AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I need this, Cal. I need you to do this job. I can’t go another day with that man. I can’t do it. Please! Please don’t do this. Don’t back out on me. I’m sorryyy.” She’s crying in earnest now, making a bigger fool of herself than when she arrived.
Normally, I don’t have the patience for shows of emotion. I find it repulsive. But on Brenda, it’s oddly becoming. I’m momentarily stunned by the depth of my attraction to this woman, so much so that I stop to stare at her, to drink her in.
“Please,” she whispers, her voice clogged with the tears that run down her face.
I bite back the urge to be nice, forgiving, and tell her what we both need to hear. “Sorry, but you did this to yourself.”
Pulling the door open, I shove Brenda out and close it in her face, ignoring her sobbing pleas through the door as I walk away and pour myself another scotch.
Twelve
~Faith~
I’m in the second darkest depression of my life. The first being when I reached the bottom of my well of patience and caring for a man I’d vowed to love, honor, and cherish all the days of my life.
Unlike my feelings for Glenn that have run dry, my ability to cry for myself have not. I’ve come all this way and hit a wall. Cal isn’t going to kill my husband, leaving my entire future up in the air. All of my plans. All of my dreams.Poof! Gone in the blink of an eye, and all because I’ve overplayed my hand.
I have never regretted anything more—my marriage to Glenn excluded.
So where does this leave me? The question has been swimming in my mind since the moment Cal closed the door in my face, casting me out into the proverbial cold.
Mindlessly, I push the scrambled eggs around in the pan, an afternoon lunch that is quick and easy and doesn’t take any more brain power than I have to give. I’m was drawing on fumes, at the moment.
Murder. Without Cal’s help, I just have to return to the drawing board and get it done myself. In fact, it seems the smartest thing to do. Hiring out could get me caught just as easy if not more so than handling the deed myself. And it will cost me less money too.
Money.
Now I’m regretting having paid that deposit. I’d demand Cal return every dime, but he wouldn’t, and it isn’t as if I could go to the police and file fraud charges. Even if I tried, Cal would retaliate and kill me.
It is a cost I’ll have to suck up and move on from.
Chalk it up to lessons learned.
The little pep talk helps me to put things back into perspective, even if it is a lie I have to tell myself in order not to freak out.
I don’t want to do this alone. Having someone, a professional, on my side, carrying out the scary, untrodden path I’m now going to have to venture down has my nerves rubbed raw.
I’ve never killed anyone before. My past attempts have been as hands-off as I could manage, but my creativity in the craft was lacking now, and the only options I can come up with involve hands-on violence that would get messy.
I don’t want messy. I want accidental death and dismemberment or a series of unfortunate events, as per the life insurance policy mandate.
The frying pan could be a good murder weapon. Heavy, compact, easy to wield. I could claim self-defense. But then, who would believe that Glenn, such a nice and helpful guy, would ever raise a hand to a woman, much less his wife? And with no history of violence, it would be a hard sell.
I’m drawing blanks. This is why I wanted Cal, the professional, to take care of it for me, but he is no longer an option.
Scraping eggs into a pile on a plate, I serve them up to my husband and hope he chokes on them. It would do me a favor.
Unfortunately, Glenn’s inhaling act goes off without a hitch, as usual.I could never get that lucky.
“Why the long face, babe?” Glenn asks absently as he pushes his empty plate away and rises from the counter.
“Hmm?” I come back to the present and offer a lax smile.
Glenn has the good grace to appear somewhat concerned as he pulls on a light jacket and steps into his worn tennis shoes. “You don’t seem like yourself today.”
I shrug. “Oh, you know, just one of those days.”
He gives me a knowing look, and I know instantly the conclusion he has reached. “Ah. Well, take a load off today and watch some shows.”
