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The carefully choreographed existence she’d built with Ryan had fallen apart when Lily Porter, the barista and baker at the local café, had heard gossip and then had it confirmed by a family member. Lisa had found out about it when Lily emailed her, expressing her disgust.
How can you justify being in an intimate relationship with your brother? Having a kid with him? I don’t care how innocently it began; once you knew who he was, you should have ended it then and there.
The scolding had become a perceived threat when Lily admitted she’d approached a local detective, Alan Stone, with her concerns. But the detective was a family friend. Lisa didn’t know what had transpired between Lily and Alan, but it hadn’t been enough to deter Lily.
“What is your vendetta?” Lisa had begged, to no avail. “What did we ever do to you that you’d want to hurt my family?”
Lisa hadn’t wanted to add to Ryan’s worries by sharing the contents of the email. But one night, out of nowhere, he’d whispered to her as they lay in bed sharing pillow talk.
“Dan tells me Lily swings both ways.”
Dan Chua was Lisa’s ex, the father of her son, Marcus and his brother, Dan Jr. Frowning, Lisa got up on an elbow. “So what? In the past, I have too, as you know.” Before meeting Ryan, Lisa had been in a relationship with a former Miss New York, Cara Ellison.
“Well, according to Dan, Lily’s parents are super conservative and would disown her if they knew about it.”
“That’s ridiculous in this day and age,” Lisa said.
But the wheels were turning, the seed had been planted. If Lisa could protect her family from Lily’s threat by turning the tables on her, it would be worth the risk she would be taking by betraying Ryan.
The affair started soon after, as a means to keep some control over the situation. But it backfired when Lily fell in love with Lisa and was beginning to make demands on her, showing up at the house, threatening to tell Ryan about their affair.
Driven to commit murder by her fanatical need to protect Ryan, Lisa had drugged Lily with Ryan’s medication and left her to die in the surf Sunday night.
Now here it was, Monday morning, and Lily hadn’t shown up at work at the coffee shop, and Lisa had already heard about it. Lily’s parents were beside themselves with worry and the police wouldn’t file a missing person’s report for forty-eight hours, so they’d gone on local television, pleading for help.
Turning off the TV, Lisa hurried to get the kids out the door. “You cuties, let’s get moving. It’s a school day.”
Her two little boys were ready to walk to school with Mom, baby Madelyn in the stroller coming along for the trip.
“Let’s go say goodbye to Daddy,” Lisa said, opening her bedroom door.
“I’m awake,” Ryan mumbled, his back to the door.
“We’re just coming in to say goodbye,” Lisa said.
The boys ran around to the side of the bed to hug Ryan. They knew he wasn’t their birth father; that designation belonged to Dan Chua, who lived across the street. But they loved him nonetheless.
“Bye, Daddy,” they cried. “See you after school.”
“I’ll be here.”
Ryan sat on the edge of the bed, looked over his shoulder at Lisa, and winked. “I promise to be awake when you get back.”
“Just relax,” she said. “See you in half an hour.”
They left the cottage by the side door and went through the gate to the sidewalk to join in the morning mass migration from the beach neighborhood to Beach Sand Elementary.
Lisa and Ryan’s half-sister, Alison, was leaving her house directly across the street. She waved and called out, “Meet you at the corner.”
The coffee shop belonged to her husband, Adam. Alison had told Lisa in an early morning phone conversation that when Adam had arrived at the coffee shop that morning, it had been dark, the ovens hadn’t been on, and there had been no aroma of freshly baked scones or muffins or cookies.
Alison and her daughters waited at the corner for Lisa.
“Any news?” Lisa asked, her hands shaking as she pushed the stroller. “Did they check her apartment?”
“I’m sure they must have in order for the parents to go on television already. I’m telling you, it serves her right with her big mouth.”
“Alison, don’t go there,” Lisa whispered. “The last thing we need is for the cops to be digging around in our personal business, or worse, some reporter.”
