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Her phone and—thank God—her keys were both inside. She had a text from Rafe sent at 3am, which she debated on opening. If it were a booty call, or another one of his taunts, it would only make her angry. But on the other hand, something could have been terribly wrong.
She was about to open it when Powderpuff began to bark frantically at someone outside.
Probably the mail.It was nearly ten, she’d slept in so late. Donni took her purse back into her room, dropping it in front of her nightstand where it belonged, before pulling on her sweatpants. She swapped out last night’s top for a cotton bra and a little raglan shirt that said THE JASONS on the front, with FRIDAY and 13 written on the back, like it was a sports uniform.
I need to ask Rafe about that lawyer, she thought desolately, as she headed out to the mailbox.And I need to go through Marco’s papers to see how badly he fucked me over.
Marco kept everything.Everything. She was sure there must be a document that showed how much of her own money she’d put into this place. She had been afraid to go through his things until now. She didn’t want to see the shadows on the heart of the man who had failed her—what if he was even worse than she thought?—but the threat of lawsuit had galvanized her into action.
Now it wasn’t just about raking up the past. It was about saving herself, because nobody else would.
The mail was the usual mix of spam, bills, and magazines, except for a single unmarked envelope marked DONNI in something that looked a little too viscous to be ink.
She opened the envelope shakily and her stomach immediately rebelled. She just barely made it to the trash can beneath the kitchen sink, where she proceeded to empty her stomach of what remained from last night as the letter, and the photographs inside, fluttered to the floor.
The photographs were of a horribly mutilated white dog that looked just like Powderpuff. Each of the photos was captioned TWO LITTLE BITCHES ARE GOING TO DIE.
???????
The police who came to her house pulled up in a squad car without sirens. Donni, who had gone outside to wait for them in the waning morning hours, recognized both of them. One was Officer Corcoran from before, the other was Richard Lambert. Richard, she recalled, had a kid who was about Rafe’s age. She was pretty sure they’d dated as kids.
She didn’t miss the piercing look the woman cop gave her as they sidled out of the squad car.No friends there, Donni thought, though she knew that already. The woman could have made an entire pan of eyeshadows crack all at once with one of those mean mugs.
“What’s the emergency?” Officer Lambert asked. “The dispatcher said you’d received a threat?”
“Yes. Someone’s threatening to kill me—and my dog.”
When she handed them the letter, the way they looked at her, like disappointed teachers, made her realize that maybe she ought to have worn gloves. She glared at them, watching Corcoran pull on some latex ones as she picked up the letter by its corner. When Lambert leaned over for a look, the two of them reminded Donni of girlfriends poring over a secret note.
“Nasty stuff.” Lambert leaned back on his scuffed heels. “Is that your dog?”
“No.” She tasted bile. “It just really looks like her. Which I think is the point.”
“Dispatch said you claimed you’ve been receiving other notes and letters?”
Her shoulders lifted defensively at the word ‘claimed.’ It sounded too similar to other words she’d heard before, like ‘alleged’ and ‘circumstantial.’ Words that meant that what you were saying didn’t matter. That victimhood was arbitrary.
She schooled her face to hide her anger as she opened her phone and showed them the photo that she’d taken of her front door. Officer Corcoran’s thinly tweezed eyebrows shot up.
“Classy,” she said dryly. It was unclear whether she was referring to Donni or the door.
“Can you text that to me?” Lambert passed her over a business card.
While she did that, Corcoran said, watching her, “What time was that taken?”
“A few days ago. I haven’t painted over it yet but I tried to clean it with solvent. You can still kind of see it on the door now. Someone defaced my walkway recently, too, but that was kids, I think. The writing on this was different. Neater. I got a letter on my car windshield while I was over at Opal’s for book club,” she added. “But I threw that one away, unfortunately.”
“What did that other letter say?”
“It said, I know what you did. In all caps, just like the door. And this letter.”
The two officers exchanged a look.
She knew what they were thinking. Between the salacious rumors about her personal life and her husband’s own scandal, there were plenty of people who might have thought that they knew something about her that was worth warning about.
“Look,” she said, a little desperately. “I know my husband—my late-husband—did some horrible things. ButIhad nothing to do with that and I don’t know who would try to punish me for it now. It’s not like he got off scot-free,” she added bitterly.
“Careful,” Officer Corcoran said.
