by E. C. Diskin
Shea leaned against the counter. It was getting hard to balance. She shook the crazy thoughts from her head. She was being ridiculous. Evelyn had just been trying to be a good friend. She probably didn’t want to see her get hurt the way she had been hurt. She sent her a text: E—hope you’re feeling better. I can’t believe you actually went home! So sorry for dragging you all the way here. Let’s talk in the morning.
She leaned toward the mirror, refreshing her lipstick, fluffing her hair. She could barely keep her eyes open, but she winked at her reflection. “You still got it, baby,” she grinned. That man, who Tori might even say met her Clooney requirement, wanted her.
But he had no idea that he’d suggested an anonymous one-night affair with the woman least likely. Not after everything she and Ryan had done to each other, everything they’d been through. She was done with the lies and secrets. She took another sip of her drink, grabbed her purse, and froze as she reached for the door handle.
She was still lying and keeping secrets, hundreds of miles from where she told Ryan she was going, on some clandestine, misguided mission to rid Georgia and herself of their guilt over Blake’s death.
How could she and Ryan start their next chapter like this? She let go of the door and fell back against the wall, wobbling. She pulled out her phone and hit the speed dial for home. It rang twice before she cut the call. She couldn’t do this now. Not here, in this bathroom. But she’d call him tonight.
CHAPTER 40
April 15
KAT WENT TO THE OTHER side of Evelyn’s bed. When she opened the drawer, her heart nearly stopped.
She couldn’t take her eyes off the granite-colored steel, the shiny grip, sitting there on top of a tablet and several papers like a life-ending paperweight. Kat hated guns—even the sight of a gun made her feel a little sick. There was nothing illegal about owning one and nothing out of the ordinary in finding a gun in someone’s bedside table. Even Shea and Ryan owned a gun. But Kat had made Shea show her where it was kept, safely locked away, high on a shelf, before she could relax about their boys playing together in Shea’s house. Shea had thought Kat was being irrational, but some people feared spiders, others bats or snakes. Kat feared guns, as if they were just as alive and unpredictable. She had heard too many stories of children and accidental deaths, sudden violence.
But Evelyn was a single woman. There were no children in this home. She was obviously incredibly wealthy. Perhaps she saw herself as a target. Kat focused on the tablet. Maybe that was as close as she’d get to a modern-day diary. She slowly reached down and lifted the gun, terrified by the weight of it in her hand, and placed it onto the soft bedspread. It felt like a grenade.
She turned on the tablet, and the screen lit up, revealing an array of app icons. Movies, news, social media, calendars—nothing that seemed extraordinary. She clicked the calendar and scanned the dates. March 25, that was the date she’d been at the hotel with Ryan. The calendar entry for that date: Rendezvous with RW. Ryan Walker. Kat felt sick. Even after seeing them on that hotel surveillance tape, she could not get her head around Ryan betraying Shea with Evelyn. Though, why was that so hard to believe? He’d admitted cheating to Mack, warning him, “It’s never safe.” What did that even mean? Had he been referring to Evelyn? At the luau party? When had it begun?
She closed the calendar and noticed a Facebook app. She clicked, unsure what she was looking for, other than a general realization that she didn’t know this woman at all. Tori had said Evelyn wasn’t even on Facebook—at least she hadn’t found her. But when the app opened, it automatically logged in to Evelyn’s account—Evelyn Alison. No last name. That explained it. Kat quickly scanned Evelyn’s list of friends but didn’t see any of the women from the neighborhood. There were not that many friends, actually. She found Ryan’s name.
The photos were categorized into those Evelyn had posted and those that had tagged her. She clicked Evelyn’s photos. Nothing caught her eye. She clicked the tagged photos, scanned the faces, and stopped on a group shot. A group in a conference room, a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows behind them, city buildings beyond. Everyone in suits. Evelyn sat in the middle of five men. And there was Ryan, sitting to her right. Just when Kat thought she’d wrapped her head around Ryan’s betrayal, she was hit with something worse. Evelyn’s hair was several inches shorter. This was an old picture. They’d known each other for years.
Kat fell to a seat on the bed, sick to her stomach. This woman had come to Maple Park a year ago. She had to have known Shea was Ryan’s wife. Ryan’s Facebook profile made it easy enough. Evelyn had sought Shea out.
She closed out the photos and clicked the messenger bar on top, scanning Evelyn’s private conversations until she found what she feared: messages between them. The first notes were three years old.
Kat sat, entranced, reading their private conversations. She could feel her eyes swelling, her throat tightening, but she couldn’t leave.
The front door suddenly opened and slammed shut.
Kat jumped, searching the room, unsure what to do. Was it Tori? She threw the tablet down on the bed and knocked into the open drawer as she stood. The remaining contents of the drawer shifted from the force. She glanced down, just for a second, her eye moving to the neon-green case.
Shea’s phone.
CHAPTER 41
April 15
KAT STOOD FROZEN INSIDE THE closet, waiting, listening. She looked down at her feet. That stupid cat, curled into a ball, relaxed in the little bed tucked into the corner. She had to get out of here.
Keys dropped onto the glass table by the front door. Shoes with a small heel clacked against the wood floor. Wheels rolled beside them. She was coming this way.
Suddenly the clacking stopped. She was in the room. On the carpet. Kat was shaking, fighting against the urge to cough. She needed air.
The closet door swung open as Evelyn hit the light switch by the door frame. The light poured down on Kat, on the gun in her hands. Kat’s eyes filled with tears.
Evelyn screamed and stepped back. “Kat! What are you doing? Did you break in?” She was acting indignant, as if she had the right.
Kat stepped forward, her hands shaking, pointing the gun at Evelyn. “What did you do?”
Evelyn was backing up, her hands up. She backed into the bed and fell to sitting. “Kat, please put that gun down. Don’t be crazy. You don’t understand.”
“She was nothing but nice to you!” Kat took a few steps forward, trying to scare her into a full confession, but she couldn’t keep it together. The tears clouded her vision. She frantically wiped, removing one hand from the gun for just a second. Her face was itchy, hot.
“I didn’t do anything, I told you. I never got on that ferry. I was sick. I’m sorry. I swear.”
“You’re a liar. I know all about you and Ryan. You were there.”
“You don’t understand, Kat. It’s not that simple.”
“Don’t lie to me!” Kat said, stepping closer.
Finally, Evelyn began to break. “He loves me, Kat,” she said softly, like it was a secret, but then her face became hard, her voice raised. “He didn’t want to hurt her, but Shea didn’t deserve him. You don’t know what she’s done.”
“I’m calling the police.” She knew it needed to happen, but she could barely see straight. She didn’t know where her purse was, where the phone was, what to do.
“You don’t understand. I went with Shea. I told you the truth about that. I know you don’t believe me, but I got sick at the terminal. Kat, don’t you see? We were there because of her stupidity. She caused all of this.”
“Stop! You’re lying. You moved here to break them up? Is that what this is about? Who does that?”
“You don’t understand.” Evelyn was shaking her head. “Ryan loves me. And it’s not like Shea’s some innocent. You’ve seen the way she behaves.”
“You got on the ferry. You were on the island. I saw the proof,” she said, waving the gun toward the bed. �
�So don’t even—”
“Okay, stop. Kat. Yes. I went to the island. I was upset. She was ruining everything for me and Ryan. He wouldn’t leave her. I knew if Ryan knew what she’d done with Blake, if he realized her recklessness caused some man’s death, it would finally be over between them. So I pulled myself together and got on the ferry. You know what I found? Shea, sitting at Rudolph’s, flirting with some man! Can you believe that? After all that she’d done, after dragging me to Ohio because of Blake, she was sitting in a bar, drinking with some guy!”
Kat stepped back, leaning against the wall, the gun dropping just slightly. “What did you do?” She barely got out the words. She didn’t want to hear it, but she needed to hear it.
“She was going to betray Ryan. Again! And after he’d said it was over between us, that he couldn’t hurt Shea, that he’d put her through too much. I couldn’t stand it. Kat, please.”
Kat looked around for her purse. She had to get out of here. She’d take what she’d found and go to the police. Evelyn stood and began moving toward her.
“Stop!” Kat yelled. “Don’t move. I swear to God . . .”
“Listen to me. Kat, listen. It’s not what you think. I left,” Evelyn pleaded. “Kat, I left! I was never in that room. I couldn’t tell anyone. How could I say I was with her on the island? I couldn’t tell anyone why I was upset. Why I left. No one would understand. But I left! I swear, Kat, I left!”
The front door slammed shut again.
CHAPTER 42
April 1
6:55 p.m.
SHEA RETURNED TO THE BAR and plopped back onto the seat beside Ted. She suddenly felt like she weighed a thousand pounds. “I should go. You’re very cute and nice and sweet, but it doesn’t matter.”
“To harmless flirtation,” he said, raising his glass. “The kind that never leads to trouble, but can provide fond memories and will certainly help me sleep tonight.”
Shea laughed and took a final swig of her vodka.
Ted put his elbow on the bar and rested his face in his hand, smiling sheepishly at her. “Since we’re being good, why don’t we talk about whether we’ve ever been bad. I’ll go first. Yes, I have, but you would have been different. I’m sure of it.”
“Mmm-hmm . . . thought you said you’d never cheated on your wife?”
He smirked, like a kid who’d been caught stealing candy, a petty offense. “I lied.”
“Of course.”
“What about you? Have you ever cheated?”
Shea considered it. She didn’t think so, but did Blake count? Did it matter what she believed at the time? “I guess it depends on how you define ‘cheating.’ I’ve learned that none of this is black and white.”
“So true,” he said, sitting up taller.
She watched him brush his hair from his forehead, mesmerized. “You have great hair,” she slurred. It was a struggle to keep her eyes fully open.
“Thanks,” he replied with a shoulder lift, head turn, and sudden feminine lisp. “It’s just such a mess sometimes.”
She nearly spit out her drink, cracking up, and threw her hand to her mouth to stop the explosion.
He grinned. A million-dollar smile.
“Okay, okay,” she said, swatting the air like he wasn’t going to tempt her with that smile or hair or humor. “I gotta go.”
“Me, too,” Ted said, standing. He threw some twenties on the bar. “Well, lovely Shea, I’m starving. I need to find some food, and I must leave you now because it’s just too difficult to remain casually seated next to such exquisite and forbidden fruit.” He took her hand to his lips and gave it a soft kiss.
Shea chuckled and said good-bye. “I need to get going, too.” She heard the slur in her words and closed her eyes. “Sorry,” she said. She stood, stumbled, and Ted caught her.
“Okay,” he said. “Maybe I should walk you back to the inn.”
“No, I’m fine,” she insisted. It was embarrassing. She heard the bartender ask if she was okay. Oh, God, she looked like a drunk. But Ted told him not to worry and held the door for her. “Thanks,” she said, linking her arm in his. “You’re a nice man.”
CHAPTER 43
April 15
KAT’S FOCUS SHIFTED TO THE door for a moment. Maybe it was Tori.
Evelyn moved closer.
“Sit!” she yelled, pointing the gun at her face.
“Evelyn!” It was Ryan. He sounded angry.
“In here,” Evelyn yelled, backing away from Kat, returning to the bed, her expression shifting, like help had arrived.
Kat didn’t know what to do. She heard him coming toward the room.
Ryan walked in, and Kat waved the gun at him.
“Kat, what are you doing?” he said, staring at her, the gun, Evelyn. He hadn’t shaved. He was wearing sweatpants. He looked like he hadn’t slept since she saw him the day before. “What’s happening here?”
Kat couldn’t stop crying. It was getting hard to breathe. “Don’t, Ryan. Please don’t lie to me anymore. I don’t know what the hell happened on that island, but I blame you both!”
“Kit Kat,” he said, his hands up. “Stop. Please, put the gun down. You don’t know what you’re saying.”
“You lied to me! My best friend is dead, and you two have been lying and sleeping together . . . and planning who knows what.”
“No . . . Kat. You’re wrong,” Ryan said. “You’ve got it all wrong. I’m not sleeping with Evelyn.”
“Why, Ryan? If you weren’t happy, get a goddamn divorce!”
“Kat, stop,” he yelled and stepped closer. “You’re wrong,” he shouted.
“Don’t come any closer,” she said. She could feel her eyes swelling. It was hard to keep them open.
“Kat.” His voice softened. “Yes, I had an affair with Evelyn. It was a mistake. We met through work. I swear to God. I never wanted to lose Shea.”
“You told me you loved me!” Evelyn yelled. “And I lost my husband over that affair, so please don’t—”
“Stop!” he yelled at Evelyn. “I told you, I love my wife.” He turned to face Kat. “Listen. It was a fling, three years ago! It was never supposed to be any more than that.”
Evelyn began falling apart. “You’re a liar.”
Ryan ignored Evelyn. “She showed up in town—she befriended my wife. I didn’t know what to do. She said it was a coincidence, that she’d never say anything to Shea, that she liked her. But when she came to our party last summer, I begged her to leave, to make different friends and stay away from Shea. The whole mess terrified me.”
Kat was shaking, both arms locked, the gun swerving back and forth between Evelyn on the bed and Ryan still near the door. She didn’t know what to do, how to call for help. She couldn’t shoot a gun. She couldn’t put it down. She could hardly see. Her eyes, itching and raw, flooded with tears.
“Please,” Ryan continued. “Kat, I swear to God, I loved my wife!”
“You’re lying!” Kat yelled. “I know you were together before Shea left town.”
Ryan’s hands were up, but he stepped closer. “Kat. You don’t understand. Shea took off to Michigan. I thought she was sleeping with Charlie. I thought I’d lost her. I got drunk, and Evelyn found me at a bar and drove me home. I slipped—one time, but only because I thought my marriage was over. As soon as Shea got back, I realized what a mess I’d made. I swear, we were working things out.”
Evelyn was shaking her head, her hands to her mouth. “It’s not true,” she mumbled.
Ryan kept his hands up, his focus on Kat. “I didn’t know Evelyn went with Shea to the island, not until you told me last night. I’m not sleeping with Evelyn.”
Kat looked over at Evelyn, whose head had dropped, like she couldn’t listen to what he was saying. “I don’t believe you. I saw you on tape. With her,” she said, waving the gun between them. “You used Shea’s vouchers. I saw you!”
“You don’t get it,” Ryan pleaded. “Evelyn took the vouchers from our house. She call
ed me after checking in under my name and threatened to tell Shea if I didn’t meet her. I went there. But only to tell her that it was over. That I’d been wrong about Shea and Charlie. I told her that whatever had happened between us was over. I never wanted to leave my wife.”
Evelyn was shaking her head. “You don’t understand, Kat. Ryan acted like she was some victim, like he couldn’t do it to her, and then she drags me to Ohio and I see her. She got drunk in that bar with a man, and they left together. I watched. They went into the inn together. Ryan, she wasn’t good enough for you. And you were oblivious. You were going to move away with her.”
Ryan focused on Evelyn. “What are you saying? What did you do?” His voice cracked.
“Stop! Don’t put this all on her. It was you, too!” Kat shouted. “You knew where Shea was that day. I saw. Evelyn sent you a message on April first. She told you where Shea was. You could have gone there. You could have done this.”
“Kat,” Ryan pleaded, stepping closer, “Evelyn wanted to break us up. Please believe me. She’d been screwing with me since summer. She put a fucking bra in my drawer. She was trying to end my marriage. I didn’t listen to her. We did not kill Shea. I swear to God. Please.” He stepped closer.
CHAPTER 44
April 1
7:20 p.m.
SHEA WAS LYING ON THE bed with her eyes closed. The room was spinning. Mary’s voice was still in her head. You’ll feel better tomorrow. What a joke. She felt nauseous and sat up, each arm locked, hands against the mattress. The room was moving, the floor sloping at an angle as she tried to stand. How many drinks had she had? She felt like she’d been drugged. The pills, she thought. She’d done this to herself. She had to stop. She and Ryan were making a fresh start. She stumbled into the bathroom for some water.