Skin and Bone: A Psychological Thriller

by T. L. Keary

  He pauses. He stands a little straighter.

  And then he rattles off an address. “I’m not getting off the phone until I hear the police have my brother.”

  Whoever is on the other line must finally get sick of arguing with him. Davis’ eyes slide to me. He leans against the counter and switches the phone to speaker.

  It’s the longest ten minutes of my life.

  “The police have your brother, Mr. Knox,” a male voice finally says on the other line. “He appears to be fine. He’s very confused and worried. But he’s okay.”

  “Please tell him that I’ve been in a serious car accident,” Davis says, his brows furrowing as his eyes darken. “Tell him I need him and the police at my house.”

  Relief floods through me, knowing Ezra is safe. Knowing that soon, it won’t just be Davis and I trying to figure this all out.

  Help is on the way.

  Shaky and unstable, I pull myself up to my feet.

  “This isn’t the way these things usually work, sir.”

  “I don’t care,” Davis says, his voice cutting like ice. “Just get them to bring my brother here, and the police, so I can report two attempted murders.”

  Davis hangs up and smacks his phone down on the counter.

  I look over at him and he looks at me.

  There are tiny cuts all over his face. I can already see a bruise blooming on the left side of his face. His shirt is cut in dozens of places and blood drips down it.

  She tried to kill us both.

  We could have died.

  Emotions well in my eyes, but I bite my lips together and refuse to cry.

  I step into Davis at the same time he wraps his arms around me. We cling to each other, because right here in this moment, Davis is the only person in this whole world that I trust. He’s the only real thing in this psychotic, upside down universe I’m now living in.

  “The police will find her,” Davis says, lacing his fingers into my hair, cradling me close and gentle. “She’s going to go to jail for a long, long time. And we’re going to get your life back, Sawyer.”

  I squeeze my eyes closed harder, forcing just one tear out onto my cheek.

  I realize this has gone on for a month now. That I haven’t been in control of my own life for four entire weeks.

  And I think I’m afraid to face the truth.

  That I’m probably not going to be the same person I was back then.

  I lean back, quickly wiping away that one, traitorous tear. I put my hands on Davis’ shoulders, looking up into his bloodied face.

  “I really want to clean you up, take you to the hospital,” I say. “But the cops need to see. Ezra needs to realize how bad it is.”

  He pauses, never once looking away. But he nods.

  We leave the tub full of water. I don’t even change out of my wet clothes, and I don’t brush through my half-wet hair. I don’t even wipe away Charity’s blood splattered over my face. Together, we make our way down the hall to the dining room.

  Still feeling stiff and a little fake from the paralytic, I help Davis sit down into a chair, and just then the doorbell rings.

  “I got it,” I say, holding my hands up for Davis to stay where he is.

  He nods.

  My heart is racing as I walk to the door.

  This has gone too far. We nearly died. We should have called the police sooner, no matter how impossible this all was to explain.

  My heart is in my throat when my hand grabs the doorknob, and I twist it.

  There are two police officers standing at the door, but I hardly even notice them.

  My eyes lock right on Ezra.

  It’s kind of hard to even believe he’s real right now. Charity made me watch him and her on the screen for weeks. It was like a boring horror movie mixed with a romantic comedy. He was a face on the screen.

  He was the object of my fear.

  I haven’t laid eyes on the real Ezra in seven years.

  But here he is.

  And I’m about to ruin his whole world.

  “Sawyer, what are you doing here?” Ezra asks, his brows furrowing together in confusion. “And why are you all wet? Is that…is that blood on your face?”

  I can’t help them now, the emotions that push out of my eyes. Tears slip down my face as I step onto the porch and I wrap my arms around him in a quaking embrace.

  “Sawyer, what…” But he trails off, and in his voice, I hear more questions. In his hands on my back, I feel uncertainty.

  I wasn’t evaluating Charity’s weight as she was trying to kill me, but thinking back now, and considering the weight I lost down in the bunker, I know she probably has fifteen pounds on me.

  Charity told me that they’d been trying to conceive on their camping trip. Which means Ezra’s hands would have been all over her body this weekend.

  Ezra will feel the difference.

  “Ma’am, we received a call from Mr. Knox saying Ezra was in danger and that we needed to bring him here,” a uniformed woman says with a cautious voice. “Is Mr. Knox home?”

  “In here,” Davis calls from within the house. “Please, come in.”

  I let Ezra go, and I hate how confused and suspicious his expression already is when he looks at me.

  I wipe my tears from my face, feeling absolutely sick to my stomach. I turn and walk back into the house, grateful to look away for even just a few moments.

  I hear Ezra and the officers follow us inside.

  I’m not sure I can do this right now. Not just minutes after I thought I was going to die. Not just minutes after Davis saved my life, and I found him to be broken and bloodied.

  I need a minute to find my head.

  But there’s no time.

  There’s no going back now.

  “Davis, what happened to your truck?” Ezra says from behind me. “We saw it down the road. Did someone try to steal it?”

  With a wince, Davis twists in his seat, and everyone but me freezes when they see him.

  “Holy…” Ezra breathes. “Davis, you need to go to the hospital.”

  “Mr. Knox, are you alright?” the female officer asks.

  “Not really,” he says as I sit in the chair beside him. “Someone cut my brakes.”

  “Who would do that?” Ezra says as he pulls out the other chair beside Davis. “You must have seriously screwed someone over.”

  Davis glares at his brother, his jaw set hard. In his eyes, I see how much patience and control he’s exercising.

  “Ez,” I say, my voice hoarse and quiet. “The last few weeks…they haven’t been what you think they are.”

  I don’t want to look at him. I don’t want to see his emotions. I don’t want to watch him break.

  “What is that supposed to mean?” he asks. There’s this numb, hard edge to his words.

  I hear a sharpness in them. A sharpness that is familiar.

  I swallow once.

  My stomach drops into oblivion when Davis reaches over and takes my hand. But I cling to it for dear life.

  Betrayal alights in Ezra’s eyes as he stares at Davis holding my hand, looks up to see the supportive, protective way his brother is looking at me.

  “The woman you’ve been with for the past four weeks wasn’t me,” I say, ripping the Band-Aid off. I just say it. “She isn’t Sawyer James.”

  Ezra looks angry. There’s a darkness in his eyes that rarely exists. There’s vengeance and disappointment.

  I look up at the police officers. They stand to the side of the table, listening and watching intently.

  They need to hear this. They need to understand. And then they’re going to have to take action.

  But this story, all of my words, are for Ezra.

  “Four weeks ago,” I begin to explain, “someone sent me an email from an address with my name. There was just one attachment. A video. It looked to be me, back here in Snohomish.” I swallow once, hoping that Ezra can read the truth in my eyes. I hope that he can feel it, that I am not ly
ing. “I watched this woman, who looked exactly like me, walk down Main Street. And then there you were, and it totally looked like a happenstance encounter. You talked to her, caught up.”

  “And you asked me to dinner, Sawyer,” he says. That hard edge in his voice grows sharper.

  I shake my head. “Up until four weeks ago, I hadn’t been back to Snohomish in seven years, Ezra. After our last awkward encounter, it was easier to just avoid town. I was in Bellevue the whole time.”

  “Why are you doing this?” Ezra asks, his words seethe out from between his teeth. “Daniel tried to tell me you were cheating on me with Davis but I told him there was no way. Why… When…?” He shakes his head, running one hand through his hair as he leans back in his seat, like he needs to put some distance between us.

  “There’s a lot more, Ez,” Davis says, his tone hard and commanding. “You need to keep listening to her.”

  “I can’t believe you’d really go and do this,” Ezra says, turning his accusatory eyes on his brother. “Of all the people you could have gone after, you choose Sawyer? The one person—”

  “You shut up and you listen to the real Sawyer,” Davis says as he begins to stand, shoving his chair back. He plants his hands on the table, staring hard and dark at the brother accusing him of seducing his girlfriend.

  The police officers take a step forward, ready if they need to interfere.

  Ezra just glares at Davis like he could kill him.

  I see the conflict in Davis’ eyes. He hates how blind Ezra is. He hates that his brother was this obsessed that he let himself fall into this. But he also has compassion. He loves Ezra. He wants his brother to be happy.

  Davis sits back down.

  I want to take his hand again. I need that support. I need that connection to reality again.

  But I can’t do that to Ezra. I can’t stand to break his heart into any smaller pieces than I’m about to.

  “There was a subject with the email,” I continue. “It said, this was never really about you. That’s it. I was at work, so it was a bit before I could do anything. I was worried for you. I didn’t understand what I’d seen in that video. So, I decided I needed to talk to you, but I didn’t have your number anymore. I had no idea how to get ahold of you.”

  I glance over to Davis, and I consider how damn lucky I am that I thought of him.

  “I remembered that Davis was a realtor here, so I looked up his company and found his number.”

  “She called me trying to track you down, Ez,” Davis says. He shakes his head. “I didn’t want to give your number to her. After everything that happened in the past, I didn’t want her opening old wounds and getting into your head again.”

  I watch Ezra’s eyes, and I can see he doesn’t believe us. Or he hasn’t processed what I’m saying.

  “But while I was on the phone with Davis,” I continue, “I passed out. Someone had drugged me at some point during the day.” I swallow, recalling the confusion, thinking I was sick. “When I woke up, I was in this bunker, locked up.”

  “Ms. James,” the female officer speaks up. “Are you saying you were kidnapped?”

  I look over at her. “Yes,” I answer with a nod.

  She leans over to her partner, whispers something, and then the both of them pull out chairs at the table, grab a notepad and a pen.

  This just got real to them.

  “I had some food, some water, enough to last me a few weeks,” I say, recalling how I counted the cans, trying to estimate how long they would last me. “And there was a toilet and a cot. But there was also a television in there. And she let me watch as she took over my life.”

  Beneath the table, I feel Davis’ hand touch my knee. I didn’t realize my hands were shaking until I grab his hand. He holds it tight, in the one way he can attempt to comfort me.

  “She made me watch you put that table together, your walk to the park, a dozen other dates that showed me way more than I ever wanted to see,” I recount, my stomach turning sick. “When I confronted her about why she was doing this, she said it was all about you, Ez. She hinted that she’s been trying to make you fall for her for years, but you weren’t interested. So, she slowly became me.”

  “Why are you doing this?” Ezra breathes. I see tears welling in his eyes. “If you want out, just tell me, Sawyer. Don’t go making up this elaborate story about someone else pretending to be you for weeks. That’s the most pathetic thing I’ve ever heard!”

  “She’s telling the truth, Ezra!” Davis yells, slapping his hand down on the table.

  “We can run DNA and prove it,” I say, leaning forward. “We can get proof. But there has to be something I can do right now to prove it to you, Ezra.”

  I’m begging. Pleading.

  There’s so much anger in his eyes. So much betrayal. It’s aimed at me, and it’s a heartbreaking place to be.

  I did this once already. A long time ago. I said goodbye, the end, to Ezra.

  I hate that it’s me that has to do this to him.

  “We engaged in a lot of activities this weekend,” Ezra says. The look in his eyes hardens, and I chill at what I see there. “Why don’t you show Davis what I did to your back during round three yesterday?”

  Oh. He’s going for humiliation.

  But I see a golden opportunity, a foolproof way to prove this to him.

  I stand, keeping my eyes locked on him as I push my chair back. My hands to the hem of my wet shirt, I pull it up and over my head. I twist, showing everyone my back.

  The movement hurts though. I look down, and I already see bruises forming on my midsection from being dragged around and thrown into the tub.

  “But…” Ezra stutters. “The…the scratches. I got a little…and I left scratch marks, and teeth marks on your shoulder. And where did you get the bruises?”

  I look over my shoulder. His eyes are wide, his mouth not open, not closed. His brows furrow together.

  I just shake my head once.

  “It wasn’t Sawyer that you spent the weekend with, Ez,” Davis says.

  I meet his eyes.

  He tries to look away, and he does a very good job of keeping his eyes locked on mine, even though I stand in front of him wearing only a pale blue bra.

  “Then if it wasn’t you, who the hell was I supposed to be with?” Ezra asks, his words rough.

  I pull my shirt back on and sit. “You remember Charity Cooper, from high school.”

  He doesn’t even have to think about it. “Yeah.”

  I expect him to immediately connect the dots. But it’s obvious he doesn’t.

  “Has she made…advances on you over the years?” I ask.

  “Well, sure,” he says, shrugging one shoulder. “She’s always flirting, but I’ve never given her a reason to think anything was ever going to happen.”

  “Ez, she’s been obsessively in love with you since high school,” Davis says. He’s losing patience and rushing. He’s hurting. He needs to get to the hospital. “But she saw you never got over Sawyer, so bit by bit, she had surgery to make herself look like the real Sawyer. And when she was ready, she went all the way. She took Sawyer out, left her to die in an underground bunker, and crawled into bed with you.”

  “And how the hell am I supposed to know this is the real Sawyer?” Ezra snaps.

  In his eyes, I can see he’s entirely overwhelmed and scared and confused.

  “You asked me out after the second day of school our senior year,” I say, letting my mind dive back into our memories. “It was just after Mr. Tennel’s psychology class. Our first official date was to go watch the stars on the roof of the high school, but we got caught by the janitor and we ran off and left your car in the parking lot.”

  I lean forward, looking into Ezra’s eyes. “For Homecoming, you snuck into my room at five in the morning and brought me breakfast in a brown paper bag. You wore a purple tie to match my dress, but you hated it and felt embarrassed about it all night. After the dance, we went back to your house
and you burned it in the driveway.”

  Ezra’s eyes widen, and I breathe a sigh of relief, realizing that I’m finally reaching him.

  “Think about it, Ez,” I say, keeping my eyes locked with his. “Does she ever bring the past up? Does she ever talk details? Does she ever know anything that anyone from high school wouldn’t know?”

  He bites his lips together and I start to see emotion ripping across his face.

  He thinks.

  Hard.

  He drags himself through the last few weeks.

  “You…” I look around, hating that we have an audience for this part. “You even said that she felt different during sex, Ez. And just now, out on the porch when I hugged you, I feel different than yesterday, or even just this morning, don’t I?”

  A huff of a sob rips from Ezra’s lips. Only once. His face is angry. It slowly turns red. His eyes don’t focus and slip down to the table as he starts putting things together. As he starts realizing that some things don’t add up.

  “I hate camping, Ezra,” I say. “I would never suggest it.”

  “How much gluten have you seen her eat in the past few weeks, and never once did she get sick?” Davis points out.

  Another of those sobs rips up his throat. Ezra raises shaking hands, covering his mouth for a moment, but then they shift into his hair, holding hard. “Who…who the hell does this? She…Sawyer, she looks exactly like you. She smiles like you. She laughs like you.”

  I nod. “I know. She’s been stalking me, watching me, for years.”

  “Wait one second,” Davis says. He gets up and walks to his office. He winces sharply as he gets up from his seat. He returns a moment later with the yearbook from our senior year and his laptop.

  He opens the yearbook to Charity’s picture and then pulls up the picture from Charity’s graduation with my degree from my school. He spins it around for Ezra to see and pushes the yearbook closer.

  Ezra leans over, first looking at the yearbook picture of Charity. Then the computer screen. The one that has the bad blonde hair, but my same exact cheekbones. But still Charity’s eyebrows and jaw.

  “Holy shit,” Ezra breathes, horror filling his eyes.

  He pulls out his phone and opens up a picture. It’s a selfie of him and the imposter.