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When I reach the landing, I realize there’s only one door up here. The rest of it is an empty, open room with a water-damaged wooden floor and a filthy window, and I bite my lip, looking at the door. It feels like a room that I’m probably not supposed to go into, even though David didn’t explicitly tell me that there’s anywhere in the house that I’m not allowed to go. But the feeling just makes me want even more to find out what’s inside.
It’s locked, which doesn’t surprise me—but it also doesn’t deter me. My first thought is that the key might be hidden somewhere, and it’s easier to find than I might have thought. My initial instinct turns out to be the right one—when I go up on my tiptoes to feel along the top of the lintel, I feel a thick, heavy key. It’s old-fashioned, the kind you might expect to find in a historic house, and it fits perfectly into the lock.
For the briefest moment, I wonder if it’s a trap—if David left the key in a place where I wouldn’t have to look too hard to find it, in order to see if I’d go into a place I’m clearly not meant to. And then, as the lock clicks open, I decide that I don’t really care.
If he’s going to keep me in this decrepit old place, then I at least want the chance to explore it.
The door creaks when I nudge it open, and I immediately smell dust and mothballs. There’s a light switch on the wood-paneled wall next to me, and I flick it on; the only light source is a bare bulb hanging from the ceiling.
The room is, essentially, an attic. There are some old pieces of furniture, some stacked, framed art against one wall, and a stack of boxes. My curiosity gets the better of me, and I walk over to the boxes, knowing that I probably shouldn’t be snooping and unable to find it in myself to care.
The first box looks like it holds some old family paraphernalia—recipe books, and some old photographs that I give a perfunctory glance. Some of them appear to be fairly old—the sort of family photos that someone probably gathered together in one place to eventually turn into a scrapbook or photo album, and never did. It’s clear that David was at least telling the truth about this being his family home—several of the pictures are taken out in front of it, dating back a few generations. I can vaguely recognize a few of the rooms, too, although I can’t be certain that they were taken here. I’m no architect, and most of the features of the house look like any other old home to me.
I stuff the pictures back into the box. If this is all that’s up here, I don’t really know why it’s locked. None of it seems particularly interesting, just photos of long-dead family members and recipes for stews, pies, and bread that probably haven’t been looked at in decades. I can’t imagine any self-respecting mafia wife cooking her own family meals now.
Sitting down on the dusty floor where I’ve been crouched, I reach for the next box, expecting more of the same. Truthfully, I’m already bored by it—but the only thing worse than sitting here poking through David’s ancient family history is sitting downstairs with absolutely nothing to do. So I open the box—and instantly pause, staring down into it.
The belongingsinside look like they must have been a woman’s—someone who must have owned them fairly recently. There’s a silver-backed hand mirror, a matching brush that still has strands of dark brown hair clinging to the bristles, several pieces of jewelry that look fairly valuable, a silk blouse neatly folded at the bottom, and a ceramic dish hand-painted with roses that looks like the sort of thing that would sit on a side table to hold jewelry or keys. I immediately feel strange looking at the items, like I’m touching things that were once very personal to someone, and now have been shoved away into this dusty old attic.
But it’s what’s in the other two boxes that really makes my stomach drop.
They’re full of children’s things. Clothes, toys, a few smaller odds and ends like a crib mobile and pacifiers. And again—they don’t look old, like they belonged to David or his brother as children. They don’t have the musty smell of clothing that’s been boxed up for years, and the fabrics don’t look aged at all. The toys look like things that might have been purchased recently—I even see one small picture book that’s from a fairly new children’s cartoon.
I feel a crawling sensation down my spine as I look at the contents, almost immediately closing the boxes up and shoving them back into the corner. I shake my hands quickly the minute they’re out of reach, as if to get the feeling off of my fingers. But I can still smell the faint scents of floral perfume from the woman’s things, and the hints of baby powder from the child’s clothes.
Something about this feels all wrong.
He mentioned a brother who had passed away. I tell myself that maybe it has something to do with that, that the knotted feeling in my stomach is just because of the utter upheaval that my life has gone through in the last two weeks. That I’m being paranoid.
I know I shouldn’t mention it to David at all. I’m upstairs in the bedroom when he comes home, curled on the bed under a thick blanket and trying to focus on a book. I hear the door open and nearly jump out of my skin, and he gives me a quizzical look.
“Awfully jumpy, aren’t you?” He raises an eyebrow. “Come downstairs. I got takeout from an Italian place in Newport. It’s good; you’ll like it.”
I press my lips together, wracking my brain for some reason to beg off and stay upstairs, and David rolls his eyes.
“You can’t hide in the bedroom forever, Amalie. Just come eat. I’m willing to bet you haven’t eaten all day, and that’s not good for the baby.”
He says it so casually that it makes my heart leap oddly in my chest. “So you believe me now?”
David frowns. “I believe you’re pregnant. Whether it’s mine or not is another matter.” He shrugs off his jacket, walking to the closet to hang it up. When he starts to unbutton his shirt, my heart gives another traitorous leap in my chest, and I do my best to ignore it. He’s fucking with me—I know he is. He knows exactly how I react to seeing him undressed, and he wants to prove to me, once again, that it doesn’t matter how he behaves or how he makes me feel.
I’m going to want him regardless.
I grit my teeth, marking my spot in my book and tossing it aside. “I’m not really hungry,” I tell him, just a hint of defiance in my voice, and David lets out a long-suffering sigh, reaching for his belt.
“Just come down and eat, Amalie. A little time in my company won’t kill you.”
My breath hitches in my throat at that. It’s foolish, but something about the way he says it makes my stomach knot.You’re being paranoid,I tell myself as I get up. He glances over at me and frowns.
“That’s what you’re wearing around the house?”
I look down at my clothes. It’s just a pair of black leggings and a long black tank top with crocheted lace at the neckline, my cashmere cardigan still wrapped around me. “Yes? It’s cold in here, and I wanted to be comfortable.”
“You can’t put on something nicer for dinner?” David is dressing as he speaks, taking out a pair of folded chinos and a henley. I glare at him.
“Is the queen coming to eat dinner with us? Because otherwise I can’t see a reason to get dressed up. It’s takeout in your half-destroyed dining room, not a banquet.”
Sudden ire leaps into David’s expression, and I see that small muscle in his jaw leaps again. We got along so much better when all we did was fuck and shop and go out to dinner, when there was an expiration date on our relationship. Now, I feel certain he hates me as much as I think I hate him. “It’s being renovated,” he says icily. “It’s not destroyed. Fine. Come down to dinner in whatever you want. Just stop being such a child about it.”
