“Fortunately, she makes a fine living as a cardiologist, so she should be able to step into those monthly payments, no problem,” I say. Jamie lets out a small squeak but doesn’t try to protest.
Beth stands, hands on hips. “How can you talk like this, talk about Sunny like this? I never really knew any of you, did I? None of you are what you seem.”
Amelia smiles at Beth and holds up her wineglass. “Haven’t you figured it out by now, Beth? That’s the Theta Gamma Mu way. None of us are what we seem. Could you pour me some wine, dear?”
I smile at both of them. “Well, somehow Beth here comes across as the saint in all this, smelling like a rose as always. She’salways been exactly what she seemed,” I say. “Boring to the bitter end, but at least she isn’t a killer like Jamie.”
Beth’s face is blanched white, and she looks like she’s going to faint. She begins to speak, opens her mouth, but nothing comes out. Clearly, she’s still processing the fresh shock of Jamie’s confession.
“Oh, fine,” Amelia says, standing. “I’ll get my own bloody refill.”
The only sound in the room is the gurgling of the wine pouring into the glass. Amelia walks back to the table, studying Jamie as she sits in her chair, head down.
“Here’s what I don’t understand, Jay,” Amelia says. “Were you so uptight around Brett this weekend because you thought he’d recognize you from our college days? I mean, that was a long time ago. But I guess you had to be worried he could, if he recognized you, expose your past drug use. I guess that could be a problem for a doctor.”
Jamie looks up at Amelia. I watch her face fall again.
“What is it?” I ask her. “What’s wrong now?”
Jamie tilts her head back, stares up at the ceiling, and then returns her gaze to Amelia. “I wasn’t worried about him recognizing me from back in college. I knew he would recognize me. Because he’s still my dealer. Or was.”
40
Amelia
I can’t help but gasp as the pieces fall into place. It all makes perfect sense. No wonder Brett made such a point of flirting with Jamie as soon as he arrived. And during the pickleball tournament, even forcing her to be his partner. He’d been toying with her, enjoying the fact that he had a connection to her that no one else knew about, that no one else could know about. What a jerk. And I’m the idiot who brought him along this weekend. I wonder if that’s the entire reason he came with me—to torment Jamie.
Jamie sits in her chair, still as a statue, staring at the table in front of her. Part of me wants to go to her side and give her a hug. But that’s a very small part of me, so I stay put. Plus, with all this wine in my system, that’s a long way down the table to travel. I cannot believe Brett. And here I thought he was just a pretty face to have fun with over the weekend.
“You’re an addict?” Roxy says with a bit too much joy in her voice.
Across the table from me, Beth bites her lip, lost in thought.
“I’m an addict,” Jamie says. “I tried to quit after Sunny died, but I couldn’t. I graduated addicted. I went through med school addicted, started my career addicted. And I still am, to this day. Last month, I decided to try to get clean and wean myself off the drugs, but Brett didn’t like that idea, not at all.”
“So he came here to give you a message, didn’t he?” I ask. And here I thought he was actually into me. I’m an idiot.
“Yep, I’m one of his biggest customers,” Jamie says. “He told me he was here to send me a message, to let me know he’d ruin my life and expose my addiction if I didn’t keep buying pills from him.”
“What a piece of shit,” I say. “I really had no idea about all of this.”
“I know you didn’t,” Jamie says. “I’m good at hiding this part of my life, from everyone.”
“But how do you hold it all together? Your job, your kids? And Greer doesn’t know?” Beth says. “I don’t understand.”
“I’ve gotten skilled at hiding, like most addicts. We’re sneaky,” she says. “I never stopped, couldn’t stop. And Brett was there all along. As a pharmacist, he has easy access to what I need. We even work for the same hospital system.”
I try to see the addict in Jamie, but all I see is her outward perfection, her career, her loving family. “I don’t know how you’re doing this,” I say. “I mean, everybody knows I have too much ofthis stuff.” I hold up my glass of wine. “I wouldn’t be able to hide this from anyone.”
“Well, I have had a lot of practice managing to show up for my patients, my kids, my husband. I convinced myself I could keep my two lives separate,” she says. She looks up from the table, tears in her eyes. “I even had sex with Brett sometimes, when I was short on cash. It was part of the price I had to pay to keep my life running smoothly.”
Whoa. I mean, we did have fun fooling around, but I didn’t need to have sex with Brett for drugs. That’s a whole other level. And I don’t want to think about them together.
“Brett kept making remarks to you. I heard him,” I say. “It was irritating me, but it must have terrified you. All those little digs about how you’re such a rule follower, what a great doctor you are, how lucky Greer is.”
“He was warning me. Letting me know he had the power to expose me to Greer, to all of you, for the fraud that I am,” Jamie says with a sad shrug.
“What a jerk,” I say. “Sounds like he deserved to die.”
