Claimed

“Mexico,” Kelsey said. “We were supposed to go to Mexico this morning, but when he unlatched the punishment closet—”

“The punishment closet?” Michael repeated, his face darkening with anger. “We have to get this bastard, Kelsey. He won’t get away with what he’s done to you.”

Kelsey nodded her agreement. Then she saw the lockbox on the floor beside the sofa. “Oh,” she said, confused and then afraid. He wouldn’t have left the lockbox full of gold and cash if he weren’t planning to return. She realized she’d been hoping against hope that he was well and truly gone.

“What?” Michael said as he followed her gaze. He stood and moved around the sofa to see what she was looking at. “What’s this?”

The key was still in the lock. Michael crouched beside it and lifted the lid. “Whoa,” he breathed. “What the hell…? There’s a fortune in this thing, Kelsey.” He turned and stared at her with those penetrating blue eyes. “Where in the hell did he get all this? Did he rob a bank or something?”

Kelsey shook her head. “It’s his inheritance, he said. He showed it to me last night.”

Michael lifted something from the lockbox and held it out toward her. “Maybe this letter will shed some light. It’s addressed to you.”

Kelsey saw the envelope with her name written on the front in James’ angular hand. She turned away. “I don’t want to touch it. I don’t care what it says.”

“It could be important. How about I’ll read it to you? Would that be okay?”

Kelsey shrugged. She knew she was being irrational. She should hear whatever James had to say. And Michael should hear it too. Let someone else be a witness to his insanity. “Okay,” she said. “Read it.”

Michael slipped his finger under the loosely sealed flap of the envelope and smoothed the letter open on his lap.

“Dearest Kelsey,” he read. “By the time you read this, I will be gone. I had been planning to take you with me, my darling wife and light of my life, but I have come to understand that, while I love you with all my heart, you can never return that love.

“This is my fault. I stole what should have been freely given. I took what was never mine. Instead of earning your love and proving my worth, I crossed a line that should never be crossed. I can’t undo what has been done. I perverted what should have been a beautiful thing. I hid behind the teachings of bullies, telling myself it was for your own good, and that you would come to love me in time.

“I know you probably can’t understand this, but when I beat you”—Michael’s voice faltered as he read these words. He cleared his throat and continued—“it was to teach you how to be an obedient wife. When I withheld food and comfort, it was to train you to behave in the fashion befitting a proper submissive woman.”

Michael broke off, looking at Kelsey. “My god, the man is a raving lunatic. He’s a monster. You poor girl.” His voice cracked and Kelsey saw that tears were rolling down his cheeks. “Look, we don’t have to read this now.”

“No,” Kelsey said, wanting Michael to hear what James had written, needing to hear it herself. He was, she realized, making a confession and a kind of apology, in his own twisted, sick way. “Keep going.”

Michael took a breath, nodded and continued. “I somehow managed to convince myself that you needed and even, on some level, wanted what I was doing to you. I suppressed my better nature, giving in to my baser instincts and lust without regard to your needs or desires.

“Something happened this morning that finally cut through my already rattled defenses and made me see that I’d lost the very woman I claimed to love. I’d turned you into something you are not, and nearly snuffed out your soul in the process.

“I only pray you can recover. I don’t ask for forgiveness, as I deserve none. I can promise you this. I will never darken your door again. I am going somewhere no one can follow, somewhere I can be at peace with what I have done.

“I love you. I’m sorry.

“James Matthew Bennett.”

A sudden, urgent beeping sound startled Kelsey. She realized it was coming from a small walkie-talkie type device on Michael’s belt. He stood and reached for it. “Police scanner,” he explained as he pulled the device from his belt. “The beep tells me it’s a local emergency.”

“It’s James,” Kelsey said, no idea how she knew, but certain she was right.

Michael depressed the button on the device, and they listened to garbled voices. “Late model Audi A4...crashed headlong into the ravine.” More unintelligible words and then, “Eyewitness says the car turned off and just drove right over the edge…Survivors unlikely…” Silence for several long seconds and then, “We’re arriving at the scene…Holy cow, the car just exploded! Get backup here right away.”