The End of Her

‘Lindsey had a friend, Erica. She’s recently moved near here, to Newburgh. She got in touch with me a couple of days ago and wanted to meet for drinks.’

‘Okay,’ Stephanie says, remembering the smell of alcohol on her husband’s breath, wondering where this is going, feeling uneasy.

‘She’s threatening me.’

CHAPTER NINE

ERICA LEANS BACK in her bathtub, the hot water up to her neck, breathing in the smell of lavender. Her mind drifts to Niall. He’s an attractive man, surprisingly good in bed. She’d enjoyed herself.

She’d applied for the job at Foote and Kilgour only to freak Patrick out; she wanted to catch him off guard. But there was an undeniable attraction between her and Niall in the interview. Plus she couldn’t help noticing that Niall was married, with a child – she’d seen his ring, the photos on his desk – and most married men, especially those with children, don’t want their wives finding out if they’re getting a bit on the side.

Her mind shifts to Patrick. Of course he said he wouldn’t pay her. But he doesn’t mean that.

Stephanie stares back at her husband, alarmed. ‘Threatening you, how?’

He sighs deeply, miserably. ‘She threatened to tell you what happened, and I said I’d tell you myself. I have nothing to hide.’

Stephanie is silent, her anxiety spiking.

Finally he says, ‘She wants money, or else she says she’ll go to the authorities in Colorado and try to get them to look at the accident again, maybe reopen the case.’

‘What?’ Stephanie says in disbelief. ‘She’s trying to blackmail you?’

He nods. ‘Yes.’

‘What is she talking about, reopening the case? What case?’ Stephanie cries, feeling a terrible unease creep over her.

He’s not looking at her. He’s staring at the floor again. ‘It was an accident, and it was officially ruled an accident, obviously. There was never any suggestion that it was anything else! But now she says she can go to them and get them to reopen it. She says she might tell them that – that I did it on purpose.’

Stephanie is stunned. She can hardly process what she’s hearing. ‘Why would she do that?’

‘For money! She’s just trying to frighten me into paying her.’

‘But she can’t do that, surely? She can’t just ask them to reopen a case. That’s absurd.’

‘Of course it’s absurd. She’s out of her fucking mind.’ He looks at her then. ‘And that’s what I told her.’

‘But’ – Stephanie doesn’t know how to put it – ‘but … can she do that? Do we have anything to worry about?’

‘I don’t know.’ He looks more worried than she would like. ‘She’s just doing this because she knows we have money. She found out about your inheritance somehow. She would never have shown up here otherwise.’

Stephanie has kept her inheritance very quiet. How would this woman know? ‘Wouldn’t she have to have some grounds?’ Stephanie protests. He’s silent for a long time. He’s still not looking at her. ‘She doesn’t have any grounds, does she?’

‘Of course not, but … she says she does.’

‘What?’ She feels like she can hardly breathe.

‘It’s too ridiculous.’

‘Tell me.’

He shakes his head, as if at the absurdity of it all. ‘She says she’ll tell them that I wanted to get Lindsey out of the way.’ Now he looks terribly uncomfortable. He glances at her uneasily.

‘Why would she tell them that, Patrick?’ Stephanie is feeling sick to her stomach.

He swallows. ‘She says she’ll tell them I was in love with her, which is absolute bullshit. I know it and she knows it. But she’ll tell any kind of lie if she gets something out of it.’ He looks at her desperately. ‘I really think she might be a sociopath, Stephanie. She has no scruples, no conscience at all. Who knows what she’ll say, what she’ll make up? It’s obvious she just wants money, but when she talks, it’s like she believes her own lies. She’s a hell of an actress.’

Stephanie’s mouth is dry. She tries to swallow. ‘How did you know her?’

‘She was Lindsey’s best friend,’ Patrick says.

‘And how well did you know her?’

He looks her in the eyes and says, ‘I was young, just a kid, really, and very stupid. I don’t want you to think …’ He hesitates.

‘Think what?’ She’s nervous now, afraid of what he’s going to tell her. She thinks she knows. He doesn’t answer her. She says sharply, ‘Did you sleep with this woman?’ His silence is all the answer she needs. ‘Oh my God.’ She gets up off the sofa and stands in front of him, looking down at him, aghast. ‘You slept with your wife’s best friend and now she says you were in love with her. Were you? Were you in love with her?’ Her voice is accusing.

In the swing, Jackie begins to cry. Almost instantly, Emma joins in. They don’t like hearing their mother speak this way.

‘I slept with her a couple of times,’ Patrick admits. ‘That’s all it was. We were drunk. We were kids. It meant nothing. Nothing! And now she thinks she can use that against me, because she needs money.’ He stands up, too, running a hand wildly through his hair. ‘She never said anything before. Because she knew it meant nothing. She knew it was an accident! She knew I was devastated by what happened.’ He reaches out to her, pleading. ‘You have to believe me, Stephanie. I would never cheat on you, if that’s what you’re worried about. I’m a different person now.’

But her thoughts are reeling. He cheated on his first wife. She can hardly believe it. It was almost ten years ago, she thinks, but do people ever really change? She says, with absolute conviction, her voice cold, ‘If you ever cheat on me, I’ll leave you and take the twins with me.’

He looks at her in surprise, as if taken aback at her tone. ‘Okay. I know that. I will never be unfaithful to you, I swear. I never have been and I never will. Let’s not even go there, because that’s not going to happen. What we have to deal with now is – this situation.’

She takes a deep breath. It’s hard to think straight because both babies are crying. They’ve had to raise their voices to be heard over the din. She walks over to the swings and turns on the timers again to set the babies back in motion. That calms them for a bit. Then she paces around the living room, suddenly filled with a nervous, restless energy, her exhaustion gone. She turns to him. ‘What are we going to do? If she goes to the police with her lies, that would be—’ She can’t even imagine what it would be like. ‘She’s accusing you of – murder!’ Stephanie says, her voice strained. ‘Think of what that would do to us, what it would do to us personally, to your reputation—’

‘It would be in Colorado, not here,’ Patrick says, his voice tense. ‘Worst case is I’d have to go back to Colorado and give my side of the story, which I’ve already done. They believed me then. They won’t believe her and they won’t reopen it. I don’t think anyone here would find out.’

‘I think that’s naive, Patrick,’ Stephanie says.

His face darkens. ‘Fuck.’ He begins to pace as well. ‘She can’t be allowed to get away with this! It’s all lies!’

‘Should we talk to an attorney about this?’

Patrick shakes his head. ‘Not yet. Maybe she’ll give up when we don’t pay her.’

Stephanie thinks for a minute, her breathing fast and shallow. ‘You said you think she might be a sociopath. Do you really think so?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘If she’s crazy, no one’s going to listen to her.’

He exhales deeply. ‘But she doesn’t seem crazy. She comes across as completely normal, but I know she’s lying,’ he says. He adds tentatively, ‘I don’t know – maybe we should pay her something, just to make her go away.’

‘No way,’ Stephanie counters. ‘If we pay her once, she’ll ask again. She’ll be after us for money for the rest of our lives. She’ll drain us dry.’ They have to stand up to her, come what may. She feels ill at the prospect of what’s ahead. ‘We’re not going to use my parents’ hard-earned money to pay off some woman who’s trying to blackmail you over something that you didn’t do. Think about it, Patrick! This is insane. I can’t believe you’d even consider paying her anything.’

‘No, you’re right,’ Patrick says, nodding.

‘Maybe I should talk to her,’ Stephanie says suddenly.

Patrick looks taken aback. ‘Why?’

‘To show her that I believe you, that I’m standing by you. That might take the wind out of her sails. Maybe I can reason with her,’ Stephanie says.

He shakes his head. ‘No! There’s no reasoning with her. I don’t want her anywhere near you, or the twins. She’s toxic – and possibly dangerous.’ He adds, ‘I mean, who in their right mind would make up something like this?’

CHAPTER TEN

NANCY FOOTE HAS put her son to bed and is now gathering up the day’s laundry to pop in the machine overnight. She picks up the shirt her husband wore that day – he’s thrown it on the bed, he never bothers to put anything in the laundry hamper – and a faint smell of perfume wafts from it. She freezes.