Free Secrets and Ink by Lou Harper Page A

body had been found by an unnamed roommate shortly after eleven the previous night. The second thing I did was locate the open bottle of wine and a clean glass and sit myself down on the balcony. Unfortunately, alcohol cheered me up only when I was already feeling good, and this time I started at glum. As I watched the sun go down, my mood went with it. By dusk, I found myself downright miserable. The evening seemed so similar to the other one when Nick sat there with me, but now I was alone, and Riley was dead. I still had trouble processing it. Back in the day, when I’d gotten in a bad mood, Riley kept pestering me with the worst jokes till I cracked up. What did the green grape tell the purple grape? Breathe, man, breathe!
    Somebody knocked on the door, but I decided to ignore it. They’d go away. The knocking got louder. Damn it. I dragged myself to the door.
    At first, Nick’s face radiated reproach, but whatever he saw in mine made it go away. “How are you doing?” he asked.
    “Not good.” I wound my hands around his waist and buried my face in the soft cotton of his shirt. I made a big mess of it too, with all the water leaking from my eyes. Nick took it well, silently rubbing my back. I could’ve stayed there forever with his arms around me, but I pulled back in fear I’d leak snot on him too.
    “I’m such mess,” I said, wiping at my eyes and sniffling.
    “Sit.” He guided me to the couch. “Kleenex?”
    “Bedroom.”
    He disappeared to the other room and came back with a box of tissues. While I blew my nose and straightened myself up, he sat next to me, kinda sideways, one elbow up on the back of the couch. He leaned his head on his hand and studied my face. “I’m sorry, Jem. I know you loved Riley.”
    “I did once. Not anymore. But it never stopped hurting. I can’t believe he’s just gone. And murdered. It’s so…barbaric.”
    “Why did you go to him? I told you not to let him manipulate you.”
    “No offense, but Riley is…was my business. I had to see him one last time, make him understand we were finished for good.” I tried to shake the disbelief out of my head. “I didn’t expect it to be so final. You don’t think I killed him?”
    “No, of course not, but it’s a strange coincidence. Why didn’t you tell Detective Lipkin I was with you at the time?”
    “I dunno, I didn’t want to mix you up in it.”
    “And you didn’t think it would make us both look suspicious when it came out?”
    “Oh, I didn’t think of it. I’m sorry.” I realized what a dumb ass I’d been. “Did he call Charly?” She would’ve told him about Nick having been with us for sure.
    “I saw the name on the board and talked to Lipkin. I told him about Saturday night, so your alibi is airtight.”
    “Does he really think I had something to do with the…murder?”
    “I won’t discuss an open investigation with you. And I’m not even on the case. But Lipkin is a good cop, and he’ll follow up every lead. If it were me, I’d look into the roommates, boyfriends, ex-boyfriends and anyone who might have had a quarrel with him.”
    “Hm. That might take a while. Riley had a knack for pissing people off.”
    “Did he really?”
    “Well, it was more like he couldn’t let things go. If someone got on his wrong side, he could be deviously vindictive. Like one time in high school there was this guy, Tyler…something—a jock type. Something happened between them, Riley wouldn’t tell me what, but he decided to fuck with Tyler. We went hiking in the hills, equipped with rubber gloves and plastic bags. And then one day, after school we broke into Tyler’s locker—Riley was an expert in lock picking—and rubbed poison oak all over his stuff, his books and his football jersey. Tyler got the rash so bad he had to stay home for a week.”
    “That is vindictive,” Nick commented.
    “Riley thought of it as a just revenge for whatever had gone down between him and Tyler. They never found out we