“I remember,” Lizzie said softly. “You were only seven, but you were the best big sister ever. Even before she was born.”
“But not later,” Leah whispered, stroking the wings of the butterfly. “Not later, when she needed me the most. I couldn’t protect her from Dad. I couldn’t convince her that he’s never going to change, and she just kept on trusting him. Over and over. And he just kept on breaking her heart. Over and over and over.” She sighed deeply, turning to press her teary face into her mother’s shoulder. “And then it was like he found an accomplice. Lana never defended Lilly. She hated Lilly. She hated the attention Dad gave her every time she came over. So, she’d start a fight, every single time.”
Lizzie held Leah close, tears burning her eyes.
“Every time,” Leah continued. “Lana would either stomp around with that resting-bitch-face, insisting on throwing a cold shoulder at Lilly, or she’d do something dramatic, like go to a party and get drunk, come home and start fighting with Dad. She wanted Dad’s attention, and Dad couldn’t see it. And they’d fight, and you’d call the police, and CPS couldn’t do anything. The police couldn’t do anything, because both Dad and Lana are a couple of liars. So Lilly,” she whispered, gripping the butterfly in her fist, “Lilly would be caught in the middle. Getting used and manipulated and abused by them both.”
“Leah,” Lizzie said softly, covering her fist with her palm. “You know what Lilly’s journal said. You know the words she wrote. She never intended to harm herself. She was going to use the gun to break up the next fight between them.”
Leah nodded, opening her palm and dropping the butterfly into her mother’s lap. “That’s what she wrote. But she said something to me that day, before I left for school. Something I can’t stop thinking about and never told you.”
Lizzie narrowed her eyes, backing away to look at her daughter. “What did she say?”
Leah took a deep, steadying breath, brushing away her tears with the back of her hand. “She said that the only way Dad would ever change is if she really got his attention. And she wanted him to change, to be a better Dad for me and Clay, and especially Gabrielle, since she’s so little. She said, since she was closest to Dad, it was her responsibility to do something drastic to make him hit rock bottom. To make him really turn his life around.”
She gasped, shuddering. I felt my blood rushing in my ears.
“She said that?” Lizzie managed.
Leah nodded. “I just told her that Dad would never change, and to give it up. Then I hugged her and left. And when the reports came back from the- the coroner- and the autopsy- and they said it was a close call, but they ruled it an accident- Mom, I don’t think it was an accident. I think Lilly changed her mind that day. I think she decided she was going to be the one to change Dad. To do something so dramatic that Dad would have no choice but to see ‘the light.’ To change his ways. To dump Lana and get himself help.”
“He never changed,” her mother whispered, staring at Lilly’s butterfly in her lap. “She sacrificed her own life to change him, and he’s at some bed & breakfast with Lana right now. He’s the ‘best husband ever.’”
Leah sneered, sniffing and sitting up straighter. “And he wasn’t held accountable. No criminal responsibility. Dad didn’t even have to answer for the fact that the gun wasn’t locked up. They said Lilly stole the gun. A tragic accident. I know my sister, Mom. I know what she did. And I will never stop blaming Cal and Lana. I’ll never call him Dad again.”
Leah stood and left the living room, leaving Lilly’s butterfly behind in her mother’s lap.
Lizzie opened her phone again, staring at the rose petal picture. She saw Lana had tagged a location.
Rolling Hills Victorian Getaway.
Southern Ohio.
About three hours away.
The snow had started to really come down, and she opened her internet browser to search the weather report for where they were.
Snowing, but with little accumulation.
Jake was working all night. Clay was at a friend’s house, and Leah was leaving for her boyfriend’s house where she planned to spend the night.
Lizzie was having a hard time processing time. She’d been to see a psychiatrist after her daughter’s death. The psychiatrist became preoccupied with the fact that Lizzie was having out of body experiences. She was losing time and finding herself in odd places doing odd things. During those blackout times, as Lizzie called them, she would awaken dressed differently. Jake went to a few sessions with Lizzie and told the doctor that his wife listened to different music during these experiences. She spoke differently. She even had different mannerisms. Gestures that Jake described as older. Like a person from another time.
Lizzie grew tired of the sessions. She knew when to give in to the blackout. She could feel them coming on and assumed that it was her mind’s way of protecting itself from the truth.
When Leah left, as she was pulling out of the driveway that evening, Lizzie felt herself slipping.
It was a gradual process, like a headache coming on after too much wine. But, once she gave in, it was merely like going to sleep.
Virginia never liked the way Lizzie dressed. Lizzie would try to defend her wardrobe, explaining that as a writer and an employee who worked from home, there was no need to get all dolled up for the work day. Virginia disapproved.
Virginia preferred to dress conservatively, and like a lady. She loved the white cardigan in Lizzie’s closet, the one with the deep pockets. It went well with any long dress, and she could easily pair the ensemble with boots or a nice scarf.
Virginia pinned her long, blonde hair into a bun, or sometimes a ponytail. Lizzie wore her dark hair like a shroud, always down, and always in her eyes. Virginia preferred to show off her face, especially her high cheekbones.
The drive to southern Ohio would be long, but music always made any car ride manageable. She chose Lizzie’s parent’s playlists, the only music she approved of. Virginia couldn’t stand the country music that Jake liked, or the nostalgic, nineties grunge that Lizzie lost herself in for most of her moody moments. No, Virginia preferred Lizzie’s parent’s music. Hits of the 1950s through 1970s. The music that Lizzie grew up listening to. Music Lizzie remembered hearing on fun trips to visit her grandparents, or outings with her siblings.
Lizzie had the most wonderful childhood.
It wasn’t until Cal showed up in Lizzie’s life that she started to doubt herself, Virginia thought. Virginia had volumes to say on that matter, but it was time for her to take care of Lizzie now.
Virginia had no problem finding the Victorian B&B that Lana had so helpfully tagged in her social media post. She drove through the snow effortlessly, glad to see the accumulation was little to nothing the closer she got to the West Virginia border.
She saw Cal’s red Ford Explorer in the driveway. The main office that handled the B&B rental was already closed for the evening; Virginia passed it a half a mile back. She learned from a quick internet search that the entire B&B was rented to one customer at a time, privately, during the off-season. Cal and Lana would be the only people staying there.
Virginia was glad she and Lizzie were so close. Lizzie had shared the combination to Jake’s gun safe with her long ago, so choosing the right weapon had been easy.
Virginia chose a revolver, the gun she was most comfortable operating.
The lights in the lower level of the oversized B&B were dark at the midnight hour, and she stepped up onto the porch. The oversized picture window was covered by sheer drapery, offering a muted view of the living room.
A fire crackled, illuminating the living room.
Cal stood in front of the fire. He held the mantle with one hand for support. His other hand was on Lana’s red head as she knelt before him.
Her head bobbed back and forth, back and forth.
Her head bobbed like she had a long way to go, and Virginia and Lizzie both knew that wasn’t the case.
Her head bob
bed like a whore.
Virginia stood watching. She watched Cal’s face as he came, and she watched as Cal tightened his grip on Lana’s head, forcing her to swallow.
Virginia watched until there was nothing left to watch.
They got up unceremoniously and went for the stairs.
Virginia tried the front door, but it was locked. It was like Cal to be overzealous in security; he never trusted anyone.
People who never trusted either had done the worst or had seen the worst.
For Cal, it was both.
Virginia walked around the house through the snow, glad she borrowed Lizzie’s frumpy but practical snow boots. The doors that opened to the basement were chained shut with a haphazard knot, as though the owners had zero concern for trespassers.
She set the heavy chain aside and opened the door, retrieving a flashlight from her pocket. She thought again about the practicality of the deep pockets in her cardigan. So useful.
As the dark corridor stretched before her, she found her way toward a tiny room just off the main basement.
A root cellar.
An old stone staircase led up into the smallest stairway, so narrow that Virginia had to place both hands flat on the walls to make her way up the steep steps. They seemed to go on forever in the dark, but the further she walked, the closer she got to sound.
Voices.
She heard Cal’s voice first.
He was speaking in his nasty way, in the tone that meant that Lana had somehow disappointed him. She was defending herself, and he was snapping at her, cutting her off.
“I brought you all the way out here for a romantic evening, and you’re texting some fucking guy?” he raged.
Virginia heard something smash against the wall in front of her. Narrowing her eyes, she pushed the smallest bit on the wall, realizing that a panel opened from the stone stairway into the master bedroom of the house.
Through a slit in the wainscoting, she could see them in the brightly lit bedroom.
“You broke my phone!” Lana shouted. “I can’t believe you broke my phone!”
“Fuck you! I’ll break your phone and I’ll break your fucking neck if you cheat on me, you hear me? You’re a fucking whore. Why wouldn’t you cheat?”
“You cheated on Lizzie!” Lana defended herself. “What does that make you?”
“With you,” Cal scoffed with a laugh. “What a mistake that was.”
Virginia clucked her tongue softly, shaking her head with disapproval. His salty business was still fresh on her lips and already he was degrading her.
She made her bed, Virginia thought smugly.
May as well lie in it.
“Oh, I know, here we go again. Lizzie was a perfect wife and mother and I’m a piece of shit,” Lana replied, her tone dripping with sarcasm. “Your first wife was a whore. I’m a whore. Why the fuck didn’t you stay with Lizzie if she’s so fucking perfect?” Lana fired. She tried to sound angry, but instead whined her words to him.
Cal reached for her then.
His hands went around her throat. He squeezed, his eyes wide. Wide like a monster’s eyes. Wide and black with no blue left.
But Lana was turning blue. Blue and bloated.
Virginia knew it was time. Time to do what Lizzie couldn’t. Time to do what Lilly had intended to do, right up until the moment of her death.
She pushed open the wainscoting panel. Cal caught her out of the corner of his eye. When he let go of Lana, Lana gasped for air.
“Lizzie?” Cal said.
Virginia decided it was fitting for Lizzie’s name to be the last word that he spoke.
She lifted the gun and shot at Cal, but her aim was terrible.
She hit Lana instead.
Lana went down, and as Cal reached for her, Virginia shot him.
Down he went.
But not far enough down.
Virginia pushed them both to the hidden staircase. She rolled them both down the stairs. Blood trailed. Blood everywhere. Blood that made her think of Martin and Liza and Molly.
But that was all so long ago.
Once she got them to the basement, she felt for a pulse. Lana was dead.
Cal was still breathing.
She tied Cal to the wooden shelves of the root cellar. He was bleeding a lot.
She dragged Lana by the hair up and out of the basement, into the snow in the backyard of the Victorian mansion. The woods weren’t far off the property, but another option loomed before her.
A lake.
The lake wasn’t yet frozen, and Virginia shoved Lana into the lake.
It was time for Cal.
Back in the basement, Cal had regained consciousness and was trying to pull at the ropes. Virginia saw him open his mouth to speak, but she wanted Lizzie’s name to be the last name that he spoke, so she shot him again.
Right in the mouth.
The mouth that charmed little Lizzie in the video store that night.
The mouth that kissed her and made her feel like the only girl in the world.
The mouth that broke her heart.
The mouth that called her fat.
The mouth that berated her and her three children.
The mouth that chipped away at their confidence, and their nerves, and their sanity.
The mouth that broke Lizzie.
Virginia shot him right in the mouth, and Cal died in the basement.
EPILOGUE
The voices always came in like AM radio chatter when Virginia left and I came back again.
“She’s doing well today, Jake,” the nurse said softly. “It might be a good time to talk to her.”
I pulled the blanket tighter to my chest, widening my eyes as Jake lowered to the chair next to me. The white walls of the hospital were always alarming when I realized that I was institutionalized, and Jake could see my panic.
“There you are, sweetheart. You’re safe. No need to be afraid,” he said, his broad smile warming my heart. He was so sexy, even still with his graying hair and salt-and-pepper whiskers.
“Where are the kids?” I begged. I knew, somewhere in my mind, that they weren’t kids any longer, but Jake was always happy to indulge me.
“They’re good. They’re in their own homes, remember Lizzie? They’re good. Leah and her husband just had a baby. Leah is a baker.”
“She makes the best cupcakes,” I whispered.
“Yes, she does.” Jake sat back, holding my hand in his. “And Clay just got promoted. Lead software designer. He and his wife have two children. Twins. Remember the twins?” He reached into his back pocket, retrieving his phone. “Look how big they grew, in just a year.”
“Red hair?” I said, cringing.
“Clay’s wife has red hair, remember?” he answered.
“And Lilly?” I begged. “How’s Lilly?”
He sighed deeply, tucking his phone back into his pocket. “Lilly is safe now, Lizzie. She’s safe.”
I wanted to push, but I didn’t. I couldn’t.
“Virginia made me kill them,” I cried finally, gripping Jake’s arm. “Virginia made me kill Lana, and then Cal. And then I killed- I killed Virginia. I’m sorry for what I did,” I said tearfully.
“Lizzie.” Jake squeezed my hands. “I know why you did it. Cal and Lana were ultimately responsible for Lilly. Losing her the way that we did...”
“We never lost Lilly!” I cried.
“Lilly is safe,” Jake soothed. “Lilly is safe now.”
“There was no body!” I shouted, frantically fisting the afghan in my lap. “Find Virginia, and she’ll tell you! She forced me to kill them, or she was going to kill me! If there was no body, then Virginia has to be alive! She still has to be alive, hiding somewhere!”
“Okay,” Jake said, his careful words staccato and monotone. “I’ll keep looking.”
I glared at him. “Why are you patronizing me? You don’t believe me. You were there, Jake. You saw her. She told us about her husband, and her daughter who died, and- an
d you were there, why don’t you remember?”
“I wasn’t there, honey. I wasn’t there.” Jake looked defeated. “When Lilly died, you spent a year in and out of psychosis. You had a psychological break. Virginia helped you through it. Virginia is a part of you. Lizzie... you’ve been here for seven years.”
I ignored his lies about Lilly. “I know that I killed Cal and Lana. I know it. But I had to, I had to. It was kill or be killed,” I said, growing tired of defending myself.
Jake nodded, taking my hand.
“Maybe Virginia should tell me about it,” he said reluctantly.
I knew Jake hated Virginia. When I became too agitated, he always seemed to invite her into our conversation.
I closed my mouth, shaking my head.
Jake smiled again. “You know, it’s a beautiful spring day. Why don’t go enjoy a walk in the garden? Okay?”
I nodded quickly.
I was tired.
So tired.
Jake reached for my hand. I wished I’d known he was coming. I would have put on something nicer than pajama pants.
“The sun does feel good through the window. I think this was the longest winter we’ve ever had,” I said to Jake as he led me toward the door.
He nodded, turning to press a kiss to my forehead.
“The winter’s over now, Lizzie. Time for the sun again.”
“And the butterflies?” I asked.
Jake nodded and smiled at me, tightening his grip on my hand.
“I promised I’d always give you butterflies. Have I ever let you down?”
I smiled up at him, leaning into his arms.
“The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it.”
-Henry David Thoreau
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BOOKS BY
KIMBERLY ADAMS
THE MOVIE SERIES
BELOW UNFORGIVEN
ON HEARTBREAK RIDGE
ABOUT HER Page 18