The view was of a small stairwell. Pandy heard voices and stuck her head out.
SondraBeth’s back was to her. She was having a heated discussion with a rubbery-faced man in a T-shirt. SondraBeth said something and the man laughed, his man-boobs jiggling under the fabric.
Pandy frowned, recognizing the man’s voice. He was Freddie the Rat, part of the old Joules crowd. Apparently SondraBeth had remained in touch with him.
Pandy withdrew her head. She heard a short knock and went to the door.
SondraBeth was standing on the threshold. She had changed her outfit, and was now wearing high-tech white workout gear with silver piping. In each hand was a shopping bag bearing the Monica logo.
“Hellenor,” she said, striding into the room.
Oh no. Pandy sighed. Not this again. She clomped to the door in Hellenor’s old construction boots and shut it firmly behind her. “Squeege,” she began.
“I’m so glad you’re here,” SondraBeth said warmly.
“I’m glad you’re here, too,” Pandy said as SondraBeth turned away to head into the bedroom. “I’ve been waiting for you,” Pandy said, annoyed. “We need to clear some things up. Like the fact that I’m—”
“I don’t have long.” SondraBeth dropped the shopping bags on the bed and gave Pandy her most brilliant Monica smile. “There’s been a change of plans. The Woman Warrior of the Year Awards are today, and thanks to your sister’s sudden death, they want me to present the award to you.”
“To me?” Pandy gasped. She looked at SondraBeth. Was it possible SondraBeth really didn’t know she was Pandy? “That is not going to happen.”
“Why not? It happens all the time,” SondraBeth said. She pawed through one of the shopping bags and held out a tissue-wrapped package to Pandy. “People die, and other people start giving them awards for having once been alive.”
“But that’s just the problem. I’m still alive.”
SondraBeth pushed the package toward her. “Of course you’re still alive, Hellenor. But it’s Pandy who’s getting the award. You’re accepting it on her behalf.”
Pandy groaned.
“First things first,” SondraBeth chirped, pushing the package into Pandy’s hands. In her friendliest Monica voice, she said, “In appreciation of how special you are, I’d like to gift you with a few of my favorite items from the Monica line.”
Pandy threw the package back onto the bed. “Now, listen—” she snapped, unable to contain her frustration.
“Here, let me help you.” SondraBeth picked up the package and inspected her incredibly sharp nails. Using her middle finger, she neatly sliced through the tissue paper and then, with a flourish, held up a garment.
It was a beautiful white hooded robe, made of the softest, lightest, coziest material Pandy had ever seen. She picked up the sleeve and felt the fabric. “It’s beautiful,” she said with a sigh.
“Isn’t it?” SondraBeth said mournfully, at last dropping the Monica routine. “It’s just the kind of thing your sister would have loved. I remember all those times when the two of us would be lounging around in our robes—”
“Still hung over,” Pandy added.
SondraBeth shot her a sharp glance. “Will you try it on? For me?” She smiled imploringly.
“Okay,” Pandy said. She wasn’t sure what SondraBeth was up to, but the robe was too tempting to resist.
She draped the hood over her head, went into the bathroom, and looked at herself in the mirror as SondraBeth came in behind her. The hood did not disguise the fact that she was bald, and now she looked like some kind of newt. Or rather like a spa refugee with huge, scared eyes.
And suddenly, she was sick to death of this farce.
“Now listen, Squeege,” she said, tearing off the robe and throwing it onto the floor. “If you have to tell me something about Jonny—”
“Jonny.” SondraBeth grimaced. “Now you listen. The truth is that in the last few years—well, your sister and I weren’t exactly friends. I’ll explain why, someday. But in the meantime, I never got the chance to tell her the truth about Jonny.”
SondraBeth leaned past her to reach into the top of the medicine cabinet. “It’s nasty stuff, but Pandy always said you were the kind of person who wouldn’t be swayed by sentiment. Unlike Pandy herself. I always told her she was too emotional about men, but she wouldn’t listen.”
“Is that so?” Pandy said archly.
SondraBeth laughed as she removed a lighter and a pack of cigarettes, which she shook at Pandy. Pandy took one.
“But since you already know Jonny’s a bad guy…” SondraBeth stuck a cigarette into her mouth, lit it, and then lit Pandy’s. SondraBeth inhaled and exhaled quickly, like someone who hasn’t had a smoke for a while. “I happen to know that Jonny owes the mob a lot of money.”
“What?” Pandy began coughing. SondraBeth patted her on the back.
“I know. It sounds shocking, but you have to remember that Jonny was in the restaurant business. He borrowed all this money from the mob. But that’s not the worst of it.”
“There’s more?”
SondraBeth nodded, and with the guilt of someone who knew she shouldn’t be smoking, she took another furtive drag. “That guy who was just here, Freddie the Rat? Your sister and I used to hang out with him. A long time ago.”
“I know all about Freddie,” Pandy sighed.
“Well, Freddie knows all about Jonny. And he told me that if there weren’t any more Monica movies…if Monica were, to say, die”—SondraBeth took another drag—“the mob would go after Jonny for the money he owes them, because they’d know his source of funds had dried up.”
“What are they going to do? Kill him?” Pandy asked sarcastically.
“Don’t be silly,” SondraBeth said. “They’re not going to kill a famous person. They don’t operate like that.”
“How do you know?” Pandy asked.
“Because they do business with famous people. It’s like being a drug dealer, okay? You don’t want to kill your clients.”
“Holy shit,” Pandy said, remembering the Vegas guys Jonny had mentioned; those mumbled phone calls in the bathroom.
“But it’s way more than that,” SondraBeth continued. “He’s been cheating the union guys, too. Who are part of the mob.”
“You mean those people who make deliveries to his restaurants?” Pandy gasped.
“Hey.” SondraBeth’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t tell me you’re in the restaurant business, too.”
“I’m not. I know all about it because I was married to Jonny.”
“What?” SondraBeth nearly dropped her cigarette. “You too?”
“I’m Pandy!” Pandy shouted. “Christ, Squeege. We’ve seen each other naked. Remember that time on the island? You invited me to come and visit you, and then you convinced me to invite Doug there. And then you stole him,” she shrieked.
“I did not!” SondraBeth jumped back in shock.
“Excuse me?”
“That’s not the way it happened. Technically, he wasn’t her boyfriend,” she said quickly.
“What difference does it make? Because after you had sex with Doug, you sent him to me as a present.” Pandy’s voice rose to a screech. “And then, you acted like it was no big deal and I was crazy. Like I was the crazy one who fucks their best friend’s boyfriend behind their back! And you want to know another thing?”
“There’s more?” SondraBeth demanded.
“The last time I looked at you, I saw evil. Pure evil. I saw a serpent come out of your head and swoop down toward me. Well?” Pandy demanded in reaction to SondraBeth’s still-startled expression.