Pretty Little Wife

by Darby Kane

  “Did they look like your mom?” Like her?

  “Don’t psychoanalyze me. I picked women who asked for it.”

  She thought about Karen and Yara and Julie. All young and going about their business until he destroyed them. “How?”

  “They got my attention.”

  He stood close enough for her to see the flatness in his eyes. She’d always been protective of him, viewing him as lonely and a little sad. Someone shaped by horrible circumstances and the early loss of a mother.

  Now she saw him as an empty shell. Not to be pitied, but to be put down. Eradicated.

  Fear flooded through her. Instead of hiding from it, she used it. Let it fill her with a dark energy. “What now, Jared?”

  “That’s up to you.” His gaze traveled over her face, wild but not unhinged. “We can move away, pretend to be horrified by Aaron’s actions, and start over.”

  Every part of her recoiled. “Me with you? Like, married?”

  “Not like that.” He shook his head. “Haven’t you been listening? I have needs. Times I’d want to be away, at my special place. Hunting.” He smiled again. “You’ve said it a million times. We understand each other. We share a bond. Hell, it’s why I did all of this.”

  The panic inside her rose with each word. His disconnection to reality whipped and battered her. “Did what?”

  “Moved Aaron’s body. Planted evidence on Ryan and Brent.” He smiled. “Let you live after you killed my baby brother.”

  “You’re demented if you think I’d go along with your killing spree.”

  “I hoped you would. It would make things easier.”

  “Never.” She brought her arm up and swung the blade.

  Chapter Fifty-Nine

  JARED CAUGHT THE KNIFE RIGHT BEFORE IT PLUNGED INTO HIS neck. Blood dripped from his fingers where they clenched around the sharp blade.

  He made that awful tsk-tsking sound again. “Naughty girl.”

  He tugged, and Lila felt her arm pop up at the shoulder. She blinked hard against the race of tears and pain. A harsh gasp filled her ears, and she realized it came from her. When she focused on him again, he was closing the knife and throwing it into the bedroom. She heard it crash against something but couldn’t see where. She was too busy focusing on the hammer he still held.

  “You won’t kill me. We’ve known—”

  “Our history doesn’t matter. If you make me hunt you, I will. And I will savor it.” He swung the hammer and caught her in the side.

  She doubled over as pain shot through her, from stomach to back. She kept her head up because she knew if she looked away he would slam the hammer into her brain.

  Her side thumped under her fingers, and an ache screeched through her head. Anxiety and panic mixed and swelled inside her. But she stayed on her feet.

  “You’re going to bludgeon me, Jared?” She tried to ignored the pain and breathiness in her voice. “How will you explain that to the police?”

  “You assume anyone will find your body.”

  The hammer was right there, in front of her face. She bolted around him. Shifted to her wounded side. But he caught her mid-run and looped an arm around her waist, tightening against the wound he’d inflicted until the breath left her lungs. He pulled her against his stomach and held her there, his breath gliding across the back of her neck.

  “That was a mistake.”

  She’d always thought of him as a guy who sat at a desk. In shape but normal. What a joke. He possessed enough upper-body strength to clamp down on her and limit her options. All that running and conditioning. She knew that was part of his game. Part of the hunt.

  She would not die like this, another victim of the Payne men.

  “Let go!” She scratched at his arm. When he lifted the hammer again, she kicked out her legs, throwing him off balance. He shifted backward and yelled in her ear to stop.

  His anger breathed life into hers, but she tamped it down. He wanted her to fight. He got off on the hunt and the fear.

  She would not give him either.

  She made her body go limp. “Okay.”

  “Okay?”

  His mouth was right next to her ear. His body so close. But she would not panic. She would not give him that.

  “Do it,” she said, issuing her challenge.

  He loosened his grip. “Your game won’t work.”

  But it had. Her arms were still trapped in his, but she could move now. Lower her hand.

  “I won’t fight you.”

  He whispered against her ear. “That’s not like you, dear sister. You fight everything.”

  She forced her body to stay still. Lure him in. “You act like I have anything to live for. You and your brother destroyed everything.”

  “Oh, come on. Let me enjoy this.”

  He barely held her now. The space between them widened.

  And she pounced.

  Her fingers wrapped around the screwdriver she had hidden in her pocket. She thrust her arm into the air, breaking the last of his hold. She spun around and aimed for his neck. He ducked just in time, and the end rammed into his cheek. Blood spurted, and he reeled back.

  She kicked him in the stomach. Used all the pent-up anger and fear and stretched out like she had with the fence. He went down, and the hammer fell from his fingers and cracked against the floor. Before he could get up, she jumped on him, arms waving, straddling his hips.

  She shifted and heard his sharp intake of breath. When she looked down, she saw his jaw drop open and felt his hands pull at hers. The screwdriver poked out of his stomach, and blood gurgled up from inside of him.

  It all happened so fast. The kick and the plunge. She’d stabbed him.

  She shoved the screwdriver deeper into his body. Moved it around, causing as much damage as possible. Ripping and tearing.

  As his eyes turned glassy and his voice died out, she leaned down. With her face just inches from his, she watched the life seep out of him.

  “I knew about you all along,” she whispered.

  His mouth moved, but no sound came out.

  “About this cabin. About you, you sick piece of garbage.” Her side screamed in pain, and her fingers ached from the grip on the screwdriver, but she kept going. She needed his last memory to be of her. “I followed Aaron here weeks ago and figured it out.”

  “No.” His voice came out as a low whisper.

  “I had to wait. Bide my time and plan. I couldn’t just kill one of you. I needed to wipe out your polluted bloodline. Make sure every last male Payne was dead, and now I’ve killed you both.” She pushed the tool even deeper and his hands slid off hers and fell to the floor.

  “I fucking win.”

  “LILA!”

  She could hear Pete’s voice but didn’t let go. Jared’s body turned boneless and his head fell to the side. She watched his chest, but it no longer moved up and down. Still, she sat on top of him and dug that screwdriver as deep as she could inside of him.

  Blood soaked his gray shirt and flooded the floor beneath him. She could smell it, feel the stickiness on her fingers, but she didn’t unclench.

  The room started to spin, and the stitch in her side begged for attention. She heard footsteps thundering up the outside steps. Pete was yelling directions, and someone said something about an ambulance.

  No need. She’d taken care of him. She’d ended it.

  Pete skidded into the room. He hesitated for a second before running over and kneeling next to her. “Okay, Lila. Let go.”

  She shook her head. “I can’t.”

  Pete felt for Jared’s pulse. “He’s dead.”

  “He killed them all. Those women. It was Jared. He set up Aaron, but he killed them.”

  “We’ll worry about who did what later. I need you to let go now so I can get you some help.” Pete tried to loosen her grip.

  So many questions crashed into her brain, and her vision blurred. “Why are you here?”

  “Ginny told me to follow you.”

/>   She thought a car had been following her, but then she’d looked back and it wasn’t there. “You took your time getting here.”

  He shook his head. “I lost you near the end of the drive.”

  None of that mattered now. She knew who and why. Everything she’d ever thought about Jared had been wrong. The bracelets. The charms he’d used as some sort of official body count of his depravity. He was more than damaged. He was evil.

  She forced her mind to focus even as her stomach spun and twisted. “Tell Ginny I wasn’t too late this time.”

  Then she gave in to the pain pulling and tugging at her and the cabin went dark.

  Chapter Sixty

  THE NEXT MORNING, CHARLES CALLED GINNY AND PETE INTO his office. Made a show of it, too. Yelled their names across the main room and slammed the door, trapping them inside.

  He’d been on the phone since she’d arrived at work. Rubbing his hand through his hair, which was never a good sign.

  He disconnected the call and fell into the chair. He eyed up both of them before turning to her. “I told you to stand down. That was an order.”

  Only he would think that catching a serial killer and a teacher who’d abused kids in the same week was a feat that demanded an explanation. He fought for his job and his reputation. Just once she wished he’d fight for the people on the ground. The people who worked so hard to make him look good to the voters.

  She inhaled, waging an internal fight. She kept her voice calm and tried to be reasonable. “You said the FBI was taking over. That meant—”

  “You heard what I said. You were to stop working on the case.” He leaned back in this chair. “Instead, you sent Pete out on surveillance.”

  She would make the same call today and next week and next year. “It’s good I did.”

  Pete nodded in an uncharacteristic show of support. He wasn’t exactly one to buck authority. “She’s right. Something could have happened to Lila.”

  “We might never have known that Jared was the killer,” she added.

  Pete nodded again. “Exactly.”

  Silence sucked all of the oxygen out of the room. There was nothing comfortable about this quiet. It itched and burned.

  “There’s one major flaw in your joint and obviously practiced argument.” He pointed at Pete but looked at Ginny. “He didn’t stop Jared. He didn’t kill him or save Lila. He got there after Jared was dead. She saved herself.”

  All true, but Ginny thought he was trying very hard to miss the point.

  “I found her over Jared’s body.” Pete stood at attention, but he wasn’t marching to orders this time. “It was obvious from the scene he was looking for Lila to be his next victim.”

  Charles shrugged. “So?”

  “So?” She was surprised her head didn’t explode.

  Charles glared at Pete. “What happened to your belief that Lila killed her husband? That Ginny was too close to this case to properly assess it?”

  Pete’s eyes widened. “I didn’t—”

  “It’s exactly what you said. You came running to me, refusing to make a formal complaint but trying to cover your own ass, just in case.”

  The weasel. Both of them. Scurrying around, whispering behind her back. But still.

  She forced her anger down, like she always did. “None of that changes what happened in the cabin.”

  “Or that Ginny’s instincts about this case not being over were right,” Pete said.

  Not that she forgave him based on that small show of support. She didn’t. Disloyalty, picking Charles’s whims over her instincts, would take a minute for her to process. Not now, but back at home. She’d talk to Roland, and then maybe—maybe—she’d remember how green Pete was and let it go.

  “What did happen in that cabin? Do we know?” Charles leaned forward with his hands folded together. This was his serious, I’m in charge position. He used it whenever he wanted to yell. “It seems to me, once again, that we’re taking Lila Ridgefield’s word on everything. We have to because she’d been leading us around the whole case.”

  But he wasn’t wrong about that. Getting there just after the altercation, not knowing what they’d said and fought about, picked at Ginny. “What are you suggesting?”

  Charles focused on her. Frowned and sighed and gave her the full I’m pissed show. “I’m saying with or without Pete in that cabin, this case would have ended the same way. With more questions than answers. With two dead men and a woman the public views as a vigilante hero. She is untouchable.”

  Pete shrugged. “I can live with that.”

  “Oh, really?” Charles’s voice grew even louder. “See, I gave an order. I had an understanding with the State police and FBI, and you two violated it.”

  And there it was. The real reason for all of this, for launching into the screed in front of the full office. “This lecture is because we made you look bad in front of your important friends?” she asked.

  “I’m in charge, not you. Do you understand me?” He didn’t give her time to answer. “Well?”

  Pete exhaled. “Yes, sir.”

  “Yes,” she said without rolling her eyes, which she thought was a huge triumph.

  “You’re both on leave. I don’t want to see either of you for a week. Not a word to the press or that woman with the podcast. Prove to me you can follow orders, or you’re fired.” He looked down at his desk blotter and treated them to a shooing gesture. “Get out.”

  SHE WALKED OUT of the office and made it halfway to the coffee before Pete’s voice stopped her.

  “Ginny . . .”

  She turned around and saw the panic on his face. The frown and the furrowed brow. Time to be the bigger person—again. “It’s fine.”

  Pete swore under his breath and took a step closer to her. “It’s not.”

  Actually, it wasn’t. It might never be. “We have to work together, Pete. Political types will come and go. They don’t wander out in the field or put their lives in danger. We do that. And I need to be able to trust you.”

  “You can.”

  She snorted. “It sure as hell doesn’t feel like it.”

  “I messed up, but I get it now.”

  She doubted it. “What do you get?”

  “Lila. Your reaction to her.”

  “Huh.” She crossed her arms in front of her. “I don’t understand what you’re trying to tell me. Explain.”

  “Seeing her there, holding on to that screwdriver in a death grip . . . It was as if she thought if she let go, then Jared would rise from the dead and attack again.”

  Ginny could picture it. She hadn’t been in the room but had no trouble reliving the moment with him.

  “A piece of her probably did believe that.” Pete’s pained expression pushed her to elaborate. “Imagine being her and having your life destroyed by your father’s betrayal. By him doing the worse thing imaginable. Then his actions steal your mother away, leaving your trust and sense of safety irreparably damaged. Your life gets flipped again by your husband and the one person you think you can trust—your brother-in-law—turns out to be the worst of them all.”

  He was wise enough to wince at the factual scenario she laid out. “What does that do to a person?”

  “Beats them down. Without getting help, probably made them more vulnerable to snapping.” That’s what Ryan’s notes had said. Lila had never dealt with the loss. She’d pushed it down, ignored it, and the PTSD had festered until her sense of what she needed and her reality skewed.

  He whistled. “So, what happens now?”

  “Nothing. I stay home for a few days and annoy my husband and son.”

  “No way.” He scoffed. “Wait, you’re serious? You’re going to give up?”

  With the trust gone, the last thing she wanted to do was share any part of her thinking with Pete. “You heard the boss.”

  “Since when do you follow orders?”

  But she did. That was the point. In the past she’d paid for it. A millionaire’s wife had
paid for it. She’d approached this case a different way, which made walking away so difficult. “I’m not losing my job over Aaron and Jared Payne. I wouldn’t lose it for Lila either.”

  “That’s not what I thought you’d say.”

  “I’ve learned my lesson.” She almost smiled. She could imagine her husband’s reaction if she tried to sell that line to him.

  “Nah.” Pete shook his head. “You’ll be watching the case.”

  “Of course.” And a weeklong break would give her the opportunity to learn one last thing about Lila and her life before she let the case go.

  Chapter Sixty-One

  Eleven Days Later

  GINNY MADE IT MORE THAN A WEEK BEFORE HEADING BACK TO Lila’s house. She thought people should praise her for that. Lila’s neighbor stalked across the lawn and met her before she reached the door. “You need to leave her alone.”

  The only thing that kept her from yelling was the possibility that Charles would find out about the visit and fire her. “I’m just here for a final wrap-up. No questions.” She held up a hand in mock surrender. “I promise.”

  “If you want to help, clear them off the street.” Cassie stared at the media vans and press congregating at the end of Lila’s driveway.

  They would move on soon, enraptured by some new horror, and leave Lila alone. But she could help the process along. “I’ll see what I can do.”

  Cassie rolled her eyes and stomped away. “Yeah, sure.”

  When Ginny looked back at the house, she saw the front door was open and Lila stood there. She couldn’t remember a time during this whole mess where she’d stood on her front porch.

  Ginny walked up the driveway toward Lila. The first thing she spied was the sign on the lawn. The next was the open curtains on the front windows.

  “Visiting with my neighbors?” Lila sounded amused at the idea.

  “You’re moving?” Not what Ginny had intended her first question to be, but it worked.

  “Being here is not exactly comforting.”

  Ginny smiled at the sarcasm in Lila’s voice. “It’s hard being a hero.”