Free Never Tell by Alafair Burke Page B

space. “Nothing like that, Casey. I only asked to get a better sense of how well you knew Julia. It might help put your impressions in context.”
    “Yeah, okay. Um, we never arranged anything with just the two of us or anything. But, yeah, a few times, we’d all be hanging out and Julia and I would end up walking in the same direction afterwards. One time, everyone else had to bail early, so we walked over to see the new part of the High Line when it first opened. You know, that kind of thing. Mostly, though, I’d say we knew each other through Ramona.”
    “And I take it you know what happened to Julia last night?”
    “That she died? Yeah, Ramona called me and I went up to her place. She said Julia’s mom doesn’t believe it’s suicide. Is that why you’re here?”
    There was no reason for this kid to know that Ellie and her partner had a split of opinion on that issue. “You seem like a pretty straight shooter, Casey.”
    He squinted. “I try to be.”
    “So give it to me straight. What can you tell us about Julia that her best friend might not be willing to say?”
    “There’s not a lot to tell. I mean, she’s super rich. Pretty. Probably had some baggage with her parents—always fighting with her mom, talking about her dad, trying to get more time with him, feeling kind of ignored. You know. But otherwise pretty normal.”
    “Did she have a boyfriend?”
    “No, it was more like she’d just hook up. She told me she was into some guy a few weeks ago, but I never asked what happened to that.”
    “Who was the guy?”
    “No clue. She only mentioned it once. Like I said, we were both friends with Ramona, but not as much with each other. This was during one of those few times we were actually alone. We’d gone to this place called Black and White.” Ellie suppressed a smile. The bar was a little lounge in the East Village where her brother, Jess, and his band, Dog Park, sometimes played open-mic nights on Sundays. She’d always teased Jess that the place was overrun by kids with fake IDs, but Jess wanted to believe it was the next CBGB. “Ramona hopped in a cab uptown, and I walked Julia home. She was pretty tipsy and was saying she was tempted to drunk-dial the guy. I was having a little fun with her, trying to get her to call him. Then she said she didn’t even have his cell phone number—that she wasn’t supposed to call or something. It was a little weird.”
    “Does Ramona know?”
    “I’m not sure. Julia said Ramona wouldn’t approve.”
    “Why wouldn’t Ramona approve?”
    “You know that daddy baggage I mentioned? Let’s just say it manifested itself in Julia’s dating preferences. Ramona was always trying to get her to see a therapist about it. I just assumed when she made that comment about Ramona not approving that it was some old guy.”
    “How old are we talking about here?”
    “Not, like, you know, Hugh Hefner old. But I think one guy last summer was, like, thirty! Ramona kind of lectured her about it, and since then I got the impression Julia decided the less Ramona knew about those things, the better.”
    In any other situation, Ellie would bristle at the thought of thirty being “old.” But to have a relationship with a junior in high school? Thirty was ancient.
    “What made you think she was keeping Ramona out of the loop?”
    “Ramona seemed to buy Julia’s act that she wanted more down time to read and study and stuff. Maybe I’m too suspicious but it seemed to me she was lying. One time she said she’d gone to the rooftop at the Standard with this guy, Marcus, but then later Ramona found out Marcus was at a birthday party for some girl at school the same night. Ramona blew it off, but other times Julia would tell Ramona she fell asleep watching TV, and I could just tell she was lying. When she didn’t show up today, I assumed it was another one of her secret disappearances. I feel awful now.”
    “How about her friends? Would you say she was well