“I have to agree with Rachael,” I offer with a shrug. “I bet it’s going to be a criminal, or someone really evil. Someone who deserved to die. I hate to imagine someone innocent would be buried out there.”
“Can’t we leave it?” Travis snaps in exasperation. He’s looking at his wife. “It’s been on the news all day. I’d rather use this time with our friends to talk about other things.”
“I agree. That’s one wicked gun.” Michael pushes the beignets aside to make room for the weapon. “Put it here, I’ve got to get a better look at it. You taken it to the range yet?”
“That’s not going to happen. Take a look at this.”
Travis goes to work dismantling the back part of the gun—hell if I know what its proper name is—and then clicks a silver knob-thing out of place.
“See that?” he asks, pushing the tiny knob from side to side. “Slide this over, and the Glock becomes fully automatic.”
“No shit,” Michael says, gawking, stroking the barrel. “Isn’t messing with that thing illegal?”
“Hell yeah it is.” Travis beams. “But I know a guy who hooked me up.”
“May I?” After getting the go-ahead, Michael holds up the gun, pointing toward the door, closing one eye as if practicing his aim. “It’s lighter than I thought it’d be. Man, I really need a concealed carry permit. How long did it take you to get yours?”
As Travis goes on about the permit process, which I now understand doesn’t include the carrying of a modified weapon like his new “toy,” I watch Michael pull back on the top of the Glock. I’ve never seen him handle a gun, but he looks natural, as if he’s done it before. He’s not hesitant or twitchy, not like I would be. Actually, I never knew he was interested in guns at all. I’ve never even thought to ask. Michael might own an arsenal I don’t know about. Maybe that’s what he keeps in the locked rooms in the east wing. It’s not a far-fetched thought considering I still haven’t figured out what’s behind those doors. I haven’t even been on that side of the house since my encounter with Dean.
“If the gun is illegal,” I ask, sheepishly, “why would you want it?”
“Because it’s fucking awesome,” Michael blurts, shaking his head in disbelief as he replaces the gun tenderly on the bar. “Why wouldn’t you want it?”
“It’s for home defense,” Travis answers. “Can never be too careful, especially after that dead woman was discovered today. If there’s a killer on the loose in our neighborhood, and he tries to break into my house, he’s not leaving in one piece.”
I search Travis’s expression for signs of humor. But there is none. And then he winks, chilling me to the core.
“Come on, Colleen.” Rachael drapes an arm around my shoulder and leads me into the kitchen. “I could use some help with dinner.”
Twenty minutes later, we’re seated in the formal dining room. Ravioli and salad cover our plates as candles flicker from glass cylinders in the center of the table. Helping Rachael in the kitchen turned out to be removing foil lids from catering pans and tossing prepackaged salad. I don’t mind. Since arriving at Ravenwood yesterday morning, I’ve eaten every breakfast and lunch there. I’m grateful to have a meal where I’m not eating from a menu handpicked by Joanna.
“What do you say we play a game?” Rachael asks, stabbing a cherry tomato with her fork. A reddish glow has bloomed over her nose, and her fourth glass of wine sits in front of her—not including the one she had in her hand when we arrived. “Remember when we used to play games, Michael? Before Joanna left? Oh, they were so much fun. Would You Rather was always my favorite—what a riot.”
The mention of Joanna’s name has me sitting up straighter and listening harder.
“I’d rather not,” Michael counters. He squeezes my knee reassuringly beneath the table. “No offense, Rachael, but some of those parties were a drag. Pass the salad, would you?”
“Come on.” Shooting him a slanted glare, Rachael hands over the chilled bowl. “Loosen up. Have another scotch. Colleen, I know you’ll play. Would you rather travel back in time, or to the future?”
“The future,” I answer immediately, and meet Michael’s eyes in a way that tells him I can roll with the punches and handle myself. “I can’t wait to meet our little one, so I’d travel to the day he or she is born.”
“God.” Rachael drops her fork and claps her palms together. “Isn’t that the cutest?”
“I’d go back in time.” Travis shovels a second helping of ravioli onto his plate. “Lord knows I’ve made mistakes in my life that I wish I could take back. I’d definitely rethink a few of my poorer choices.”
“Only a few?” Rachael hiccups into a laugh, then directs her attention to Michael. “Your turn.”
“I said I’d rather not.” He takes a long drink, emptying his glass. “You guys know I’ve never been into these games. Can’t we just eat, drink, and argue about politics and religion like normal people?”
“Who’s normal these days? No one I know,” Rachael snaps. “Looks like it’s just the three of us playing, then. Colleen, your turn to come up with a question.”
“Would you rather,” I say slowly, letting my thoughts simmer, “live in the house of your dreams, but it was haunted by ghosts? Or live in a run-down apartment that wasn’t haunted?”
“Oh, that’s a great one,” Rachael croons, stuffing a ravioli into her mouth. For the first time, she looks sloppy, waving her fork in the air in front of her face, smacking her lips together. “Let me think. Think, think, think.”
I like drunken Rachael.
“Got it,” she cries out, lifting her fork as if it were a scepter. “I’d live in the haunted house, but hire an exorcist before moving in. Voilà. Ghost problem solved.”
“You can’t do that.” Travis shakes his head. “That’s going against the rules.”
“This is my game. I make the rules.”
She laughs for no obvious reason at all, and I can’t help but giggle along with her. Her laughter is infectious and melodic, a string of sweet, high-pitched sounds that I wouldn’t have expected to come from her.
“Do you always have to manipulate things in order to get what you want?” Travis asks.
“We’ve been together nine years, and you’re still asking me that question? Sometimes I wonder if you know me at all.” She beams, revealing perfectly straight teeth stained a disgusting shade of purple. And then she laughs harder, smacking the table with the palm of her hand. But she misjudges the distance, hits her long, manicured nails instead, and pulls them back with a squeal. At that, everyone laughs hysterically.
“We don’t even have to ask you,” she says to Travis, clutching her hand against her chest as she nurses her nails. “You’d live in the house of your dreams. You don’t believe in ghosts.”
“Why would I? I’ve never seen a ghost. Have you?” Travis glowers at his wife as if he’s waiting for a challenge. “What about you, Colleen?”
“I’d go wherever Michael goes,” I say, probably too quickly. I’ve had more than enough time living in this scenario to make up my mind. “He’s worth the haunting.”
Rachael stares at Michael. “Is she always so gaggingly sweet?” she demands.
He nods. “Every single day.”
“It’s lovely.” She presses her lips together, but a chuckle bubbles out of them. “Your turn, Travis. Ask away.”
He finishes his salad and his drink. Wipes his mouth. Sets down his napkin. “Would you rather,” he says, drawing out the words, “kill or be killed?”
“Oh, give me a break,” Rachael grumbles as she pushes back from the table and disappears into the kitchen. When she reappears seconds later, she’s carrying the platter of beignets. Dropping it in the middle of the table, she steals the one closest to her and takes a generous bite, even though she hasn’t fi
nished her dinner. “Oh God, these are as good as I remember. Colleen, be a dear and thank Dean for me. He both sabotaged my diet and salvaged my night in one eight-hundred-calorie swoop. Anyway,” she says, dabbing powdered sugar from the corners of her mouth with a napkin, “why are you bringing up death at the dinner table?”
Travis shrugs. “Thought you’d be all for it, considering how obsessed you are with that body dragged out of the mud this morning. What would you rather, honey? Kill? Or be killed?”
Rachael makes a satisfied sound as she sucks sugar off her fingers. “I would have to be killed….I think.”
“You think?” Travis mimics, nastily. She ignores him.
Michael finishes his dinner with a sigh and pushes his plate aside. He’s been silent the whole time, except for those few times he’s laughed at Rachael’s drunken expense, and his silence hasn’t gone unnoticed. He hasn’t touched me through dinner either, now that I think of it. Not since the one time he put his hand on my knee. Is it the game that’s bothering him? Or something else?
“If I killed someone,” Rachael prattles, “I’d go to jail, and have to leave all of this behind. I might as well be dead. Besides, can you imagine me in an orange jumpsuit?” She gives a visible shudder and laughs, tipping her glass back to down the very last drop. “That’s not a way to live.”
“That’s if you get caught,” Travis counters, straight-faced. “What if you kill and get away with it?”
“If they don’t catch you right away, you wouldn’t be able to think about anything else until they did. You’d drive yourself crazy, wondering when someone was going to beat down your door and haul you away.” She shakes her head, flinging her blond hair about her face. “I’d rather die than be a prisoner in my own hell.”
She hasn’t mentioned a single thing about committing the actual crime, or the guilt of taking another life, only the ramifications it’d have on hers. I’m not surprised, but a part of me hoped she’d have higher morals.
“What about you, Colleen?” Travis says, twisting in his seat to face me. “I’m dying to hear your thoughts on this. Kill or be killed?”
“Or more importantly,” Rachael presses, leaning over the table and lifting the dessert tray. “To beignet or not to beignet?”
I can’t bear to eat more of Dean’s food. No matter how delicious, I inevitably think of Joanna with every bite. If Dean made these beignets, Joanna must’ve approved the recipe. She must’ve chosen which nights she and Michael would indulge in the treat. And one or more of those nights, Rachael and Travis must’ve come to visit and fallen in love with the dessert as well.
“No, thank you.” Placing a guarded hand over my stomach, I shake my head. “Not this time, anyway. Desserts haven’t been sitting right with me lately.”
“Seems like nothing has,” Michael interjects under his breath.
I shoot him a sideways glance that goes unnoticed.
“I’m not letting you off the hook that easily, Colleen. You still haven’t answered.” Resting his elbows on the table, Travis temples his fingers together and stares me down. “What say you? Kill or be killed?”
My cheeks heat as the table goes quiet waiting for my answer. “I think it would probably depend on who was trying to kill me—I mean, if it was self-defense, well, I suppose it would—I don’t know, but I guess—”
“I’d kill,” Michael blurts, his voice dark as the night. “Without a thought.”
The table goes quiet as all eyes turn toward him.
“Well, of course you would, Michael,” Rachael says with a smirk as she slides another beignet off the tray. “Travis may own guns, but you’re the one with a history of violence.”
This time, when she laughs, nearly falling out of her chair, no one laughs with her.
MICHAEL
“What’d she mean?”
“Who?”
“Rachael.”
It’s well after midnight, and I’m so exhausted, I can barely hold myself upright. Probably has to do with the amount of alcohol I consumed tonight, but how could I resist? It’s not every day someone buys a bottle like that.
Staggering, I heel off my shoes, then shelve them in the closet. When I emerge, Colleen is dressed in a pale blue satin nightgown, her dark hair falling over her shoulders, and my breath catches. Removing the throw pillows from the bed, she gently pulls back the covers, adjusting them so they’re perfectly folded back.
Tonight’s the night. Finally, after a week of taking care of my own needs, I’m going to have sex with my girlfriend. It’s been so long, anticipation makes my movements twitchy.
“When she said you have a history of violence,” Colleen goes on without meeting my eyes, “what did she mean?”
There goes any hope I had of sleeping with her tonight. It’s not happening, not now. The air is suddenly full of tension, and I can tell she’s upset. I love her so damn much, and I want to tell her everything.
But I can’t.
I can’t tell her about Joanna, about the fights we had near the end of our relationship, about the time she ran to Rachael’s house and called the police. I did things I’m not proud of. Pushed boundaries. Lost my temper and my mind. I’ve never been an aggressive person, but my marriage had deteriorated to a point where I hardly recognized myself when I looked in the mirror. It’s not an excuse—there’s absolutely no justification for what I did and said to her—but we were both to blame. I wasn’t innocent, but neither was she.
With Colleen, I’m not even a shadow of that man anymore. I’m the man I used to be, the one I want to be.
I’d never hurt her.
Dredging up the past will only bring that negativity into our relationship. Once I tell Colleen the truth, she’ll look at me differently, with regret in her eyes instead of adoration. And there might be fear there, too. Fear that I’d do the same thing to her.
I couldn’t bear it.
“Last summer a guy came into the office,” I lie as I strip to my boxers. “He was irate, screaming, causing a scene about a deal gone wrong, and when I went to escort him out, he swung. I reacted fast, dodged his punch, and took him to the ground. Everything happened so fast. It was blur, really.”
She looks up at me for the first time, skepticism darkening her eyes. “What happened?”
“I let my anger get the best of me. He ended up with a cut over his eye and a bloody lip. Thank God he didn’t press charges.” I toss the pillows on my side of the bed to the floor and yank back the covers. “I was never arrested.”
The story’s not entirely fabricated. A man did come in, upset by one of his investments. He had made a scene in the lobby of my building. When I went down to confront him, he screamed until a crowd gathered around us. From there, security escorted him out. I didn’t lay a finger on him. Doesn’t mean I didn’t want to.
But the violence Rachael mentioned is much worse than beating up a stranger in the lobby of my building.
“Do you…” She stops as she kneels on the edge of the bed.
“Do I what?” I press, knowing I shouldn’t.
“Do you own any guns?” She pauses, tension ballooning between us. “I’m just curious.”
“No,” I say. “I don’t own any. Never have.”
Doesn’t mean I’ve never wanted to, but I leave that part out.
“That’s good.” She slips beneath the covers and draws them up to her chin. “I don’t care for guns. I wouldn’t want any in the home. Especially with children running around.”
“I agree.” I lie back, folding my hands behind my head. “Now let’s try to get some sleep. You’re not the only one exhausted by what’s going on.”
She crosses her arms over her stomach and sighs. A few moments later, she rolls onto her side, facing me. I can almost feel her gaze burning into the side of my face.
A stark change from the way Joanna would sleep, turned away from me all night.
“Michael, do you…Never mind.”
“What?”
“Well, it’s just that we—you and I have never talked about your wife.”
Not what I was expecting. She pronounces Joanna’s title hard and clipped as if it’s cursed. Forbidden. Perhaps it should be.
Wife.
Outside, the wind howls, slamming against the bedroom windows. We’re in for another bad storm. “We haven’t talked about her because there’s no reason to. She’s not my future. You are.”
There. Cut and dried. Conversation finished before it could begin.
“Good night,” I go on, hopeful.
“But…”
“What, Colleen?” I snap. “Why would you want to know anything about my wife? Our marriage is over.” Only it isn’t. Not legally, anyway. But in every other sense of the term, Joanna is dead to me. “I thought we agreed to leave the past in the past and focus on our future.”
“I know, I know that’s what you said, but—”
“But what?” Anger scrapes away at my insides. “You suddenly want to know everything about her? All the juicy details of our marriage? Why? What good would that do either of us?”
She looks away as if I’ve struck her. “I guess I’m just curious,” she whispers.
“Curiosity killed the cat, remember?” I scrub my hands through my hair as if that’ll help me understand how this evening unraveled so quickly. “You want to know? Fine. We met at a charity function in the city, we were married five years—only truly happy for a fraction of that time—and then she left me.”
Silence seems to stretch for minutes, and I breathe deeply, thankful she’s finally dropped the subject.
“If you weren’t happy,” she asks, “why didn’t you get a divorce?”
“For the love of God, Colleen, drop it,” I holler. “I don’t want to talk about my wife again. I don’t even want to hear her name. Not tonight, not ever.” I’m shaking with rage. Why wouldn’t she just leave it alone?
In Her Shadow Page 8