Page 94 of The Woman I’ve Become

He pulls out his phone and taps the screen. “See.” He chuckles. “Unless you were inviting someone else to please come.”

Please come back. I need you.

Shock rocks through me. “I . . . I tried to call you.”

Phillip makes a face. “I must have been in a dead zone.” The worry in his eyes deepens. “Are you all right, Jules? You’re scaring me just a little.”

He might be scared a little, but I am fucking terrified. The one surefire way to retake full control over me in this evolving situation was to bring my daughter back.

I see the ending now.

The only way Julia gets her life back is if everyone dies. My laptop is upstairs—access to the banks and basically everything else in my life is on that damned thing. All the passwords . . . everything. A good hacker could get beyond the passcode.

And maybe that’s why the boyfriend isn’t here yet. He’ll take care of Catherine before coming to join the fun. Phillip has no siblings or other close family. With everyone dead, Julia could disappear with full remote access to everything from wherever she lands. No one would think a thing about it—especially if there’s a fire and all the bodies are unidentifiable. The poor grieving widow lost not just her husband but her only child. She’s gone into seclusion.

We’re sitting ducks. Terror ignites like a match to gasoline vapors inside me.

I smile for my husband and reassure him. “I’m fine.”

I just need to make a call to Catherine and then have a moment alone with Helen.

42

I stare out the living room window at the blackness of the night. I want this day to be over, but I fear it won’t end the way I hope. I insisted Phillip see that a protective detail was sent to Catherine’s. He’d opted not to have them come here, which I think was a really good idea under the circumstances.

I can’t even imagine explaining this situation to the New York Police Department.

I’m glad Catherine is covered. I couldn’t relax until I knew she was safe.

Now, if we can just get through the rest.

“She wants you to tuck her in,” Phillip says, coming up behind me.

I turn and assemble my lips into a smile. Olivia is already in her jammies and is holding Phillip’s hand, waiting patiently for me to take over.

I lean down and kiss the top of my sweet child’s head and take her little hand in mine. “I’m so pleased to do the honors.”

She giggles and we head for the stairs.

Earlier, while Alicia and Helen prepared dinner, Julia and I explained things to Phillip using the same story we told Rick, leaving out unnecessary details. There are many things Phillip never needs to hear. I’m still surprised at how well he took the news. I’m sure it hasn’t hit him yet that if any of this comes out, his mayoral run may be in jeopardy.

Or, who knows, maybe it will help. Everyone loves a story of survival.

The past couple of hours have given me time to think, to assess all the things said and done. I don’t require any additional proof that Julia is lying about basically everything. I learned all I needed to know about my old friend when I had Archer look into her past. Of course, he believed he was looking into mine—it wasn’t like I could tell him who I really was. At any rate, I told him I needed to know if there was anything that might come back to haunt me since marrying Phillip had elevated my social status, so to speak. Archer is thorough, to say the least. He didn’t find a single person who had anything negative to say about the only Anderson heir. But he found a different story in the file kept by the therapist Julia’s mother had been seeing for years before her death. I always find the idea of a therapist with a therapist amusing. But in this case, it was quite handy.

When Julia was ten, she stole a friend’s parakeet. Of course, the little girl could never prove it, because when Dr. Anderson, Julia’s mother, confronted her, she had already buried the poor thing in a pot of lilies. Dr. Anderson later found it. Many such events were recounted in her patient file. Julia’s lack of compassion and impulse control was why they never had pets. No cats. No dogs. Not even goldfish.

At fourteen, she caused a girl to fall off the ladder of the high diving board at a birthday party. By sixteen, she’d had several boyfriends—all of whom quickly exited the relationship, including one who swore Julia had slashed the tires of his new car. A hefty payoff kept him quiet.

Archer took the file from the therapist’s office and gave it to me. With it being so old, and the patient deceased, it’s doubtful the therapist will ever miss it.

In the end I learned the real Julia was never a good person. But she was the one person in our privileged private school who was nice to me. I suppose I was her pet project. Until I made her see what she didn’t want to see.

I relegate the memories to that place in my brain that I don’t like to visit. I wish the traumatic brain injury had relieved me of those, but then I wouldn’t be able to protect my family. Sometimes you have to keep a reminder of the ugly truth so that you don’t make the same mistake twice.

“Which story would you like to hear?” I ask as I tuck the covers around Olivia.

“The story of me.” She smiles, her eyelids so heavy she can hardly keep them open.