Wednesday, August 18
Woodstock, New York
The call came just after eight, when I was walking across the station’s parking lot, about to finally head home. My fingers shook at the name on my screen, and I answered quickly.
“Ruth,” I said, my tone cautious, defensive. “Hi.”
“I’m sorry, Mary,” she said, her voice cracking slightly. “I’m sorry I ever thought it was you.”
Her words were so tender, so honest, they stopped me in my tracks. “It’s okay,” I said.
“It’s not okay. You’ve never given us any reason to think you would do anything like this—you’re a good person, Mary. I know you are . . . but when you lose a child, you feel so hopeless, so . . . powerless, you want to do something, anything, because you know you can’t fix it, but you want to so badly.” She broke into a sob. “I spent so many years worrying about Henry. His drinking and partying. Whether one day he’d make a bad decision, piss off the wrong person, get behind the wheel when he shouldn’t—I never thought to worry about George. I never thought that I could actually lose my boy. That some woman, some horrible woman . . .” She gasped for air, sobs racking her again.
I looked at the bleeding sky, the sun disappearing behind the mountains, and my heart swelled for what she’d lost. “I’m so sorry, Ruth. I can’t imagine what you’re going through,” I said, and meant it. No matter what Alex did, who he grew up to be, I couldn’t imagine a world where losing him wouldn’t absolutely destroy me.
“The detective told me you’re cleared to leave,” she said. “Come get Alex, tomorrow morning. And whatever you want to do, wherever you want to go, we’ll make it easy for you. Alex needs his mother, now more than ever.”
Relief flooded through my chest. For the first time in six months, there was nothing—no one—standing between me and my boy. “Thank you,” I said. I looked around, at the sun already beginning to set behind the mountains, at the sky, gray and dark, like it was about to rain. “Maybe I should come there now?”
As I said it, there was a clap of thunder. The wind picked up.
“George always said you weren’t a good driver in the dark,” Ruth said. “And there’s a storm coming here tonight. I imagine there, too.”
“I’m not,” I said, and as I did, I saw lightning in the distance. “My astigmatism makes the headlights look like orbs. But still. Then I’d be out of here. I’d be with him.”
“Please, Mary. Don’t risk your safety just to get here tonight. Alex is already asleep. He won’t know the difference. And I’m sure you’ll have plenty to do tomorrow. Get some rest, then come first thing.”
“You’re right,” I said. “I’d like to get my things from where I was staying in Brooklyn, and then I’d like to go up to my mom’s in Old Forge.”
“Okay,” Ruth said.
“And then I’d like to build a life up there. A quiet life, for Alex and me.”
A pause, hanging across the line, but finally: “I know, Mary. George told me as much. But we’d like to be involved with Alex as much as we can. We love him, still. We’ll always love him.”
Hope blossomed within me. She wasn’t going to fight me. This was all finally going the way it was supposed to. George’s killer had been caught. No one could hurt me anymore. Not Willa, not anyone.
“And you will,” I said. “Alex loves you, too.”
It was fully dark by the time I got back to the rental, and the rain that the thunder had promised had begun. I rushed up the walkway, shut the door behind me, twisted the deadbolt, tossed my purse down, and flicked the light on.
The place was a wreck, obviously turned over by the police, looking for the jewelry, for anything to pin this without a doubt on Willa. The empty cups of tea Willa had poured for us were still on the coffee table. Remnants of another life.
I was taking it all in—the sofa cushions askew, the art pulled down from the walls—when I heard something. A squeaky sound, like a drawer being pulled out. Then footsteps.
Was an officer still here, looking? Had I misunderstood Morales when she told me I could go?
Heart racing, I stepped forward. “Hello?” I called out. “What’s going on?”
Then there he was, standing in the kitchen doorway, smirking at me like he had every right in the world to be here.
“Henry?” I asked, my heart racing. “What the fuck? You can’t just—”
“Where is it?” he snapped.
“What?”
“You know what.” He stepped forward, and he was so much taller than me, taller than George. His face was white with anger, his forehead beaded with sweat. He smelled of booze. “The jewelry.”
“You liar,” I said. “It was you on Saturday night. You did take my key.”
Henry shrugged. “I was going to put it back in the lockbox on Saturday, but I forgot. By the time I remembered, you’d already arrived. So I hung on to it, who cares? And then, on Saturday, I came looking for what’s mine. So what? The jewelry has fuck-all to do with you. Now, where is it?”
“Why do you even care?” I spat. “She needs the money. You don’t.”
Henry’s head whipped back, and he let out an awful laugh. Then he stopped, shook his head, looked at me like I was a child who just didn’t get it. “Because if I let you people take an inch, you’ll go for the whole goddamn mile.”
“You people?” I asked.
“If I wanted to give her money, I would have put it in a fucking trust. But I bought that jewelry. I gave it to my wife. She doesn’t want the title anymore? Then she doesn’t get the rewards. Don’t you get it? None of it was ever hers. And none of it was ever yours. You can’t marry into this. You can’t work your way into it, either. And yet you still try, don’t you? You and her, you still go after guys like George and me. You pretend not to want the money, but you’re desperate for it all the same. Hungry.”
“I don’t care about the money,” I said. “It was never about the money.”
Henry let out another horrible cackle. “Keep telling yourself that, Mary.”
“Give me that key, and then get out,” I said. “Get the hell away from me.”
“Gladly,” Henry said. He reached into his pocket and deposited the key in my hand. “Shit’s not here anyway. I looked everywhere.”
He turned away from me, made for the door.
Before he left, he turned back. “Have a nice life, then. Spend the generous life insurance—you know, the money that you care so little about. And if that runs out, don’t be surprised if you find yourself begging another man to take you again. Once you’ve had a taste of this world, you can’t let it go.”
He smirked. “Just ask Cassandra.”