Prosecution: Then how did you end up in Eliza Tate’s living room on the afternoon of February 13?
FIFTEEN
Six Months Before
August 2018
Penny gasped at the price. Three dollars for a stupid can of beans? She stood there, blocking the aisle as she hugged a plastic basket to her chest, gazing at the can in her hands like it was a brick of solid gold. At the Mexican supermarket down the street from her apartment, she could buy a bag of dried beans for eighty-nine cents that would last her a week. This was highway robbery.
Still, Penny plunked the damn beans in her basket with a frustrated flourish before stomping toward the front of the store. Swinging by the cold case, she nabbed a stupid Fiji water and added that to her tab, too. When she reached the meat section, however, she lost her nerve. The price stamped across the chicken breasts was just too much. Instead, she reached for a head of lettuce that was two shocking dollars more expensive than it needed to be.
Then again, that was the price tag of her field trip to the ritzy grocery stores near Beverly Hills. Heading over to the sample cart, Penny snagged two chunks of cheese instead of the customary one. If she was going to donate half her savings to this stupid store, they could at least feed her lunch.
She was halfway into the cheesecake sample at the bakery when she felt the hand on her arm. Choking down a bite of buttery crust, she turned and pasted a look of surprise on her face.
“Penny?” Roman’s voice asked a question, but the look in his eyes said he wasn’t fooled. “What are you doing in my neck of the woods?”
“Oh, hi.” The cheesecake was suddenly sticky. Penny swallowed. Again. “Just doing the weekly grocery shopping.”
Roman’s eyes flicked to her dismal basket. In his arms, Penny noted, was a spread of delicacies. Fresh produce, beautiful fruits, packages of meats and cheese, and even a bottle of champagne. What’s he celebrating? she wondered aimlessly.
“I see,” Roman said. “That looks like some diet.”
“Just the essentials today. How about you?”
“Same,” he said. “Just on my way out.”
“Me too.”
Penny scurried toward the register first, as if that would make her cover story hold water. She wasn’t convinced Roman believed her. She wasn’t convinced she cared.
“We’re together.” Roman’s voice rolled warmly over Penny’s shoulder as she set her basket next to the clerk. “Please ring these up together.”
Penny’s shoulders went rigid. “You don’t have to—”
“You’ve barely got anything.” Roman waved her arguments away. “It’s not worth the paper of two receipts. You’re saving the world, Penny Sands, one receipt at a time. You can’t say no to that, can you?”
“I couldn’t possibly.”
She played along, wondering how on earth they’d gone from their awkward last encounter to this playful, exciting one. And just like that, like the snap of a breadstick, Penny thought they were back on track.
Once they’d checked out and each held her bag—one significantly more full than the other—Penny and Roman walked side by side out the sliding doors. She glanced sideways at him and wondered if this was what it would feel like. Their life, if they were ever allowed to live it together. Grocery shopping, cracking jokes, smiling beneath a sunny day.
“Where’s your car?” Roman asked. “I can walk you to it.”
“I took the bus.”
“The bus?”
“You know, the big thing with wheels that carts people around town.”
“I’ll give you a ride home,” Roman said. “Where do you live?”
“That’s really not—”
“Hollywood?”
Penny wondered if Roman had checked her files or if it was a lucky guess. Maybe it didn’t make a difference.
“Hollywood,” she confirmed. Then, on a whim, “I guess if you’re not busy…”
The car ride to Penny’s apartment started out quiet. They passed the first few minutes listening to easy jazz, staring out the windows. There were a million questions Penny wanted to ask, but to do so would ruin the day. After two city blocks in tense silence, Penny made the snap decision to relax and enjoy. To let Roman make the first move this time around. Penny had cued him up. It was time to let him take the reins.
Twenty minutes later, and Roman hadn’t taken a swing. The two had managed bits of small talk as they cruised through the palm tree–lined streets but had avoided anything of substance. In a sense, it was almost a relief—the normalcy of it all.
“I’m right here,” Penny said finally, gesturing toward her building. “Thank you so much for the ride.”
“You’re not going to invite me up?”
Penny wiped her sweaty palms on her lap. When she glanced over at Roman, she saw him give her a teasing smile, but a sparkling challenge glistened in his eyes. She wasn’t sure what to make of it.
“I don’t have a great place,” she said. “Sadly, the inside’s not much better than the outside.”
They both stared at the outside for a moment.
“I think that’s a wise decision,” Roman said, his lips flickering in another quick smile as he turned back. “It was nice seeing you today.”
“Roman…” Penny heaved a breath.
She wanted to ask what they were doing. Why he was so kind and friendly to her sometimes, and why, other times, he was cold and distant. But she couldn’t vocalize those questions, because they might ruin everything. She’d learned from Ryan Anderson that sometimes, less was more. More could quickly become too much. And too much was…suffocating.
“It was nice to see you, too.” Penny climbed out of the car, ripping her gaze from Roman’s before they broke their peaceful moment. “I guess I’ll see you around.”
She rushed inside, hoofed it upstairs. She was just putting away her paltry items when there was a knock on the door. Penny just about fainted onto her can of beautiful, overpriced beans. Three dollars was a small price to pay for the day she’d had. Especially if it involved Roman coming upstairs because he’d found he just couldn’t stay away.
Rushing to the door, Penny pulled it open, her heart sinking as she found Lucky standing there instead. He wore a stained wifebeater and pinched a cigarette between his lips. He held a grocery bag in his hands.
“Some asshole left this outside my door with your name on it,” Lucky said. “Is it the same asshole who keeps sending you flowers?”
“I—” Penny didn’t think Ryan’s incessant flower sending was a particularly asshole-ish move, but apparently it annoyed her landlord. “Sorry.”
“Tell your suitor that deliveries need to be left outside your door,” Lucky said. “Next time they leave something outside my door…it’s mine.”
“Understood.”
Penny reached for the bag of groceries and drew it to her. She kicked the door shut behind her and immediately went to the couch and deposited it on the cushion next to her. On top, there was a note: Enjoy. —Roman
Penny pressed the note to her chest. It was written in pencil on the back of a receipt for gas—something that had probably been sitting in Roman’s glove compartment. Then she set it down and reached for the bag.