Page 70 of Dark Ugly Places

“There’s a way to put her back. I just need to get a handle on things and figure out exactly what Martha is up to.”

Emmy sighs, an expression of doubt hanging over her eyes. There’s a dark, sleepless quality about them I hadn’t noticed before. My stomach rolls with guilt.

“I think I know what Martha is doing. I’m going to put a stop to this.”

“What is she doing?”

I think for half a second about not telling her, but the impulse to keep Emmy safe is strong. She has to know. “She’s working for Bambi Redfern.”

Emmy’s eyes grow large. “Bambi Redfern? As in Jason Redfern’s wife?”

I nod. “I think so. I’m pretty sure that’s where we’ve been each day, but I can’t say for certain.”

Emmy laughs, cackles really. It’s a hollowed-out, feral sound. “Are you kidding me? That’s unreal. Do you know who they are? Who she is? They’re the definition of rich and famous.”

“Of course.”

“Mom. You have to admit. You’re—she’s—brilliant.”

Martha flicks a hair that tickles deep inside, near my eardrum, and I can hear her laughing. I cringe.

“Listen to me, Em. Martha is not brilliant. She’s crazy. And dangerous. No one can know about this, okay? You can’t tell Nubia, your friends, no one. Do you understand?”

Emmy smiles a little. I can see she’s doubting me already. “Sure I do. But dangerous might not be a bad thing. Dangerous might be just what we need.”

The day is a blur of organizing the house, cleaning, getting things back in order that Martha left awry. I wash Emmy’s clothes and mine, tidy the downstairs, change the sheets upstairs. The work feels easy and quick, and I’m grateful for the distraction from the flashes that keep coming to me from Martha’s week of my life. Broken fragments of thoughts, sounds, scents that belong to her, not me.

After I’m finished, I find Emmy sitting outside the apartment letting the sun hit the side of her head where the scar is still pinkish mocha. I sit down next to her and kiss it gently. Emmy winces.

“I still see the car,” she says. “Even now, the whole accident just keeps replaying in my mind.”

“I know,” I tell her. “It’s the same for me.”

She looks up at me, her golden-brown curls falling to one side in the sunlight. “How long is it supposed to be like that?”

“A while. Maybe longer. I don’t really know.”

Emmy rubs the toe of her shoe with her thumb. She squints and looks at me, the sun catching her brown pupils, making them honeycomb gold. “We’re out of money, aren’t we? That’s why she’s doing this.”

Oddly enough, it’s a relief that this is what she thinks. “Money is tight,” I tell her.

“So maybe what Martha is doing is good, right?”

I shut my eyes for a moment, collapsing the world into gray light. “No, I don’t think so.”

Emmy gives me a skeptical look. “Well, she got you a job with Bambi and Jason Redfern, and she’s making money. Isn’t that a good thing?”

I take her arm and fold it onto my lap. The loops of bracelets and chains are cool against my leggings. “Martha doesn’t always think things through. She just acts.”

Emmy listens, her eyes fixed on the ground. “She’s impulsive, but so are you, Mom.”

I turn to face her. “I know it’s hard for you to understand, but she doesn’t get right from wrong. She doesn’t think like that.”

“Well, what does she think like?”

I feel my spine stiffen. I’m unsure what to say. How to describe the woman who has both saved me and destroyed me—my crusader, my protector, my unearthly shame? “Remember how we talked about getting even?”

Emmy nods. “Yep.”