No Strings Attached Read online

  Mandy yanked away from her. “Are you kidding? I’m not goin’ in there.”

  “Then stay outside and call the police. I’ll go in.”

  Ali braced herself, afraid of what she might find. Something had happened—oh God, what if Harper was in there?

  She wasn’t.

  Nor was anything else.

  The living room was bare; the only clue that furniture had once been there, the indentations in the carpet from the coffee tables and lamps. Unless the stuff had been repossessed or something, they’d been robbed. Big time. Ali’s hand flew to her mouth, her eyes went wide. She dashed into the kitchen—same story: table and chairs, coffeemaker, microwave, gone. Only the refrigerator remained, but like the cabinets, the door was open, its contents strewn all over the floor.

  Mandy noisily trotted in, calling out brazenly. “Whoever you are, we got a rat! A poisonous big ol’ rat—and we’re not afraid to use him! He’s got teeth! Come out with your hands up!”

  Ali rolled her eyes. If Mandy wasn’t so ludicrous, it’d be funny. “No one’s here,” she told her. “They took everything. Did you call the police?”

  “They took our stuff?” Horrified, Mandy lurched toward the stairs, groping for the railing. She stumbled several times, anyway, on her way upstairs.

  Mandy was on her hands and knees, wailing now as she attacked the hills of sartorial wreckage. “They took”—hiccup—“my good stuff. My lingerie! I saved up for all that stuff! Even my scrapbook.” She turned her tear-stained face to Ali. “What’d they want with that? It’s personal—it’s my dreams. …” She trailed off, her nose running, and sobbed into her hands.

  “It’s just material possessions. They can be replaced.” Ali searched for a tissue.

  “No they can’t!” Mandy shrieked, and ran to the bathroom.

  Ali guessed Mandy, drunk and distraught, had not summoned the police, so she went downstairs to use the landline in the kitchen. She had one hand on the phone when she heard Katie come in squealing. “Oh my God! What happened in here?”

  “We got robbed,” Ali yelled to her.

  “We got robbed?” Katie repeated dumbly. “Who’d want to rob this dump? There’s like nothing worth taking.”

  Ali shook her head. Maybe to Katie, there wasn’t—the roomie upstairs would beg to disagree. As Alefiya gave the address to the cops, she heard Katie make a decision.

  “I better call Mitch.”

  Calling Mitch was Katie’s default reaction to anything that required a responsible adult to take over. It was at that moment Ali realized Mandy had probably been right about Katie all along. She was underage. And more: had been sheltered, pampered, taken care of all her life. It begged the question, already asked by the others, what was Katie doing here?

  Katie flipped her phone shut and reported, “Mitch’ll be here in a second. He was just turning onto the block. He’ll handle everything.”

  Ali squeezed Katie’s shoulders lightly. “The damage has been done, and thank god, no one got hurt. The police are on the way. There’s really nothing for Mitch to handle.”

  That turned out to be a really good thing. For this time? Mitch was incapable of handling anything. For the first time, in the face of crisis, their can-do den dad suddenly could not. Their lean-on-me hero became unhinged. Neither calm, nor cool, and far from collected, Mitch raced through the living room, directly into his bedroom, and very noisily freaked out. “My money! They stole the ring money. Every cent I’ve made this summer is gone!”

  Ali and Katie, who’d followed, stood in Mitch’s doorway, paralyzed. Just like in the other bedrooms, it looked like a tornado had touched down: The mattress had been turned over, sheets stripped off, pillowcases gone—used to haul away anything that could be stuffed into them.

  Steadfast Mitch was in full-frontal meltdown, pounding the walls, screaming like a Mandy-banshee. “The bastards! The rotten, fucking bastards! I’ll kill them!” He kicked the bed. “How’d they fucking know? How’d they get in? Through the fucking window?” He railed at the window, drew his arm back, and before anyone could stop him, smashed his fist through the glass.

  “No! Stop it! Stop!” Summoning her prodigious strength, Ali pulled Mitch away from the window. Katie rushed to the bathroom to grab a towel to wrap around his bloodied wrist.

  Mandy came thumping down the stairs. The glass-shattering commotion must have pulled her out of her personal pity-party. One look at Mitch, she sobered up. Pushing Katie aside, she barked, “Give me the towel. Let me do that.”

  Ali was almost impressed.

  “Mitch! Get a hold of yourself!” Mandy commanded. Then her voice softened to a nurturing cajole. “Come on, honey, let’s see if I learned anything from all those first aid lessons we got at the Dorchester Boys and Girls Club.”

  Ali registered surprise. So did Katie—for a microsecond. Then, the petite powerhouse leaped into action. “I’m getting duct tape, or whatever Mitch said he bought. All that stuff’s in the bathroom, right?”

  Eventually, Mitch succumbed to Mandy’s ministrations, though it took all three girls to hold him down and stem the bleeding. If only, Ali mused miserably, they could have a similar effect on his psyche. Stalwart, unflappable Mitchell James Considine was falling apart before their eyes.

  “You don’t understand,” Mitch whimpered. “How am I going to propose? How am I going to get her to marry me? My life is ruined!”

  Worse than devastated, Mitch looked defeated. He sat on the edge of the bed, head in his hands, sobbing inconsolably. There was nothing Alefiya and Mandy could do but sit on either side of him, stroke his back, and try in vain to console him.

  Katie asked what no one else dared. “Why was all that cash in the house? Why didn’t you put it in a bank?”

  Bad move. Mitch freaked all over again. “Because, Missy McMoney-bags, I got a better deal from a jeweler who only takes cash. Not something you would understand! And besides, I didn’t think we had anything to worry about living here—why would robbers pick this shithouse to target?!”

  Mandy, Ali, and a stunned, red-faced Katie teamed up to soothe Mitch, tried to get him to settle down, until the cops arrived and they could take him to the hospital.

  Such was the scene when a stunned Joss and Harper blasted in to find them a few minutes later. The sight of Mitch so pathetic stopped them cold.

  Ali wiped away tears as she filled them in. “I called the police. They’re on the way. I don’t know what else to do.”

  Mandy began to bark out orders. “Finally! You managed to show up. Now make yourself useful and take Mitch to the emergency room. His hand’s gonna need stitches.”

  With lightning speed, Joss took hold of Mitch, ignoring his distraught housemate’s cries to “Let me go, you asshole! I have to get my money back!”

  “Now you, Princess!” Mandy turned to Katie. “Your type always has some prescription drugs around—go get something for Mitch.”

  Katie looked scandalized. Ali was about to intervene, when Mandy shrieked, “Just do it!”

  Katie returned with two orange pills in her palm. “Xanax,” she told Joss. “That should do the trick.”

  “Good,” Mandy said condescendingly. “Princess isn’t such a pea-brain after all.” She turned to Joss. “Force him to take them. He needs sedating.”

  The cops arrived just after Joss left for the emergency room with a still-protesting Mitch. The Hyannis Police had sent two detectives, who went through the share house with the four girls, helping them catalog what had been stolen.

  It was a long list. The thieves had been equal opportunity: They’d hauled off anything of even remote value. Aside from all their furniture, among the missing was Mitch’s money, his laptop, Mandy’s “designer accessories,” trinkets, and, strangely, her scrapbook; Ali’s embroidered silk sari—she had no idea what she’d tell her parents about its loss—and Harper’s last paycheck. Joss, at the emergency room with Mitch, would fill in his missing items later; though Mandy was positive he
owned several guitars, not a one remained in his room now.

  The detectives repeated Ali’s words of wisdom: “Just be glad no one was hurt.

  “Besides,” they added, “could be the owners of the house even have insurance. You could get the furniture replaced right away.” They took everyone’s statements, and copious notes. By the time they were ready to leave, they confirmed Ali’s worst fear when she’d first discovered the robbery.

  “No sign of forced entry,” determined the young-looking detective, who’d introduced himself as MacMillan. “If you’re absolutely sure the last person out locked up, then we’re left with two scenarios.” He paused, and let his partner spell it out.

  “The thief was one of you, or it’s someone with access to your keys,” said Detective Ronson with a shrug. “So you gotta be asking yourselves, is anyone’s key missing? Did one of you duplicate a key and give it to someone? What about the two guys you live with? One of them a little shady?”

  Ali, Harper, Katie—even Mandy—said absolutely nothing.

  Naturally, the detectives promised to do everything they could to find the perps and recover the stolen belongings. Before leaving, MacMillan wagged his finger at them. “Know what I think? One of you knows more than you’re saying. This was an inside job.”

  Ali felt herself crumbling. It didn’t take a sage or seer to know exactly how this was going to play out.

  The Blame Game

  Mitch could not look at Alefiya without glaring. He didn’t bother to hide his disgust with her. Or with himself.

  Saturday afternoon, he jogged along the shoreline, his bandaged right hand still throbbing nearly a week later. Damn! Why hadn’t he trusted his instinct instead of convincing himself that Ali’s slovenliness was just a minor nuisance? Her laissez-faire attitude was a major character flaw; he should have nipped it in the bud before it led to disaster.

  Mandy had nailed it, right from the jump. But Mitch had convinced himself he wasn’t judgmental like that anymore. Just because they’d grown up in poverty and the small-minded attitudes of the city housing projects didn’t mean he still was like that. He’d gotten out. He’d earned a scholarship to Harvard, he’d evolved, he didn’t make snap judgments about people based on one character trait. He was worldly, worthy of Leonora and her family, primed and poised to jump into that life, as if he’d been born to it.

  And now that was gone. Slipped through his grasp like sand through his fingers. All because the money he’d put in the “Engagement Ring” envelope, all that he’d saved by living in a cheapo place, by playing janitor so he could pay less in rent, everything he’d so carefully put aside to buy his better life—all of it was gone, stolen.

  All because Ali had been sloppy. He was convinced of it. How many keys had she lost? Like he didn’t know Harper had replaced them. Katie had snitched.

  How many keys had Ali—despite her denials—given to her “friends”? She used the place as a damn crash pad, which he’d tried to curtail. But Joss, the big strong silent hero, had defended her, insisted she had the right to as many guests as she wanted. Mitch wondered how Joss, who’d lost two precious guitars in the robbery, felt about Ali now?

  Mitch cursed himself for not dealing with her right after the party. That’s when he ought to have shut her down, kicked her out for breaking the rules. She’d have gone, too, ridden her guilt on the next bus back to Tufts.

  But no, he hadn’t handled it that way. He was bigger than that. Any fool knew there’d be a party; he just didn’t know who’d break the rule first. When it turned out to be Alefiya Sunjabi, he was secretly glad. By taking it all in stride, he’d shown that he bore her no prejudice, treated her as he’d have treated Katie had she invited a hundred strangers to trash their house.

  Good call, he chastised himself bitterly as he finally ran out of steam, panting for breath. Schmuck.

  Without the money, he couldn’t hope to buy a ring. Without use of his right hand, he couldn’t even work for the next couple of weeks. Let alone take on a second job, which he contemplated. So much for building the ring fund back up. Without it, what did he have to offer the ever-more-distant Leonora?

  Katie knew this was Ali’s fault. Unlike Mitch, she couldn’t show her contempt since, comparatively, she’d barely lost anything in the robbery. Just her Vera Bradley suitcases, which the thieves probably used to carry out their booty. Which sucked, since she’d planned to sell them. But it was a far cry from having your money, your guitars, or, like Mandy, your jewelry (tacky as it was) stolen.

  The cash Katie had been saving was every bit as crucial to her life as Mitch’s was to his. (So were the prescription drugs she’d been hoarding, which she could totally sell.)

  But she’d been cagier than transparent, trusting Mitch. She hadn’t left her currency in an envelope underneath her mattress! Hello? Her Charlesworth brain was always working: Even her oblivious mother knew that much about her.

  True, the low-class losers who’d ripped and slashed their way through the cottage had come close, ransacking the closet she and Harper shared. But even they wouldn’t bother with a pile of extra rolls of toilet paper—let alone, think to look inside the hollow cardboard tubes of the Charmin. All four triple-ply were stuffed with bundles of cash, every bit of what she’d earned and/or snagged from Brian had been squirreled away. She’d outfoxed the robbers.

  Katie sat on the floor, legs pretzeled beneath her, and counted her cash. She was up to $3,000. She felt relieved, if not safe. She’d ducked the cops the night of the party, but the investigation of the robbery—they’d taken the names of everyone in the house—meant there now existed a police record of exactly where she was. Anyone could find her now, anyone could find the truth. The diva was in a dive, partying on someone else’s dime every night, while she toiled in some drone job during the day. Not for charity or social causes, but because she needed the money.

  Her parents could find her, if they wanted to. Anyone could.

  Here it was, August, and she still had no real plan to escape the spiderweb, the mesh of lies her stupid parents had woven, to elude being punished along with them, for nothing she had done.

  So maybe Nate? She didn’t know exactly how he could help, but he was smart, as well as rich. Maybe if he understood her predicament, he’d think of a way out.

  As for Alefiya Sunjabi? If Katie never saw her again, it would be too soon.

  Harper stuck up for Ali. “You have no proof,” she scolded Katie.

  “It’s circumstantial,” she told Mitch.

  Those two made no secret of their guilty verdict. Privately, though, as she sat on the beach writing in her journal, Harper conceded there was more than a good chance Ali’s sloppy habits, and open-door policy, had indeed led to the robbery. She’d personally replaced Ali’s lost keys twice.

  Ali’s denials counted for something, Harper reminded herself. She’d taken full responsibility for the party, had even ponied up as much of the damage-repair expenses as she could afford. If this robbery had been her fault, Harper believed Alefiya would own it.

  But just because she hadn’t intentionally handed her keys to one of her guests didn’t mean it hadn’t gone down that way. Who, aside from Alefiya, had so many random guests, anyway?

  Harper gazed out at the ocean. A lone jogger stopped to catch his breath.

  Mitch.

  She’d lived with him nearly two months now, and stood by her first impression: J.Crew-guy was stand-up, square-shouldered, straight-laced, and … pure. Her heart broke, he was so misguided in his misery.

  What she wouldn’t do to run up to him now, take him by the shoulders, and shake some sense into him. “Dude, you should thank Ali. Good you can’t buy the cheating bitch a ring. Leonora’s not worthy of you!”

  Harper sat still. No way could she crush him now—even Joss agreed. Now was not the time to tell what Harper had seen.

  Thinking about Joss, she went back to the poem that’d go with Joss’s music. She was into him, no matter that
she didn’t want to be. She almost wished he’d do something crappy, reveal his inner asshole.

  Only, not. Joss had remained amazingly cool. He’d lost two of his precious guitars, which he so didn’t have the money to replace—and yet, had not rushed to judgment, had sided with her in defending Ali.

  “Hey, Shakespeare, ever thought-a writing a movie? That’s where the money is.”

  Harper looked up and frowned. Mandy, in a barely there bikini, slinging a towel over her shoulder, plopped down in the sand next to her.

  Crude, rude Mandy had been strangely subdued after the robbery, neither blaming nor supporting Ali. It had come out that she and Mitch were childhood friends—which now made a lot of sense to Harper. It explained tons about why these two opposites were so alike. And explained why Mitch’s meltdown had pulled Mandy out of terminal self-absorption.

  “How come you’re not at Muscle Beach?” Harper inquired. “Isn’t that where the daily manhunt takes place?”

  Mandy slipped off her bikini top, exposing herself to the sun. “I need to get an all-over tan. My photo shoot is in a few days.”

  “You’re not posing nude, are you?”

  “Why? Ya worried about me?”

  Harper found that she was. “I just wouldn’t want to see you—or anyone—being exploited, or taken advantage of. That’s all.”

  Harper was partly right about Joss. Losing his guitars had bummed him out, but not nearly as much as Mitch’s behavior did. Joss had witnessed more than his share of meltdowns in twenty-one years, but he felt worst about this poor dumb housemate. All that pent-up good-guy rage had just spontaneously combusted! Mitch had not recovered emotionally—and he didn’t even know the truth about Leonora yet.

  It was Joss who went ahead and contacted the owners of the house. It hadn’t surprised him that they didn’t, in fact, have theft insurance. Nor did they care to replace the furniture. The summer share clients would just have to deal. Soon enough, it was all good riddance, anyway. They should count themselves lucky the owners of the shit-shack weren’t suing them!