Page 74 of Dark Ugly Places

“Yeah. If they did it, I think the Redferns should go to jail. That’s the right thing, isn’t it?”

My eyes roam over her as I stand from the breakfast stool. “Listen, this isn’t a Marvel movie. I’m not your superhero, and you’re not my sidekick. We’re not in this together. We are not making them go to jail. That’s not how this works.”

Emmy stands from the stool. She stares me down. “Yes, it is.”

My breath quickens. I feel that same anger lurking. This is the soul that pushed me into the dark fifteen years ago and sent me away for nine long months. Now she’s giving orders once again. Who does she think she is? “What the fuck did you say to me?”

“I said ‘Yes. It. Is.’ It is how it works. If you figure out that they did it, we can tell the police, and they will arrest them.” Her chest rises and falls.

“Emmy, did it ever cross your mind that for obvious reasons we can’t involve the police?”

A look of confusion clouds her eyes. “Wait. What? No police? Martha, that’s insane. What are you going to do then?”

“I have my own ways of getting even. That’s all you need to know.”

Again, her breathing grows heavy. “Does my mom know about this?”

“Honey, this is why your mom called me, okay? Now leave it alone.”

She shakes her head, her brow furrowed with concern. “This doesn’t feel right. My mom isn’t like this.”

“Perhaps you don’t know your mom as well as you think you do.”

“I know my mom, Martha.”

“Do you? Do you really?” I lean forward. “Because I was there with her long before you were even born. Did you know that?”

Nicola comes toward me from within, her arms and legs scratching at me, a deep caterwauling in my throat wanting to come out. I suppress it and swallow.

When Nicola got pregnant, I went away for nine whole months. It was really very stifling, all those souls in one body. How selfish of her, though. Casting me out to bring in someone else for a term. Being forced into the darkest of places can be torture. What do you call that? I call it exile.

Until the moment Emmy showed up, I thought I was everything to her. But it was different, she said, having someone she could actually touch and feel growing inside her. A real person, a real body with a life of her own.

Having children is like having a God complex. I brought you into this world, and I can take you out again. That sort of thing. Nicola’s father used to say that to her when she was little. He had a God complex, too. I think that’s why he didn’t like it when I made him realize he didn’t have any of God inside him. He was just a man who had let Nicola down in all sorts of ways. I tried to shield her, and yes, there were times when I tried to take him from her, but she wouldn’t let me. I see him now in that basement and shake away the thought.

“Now stop asking questions and let me do my job.”

“This is my life, too,” Emmy protests, her voice rising. “I get to have a say.”

“Not on this you don’t.”

Her breathing quickens once more; her chest rises up and down. I think I even notice her hands shaking.

Emmy’s eyes are full, her nostrils flared. “They killed my dad. They did this to me,” she says, twitching her head to the side and pointing to her scar. “They took my mom and turned her into some crazy person. Our lives weren’t perfect before, but at least we were normal. We were fine. They ruined everything, and they got away with it!” she screams. “You think I’m going to stand here while you do nothing?”

“Emmy, that’s not the plan. Calm down, okay?”

“Did you know it was broad daylight? We were in a crosswalk! Now my father is dead because of him. Dead, Martha!”

Emmy’s sobs echo through the kitchen. Scotch cowers under the counter and begins to whimper. I know Nicola can hear them, and she’s close now. Too close.

“Okay. Fine!” I concede. “You can help.”

Emmy tears up, then wipes her fist across her eyes.

“You know what this means?”

“I think so,” she says, her breath shallow.