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My heart bangs in my chest.Your husband.
My head starts to spin. I’m afraid I might be sick. And Freddie, in the back seat, has reached a fever pitch. “Y-You can’t take me back there,” I whimper, the tears streaming down my face. “My husband hurt me! He’s dangerous!”
“Ma’am.” My eyes have adjusted now, and I can see their faces more clearly. They’re craggy, bland, generic, uncaring men, and as they look at me, I can tell they see only what they want to see—what Ollie has told them. The first guy puts his other hand on my shoulder, guiding me toward the waiting vehicle. “The only dangerous person here is you.”
37
KIT
SATURDAY, MAY 6, 2017
I sit on the side of my old bed from childhood, staring at the braided rug. There’s no way I can sleep. I watch as the clock ticks from 1:20 to 1:21. Then 1:59 to 2:00. Then 2:12 to 2:13.
I haven’t heard from the anonymous caller again, but those few words, that bald threat—I know you did it—is enough to send my mind spinning. Who was on the other end? Why would they sayImurdered Greg? I try to reconstruct the night of the benefit as best I can, but it’s pointless. The whole night is a jumble of sounds and images I’ll never get back, a dark, formless room with a door shut tight.
But if I could open that door a crack, what would be in there?
I was certainly angry enough. Humiliated that Greg had ruined our family. Rejected, too, because I’d expressed again and again that I wanted to save the marriage. And then I’d seen Patrick at the benefit, the fresh lust making things hurt even worse. What might have happened in my yearning, needy, hopeless, irrational brain? Did betrayal plus wanting plus rage plus embarrassment plus extreme intoxication equal murder?
Stop it,I tell myself, punching my pillow.You didn’t do anything.ButI don’t know for sure. I don’t have certainty, and it’s that tiny shred of doubt that makes me uneasy.
I rise from the bed, pull on a cardigan, and push my feet into a pair of slippers. I can’t be in this house right now. I’ll take a flashlight, I’ll take some pepper spray, but I at least need to stand on my father’s front porch and look at the stars.
I creak down the stairs, not wanting to wake the girls. I disarm the alarm system and push open the front door. The air feels good on my skin, and I tilt my face toward the sky. The moon shimmers above me. The only sounds are faint gusts of wind and far-off traffic.
I wonder if the neighborhood was this still the night Greg was killed. I shut my eyes, trying to recall padding across this lawn, poisoned out of my mind. Staggering into the house. Not heading straight into the bathroom but instead into the kitchen and finding Greg at the fridge, casually reaching for a beer. Could we have fought? Maybe everything burst to the surface, and I just... snapped? I don’t remember, though. There isn’t even a glimmer.
I turn and look at my parents’ house, the stonework towering toward the sky, the aged copper roof tiles intricately shadowed in the moonlight. I’m sorry, I want to tell my sleeping father. The last thing he needs is a shock to his system. I want to tell my daughters I’m sorry, too. I’m sorry because I don’t remember, and I don’t have a good excuse, and I can’t know for sure if I’m not a killer. And I’m sorry to Willa as well. I dragged her out here. Put her through this. And it turns out it was me all along.
I swallow hard. Plunge my hands into my cardigan pockets and locate my phone. I need to run this by someone. I scroll through my calls and find the number. It rings a few times, and when he picks up, he sounds disoriented. Which—obviously. He was sleeping. It’s the dead of night.
“Please come,” I tell him, my voice cracked and dry. “There’s something we need to talk about.”
38
WILLA
SATURDAY, MAY 6, 2017
I snap awake and look around confusedly. It takes me a moment to realize I dozed off on my parents’ couch in the back room—I’d wanted to wait up for Kit when she came home to ask where she really was tonight, but I guess my sleepless nights got the best of me. I sit up and rub my eyes. My heart is still banging in my chest. Something woke me. A sound? Kit?
A car engine growls outside. Frowning, I hurry to the front window. Headlights glow on the circle. Kit drifts, sylphlike in a white cardigan, toward an open door of a white SUV. There’s a nervous, conflicted look on her face, almost like she isn’t sure she wants to get in. The car chugs. It’s too dark to see the driver. After a beat, Kit seems to gather her courage and climbs into the seat. The car door slams, and the car peels away noisily, tires screeching.
“Kit!” I cry out uselessly. But there was something so unsettling about the way the car just left the house. It was almost like a...getaway.Worry spirals through my gut. I know someone with a white SUV: I saw him, his wife, and her baby climb from it the day ofGreg’s funeral. Ollie Apatrea. The cop. Themurderer? Is thathiscar she just climbed inside?
“Oh my God,” I whisper, my hand flying to my mouth. Is this because of the call I made to their house earlier? Does Ollie know we know? What on earth did he say to Kit to tell her to get into the carwillingly? I curse my choice not to text Kit with my hunch about Ollie. News that your dead husband had a child with another woman seemed like a callous thing to find out through text, but maybe I shouldn’t have waited. Clearly, Kit trusts Ollie enough to get in the car with him. But she’s dead wrong.
I rush down the path, but there’s no way I’ll catch the car; even before I reach the curb, it’s already turned off the street. I scramble back into the house, snapping on lights in the kitchen, wondering what to do. I can’t let them get far. I grab the VW keys from the table and hurry to the garage. The engine springs to life, and I’m backing out of the driveway and turning in the same direction the vehicle went—toward the college. If I drive quickly, I can hopefully catch the SUV. Where could it be going?
With one hand, I stab at the green phone button on my screen and dial Kit’s number, putting the call on speaker. But it rings and rings, then goes to voice mail. I pressEND, then do it again. Voice mail. My stomach swoops with worry and dread. Do I call a third time, or is this making the matter worse? If Ollie is the driver—and if Ollie is the murderer—he might hurt Kit faster if he’s aware someone knows she’s missing.
Far ahead, two taillights blaze at a stop sign. It’sthem.I ease up on the gas now that I’ve got them in my sights—and then it hits me. What am Idoing? Am I really going to do whatever this is, alone? As much as I want to handle this all on my own, maybe I’m being foolish.
My eyes are still on the car—and my sister’s shadowy figure in the passenger seat. I feel around for my phone in my cardiganpocket. Glancing from screen to road and then back to screen again, I click on the window I need, and then the phone number. The time between rings feels like an eternity. I hold in a breath, praying that he answers.
“Hello? Willa?” And here’s Paul’s groggy voice, full of concern and confusion. “I-Is everything okay?”
I swallow hard. “No. I need your help.”
