ANNASOPHIA
After Anastaysa’s third yawn, I revert to mother-knows-best mode and switch off her bedside lamp, promising to sit in her room for a while. Careful not to usurp Sir Kitty, I scooch to the middle of the bed. The cat and Anastaysa start purring within minutes. I remain in the room for a minute longer to evict all the day’s monsters.
In the hallway, I walk to Alexandra’s door on autopilot. The darkness in her bedroom engulfs me in a breath-stopping clinch. Logic evaporates. I smack the wall like a panicked child. My palm hits the light switch. Light illuminates the empty bed.
Still unmade from her tryst with Maverick. The tangled sheets bring back slo-mo frames of their butt fucking. Bile coats my throat. I yank the sheets and comforter off the bed. The jostling sends pain rippling into my cuneiform. Panting, I stop and lean against the bedframe.
If I still lived at Belle Haven …
An involuntary tremor shakes me as if someone dumped ice cubes down my spine. My mind lurches away from an explosive image of me carting the bed linens to the incinerator. Light-headed, I drop the bedding and stumble out of the room—disgusted by my cowardice.
Later. I’ll wash everything later. Not tomorrow. Or the next day. Not till I’m ready.
First, I have to prove to myself there is no possibility Alexandra found anything about Stefan Lefevbre. She was taunting Anastaysa. Planting ideas in her sister’s writer’s imagination.
Every family has at least one destructive secret. Rachel Hamilton’s sermonette rings in my ears as I flip on the lights in my own bedroom. God, what I’d give for just one destructive secret.
The fury of the struggle with Alexandra is still imprinted in my unmade bed. Covers piled on the floor. Pillows balancing on the edge. Bloodstains on the top sheet, the bottom sheet torn back from the corner where she slept and woke like a wounded leopard. My saliva dries up, and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth.
Amazing two EMTs could carry her out of here.
Two dozen Sumo wrestlers couldn’t force me to sleep in here tonight.
The memory of the blue binder sliding down my leg shatters my fugue. A glance confirms the notebook isn’t on the floor or below the chair. Ignoring the low ache in my foot, I drop to my knees, throw the covers out of my way, and stretch my arm underneath the bed.
My fingers grasp the slick binder, and I wobble out to the family room. Did I ever fall asleep with the notebook when Alexandra was around? She’d seen me—at least once—put it in the safe and asked what it was. I avoided lying and said it contained papers I’d need to sell Belle Haven. Never one to accept a simple answer, she’d pushed for more information.
What kind of papers? Could she see them? Did I know that “Papá once promised to give me Belle Haven when I graduated Oxford?”
“He never told me. Would you like to live at Belle Haven again?”
“What if I said yes, would you sell it anyway?” Steel vibrated in her voice.
Turning the lock on the safe, I kept my back to her and got my ragged breathing under control. How like Michael to manipulate her with empty promises. When I faced her, I said, “I’m sorry, Alexandra, but yes. I plan to sell Belle Haven as soon as possible.”
“Why? We don’t need the money.”
“We don’t need Belle Haven.” I sidestepped the money issue. We so needed the money. “Our new house is perfectly fine.”
“Perfectly fine for you and The Brats. Not fine for me at all.” She’d flounced out of the bedroom, slamming the door.
Seated on the family-room sofa, an ice pack on my elevated foot, I replay the scene a couple of times. Certainty replaces doubt. After that corrosive argument, she became even cooler, more distant. She made oblique references to needing to burn several boxes of papers and trash she’d shredded. I ignored the allusion to the damned incinerator and reminded her we paid for daily trash service. She snorted and stalked to her room and slammed the door. She’d never have dared throw a tantrum in front of her father—any more than she’d have dared getting a nipple-ring.
How the hell did she pull off that nose-thumbing act of rebellion?
Faced with another unanswerable question, I pick up the notebook. Nothing unusual on the cover. Nothing alerts the casual eye to the damning reports from the hazardous disposal company. Nothing refers to the summary from the Bay Area’s premier real estate broker.
The table of contents is innocuous:
1. Overview
2. Details of findings on property
3. Legal requirements for reporting findings
4. Summary
Paranoia aside, I face reality. Alexandra somehow broke into the safe. Of course, she’d read the report. Every paragraph. Every word. Every syllable. Especially the section about the human teeth. Never saying anything while every day, more and more of her came unmoored.
The simultaneous ringing of the doorbell and the chirp of my cell phone derail my thoughts, and I drop the damn notebook again. This time it misses my foot. I pick up the report wanting more than anything to ignore the unwanted interruption. Not a good tactic. The phone rings in a short, muted burst—too low for the kids to hear, but the doorbell clangs like a claxon.
Satish’s name appears in the LED. The phone stops ringing. His text announces he’s at my front door. Nd to tlk. Now.
R U cra—I delete my text. Ten minutes before one. Later than the time I called him on Sunday. I lay the ice pack on the couch and slide my feet into soft slippers.
Maverick’s friend died. Riding the thought, depression creeps into my bones.
The notebook jabs my ribs, but I hold it close, open the front door, and stand aside. “Did you get to the ER in time?”
“She was unconscious.”
“You spoke to her? She probably recognized your voice. You have a distinct voice, you know.” And a soothing tone that few women would ever forget.
“I did. And I held her hand till the end.” In mourning, his baritone deepens.
“I’m sorry.” I switch the notebook and phone so that my hands are full and I can’t touch him. Touching him under the circumstances would be socially acceptable, but personally selfish.
“I could use a cup of coffee. I need to stay awake.”
My heart misses a beat. Restarts. Gallops. His statement sounds ominous. He’s come to deliver more bad news—worse than a dead woman? Why does he need to stay awake?
To make sure I don’t fall apart.
In the kitchen, he stops me as I move toward the coffeemaker. “Your friend Patrick Reid called me tonight. A couple of local TV stations ferreted out Alexandra’s name. They can link her to Maverick.”
“Oh, sh—” The floor tilts, and the phone and notebook crash at my feet.