 2009

It isn’t until the girl who has been vomiting in the tub staggers into me on her way to the sink that I realize—one, I know her, and two, I’ve been hiding in the bathroom for way longer than socially acceptable.

“Can you believe we made it?” she shrieks, giddy, laughing. “We’re officially Zetas, bitches!”

She shout-sings the last word and it hits me.

We did it. Everything we did for this moment was worth it.

“I’m Dionne by the way,” she says, her words one amorphous slur. “Wait. You already know that. Sorry, I’m so fucked up right now.”

I laugh because she laughs, and when I give myself a once-over in the mirror, I notice that one of my boobs is higher than the other. I adjust the neckline of my dress, which is genuinely starting to cut off my circulation, and she catches my eye using our reflections.

“You have the prettiest hair,” Dionne says, slight pauses between each word for emphasis. “I’ve been meaning to tell you that for like, so long. I would die to have hair like that.”

I thank her, and while she reapplies her matte red MAC lipstick, I debate whether to tell her about the vomit on one of her braids. Even though we’ve spent copious amounts of time together over these past few weeks of pledging, I’m not sure if we are at that point yet.

“Obsessed with your braids,” I say instead, hoping she will take another look at them.

It works and she laughs like it is the funniest thing she’s ever seen. I hand her a wet wipe before heading for the door, every movement a threat to the integrity of the tightly woven spandex keeping my organs in place. I brace myself for the roar of the crowd and reach for the doorknob.

The air is damp with humidity and sweat as I cut through small clusters of people dancing and drinking. Doing my best to appear aloof and cool, I take in everything happening at once—Usher’s “Love in this Club” bleeding through the sound system, the smiling shot of last year’s graduating class in their matching pink and orange Zeta Phi Zeta jackets on the wall, a couple kissing aggressively in front of the sixty-inch TV, someone rolling a blunt in the corner, empty beer cans strewn on every flat surface, someone’s abandoned glittered heel on the floor. I avoid stepping in the mystery puddle on the tile as I cross through the kitchen and scan the main room one more time to make sure I haven’t missed her, but Priscilla is fully MIA.

I reach for a SOLO cup just so I can have something to do with my hands. As I dunk the ladle in the mystery punch bowl, I try to focus only on the bright red liquid and not on my body, my liver, the inevitable breakdown of carcinogens into water and carbon dioxide.

Priscilla promised that joining a sorority would help me expand my friendship group, that this was the way to meet like-minded women who would have my back for life, but so far it has only made me more insecure, especially on nights like tonight. Everyone but me has figured out how to bounce effortlessly from conversation to conversation and I’m still trying to escape the prison that is my own head and not overthink every moment.

“And you’re sure it’s not a cult?” I asked her at the beginning of last semester.

“Lu, to become a Zeta, all we have to do is prove that we’re serious about joining the organization and that we have the same values. There’s no blood sacrifices, don’t worry. They don’t even allow hazing. It’s literally against their whole code of conduct.”

I text Priscilla again. It’s the sixth unanswered message I’ve sent since I snuck into the bathroom. I’m about to fire off another one when I notice Chanel and Alexis playfully grinding on each other across the room. They’ve both been so supportive and helpful these last couple

of months, but neither of them have seen Priscilla in the last hour. They direct me to Zoë, who I find over by the food spread. She tells me she saw Priscilla heading to grab something from her car.

She wasn’t supposed to leave me alone tonight. She knows I can’t do high-volume social events without her.

I have no idea what was in that punch, but I miss the last step on the staircase leading to the back pathway and fall forward, my phone flying out of my grasp. I check to make sure there is no blood on my knee where it stings before palming around in the near black darkness.

“I saw you.”

I jump to my feet at the unexpected low voice behind me. I stumble back a couple steps in my strappy heels and take in the tall, gangly guy staring at me. His white T-shirt is all wrinkles, and bright in the dark.

He offers no explanation for his words, just hawks me down.

I can see he hasn’t washed the tousled blond hair peeking out from his gray beanie in a while, and the color of his eyes—either icy blue or piercing gray—remains a mystery.

Also, he’s holding my phone.

I swallow. “You...what?”

“Last week. I saw you.”

I part my lips, then abandon the words on the tip of my tongue and glance over both shoulders. Even when I squint, I can’t make out Priscilla anywhere; the lot is too far away. No one else is around.

“Sorry, can I have my phone back?” I ask, fighting to keep my voice casual, though I very much want to snatch it from him and bolt.

I have no idea where he materialized from or what he’s doing back here in such close proximity to the Zeta house. He for sure wasn’t invited to the party, and by the looks of him, he doesn’t belong to any of the frats who have houses back this way.

He hands me my phone back without a word, a smoking cigarette wedged between two of his fingers. He lifts the filtered end to his full pink lips and takes a drag, never breaking eye contact with me. I watch the way his cheeks go hollow, the way his lips purse as he blows the smoke from his mouth, angling his jaw over his shoulder so the plumes don’t directly assault my face. Tattoos adorn each of his knuckles.

“You were dancing with the rest of them,” he says, nodding toward the house when I take a backward step away from him, ready to go back inside. “In the middle of the quad.”

“You mean stepping.”

An almost imperceptible shrug. “What’s the difference?”

I shake my head and while I don’t mean to be rude, it’s been a long day and I don’t have time to give this white boy a lesson in black culture.

I flip around to head inside, but before I take a full step away, he manages to circle me. Like a hungry canine ready to masticate bloody flesh and tendon.

“What’s it mean?” he asks softly, barely moving his lips.

My mouth is parted in question when he steps forward. I jump a little, startled. Part of 

me wants to bail immediately, bolt like a bullet from an M16. But the other part of me is momentarily paralyzed by the actual hue of his eyes. The saddest blue I’ve ever seen.

“The emblem,” he says. “On your jacket.”

“Oh. It’s...it’s a sphinx.” I expect him to nod and walk off, satisfied, but his stare lingers. There’s something haunted in his eyes. Something that makes me panic and keep talking. “The lion embodies strength and authority. The woman represents intelligence and leadership.” I point to the other side. “There’s Nefertiti. And the black fist... I mean, that one’s obvious.”

Again, I expect some kind of reaction. A response. Something. Anything.

He just stares at me with those deep-set, oddly penetrating eyes and I swear he can see right through me.

Or in me.

“I’m...” I glance over my shoulder at the back door and remind myself that I owe this stranger no explanation. “I’m heading back inside.”

“Wait,” he says fast, and I feel him coming after me.

There’s a shift. Adrenaline surges. I don’t stop or slow down, but he catches up to my stride in no time with those long legs and reaches for my hand. I speed up as fast as I can in my heels.

“Lu!” I pause, relief washing over me at the familiarity of the voice. “Where have you been?”

I glance over my shoulder and see Priscilla closing in on us, sparkling with sweat and sequins against the dark of the night. She doesn’t even acknowledge him. She grabs my wrist and drags me toward the front of the house, doesn’t let go of my hand even when we slip back inside the throbbing four walls of the house. She waves over Zoë, Alexis, Chanel and Dionne and we all dance to a Ciara bop.

“That guy had a weird vibe,” she eventually shouts over the music in explanation.

“I went out looking for you and he came out of nowhere. One of the bushes, I think.”

“Oh my god, I just saved you from being abducted and chopped up and put in his freezer.”

“I think he was harmless,” I say, laughing. “Just painfully awkward.”

“And a smoker. Ooh. This is my song.”

It’s a club remix I haven’t heard yet, but I work up a sweat with her anyway until she slows to a stop. I ask what’s wrong and her eyes narrow on something that’s caught her attention behind me.

“Don’t look now,” she says.

“What?”

“That guy. He’s...”

Even though she’s

warned me not to, I immediately flip around so I can see for myself. I don’t stop moving though. I make it look like an intentional dance move when I come face-to-face with the guy from outside.

He’s still sucking from his cancer stick. Still staring at me, now through one of the windows.

“I can call security,” Priscilla says in my ear.

I don’t say anything. I don’t blink. I’m entranced by my voyeur as he takes a final draw of his smoke, then drops it to the ground, unblinking, eyes locked onto mine.

He doesn’t care that I know he’s watching.

He wants me to know.

He wants me to watch him as he watches me.

I turn and tell Priscilla yes, I think we should have him escorted off our property. When she steps off, I glance out the window again and the spot where he was just standing is empty.

He’s gone.

But I still feel his eyes on me. 2

Priscilla

Now

Her scream rings in my ear just before a horn blares, that loud, trumpeting sound drowning out the subsequent crack of her neck snapping in two.

My feet stutter to an abrupt stop in my pumps and it’s not until I look up from the article on my phone that I realize I should be on the ground right now, trapped beneath the underside of the bulky SUV at my hip, sprawled and bleeding. Just like Lupé was after she plummeted to her death ten years ago.

The piercing cry she made as she went flying backward down the flight of stairs at the Zeta Phi Zeta house reverberated in my head just as the driver flattened his brake with less than a second to spare to avoid colliding with me. There is only an inch separating the side of my calf from the bumper of a shiny Porsche that looks pristine enough to still reek of the heady aroma of brand-new plush leather seats.

I cannot defend myself when the red-faced man juts his head out of the window and releases his ire toward me for mindlessly walking behind him as he reversed out of his parking space. My head was down as I desperately tried to process the impossible headline, a haunting string of words that, like a portal, took me back to the moment I discovered Lupé’s cooling corpse, those few seconds replaying in my head like a distorted silent film on a loop.

Though I wasn’t at the house when she fell, Lupé’s scream is a sound I can never stop hearing, a figment of imagination, not memory, that my mind can’t let go of. It echoes again as I robotically step out of this angry stranger’s way so he can finish pulling out of the garage, a shriek that could mute the living and wake the dead. Once I’m out of the way, I read the headline for the thousandth time, my pulse soaring, adrenaline surging, a low frequency hum muting all sounds around me.

It all rushes back, fast and fierce, as if it’s 2012 again, a couple weeks before graduation, the darkest night of my life.

I still remember the intensity of the paralysis that held my body prisoner when I stepped in the house and saw her lifeless body twisted at the bottom of the stairs, the force as inescapable as gravity as I took in the steady stream of blood draining from the back of her head, warm and salty as the tropical waters of the Caribbean. The metallic odor, like rusted pennies, was so pungent that I could taste it on my tongue. It was distinctly crisp and fresh, like it was still alive. It seemed like I’d punctured one of her veins with my incisors and drunk her blood straight from the source. I scrubbed my skin with antibacterial soap and scorching hot water for weeks, but it took years for that stench to fade away.

If my Zeta sisters hadn’t been there to help me focus on taking deep breaths, the shaking would have come next, then the hot flashes. And maybe I would have ended up in the hospital that night too. I don’t remember who called the ambulance. Just that somehow when the loud vehicles arrived, I was soaked in Lupé’s blood. My clothes, my hair, under my nails, everything stained crimson. I think I tried CPR. Even now it’s easy to recall the tinny wail of the sirens. Voices. A cacophony of irritatingly calm, almost robotic, male and female voices, discordant, overlapping, nonstop. The snap of Lupé’s neck as it cracked in two. And the last sound Lupé must have made as her mortality made its way to center stage. Some of those sounds I experienced. Some my brain has made up to fill in the gaps.

She was pronounced dead at the scene by the lead paramedic, but it took weeks to process that her body was now decomposing. That she would never grow old, fall in love, get married and foster rescued farm animals like she planned. The truth is, I haven’t thought of her death in years. Whenever I picture Lupé, I see all the vivid colors that she was. Ultramarine pink. Cobalt. Fluorescent orange. Cyan. Magenta. I see us laughing, doing each other’s braids on Sundays, telling each other our deepest secrets. When Lupé wanders into

my subconscious, inside my dreams, she’s whole. She’s alive.

And that’s the hardest part, when I remember she’s dead. Not gone. Not in a better place. Dead.

I also don’t think of him. Travis Wolfe, the boy who was convicted of her murder. Travis Wolfe who is now a man. A free man, according to this article.

This can’t be happening. This can’t be true.

Though I have a couple waiting in the lobby of my office for my first session of the morning, I reread the headline once more and still it feels inconceivable.

The foreperson in court read the unanimous verdict after deliberating for less than two hours. Travis Wolfe was taken away in shackles and sentenced to life without parole for murdering the best friend every girl deserves. I excavated him from my memory because I thought he was as good as dead. I thought it was over. But now, despite being found guilty, he has been released from prison after seven years thanks to the diligence of his civil attorney, the brief article says.

The car didn’t hit me, but it feels like I’ve been knocked sideways. Suddenly, the idea of facing my clients and pretending I have it all together seems not only overwhelming but absurd.

Nothing can ever be the same anymore. This is going to be my new normal.

No justice, no peace.

It’s a wicked thing to conjure in my mind, and though I would never act on the thought or speak the words aloud, not even to myself in the mirror, I wish Travis Wolfe was dead.

 

3

Priscilla

Now

Still dazed, I check my mascara using the mirrored wall inside the elevator on my way up to my suite. I’m dressed in my usual monochromatic summer uniform of a sleeveless bodysuit and high-waisted tailored pants, black from head-to-toe because even muted or pastel colors these days feel too loud. My first client of the day has a tendency to break eye contact with me and indulge whenever his wife speaks about how she feels like she’s married but he isn’t, so I adjust my neckline to make sure no cleavage is exposed before I step back out of the stall.

The suite is designed with the minimalism of a monastery, sparse without being austere or cold. Everything from the ecru walls to the Scandinavian-inspired furniture is done in a palette of soothing neutrals. I lead my clients inside my private office first and try to feign nonchalance as they get comfortable in the sculptural upholstered chairs across from the twin curved bouclé love seats facing each other. It’s always telling that they choose separate chairs to sit in instead of sharing one of the sofas.

I have to stop my leg from violently shaking the entire length of my first appointment. I know the ins and outs of this marriage, and I’m sure it’s the only reason I make it through the hour-long session without dissolving into a radioactive puddle of chaos.

The second couple I see is a bit more demanding. The husband captures my full, undivided attention when he confesses to sucking on his wife’s leaking nipple while she was napping a few days ago. Apparently, he did it to “gently” wake her up, but it served two purposes because he also thought it would be a great way to show her that their three-month-old isn’t the only one who enjoys her breasts.

Looking mortified, the wife tells me she slapped him away as soon as she was fully conscious, which is where he cuts her off to claim that this reaction from her brought him to tears. Horrifyingly, this recollection inspires new tears, and before there’s anything I can do to stop it, he’s breaking down in front of me. His wife rolls her eyes as I hand him a Kleenex from the box on my desk.

I would lose my license if I suggest they proceed with divorce, even if I brand it consciously uncoupling, but I have never felt the urge to risk my entire career more than right now. This man makes me feel like my husband is a god.

But our marriage is in shambles too. The truth is, I’m a fraud.

Luckily, our session comes to an end soon after the blubbering and I get up from my desk to shut the door.

I munch on a handful of raw unsalted almonds and wonder if any of the couples I’ve seen today could perceive the madness going on inside my head, the pandemonium plaguing my psyche as I mediated practically on autopilot. I feel stuck in a stupor, like I’ve been transformed into an insentient robot ever since reading about Travis’s release. Before I can finish my snack, my mind has time traveled back to the trial, to when I was sweaty and fidgety in the witness box.

All I had to do was tell the truth, but it was beyond intimidating. The stakes were so high. Someone’s freedom and justice for the murder of a young woman, my best friend since second grade, was on the line. All of us who testified were lauded afterward. To everyone else—the police, the prosecutors, the dean, some classmates and random people online—we’d committed an act of nobility going up there and completing our civic duty. We were deemed as brave for facing The Big Bad Wolfe.

But it was the most difficult thing I’ve ever had to do. I almost blacked out while being crossed. I caught Travis’s stare from the front pew and made myself think of Lupé. Of what would never become of her life. I forced myself to imagine if it had been me whose life and hopes and dreams were prematurely cut short.

We sealed his fate.

And now it’s all being unraveled.

A knock on the door to my office jolts me back to the present. I glance up from my agenda

book, which is turned to the page filled with the notes I took during the last session for my next couple. Theirs doesn’t start for another twenty minutes.

Before I can respond, or even slip my feet back into my heels, the door swings open. I hold my breath.

Kenan, my husband, is in surgery all day today.

I have no idea who this could be.

 

4

Priscilla

Now

“Scared you?” Chanel asks with an unfair laugh, stepping into my office with a Fendi baguette tucked under her arm.

It’s so far from a mom handbag that despite the chaos buzzing in the back of my head, I can’t help but beam with pride that she hasn’t lost her identity to motherhood, which was her biggest fear during the third trimester of her first pregnancy. Back in the day, when we were not-yet-disillusioned students at Acadia University, the small, ever-chic bag would have contained only whatever nude-brown lipstick she was wearing that day, the Amex her dad footed the bill for and a collection of condoms of varying sizes. But I’m sure now that she’s got two toddlers under five, she’s managed to squeeze a pacifier and some baby wipes inside it and has the rest of her mommy supplies in the Dior Book Tote that’s likely in the trunk of her Range Rover as we speak.

“What are you doing here?” I ask, lowering my Prada frames and doing my best to feign insouciance.

She shrugs. “Was in the neighborhood.”

I know her too well. She never ventures east of La Cienega unless she’s coming to see me. “No, you weren’t.”

Though she’s casual in a high-waisted pair of sweatpants and matching cropped sweater, she’s wearing a full face of makeup, her contour and highlight camera ready as always, and has on a different lace front than the last time I saw her, this one long with honey-blond highlights. I’m pretty sure she has more wigs than bras, which is saying a lot since she is a total slut for overpriced La Perla.

“You busy?” she asks.

“No, they pay me to just sit pretty and take in the view,” I say with just enough sarcasm to make her laugh and glance at my panoramic view of the Hollywood Hills just over my shoulder. I stare at the smog, at the way it makes the view so much prettier until I remember what it is.

“Well, I kinda need to talk,” Chanel says, draping herself onto one of the ivory love seats. “You accept Venmo? Cash App? Hand jobs?”

I smirk and glance at the titanium face on my wrist, because yes, I am now the kind of woman who habitually wears a watch and actually uses it. “I’ve got fifteen before my next session.”

She finishes getting comfortable, then parts her brown-lined lips to speak but pauses, her gaze settling on my left hand. “You saw it already, huh?” she asks, meeting my eyes.

“Saw what?”

“You’re stress eating.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Almonds give you a rash on your neck.”

“Not always,” I say, fighting the sudden urge to scratch at the fleshy part next to my thyroid that’s always first to flare up.

“Girl, the only kind of nuts you should be snacking on are the ones attached to a certain hot ER surgeon.”

I blush, maybe because I can barely remember the last time Kenan and I have been intimate, much less had a below-the-hips taste of each other. Chanel forces me to empty the nuts from my hand and tosses them in the bin beneath my desk.

“It’s all that was left in the vending machine downstairs,” I confess with a laugh.

Chanel joins in for a beat, then a serious tone edges into her voice. “So you saw the article?”

“Yeah, I...” My heart knocks against my chest so hard, I almost answer it. “I saw it.”

I knew what she was asking the first time. I just couldn’t admit it. I don’t want thoughts of Travis Wolfe to hijack my afternoon. He’s already ruined my entire morning.

Neither of us feel bold enough to speak his name aloud. Chanel falls uncharacteristically pensive and I wonder if she’s feeling the same anxiety I am. She’s harder to read than an overly enthusiastic Botox aficionado. I watch as she replies to a text that comes in, mumbling that it’s her three-year-old’s daycare.

“What do you think this means?” I ask when she stops typing, taking a seat across from

her.

“They’re saying it’s because of some shady shit the prosecution did. What’s that term they used...” She briefly references the article, then quotes it verbatim. “‘A miscarriage of justice.’”

“I don’t get it. Why would they tamper with evidence when they had all of us?”

We both testified, but so did Alexis, Zoë, Dionne and Val. Val was two years behind us at Acadia, but really hit it off with Lupé and recounted the times she witnessed Travis stalking Lupé around campus in such compelling detail, even I was incensed by her protestation.

“I don’t know,” Chanel says with a shake of her head, then shrugs. “Guess the prosecution wanted to make sure there was no chance he could walk.”

“That was so careless.” I pace away from the seating area, an inferno of panic creeping up my spine.

“Prissy,” she says, calling me by the moniker she coined back in our freshman year because I, like Alexis, always had to be in heels and at least lip gloss if I was in public. “It’s done. He’s out. Nothing we can do about it. Don’t freak.”

“I’m not. I just...”

“Breathe, okay?” She watches me, then, horrified with my inability to pump a decent amount of oxygen into my lungs, offers, “Want a Xanax?”

“What? No.” I know she pops one occasionally when the stress and pressures of being a pulled-together, make-no-mistakes-ever suburban mother and wife gets to her, but she also knows my aversion to synthetic sedatives. “I just don’t get how they could release him and not tell any of us. How do they expect us to feel? We’re just supposed to accept this and move on like nothing’s wrong?”

Chanel pushes up to her feet too now, and eases over to me by the window. “Being released from prison on a technicality doesn’t mean you’re innocent.”

“Exactly. Why isn’t he still considered a danger to society just because some power-hungry prosecutors got carried away?”

She stops less than a foot away from me. “All I’m saying is he hasn’t been exonerated. This doesn’t mean Lupé’s case is suddenly back open or that he’s gonna be welcomed back into society with open arms.”

I nod. Chanel’s logic instantly calms me. She’s always been a straight shooter, no chaser necessary. I lean my weight into the wall behind me and take a deliberate breath.

“Maybe the party isn’t a good idea,” I say with a sigh. “The timing is so bad.”

“Girl, I’m trying to twerk and sweat and forget about them kids for a few hours. You can’t cancel now.”

I try to imagine calling

it all off with only six days to go and my stomach knots up. This ten-year reunion feels more high stakes than my wedding did, which, granted, was an intimate backyard affair with only twenty guests, but still. It’s not only that the reunion guest list will rival my wedding’s, but it’s the first time all the women from our pledge year will be in the same room since graduation. We weren’t even allowed to attend court when the others were testifying against The Big Bad Wolfe, as the LA Times coined.

There’s so much to prove. Most of all to myself.

“This is our anniversary of losing Lupé too,” I say, sifting through my tangled thoughts. “Won’t it look bad if we’re partying a week after his release?”

“Not if we do a special tribute to her.”

I tilt my face in thought. It’s not a bad idea. And there’s still a week to implement a tribute speech and a special dedication.

My next client arrives in the lobby and I hustle to slip on my shoes. Chanel kisses me on both cheeks without making actual contact and rushes out to run an errand in the Valley before she’s due to pick her kids up from daycare in Brentwood.

After she’s gone, a wave of gratitude washes over me, counteracting the budding anxiety. She’s so right. The party must go on.

It’s what Lupé would have wanted. ...