So Be It

 

I got pregnant with Crew within two weeks of lying to Jeremy about my pregnancy. It’s as if fate were on my side. I thanked God with a prayer, even though I don’t believe he had a hand in it.

Crew was a good baby (I’m assuming) . By that point, I was making so much money, I was able to afford a full-time nanny at our new house. Jeremy was staying home with the kids after quitting his job and didn’t think a nanny was really necessary, so I called the nanny our housekeeper, but she was a nanny.

She enabled Jeremy to work on the property every day. I had new windows installed in my office so I could watch him from almost every angle.

Life was good for a while. I did all the easy parts of mothering and Jeremy and the nanny did all the hard parts. And I traveled a lot. I had book tours and interviews, which I didn’t really like leaving Jeremy for, but he preferred to stay home with the kids. I grew to appreciate those breaks, though. I noticed when I was gone for a week, the attention Jeremy gave me when I returned home was like the attention he used to pay me before the kids came along.

Sometimes I would lie and say I was needed in New York, but I would hole up in an Airbnb in Chelsea and watch television for a week. Then I’d go home, and Jeremy would fuck me like I was his virgin. Life was great.

Until it wasn’t.

It happened in an instant. It was like the sun froze and darkened on our lives, and no matter how hard we tried, the rays couldn’t reach us after that.

I was standing at the sink, washing a chicken. A fucking raw chicken. I could have been doing anything else…watering the lawn, writing, knitting, anything else. But I will forever think of that fucking disgusting raw chicken when I think about the moment we were told we lost Chastin.

The phone rang. I was washing the chicken.

Jeremy answered it. I was washing the chicken.

He raised his voice. Still washing the fucking chicken.

And then the sound…that guttural, painful sound. I heard him say no and how and where is she and we’ll be right there. When he ended the call, I could see him in the reflection of the window. He was in the hallway, gripping the

doorframe like he was going to fall to his knees if he didn’t. I was still washing the chicken. Tears were streaming down my cheeks, my knees were weak. My stomach began to lurch.

I vomited on the chicken.

That’s how I’ll always remember one of the worst moments of my life.

On our entire drive to the hospital, I was wondering how Harper had done it.

Had she smothered her like in my dream? Or had she come up with a more clever way to murder her sister?

They had been at a sleepover at their friend Maria’s house. They’d been there several times before. And Maria’s mother, Kitty— what a silly name

knew all about Chastin’s allergies. Chastin never traveled without her EpiPen, but Kitty had found her unresponsive that morning. She dialed 9-1-1, and then called Jeremy as soon as the ambulance took her.

When we arrived at the hospital, Jeremy still had that faint hope that they were wrong and that Chastin was okay. Kitty met us in the hallway and kept saying, “I’m sorry. She wouldn’t wake up.”

That’s all she told us. She wouldn’t wake up. She didn’t say, She’s dead.

Just, She wouldn’t wake up, like Chastin was some kind of spoiled brat who wanted to sleep in.

Jeremy ran down the hall, into the patient hallway of the E.R. They escorted him out and told us we needed to wait in the family room. Everyone knows that’s the room where they put the surviving members after someone has died.

That’s when Jeremy knew she was gone.

I’d never heard him scream like that. A grown man, on his knees, sobbing like a child. I’d have been embarrassed for him if I wasn’t right there with him.

When we finally got to see her, she’d been dead less than a day, but she didn’t smell like Chastin. She already smelled like death.

Jeremy asked so many questions. All the questions. How did it happen? Did they have peanuts in the house? What time did they go to sleep? Was her EpiPen taken out of her bag at all?

All the right questions, all the devastatingly right answers. It was over a week before her cause of death was confirmed. Anaphylaxis.

We were hyper vigilant about her peanut allergy. No matter where they went or who they were left with, Jeremy spent half an hour telling the mother their routine, explaining how to use the EpiPen. I always thought it was overkill since we’d literally only had to use it once in her entire life.

Kitty was well aware of her allergy and kept nuts out of their reach when the girls were there. What she wasn’t aware of was that the girls had snuck into the pantry and grabbed a handful of snacks to take back to their room in the middle

of the night. Chastin was only eight; it was late at night and dark when the girls decided they wanted a snack. Harper said they didn’t realize anything they were eating contained peanuts. But when they woke up the next morning, Chastin wouldn’t wake up.

Jeremy went through a period of denial, but he never questioned that Chastin unknowingly ate the nuts. But I did. I knew. I knew.

Every time I looked at Harper, I could see her guilt. I had been waiting on this to happen for years. Years. I knew, from when they were six months old, that Harper would find a way to kill her. And what a perfect murder she committed. Even her own father would never suspect her.

Her mother, though. I was a little harder to convince.

I missed Chastin, obviously, and I was saddened by her death. But there was something unpleasant in how hard Jeremy took it. He was devastated. Numb.

After she’d been dead for three months, I was growing impatient. We’d only had sex twice since her death, and he hadn’t even kissed me with tongue either time.

It’s like he was disconnected from me, using me to get off, to feel better, to get a quick rush of something other than agony. I wanted more than that. I wanted the old Jeremy back.

I tried one night. I rolled over and put my hand on his dick while he was asleep. I rubbed my hand up and down, waiting for it to grow hard. It didn’t.

Instead, he brushed my hand away and said, “It’s okay, Verity. You don’t have to.”

He said it like he was doing me a favor. Like he was turning me down for my reassurance.

I didn’t need reassurance.

I didn’t.

I’ve had over eight years to accept it. I knew it was coming—I had dreamt about it. I gave Chastin all the love I had every minute she was alive because I knew it would happen. I knew Harper would do something like that to her. Not that it could ever be proven that Harper had any involvement. Even if I had tried to prove it to him, Jeremy would never believe me. He loves her too much. He’d never believe such an atrocious thing—that a twin could do that to her own sister.

Part of me felt responsible. Had I just tried choking her again as an infant, or leaving an open bottle of bleach near her as a toddler, or ramming the passenger side of my car into a tree while she was unbuckled with the airbag turned off, all of it could have been avoided. So many potential accidents I could have staged.

Should have staged.

Had I stopped Harper before she acted, we would still have Chastin.

And then maybe Jeremy wouldn’t be so fucking sad all the time.

Image 29

 

 

 

Verity is in the living room. April brought her down in the elevator right before she left for the evening. An unusual change in their routine that I’m not sure I like.

April said, “She’s wide awake this evening. I thought I’d let Jeremy put her to bed tonight.” She left her in front of the television, her wheelchair parked near the sofa.

Verity is watching Wheel of Fortune.

Or…staring in that direction, anyway.

I’m standing in the doorway to the living room, looking at her. Jeremy is upstairs with Crew. It’s dark outside, and the living room light isn’t on, but there’s enough light from the television that I can see Verity’s expressionless face.

I can’t imagine anyone going to such great lengths to fake an injury for this long. I’m not even sure how someone could pull it off. Would she startle at a loud noise?

Next to me, near the entryway to the living room, is a bowl full of decorative glass balls mixed in with wooden ones. I look around, then pluck one of the wooden ones out of the bowl. I toss it in her direction. When it hits the floor in front of her, she doesn’t flinch.

I know she’s not paralyzed, so how does she not even flinch? Even if her brain damage is too severe to understand the English language, she’d still be alarmed by noise, right? Have some kind of reaction?

Unless she’s trained herself to not react.

I watch her for a little longer before I start to creep myself out with my own thoughts again.

I return to the kitchen, leaving her alone with Pat Sajak and Vanna White.

There are only two chapters left of Verity’s manuscript. I’m praying I don’t find a part two anywhere before I leave here because I can’t take the ups and downs of it all. The anxiety I get after every chapter is worse than the anxiety I get after I sleepwalk.

I’m relieved she had nothing to do with Chastin’s death, but disturbed by her thought process during all of it. She seemed so detached. Two-dimensional.

She’d lost her fucking daughter, yet all she thought about was how she should have killed Harper, and she was fed up with waiting for Jeremy to get over his grief.

Disturbing is putting it mildly. Luckily, it’s coming to an end soon. Most of the manuscript details things that happened years ago, but this last chapter was more recent. Less than a year ago. Months before Harper’s death.

Harper’s death.

It’s the thing I plan to get to next. Maybe tonight. I don’t know. I haven’t slept well the last few days, and I’m worried after I finish the manuscript, I won’t be able to sleep at all.

I’m making spaghetti for Jeremy and Crew tonight. I try to focus on dinner and not at all on Verity’s lack of a soul. I purposely timed this meal so that April would be gone before dinner was ready. And I’m hoping Jeremy takes Verity up to bed before it’s time to eat. My birthday is almost over, and I’ll be damned if I eat my birthday meal seated next to Verity Crawford.

I’m stirring the pasta sauce when I realize I haven’t heard the television in a few minutes. I carefully loosen my grip on the spoon, placing it on the stove next to the pan.

“Jeremy?” I say, hoping he’s in the living room. Hoping he’s the reason there’s no sound coming from the television anymore.

“Be down in a second!” he calls from upstairs.

I close my eyes, already feeling the quickening of my pulse. If this bitch turned off that goddamn television, I’m walking out that front door without shoes on and I’m never coming back.

I clench my fists at my sides, growing really tired of this shit. This house.

And that fucking creepy-ass, psychotic woman.

I don’t tiptoe into the living room. I stomp.

The television is still on, but it’s no longer making noise. Verity is still in the same position. I walk over to the table next to her wheelchair and snatch up the remote. The television is now on mute, and I am over this. I’m over this.

Televisions don’t just mute themselves!

“You’re a fucking cunt,” I mutter.

My own words shock me, but not enough to walk away. It’s as if every word I read of her manuscript fans the flames inside of me. I unmute the television and drop the remote on the couch, out of her reach. I kneel down in front of her, positioning myself so that I’m directly in her line of sight. I’m shaking, but not from fear this time. I’m shaking because I am so angry at her. Angry at the type

of wife she was to Jeremy. The kind of mother she was to Harper. And I’m angry that all this weird shit keeps happening and I’m the only one who is witnessing it. I’m tired of feeling crazy!

“You don’t even deserve the body you’re trapped in,” I whisper, staring straight into her eyes. “I hope you die with a throat full of your own vomit, the same way you attempted to kill your infant daughter.”

I wait. If she’s in there…if she heard me…if she’s faking it…my words would reach her. They would make her flinch or lash out or something.

She doesn’t move. I try to think of something else to say that would make her react. Something she wouldn’t be able to keep her composure after hearing. I stand up and lean into her, bringing my mouth to her ear. “Jeremy is going to fuck me in your bed tonight.”

I wait again…for a noise…for a movement.

The only thing I notice is the smell of urine. It fills the air. My nostrils.

I look down at her pants right when Jeremy begins to descend the stairs.

“Did you need me?”

I back away from her, accidentally kicking the wooden ball I tossed toward her earlier. I motion toward Verity while bending down for the ball. “She just…

She needs to be changed, I think.”

Jeremy grabs the handles of her wheelchair and pushes her out of the living room, toward the elevator. I bring a hand to my face, covering my mouth and nose as I exhale.

I don’t know why I’ve never been curious about who bathes her or changes her. I assumed the nurse took care of most of that, but she obviously doesn’t do it all. That Verity is incontinent and has to wear diapers and be bathed makes me feel even sorrier for him. Jeremy is now taking her upstairs to do both of those things and it makes me angry.

Angry at Verity.

Surely her current state is a result of the terrible human she’s been to her children and to Jeremy. Now, for the rest of his life, Jeremy will have to suffer the consequences of Verity’s karma.

It isn’t right.

And even though she flinched at nothing I said, the fact that I seemed to scare her has me convinced she’s in there. Somewhere. And now she knows I’m not afraid of her.

•••

I ate dinner at the table with Crew, who played on his iPad the whole time. I

wanted to wait for Jeremy, but I knew he didn’t want Crew to eat alone and it was getting past his bedtime. While Jeremy was tending to Verity, I put Crew to bed. By the time Jeremy got her showered, changed, and put to bed, the spaghetti was cold.

Jeremy finally comes downstairs as I’m washing the dishes. We haven’t talked much since our kiss. I’m not sure what the vibe will be between us, or if we’re going to be awkward and go our separate ways after he eats. I can hear him behind me, munching on garlic bread as I continue to wash the dishes.

“Sorry about that,” he says.

“What?”

“Missing dinner.”

I shrug. “You didn’t miss it. Eat.”

He takes a bowl out of the cabinet and fills it with spaghetti. He puts it in the microwave and then leans into the counter next to me. “Lowen.”

I look at him.

“What’s wrong?”

I shake my head. “Nothing, Jeremy. It’s not my place.”

“It is now that you said that.”

I don’t want to have this conversation with him. It really isn’t my place. This is his life. His wife. His house. And I’m only going to be here for another two days at the most. I dry my hands on a towel just as the microwave beeps. He doesn’t move to open it because he’s too busy staring at me, attempting to coax more out of me with that look.

I lean against the island and sigh, dropping my head back. “I just…I feel bad for you.”

“Don’t.”

“I can’t help it.”

“You can.”

“No. I can’t.”

He opens the microwave and pulls out his bowl. He sets it on the counter to cool off and then faces me again. “This is my life, Low. And I can’t do anything about it. You feeling sorry for me doesn’t help.”

I roll my head. “But you’re wrong. You can do something about it. You don’t have to live like this, day in and day out. There are facilities, places that can take much better care of her. She’ll have more opportunity. And you and Crew won’t be tied to this house every day for the rest of your lives.”

Jeremy’s jaw hardens. I knew I shouldn’t have said anything . “I appreciate that you think I deserve better. But put yourself in Verity’s shoes.”

He has no idea how far I’ve walked in Verity’s shoes over the past two

weeks. “Believe me, I have been.” I make a frustrated fist and tap it on the counter, trying to find a better way to word it all. “She wouldn’t want this for you, Jeremy. You’re a prisoner in your own home. Crew is a prisoner in this home. He needs to get away from this house. Take him on vacations. Go back to work and put her in a facility where she can receive full-time care.”

Jeremy is shaking his head before I even get the sentence out. “I can’t do that to Crew. He’s lost both of his sisters. He can’t go through another loss like that.

At least if she’s here, Crew can still spend time with her.”

He didn’t indicate his own desire to have her here. Only Crew’s.

“Take moments, then,” I tell him. “You can put her in a facility part time so it’s not weighing you down. Bring her home on the weekends, when Crew is out of school.” I walk over to him and take his face in my hands. I want him to see how much I worry for him. Maybe if he sees that someone actually cares about his well being, he’ll take this conversation more seriously.

“Take moments for yourself, Jeremy,” I say quietly. “Selfish moments. You deserve to live a life where you have moments that have nothing to do with her and everything to do with you and what you want.”

I feel his teeth clench beneath my palms. He pulls away from me and presses his hands into the granite, dropping his head between his shoulders. “What I want?” he says quietly.

“Yes. What do you want?”

His head falls backward and he laughs, once, like that was a stupid question.

Then he says one word, like it’s the easiest question he’s ever answered.

You.”

He pushes off the counter and marches toward me. He grips my waist with both hands and presses his forehead to mine, looking into my eyes with nothing but need. “I want you, Low.”

My relief is met with a kiss. It’s different from our first kiss. This time he’s patient as his lips move lazily against mine and his hand curves around the back of my neck. He’s savoring the taste of me, drawing up my desire with every motion of his tongue. He bends a little, lifting me, and then he wraps my legs around his waist.

We’re leaving the kitchen, but I don’t want to open my eyes until we’re alone behind a locked door. Verity isn’t ruining it for me this time.

Once we’re in the master bedroom, he releases his grip on me and I slide down him, our lips slipping apart. He leaves me standing next to my bed as he walks toward my bedroom door.

“Take off your clothes.” He says it without facing me, as he’s locking my bedroom door.

It’s a command. One I’m eager to follow now that the door is locked. We watch each other undress. He takes off his jeans as I’m taking off my shirt, and then his shirt comes off with my jeans. I remove my bra as his eyes move over me. He’s not touching me, not kissing me, just watching me.

So many emotions flood me as I remove my panties: fear, excitement, irritation, desire, trepidation. I slide my panties down my hips, over my legs, and then kick them off. When I stand up straight, I am on full display.

He soaks me up with his eyes as he removes the last of his clothing.

Something inside me shifts, because no matter how accurate Verity’s physical descriptions of him were, I wasn’t prepared for the full magnitude of his body.

We’re both standing there, naked, our breaths exaggerated.

He takes a step closer, his eyes on my face and nowhere else. His warm hands slide up my cheeks and through my hair as he brings his mouth down on mine again. He kisses me, soft and sweet, with just a tease of his tongue.

His fingers trickle down the length of my spine and I shiver.

“I don’t have a condom,” he says as he cups my ass and pulls me against him.

“I’m not on the pill.”

My words don’t prevent him from lifting me and lowering me to the bed. His lips circle my left nipple, briefly, then brush across my mouth as he hovers over me. “I’ll pull out.”

“Alright.”

The word makes him smile. He whispers, “Alright,” against my lips as he begins to push into me. We’re both so focused on connecting, we aren’t even kissing. Just breathing against each other’s mouths. I squeeze my eyes shut as he tries to fit his entire length inside me. It hurts for a few seconds, but when he starts to move, the pain is replaced by a pleasurable fullness that makes me moan.

Jeremy’s lips meet my cheek, and then my mouth again before he pulls back.

When I open my eyes, I see a man who, for once, isn’t thinking about anything other than what’s right in front of him. There’s no distant look in his eyes. It’s just him and me in this moment.

“Do you have any idea how many times I’ve thought about being with you?”

It’s a rhetorical question, I’m assuming, because his kiss that immediately follows prevents me from answering it. He cups my breast while he kisses me.

After about a minute of this position, he pulls out of me and rolls me flat onto my stomach. He enters me from behind, lowering his mouth to my ear as he pulls out. “I’m going to take you in every position I’ve imagined us in.”

His words feel as though they settle in my stomach and catch fire. “Please,”

is all I say.

With that, he places a palm against my stomach and pulls me onto my knees, pressing my back against his chest without slipping out of me.

His breath is warm against the back of my neck. I snake a hand up and grip his head, pulling his mouth against my skin. That position lasts about thirty seconds before his hands slip to my waist. He rotates me so that we’re facing each other and then slides me back onto him.

I feel weak against his strength, his arms effortlessly moving me around the bed every few minutes. I realize, in all the times I’ve read about his intimacy with his wife, she always had to have some form of control over him.

I relinquish all my control to him.

I let him take me however he wants me.

And he does, for over half an hour. Every time he seems close to release, he pulls out of me and kisses me until he takes me again, kisses me, repositions me, takes me, kisses me, repositions me. It’s a cycle I never want to end.

Eventually, we’re in what I’m assuming is one of his favorite positions, him on his back, his head on a pillow, my thighs on either side of his head. But I’m not sure if we ended up in this position because of him or because of me. I’ve yet to lower myself onto his mouth because I’m staring at the teeth marks on his headboard.

I close my eyes because I don’t want to see them.

His palms are sliding up my stomach, to my breasts. He cups my breasts in his hands, and then he begins to slowly part me with his tongue. I let my head fall back and I moan so loud, I have to cover my own mouth.

He seems to like the noise because he does the exact same thing with his tongue again, and the ecstasy that surges through me propels me forward until I’m gripping the headboard. I open my eyes, my mouth inches away from the headboard. Inches away from the bite marks Verity left behind from all the times he had her in this same position.

When Jeremy’s fingers slide down my stomach and accompany his mouth, I have nowhere for my screams to go. With the position he has me in, I’m compelled to lean forward and stifle the sounds of my climax.

I bite down on the wood in front of me.

I can feel Verity’s teeth marks beneath mine. Different. Unaligned with my own. I bite harder into the wood as I come, determined to leave deeper marks than she ever did. Determined to think only of Jeremy and me every time I look at this headboard in the future.

Verity is mostly confined to one room, but her presence looms in almost every room in this house. I no longer want to think about her when I’m in this

bedroom.

After I come, I pull away from the headboard and open my eyes, seeing the fresh marks I’ve left behind. Just as I run my thumb over them to wipe away my saliva, Jeremy pushes me onto my back and I’m suddenly beneath him again. He doesn’t even need to enter me to reach his climax. He presses himself against my stomach and I feel the warmth spilling onto my skin as his mouth finds mine.

I can tell by his frantic kiss that this is going to be a long night.

Image 30

 

 

 

Our second round happened in the shower half an hour later. Our hands were all over each other, our mouths were one, and then he was inside me again, my palms flat against the shower wall as he thrust into me beneath the spray of the water.

He pulled out and came on my back before washing me clean.

We’re in the bed again, but it’s almost three in the morning, and I know he’s going to go back to his room soon. I don’t want him to. Being with him in this way is everything I imagined it would be and, somehow, I feel okay being inside this house when I’m also wrapped in his arms. He makes me feel safe from the things he doesn’t even realize are dangerous.

He has me tucked against him, an arm wrapped around me as I lie against his chest. His fingers are tracing up and down my arm. We’ve been fighting sleep, asking each other questions. The questions have taken a more personal turn because he just asked me what my last relationship was like.

“It was shallow.”

“Why?”

“I’m not sure it was even a relationship,” I say. “We defined it that way, but it only revolved around sex. We couldn’t figure out how to fit into each other’s lives outside of the bedroom.”

“How long did it last?”

“A while.” I lift up and look at him. “It was with Corey. My agent.”

Jeremy’s fingers pause on my arm. “The agent I met?”

“Yes.”

“And he’s still your agent?”

“He’s a great agent.” I lay my head back down on his chest, and Jeremy’s fingers resume their movement down my arm.

“That just made me a little jealous,” he says.

I laugh because I can feel him laughing. After it’s quiet for a beat, I ask him a question I’ve been curious about. “What was your relationship like with Verity?”

Jeremy sighs, and my head moves with his chest. Then he positions us so that I’m on the pillow and he’s on his side, making eye contact with me. “I’ll answer your question, but I don’t want you to think bad of me.”

“I won’t,” I promise, shaking my head.

“I loved her. She was my wife. But sometimes I wasn’t sure we really knew each other. We lived together, but it’s as if our worlds weren’t connected.” He reaches up and touches my lips, tracing over them with the tips of his fingers. “I was insanely attracted to her, which I’m sure you don’t want to hear, but it’s true. Our sex life was great. But the rest of it… I don’t know. I felt like there was something missing in the beginning, but I stayed and I married her and we started our family because I always believed that deeper connection was within reach. I thought I’d wake up one day and look her in the eyes and then it would click, like that mythical puzzle piece had finally snapped into place.”

It’s not lost on me that he mentioned loving her in the past tense. “Did you eventually find that connection?”

“No, not like I had hoped. But I’ve felt something close to it—a fleeting intensity that proved a deeper connection can exist.”

“When was that?”

“Several weeks ago,” he says quietly. “In a random coffee shop bathroom with a woman who wasn’t my wife.”

He kisses me as soon as that sentence escapes him, like he doesn’t want me to respond. Maybe he feels guilty for saying it. For momentarily feeling a connection with me after trying to feel that connection with his wife for so many years.

Even if he doesn’t want me to react to that admission, I feel something grow inside me, like his words sink into me and expand in my chest. He pulls me against him and I close my eyes, tucking my head against his chest. We don’t speak again before we fall asleep.

I wake up about two hours later to his voice in my ear.

“Shit.” He sits up and most of the covers go with him. “Shit.

I rub my eyes as I roll onto my back. “What is it?”

“I didn’t mean to fall asleep.” He reaches to the floor and then begins pulling on his clothes. “I can’t be in here when Crew wakes up.” He kisses me, twice, and then walks toward the door. He unlocks it, then pulls on it.

The door doesn’t budge.

He jiggles the handle as I sit up in bed, pulling the covers over my exposed breasts.

“Shit,” he says again. “The door is stuck.”

Something drops inside me, and I’m abruptly ripped from the pleasure of last

night. I’m back in the moment, in yet another scenario where I feel desolate inside this eerie house. I shake my head, but Jeremy is facing the door so he can’t see me. “It isn’t stuck,” I say quietly. “It’s locked. From the outside.”

Jeremy turns his head and looks at me, his face giving way to concern. Then he tries pulling the door with both hands. When he realizes I’m right and that the door is latched on the outside, he starts beating on it. I remain where I am, scared of what he might find when he finally gets that door open.

He tries everything to open it, but then he resorts to calling out Crew’s name.

“Crew!” Jeremy yells, beating on the bedroom door.

What if she took him?

I’m not sure she would have. She doesn’t even like her kids. But she likes Jeremy. Loves Jeremy. If she knew he was in this room with me last night, she’d probably take Crew out of spite.

Jeremy’s mind hasn’t gone there yet. In his head, Crew is playing a prank on us. Or the lock somehow accidentally latched itself when he closed the door last night. Those are the only plausible explanations to him. Right now, he merely sounds annoyed. Not at all concerned.

Jeremy glances toward the alarm clock on the nightstand and then beats on the door again. “Crew, open the door!” He presses his forehead against it. “April will be here soon,” he says quietly. “She can’t find us in here together.”

That’s where his head is?

I’m thinking his wife kidnapped his son in the middle of the night, and he’s worried he’s going to be caught fucking the houseguest.

“Jeremy.”

“What?” he says, beating against the door again.

“I know you think it isn’t plausible. But…did you lock Verity’s door last night?”

Jeremy’s fist pauses against the door. “I can’t remember,” he says quietly.

“If by some bizarre chance it was Verity who locked us in here…Crew probably isn’t here anymore.”

When he looks at me, his eyes are full of fear. Then, in one swift movement, he stalks across the bedroom and unlocks the window. He lifts it, but there are two panes of glass. The second one isn’t giving way as easily as the first.

Without hesitation, he reaches to the bed and pulls a pillow case off of a pillow.

He wraps his hand in the case, punches through the glass, kicks it, and then crawls out the window.

Several seconds later, I hear him unlock my bedroom door as he passes it and heads for the stairs. He’s already in Crew’s bedroom before I make it out of the master. I hear him run across the hall to Verity’s room. When he makes it

back to the top of the stairs, my heart is in my throat.

He shakes his head. He bends over, clasping his knees, out of breath.

“They’re asleep.”

He squats, as if his knees were about to give way, and he runs his hands through his hair. “They’re asleep,” he says again, with relief.

I’m relieved. But I’m not.

My paranoia is starting to reach Jeremy.

I’m not doing him any favors by bringing up my concerns. April walks through the front door moments later. She looks at me, then at Jeremy squatting at the top of the stairs. He glances up and sees April staring at him.

He stands and walks down the stairs, not looking at me or April as he heads to the door, pulls it open, and walks outside.

April looks from me to the front door.

I shrug. “Rough night with Crew.”

I don’t know if she buys it, but she walks up the stairs like she doesn’t give a shit if I’m telling the truth or not.

I go to the office and close the door. I pull the rest of the manuscript out and begin to read. I have to finish this today. I need to know how it ends, if it even has an ending. Because I’m at the point now where I feel like I need to show this manuscript to Jeremy. He needs to know that he was right when he felt they never really connected. Because he didn’t really know her.

Things aren’t right in this house, and until he mistrusts that woman upstairs as much as I do, I have a feeling something else is going to happen. The other shoe is going to drop.

After all, this is a house full of Chronics. The next tragedy is already long overdue.

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