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35
THE GROUND SEEMS TO DISAPPEAR BENEATH EMMA’S FEET.
“The panel on trends?” she manages to say. She knows the answer, but she’s buying time now, trying to get a grip.
“Yes, you were wonderful. I hadn’t heard of you at that time, but Tom was already a fan.”
“Speaking of your mother, Stacey,” Emma says, needing to end the call as soon as possible. “I don’t want to take you away from her any longer. I—I... I’m so sorry for what you’re going through.”
“Thank you, Emma. I look forward to speaking at another time.”
After mumbling a goodbye, Emma stuffs the phone back into a pocket of her jeans, stumbles back to the boulder, and collapses onto it, covering her face with her hands.
Her husband’s a liar, just as she’d thought—and worse than that. He stalked her after the Florida event and later ensured she was hired at his company, pretending it was all by chance, the stars aligning in their favor. And he sat in theirkitchen two days ago denying her fears, making her think she’d let her imagination run amok. Though Taylor and Brittany tried to rattle her about Tom, make her suspect there was something unsavory about him, they didn’t actually believe those things then—and yet they’d been right all along.
What else has he lied about?she wonders.
Stowe?He claims he was helping a snowboarder that night, but that might be only something he told his colleagues at the time. He could have composed the email he showed her himself—once he sensed she was checking on his whereabouts that weekend.
And then there’s the incident Taylor reported to Brittany. Maybe Brittany was right, that Tom snapped at Taylor because he sensed she was digging in places where he didn’t want her to be. And he might have killed her because of it. He claimed the scarf was Diana’s and yet he could have made that up after he heard Emma snooping in his office or spotted her car on his tail.
According to Tom, he was on the phone with the forensic accountant during the window of time in which Taylor was killed, but perhaps he was able to slip away—and then plant evidence against Justine. How perfect to use her, the unscrupulous embezzler, as the fall guy.
So what is she supposed to do next? With her stomach twisting, Emma realizes that she might even be in physical danger. If Tomisa murderer and suspects she’s wise to him, maybe he has nasty plans for her, too. That could be the whole reason he organized this little getaway, and now she’s stuck in this fairly isolated cottage with him on an island inthe Atlantic Ocean, an hour’s ferry ride away from the mainland. She needs to get out of here.
Emma pulls up the ferry schedule on her phone but first has to walk around the garden to get just a few bars of service. When she finds the website, she sees that there’s only one more boat tonight—at 8:20. If they eat in ten or so minutes as planned and Tom retreats to the office afterward to make calls, she can probably catch it. No, shehasto catch it. Her fingers tremble as she reserves a seat online.
And then what?she thinks. She’ll have to Uber back to Westport, grab whatever belongings she can fit in a bag, and find someplace to stay for the night.
She’s scared but also heartsick. She wanted to believe her husband so badly, wanted to buy into the idea of him as the total opposite of Derrick, and she allowed him to convince her time and time again, allowed him to blind her with his fucking Tom Halliday charm.
“Ahh, Iwonderedwhere you were hiding.”
Here he is now, changed into khaki shorts and a navy polo shirt, and standing at the other end of the garden, his face shadowed by the leaves of a raggedy apple tree.
“Hey.” It’s all she’s able to force out of her mouth.
“Food’s about ready.”
“Be right there.”
She takes sixty seconds to flesh out her escape plan, which will only work if Tom retreats to his office after dinner. She has to make sure that happens.
Returning to the veranda, Emma finds Tom at the grill, basting salmon fillets with his typical enthusiasm. It’s all afraud, though. Helookslike the Tom she married,actslike the Tom she married, and yet—that person was never real.
“Pierce made a great selection,” he says, cocking his chin toward the salmon.
“Nice.”
“Everything good at the office?”
“Uh, I don’t know. For some reason Eric’s not picking up.”
“That wasn’t him?”
She looks at him, confused.
“When I first checked the garden, you were on the phone. I figured it was Eric.”
