Page 45 of Road Queens
Sidney was giving Amanda the a-little-harsh-doncha-think look, which was deserved. As soon as the words were out, Amanda wished them back.You hate her and never want to see her again. Or you missed her and want to help her. Or you hate her but want to help her. Make. Up. Your. Mind.
Give me a break, internal nagger. It’s been all of two days.
Just so. Because it wasn’t simply a matter of forgiving Cassandra and weaving a spell, and abracadabra, they would all be friends again, riding and living together.
The only problem with that was that they weren’t friends. They had never been friends. Cassandra and Sidney and Amanda had been only children. Not a single one of them had a sibling or even a cousin. So they created a sisterhood. They made their own family, and that family created OpStar out of nothing but the pictures in Cassandra’s mind.
And she shit on all of it. People always assumed Sidney was the mean one, because they were unobservant idiots. Sidney was a pile of sentimental mush, which she camouflaged with smirks and profanity. By contrast, Amanda held on to grudges like dragons hoarded treasure. Small wonder Sidney had been ready to haul ass to the Minneapolis police station, while Amanda would have been fine staying in her Hole.
“So that skinny little fuck who bopped up and watched us pack Dinah’s shit,” Sidney was saying, “that was college-age Sean, prebadge? Huh.”
Cassandra nodded. “I see it now, but ... if he hadn’t reminded Amanda where we saw him, I wouldn’t have remembered him either.”
True, but that was more because when Cassandra was Starfishing, she reminded Amanda of a line fromThe Other Boleyn Girl: “Anne always had a vision like a lantern with the shutters down. She only ever shone in one direction.”
In Cassandra’s case, she was always entirely focused on the abusee and getting them out. And then moving on to the next and the next and the et cetera.
And if the abusee went back? Well. Cass tended toward the you-had-a-chance-and-you-blew-it-so-best-of-luck-and-we’re-out-of-here mindset.
Cassandra Rivers’s upbringing was responsible for her bestandworst qualities.
“So in addition to a stalker alert—”
“He didn’t come near us for years,” Amanda pointed out. “He didn’t seek us out until Cass was in trouble. How is that stalking? Although there may or may not be an obsession board in play.”
“—we should see this as good news,” Sidney finished. “Cass was never under arrest; the cop isn’t a cop; Cass doesn’t know the dead guy; we don’t know the dead guy; they’ve got nothin’; the end. And nobody’s even hired this guy, right?”
“Not so far.”
“Okay then. This is good. Things are starting to make sense, a little. We didn’t think you killed anybody, Cassandra.”
Amanda coughed. “Sidney’s not speaking for me.”
“But we were worried you’d go down for something else. From, um. Earlier.”
“Thoughtful! And nothing at all to do with protecting yourselves from five years of fallout, hmm?” But Cass said it with a grin.
“Right. Nothing to do with that. So ... we good?”
Amanda blinked. “Is that it, then? We all go back to our lives? Our bikes, our obsessions with dead writers, supper for breakfast, dessert first, clinic notes addressing the heartbreak of incontinence?”
“Hey, don’t joke about that,” Sidney said. “Incontinence isn’t funny if you’re the one pissing yourself in the grocery store in front of a feral pack of giggling nose pickers.”
“Noted. Sorry.”Shit. I forgot how zealously Sidney guards her clinic patients and their dignity.“So we’re agreed? This is done?”
“Yeah. I mean, I did just give a whole lecture on how we’re not detectives; we’re the embodiment of amateur.”
Cass smiled. “Sorry I missed that.”
“Let the real cops handle it,” Sidney finished.
“Not sure that’s the best idea either,” Amanda muttered, remembering what had driven Beane to quit.
Sidney read her mind. “Oh, come on. Hashtag ‘not all cops,’ right?”
“... right. Okay, so I’ll let Beane know and that’ll be that.”
“You’ll let him know?” Cass asked.
