I turned to stare as her mask fell away. And suddenly I saw her for what she truly was. A young woman, poor, scared, desperate. And all my jealousy fell away. The fear and the anger dissolved, too, leaving only the truth behind, like a residue after all the lesser elements have burned away.
“You’re trying to poison me, aren’t you?”
She shook her head. “The foxglove was designed to make you feel sick and weak and lethargic. To keep you from running away. To keep you here until I went into labor. I’m sorry about that. I truly am. But I can’t ... I can’t help Dickie with the rest. I won’t.”
The top of my scalp prickled. “What do you mean ...the rest?”
“The locks.” She grimaced as she waved a limp hand toward the door. “He reversed them.”
I rose from the cot and examined the door to the fallout shelter. The dead bolt, the throw bolt, and the hook and eye bolt. Everything used to be on the inside. Now the door to the fallout shelter locks from theoutside.
I shuddered. “Why would—”
“He wants to lock you inside the fallout shelter. Then he’ll shut the garage door and start the car. There’s this small hole, above us, in the corner of the garage. He’ll kill you with carbon monoxide poisoning.”
My body froze. “And then tell everyone I died in childbirth.”
She nodded, eyes enormous in her pale face. “After you’re ... dead ... he’ll haul your body upstairs. He’ll stage it all. Everything ... that comes out of my body will bolster his story. The bloody sheets ... the afterbirth ... the placenta. He’ll call the doctor, and it will all look so convincing. So obvious. No one will bother to examine you. No one will doubt his story. Not when there’s a dead woman and live baby lying in his bed.”
“What happens to you?”
“I stay. We get married.” Her lip twisted and her face went hard. “And then we live happily ever after.”
I rubbed my hands over my face and sat down beside her on the cot. “I’m so incredibly stupid.”
“No, you’re not.” She reached out to touch my arm and I flinched and pulled away. “You’re kind and trusting and good, so it would never occur to you to do something this depraved.”
“Why are you telling me this?” I turned to face her. “Isn’t this what you wanted? With me out ofthe way you get to raise your own child. You have a husband to claim your ...” I can’t bring myself to say the word.
“I have a husband to claim my bastard?”
“Yes.”
“I was fine with giving you my child. I was fine with you raising my baby and pretending it’s yours. But I’m not fine with murdering you and then taking your place as Dickie’s wife.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s wrong,” she said simply.
“Ah yes. And you’re such a moral person.”
“I’m not a bad person.” She looked hurt.
“You sure fooled me. You’re sleeping with my husband.”
“That’s not ... it’s not what you think.”
I thought back to the mattress above my head. “What else could it possibly be?”
“Look, when I started having contractions this morning, Dickie told me to lock you in the fallout shelter. And I think we should still do that.”
“Why on earth would I let you—”
“Just listen. Please.” She winced and pressed her hands into her back. Then she turned her pale face toward me. “I lock you in here. I have the baby. And then I leave.”
“How does that help me?”
“If I’m gone, he can’t kill you. He needs a wife. And he needs a mother for the baby. You’ll be safe, once I give birth.”
