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Tell him the truth. Tell him now.
His gaze moves to the cabinet. I notice the drops of rain on his hair, his shoulders. He must have just gotten home.
“Come with me, Ivy,” he says and, without waiting for me, he turns to walk toward the corridor that I know will lead to his study. He doesn’t look back to make sure I’m following. He knows I’ll come.
Using a key, he unlocks the door and opens it for me to enter. He follows me in, closes the door.
“Sit,” he commands, touching the back of the chair I’d sat on the last time I was here as he proceeds behind his desk to push some buttons on that keyboard.
Is he going to make me watch that footage again? The woman who looks like me but isn’t? I open my mouth to tell him I don’t want to see it when a stack of letters beneath a paperweight near the edge of the desk catches my eye. I lean closer because I recognize that handwriting.
“Don’t touch,” he says without even looking up from his work and I pull my arm back.
“Are they for me?” I ask, seeing Evangeline’s name in the top left corner. “They’re from my sister.”
We look up at each other at the same time.
“You opened them? How many are there? How long—”
“Did you have anything to do with poisoning your father?”
The rest of my sentence gets caught in my throat. “Did I...what?”
He studies me for a very long minute then shakes his head and returns his attention to the keyboard and a moment later, those same screens on which I watched Santiago kiss a woman who looked a lot like me come to life.
It’s not until then that I consciously realize that I was set up. Used as a weapon in an attempt on my husband’s life. The woman was dressed exactly like me. I knew it on some level before, but it’s like the reality hits home now, and I shudder. Because who else knew what I’d be wearing?
We watch the screens together and it’s not that night at all. What I see are various rooms of the house. The kitchen. Living room. Dining room. My bedroom.
And me in those rooms. Well, all except my bedroom. That one’s empty and it’s just as incriminating as the others where I’m looking through every drawer, every cabinet, every nook right up until I smash my head into the cupboard when Santiago surprised me in the dining room.
He switches the monitors off and faces me.
“Do you want to tell me what you’re looking for exactly?”
I stare up at him. God. What must he think of me? A thief in the night? A poisoner. Am I surprised he’s kept my sister’s letters from me? He thinks I tried to kill him. He truly believes it and can I blame him?
The weight of that hits me.
I shake my head and I study his face as intently as he did mine just a little while ago. And what I see isn’t pure hate like before. There’s a resignation there. An even deeper sadness.
He believes I tried to kill him yet he lied to save my life.
Can he save my life? What happens when they find out I’m not pregnant at all? Do they hang me?
God. I’m going to be sick.
Then there’s what happens to him because of me. What if he’s wrong about his standing? What about that reckoning he knows is coming?
“I have to tell you something, Santiago.”
He remains silent, arms folded, a hulking shadow in this room, this house. He’s ready for the worst. I wonder if he always expects the worst. After what happened to his family, to him, maybe it’s the only way he can be.
“I won’t be pregnant next month. Or possibly the month after, but I don’t know.”
His jaw tightens. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“The day Abel took me to that doctor, they gave me a shot. He said it was vitamins,” I start as he sets his arms by his sides, hands fisting, knuckles going white. “But even if I knew, I don’t think I could have stopped it.”
I hear him swallow.
“He told me when he came to the house the day of the gala that it was a birth control shot.”
I grip the edges of my chair waiting for him, for his reaction, my heart racing inside my chest.
“A birth control shot,” he repeats robotically like he’s processing the meaning.
I swallow, nod. I leave out the part about not wanting to have that monster’s baby because I’m starting to wonder who the true monsters are in our world.
“I’m sorry.”
His expression doesn’t change, the line of his mouth stretched tight, jaw tense. His hands balled into tight, angry fists.
He’s not quite looking at me. Not at first anyway because when his eyes do finally zero in on me, the look inside them sends ice down my spine.
