22. Piper

22

PIPER

JANUARY 2, 3:50 P.M.

Aiden starts to speak, but I beat him to it.

"Where the hell did you get this?"

"I—" He stops, and his expression changes from panic to something unexpected. Relief. "You know."

Confusion makes me hesitate, but I won't back down. "I asked you a question."

"It's not mine."

"Bullshit."

Aiden's gaze locks on the invitation in my hand. And then, when he seems to conclude that I'm not letting him get out of this, "If I explain, I need you to swear that you won't tell anyone."

"Why?"

"Piper—"

"Sorry, but this feels like a pretty conditional situation. I can't exactly keep it a secret if you're about to tell me you committed a felony."

"Okay, fair." He puts his water bottle down and slumps into a chair. "If I can swear this isn't related to a federal crime, will you trust me?"

I meet his eyes, searching for a shred of duplicity in their sticky honey brown, but all I see is desperation.

"Fine." Some instinct for professionalism moves me to offer a handshake, and he takes it. When his fingers close around mine, an almost electric current shoots up to my wrist, but I tell myself it's because his hand is cool from the water bottle. Simple physics. "Don't make me regret this, Ortiz. Now where the hell did you get that invitation?"

He lets go of my hand and clasps his own together on the table. "I found it a few days ago, addressed to one of the Deus members."

"Who?" When he hesitates, I press harder. "If your main concern is protecting the anonymity of some old guy, I'm going to have a hard time trusting you."

"I know. I'm just trying to figure out how to—" His eyes drop to the table. "Look, there are things going on inside Deus that you may not… know about."

He's speaking like it's physically hard to get the words out, and I realize, suddenly, that he thinks he's protecting me. My fragile image of my family traditions, how glorious and important it all is.

I cross my arms. "Try me."

He finally looks at me. "What do you know?"

"I'm asking the questions."

He gives a small flash of a smile. "You're killing it with the bad-cop thing, but I'm trying to put this together, too. Maybe help me out a little?"

I want to argue, but there's something about the way he's looking at me, all pleading, that makes my brain briefly turn into mush.

"Fine." I smooth my skirt, suddenly unable to look at him, either. "I may or may not have heard about the Pierrot from Milford on New Year's. Now what do you know about it? Are you a member?"

"No."

"Is your dad?"

Aiden gets this look that I hate—one that says there's something obvious I'm not seeing. "We're not exactly welcome there."

An uneasy feeling squirms in my stomach. I think I know why, but still, I ask, "What do you mean?"

"As far as some people are concerned, my dad shouldn't be in Deus, let alone the Pierrot. I know membership is technically ‘nondiscriminatory' now, as long as you've got the money and connections to work your way in, but there was still pushback from the old guard when Dad joined. Some of them weren't too happy about having the son of Mexican immigrants in their little club."

The uneasy feeling deepens. I know about Deus's ugly, racist roots. Almost all of the oldest Krewes were segregated at first. It wasn't until the nineties that the city outlawed discrimination, ordering any groups that didn't comply to forfeit their parade licenses. Most Krewes, like Deus, wised up and changed with the times, but others clung to their exclusionary practices, canceling their public parades and choosing instead to host only private balls. Some of them do to this day, claiming their refusal to be inclusive is some kind of First Amendment right. Still, I thought Deus was different. A week ago, I would have balked at the idea that anyone in our Krewe is so openly bigoted. But now…

"I think that's why the Pierrot exists," Aiden continues. "Or at least partly. These old-line guys wanted to go back to a time when they didn't have to hide who they were, so they started a group that would let them do it."

As soon as he says it, I know, without a doubt, that it's true.

"How do you know about the Pierrot?" I ask.

"I first heard about it last semester. The Les Masques invitations had just come out, so Milford's parents invited all the Dukes and their dads over to celebrate."

I remember that night. Wyatt and Dad were there. Mom and I weren't invited, because, like an echo of Milford's annoying lilt when we made him tell us about the Pierrot: No girls allowed.

"One of the guys from St. Anthony's said something about an after-party," Aiden says. "At the Pierrot. As soon as he said it, the other Dukes got really weird. Milford changed the subject, but the way they were all looking at me… I knew. It was like walking up to a group of people when you know they were just talking about you, only I'd been standing there the whole time. I pressed Milford about the Pierrot later, but he said he couldn't tell me. It was a ‘Carnival secret.'"

It's the exact same phrase he used when we cornered him in the bathroom, and it makes my skin crawl.

"I asked my dad about it when we got home, and he had no idea what I was talking about. But I couldn't leave it alone. I had this feeling, like something big was going on right under our noses. So I started doing research. The first thing I found was about Milford's dad. Last year, when he announced that he was running for mayor, a former employee at his law firm came forward to accuse him of sexual harassment."

My blood goes cold. "I didn't know that."

"It didn't get much attention because two days later, that same employee retracted her statements. There weren't any news items about it after that, but I found her on LinkedIn. She was working at a new firm in Florida. I messaged her, pretending to want advice on applying to her alma mater, and we set up a call. When I asked her about the Pierrot, she shut down. Told me never to contact her again. She seemed terrified."

"You think they ran her out of town," I realize.

"I don't know if they paid her off or just threatened her badly enough to make her leave, but… yeah, I do. And it's not the first time they've done it. I found two other stories almost exactly like this one within the past ten years. An allegation gets made about a prominent Deus member, it gets dropped, and the person who made it leaves town. And it's not just that. Lawsuits against members' companies disappearing, their DUIs getting reduced to smaller charges or going away completely… the past three Louisiana congressmen elected have been pictured at balls or other Krewe events, chumming it up with active Deus members."

I shake my head, like that might make it stop spinning, even though some part of me already knew from the moment I saw that place: they're covering up each other's crimes. Exchanging favors. Maybe even rigging elections.

"And now," Aiden says, gesturing at the invitation, "they're ‘welcoming their newest brothers.' It's like a cult. They're building their ranks. Indoctrinating people."

"I know," I say. "I've been."

"What?"

The rest of it rushes out of me before I can stop myself. "They have this club in the Quarter. They all meet there and wear masks and bring these young women and—" I shut my eyes for a second, commanding myself to keep it together. "We think they might have something to do with Lily's disappearance."

"Piper…" His face is so full of concern that some instinct in me wants to deny it, if only to make him stop looking at me like that. "How did you end up there? And who's ‘we'?"

"Me, April, and Vivian. We've been investigating ever since Lily went missing. We sort of blackmailed Milford into taking us to the Pierrot. And…"

I hesitate. It feels like I'm standing on the edge of something, like if I finally accept April's theory, say it out loud, it will make it true. And I still don't know if I can trust him.

But right now, who else do I have?

I take a breath and pray I can rely on the sanctity of the handshake.

"We think someone at the Pierrot might have killed Margot Landry. And Lily might have known about it."

I watch as Aiden takes it in, my hands shaky with adrenaline—not just because I said it out loud. But because now that I have, I realize I might really believe it.

"Shit," he says finally. "So that stunt at the ball, with the projections of Margot…"

"We think it's all connected. The Pierrot is the reason Lily's missing."

"Like how they forced those other women to leave town," Aiden says. "Or…"

I can feel us both reaching the same conclusion. If Aiden's suspicions are right, then this wouldn't be the first time the Pierrot has run someone out of the city for knowing too much. But there's more than one way to make a girl disappear. And if the Pierrot is truly capable of murder…

With a sudden jolt, I realize just how badly I screwed up by telling April and Vivian we should stop investigating. Because Lily knew exactly what the Pierrot was doing. She knew what they did to Margot, and she was planning to tell us that morning at the Den. But if the Pierrot found out, they would have done anything to keep her quiet. Even if, I realize, that meant withdrawing money from her account, making it look like she ran away.

Even if it meant killing another Queen.

April was right. I've been wanting so badly for everything to be fine that I practically covered my eyes as the evidence piled up in front of me. But now?

Now I'm making up for lost time.

"Come on." I push out of my chair and start to shove my things into my bag. "We have to find April and Vivian."

"We?"

I stop. This time, I can't fight the flush as I look back at him, his warm eyes and the little smirk on his face. "Don't feel too proud of yourself."

He smiles wider. "Wouldn't dream of it."

And then his smile fades. The look in his eyes is dead serious.

"What?"

"If there was something else," he says carefully, "something that would hurt you… would you want to know?"

My stomach drops as I realize where he's looking. The invitation, still in my hand.

"Tell me," I say.

He takes the sort of breath you take when you know what you say next is going to shatter everything. Still, I'm not prepared for the impact.

"I found that invitation at your house on New Year's," he says. "It was addressed to your dad."