Unfaithful: An unputdownable and absolutely gripping psychological thriller

by Natalie Barelli

  “They’re here for you.” Then, eyebrows knotted, she mouths, Sorry.

  I freeze, turn around slowly and come face to face with Detective Jones.

  Thirty-Seven

  They just wanted to talk to me, they said. Detective Jones and the other one, Detective Dalloway, a woman with short black hair and a scar over her top lip. I wonder if it’s the same one who interviewed Luis the other day. I let myself be led away, head bowed, cheeks flushed with humiliation. I followed, obedient and meek and so frightened it made my legs feel like rubber, and was put into the back of a black sedan that stank of stale cigarettes.

  They have brought me to a small room with white walls and a plastic table. They both introduce themselves even though I know who they are already. It’s for the camera, Jones says. He asks me to do the same.

  “My name is Anna Sanchez,” I say, my voice shaky. “Am I under arrest?” I ask finally, staring at the manila folder on the table.

  “No,” Jones says. “We just have a few questions. Just a few things to clear up and you’ll be out of here in no time. Would you like a lawyer present?”

  A lawyer? I feel faint. I ask for a glass of water. There’s a water fountain in the corner of the room and Dalloway fills up a white plastic cup for me. I drink it and some of it dribbles on my chin, like my mouth can’t function properly.

  They wait, patiently, while I try and think if I want a lawyer. Everybody says you should have one, no matter what, but I don’t know where to get one. I consider asking to call Luis, but I desperately want to know what this is about first, and didn’t Jones just say I’ll be out of here in no time? That doesn’t sound like I’m in any trouble. It sounds like they need my help. I just need to remember that’s why I’m here. To help. I’m fabulous at helping. I’m a team player.

  “No, I don’t need a lawyer. What did you want to ask me?” I say, my voice stronger now that I’m on familiar territory, rallying to the cause.

  “I should tell you first that we’re now conducting a murder investigation around the death of Ms. Wilcox.”

  My heart skips a beat. I wonder how many I have left, how many more I can skip before my heart gives up completely. I stare at him, replaying the words in my mind. “You think she was murdered?”

  “Mrs. Sanchez, you said the last time you saw Isabelle Wilcox was on the Friday when you and your husband hosted a small dinner party.”

  I think of June’s sad face as I walked out. Sorry.

  “I did, didn’t I.” It’s not a question. “I made a mistake.”

  He writes something down. “What mistake would that be, Mrs. Sanchez?”

  “I saw Isabelle the night she died.” I say this quickly, on the out breath.

  “I see. That’s quite a mistake. Did you forget about that?” He sits back in his seat and chews on the top of his pen. That is a bad habit, I want to say. I’ve been trying to get Carla to stop doing that and it’s really hard. Do you know how many trillions of bacteria you’re ingesting right now? Where has that pen been? In your unwashed pocket? Have you dropped it on this filthy floor lately? Of course you have.

  “Mrs. Sanchez?”

  I blurt it out. “I told you before, I went out with someone from work, June. I said we were together until I went home, but we weren’t together all night. We went our separate ways around eight p.m. I think. After that I went to Isabelle’s house, to talk to her, that’s all, just to talk. And before you ask what it was about… it was nothing. It was about my husband, actually. She was home, she let me in. I… my memory of that night is a bit fuzzy, so please bear with me.”

  “Sure. Take your time.”

  I pick at the skin around my thumbnail.

  “I asked her to leave him alone. I suppose you know that she and Luis…”

  I look at him, for help almost, for confirmation. But he just waits for me to continue.

  “Well, I suppose you know that they had some kind of fling. Very brief, and he had ended it by then. Except I didn’t know that. Anyway, she wasn’t going to leave him alone, that’s what she said. Because they were in love. I may as well tell you, since you probably already know, that she was pregnant, and that it was Luis’s… but I don’t know if that’s true. I called her names, told her to stay away from my family, then I left.”

  “What time was that?”

  “Um… ten? Eleven maybe? Then I went out to a bar, I don’t remember where exactly.”

  “Okay. So why didn’t you tell us this the first time?”

  “I was embarrassed. I didn’t want you know about Luis and Isabelle. The fewer people who knew…”

  Detective Dalloway, who is sitting on a flimsy plastic chair in a corner taking notes, turns to Jones. “I understand that,” she says. Then to me she adds, “If my husband was cheating on me, I wouldn’t want anybody to know about it.”

  “Right?” I say, relieved. “Exactly.”

  Jones makes a face. “We’ve all been there, Mrs. Sanchez. Having a partner cheat on you is a nasty feeling. Especially when there are children involved. I don’t blame you for wanting to have it out with her.”

  I flinch. “I wouldn’t say ‘have it out’. More like a frank and honest discussion.”

  “Right,” he says. “So that frank and honest discussion took place over… three hours?”

  “No! God, no, I don’t remember what time I left but it couldn’t have been that long.”

  “That’s all right, we have CCTV that places you in the neighborhood, walking away from Ms. Wilcox’s home at… eight minutes past ten. So let’s call it two hours, then. And just so I understand clearly here, you went to Ms. Wilcox’s house, you told her to stay away from your husband, you called her names… Then what did you do for the other hour and fifty minutes?”

  “We argued! She told me she was pregnant, I cried, we shouted at each other!”

  “Did you assault her?”

  “No!” I rub my hand across my forehead. “I knocked over a vase. That’s all.” I think of the pool of water on the carpet, her crouching and putting the flowers back in the vase. How incongruous it all seems now. “She was perfectly fine when I left her.”

  “Did she agree to”—he licks a fingertip and flicks over a page—“leave him alone?”

  I take a moment to reply. “No. But it didn’t matter. Luis had already broken it off.”

  “Had he?” Jones says, eyes wide, as if this is the first he’s heard of it. I tilt my head at him.

  “He must have told you.”

  He turns to Dalloway. “Did Mr. Sanchez say he’d broken it off?”

  She raises her hands in a Search me gesture. They exchange a knowing glance, then Jones turns back to me. “Let’s accept that your husband had broken off the relationship.”

  I wince at the word ‘relationship’. Such a happy and committed word, utterly inappropriate in this instance. But I let it pass.

  “Then why did you feel the need to go and see her?”

  I rub my finger again on the same spot on my forehead. The skin is starting to peel there. “Because I didn’t actually know at that point in time.”

  He leans forward. “See, if that was me, Mrs. Sanchez, and I went to see my wife’s lover—for the sake of argument—and I was politely asking him to stay away from my wife, and he said no, I don’t know what I’d do. I’m being honest here, I really don’t. But you accepted her response and walked away, is that right?”

  “I wouldn’t say I just walked away.”

  “Because you said, you called her names, and you left. You’d gone all that way to save your marriage, then you just took it on the chin and left?” He lets the question dangle between us.

  “How did you get that mark on your hand, Mrs. Sanchez?”

  I look at the welt. It’s almost gone now. “I told you. Gardening.”

  “Did you know your husband had gifted Ms. Wilcox a necklace? She was very fond of it. She wore it all the time. In fact, she told her colleague that she never took it off.” He opens
the folder and pulls out a clear plastic envelope. Inside is a photo of Isabelle and another man at what looks like an art opening. They’re standing close together smiling at the camera, a glass of champagne in one hand. Clearly visible around her neck is the necklace.

  I can’t stop staring at her. I can’t stop thinking how beautiful she is, and a flash of outrage bolts through me. How could Luis possibly resist? She’s like one of those plants that are beautiful on the outside but carnivorous on the inside, all bright colors and pearls of dew, but get too close and they’ll entrap their prey and won’t let go until they’re completely suffocated.

  “Mrs. Sanchez?”

  I raise my head. “She never took it off?” They exchange a glance, and I know it was the wrong answer.

  I sit back. “I didn’t know that he had given this to her, no.”

  “Not even when you visited the jewelry store on November 12th with the receipt from your husband’s purchase, claiming your husband had in fact given the necklace to you?”

  For a moment I feel like I’m falling, the ground rushing towards me and I’m scrambling to hold onto something. “I knew,” I say, feeling the corners of my mouth pull down.

  “So that was another mistake then, you not telling us just now?”

  I don’t know what to say. My eyes well up, and a fat tear rolls out onto my cheek. I brush it off.

  “Why didn’t you say so, Mrs. Sanchez?”

  “Do you know why she didn’t have the necklace on her that night?” Dalloway asks. “She had it on her during the day. She didn’t have it on her when she died. We searched her house. We didn’t find it.”

  “Because I took it from her,” I say. “She was playing with it as we spoke, taunting me. I–I grabbed it and pulled it off her.” I rub the side of my hand. “It was fastened more tightly than I’d expected.”

  “I see. So you did assault her.”

  “No!”

  “Come on, Mrs. Sanchez. You said so yourself, she taunted you. She was pregnant. She wasn’t going to end the relationship with your husband—”

  “It was already over! He’d already ended it!”

  “So you keep saying, but you also admitted you didn’t know this at the time. You don’t think grabbing someone’s throat qualifies as assault? How did you get her upstairs?”

  “What?”

  “She fell from the top of the steps leading to the main bedroom. She was pushed. Did you follow her up the stairs?”

  “Was that when you pulled the necklace off her? Is that what happened?” Dalloway says.

  “Was it an accident?” Jones says.

  Their voices are drowned by the blood roaring in my ears. I press my fingers against my throbbing temples.

  “Tell us what happened, Mrs. Sanchez.”

  I close my eyes. I can see her face, her eyes wide in shock.

  “Why did you lie about being there, Mrs. Sanchez?”

  “Did you push her down the stairs, Mrs. Sanchez?” “

  “No!” I’m on my feet now, shaking and confused. I stare at Jones, then Dalloway. “I’d like to leave now,” I say. I bend down to retrieve my bag at my feet. I fully expect them to stop me, to tell me that I’m under arrest after all, and all I can think about are my kids and I imagine their faces when they find out and my heart snaps in two.

  Jones says the interview is terminated at four thirty-two and closes his folder.

  “Dalloway will accompany you outside. We’ll be in touch. Don’t go too far, and if you need to leave the state, we’d appreciate you letting us know.”

  I called Luis. I didn’t think I could get back home by myself. I am numb and confused, the way you might feel when you wake up after fainting and you’re not sure what happened or where you are or why you’re here. “Will you come and get me?” I asked. Pleaded, really.

  “Anna?”

  I was looking at my hands and I didn’t see him approach. I look up and there he is, looking broken, and I don’t know if it’s for me or her anymore, and when he says, “What did you do, Anna?” I think he’s going to cry.

  He helps me to the car, one hand on my elbow.

  “I asked my dad to take the kids tonight.”

  I nod. “That’s good.” I wipe my tears with my sleeve. “It’s better for them to be there. They love being with him. I’m glad he could take them. It’s nice of him.”

  “Yeah.” We don’t talk after that. When we get home I go upstairs and lie down on the bed. I can’t even describe to Luis how frightened I am right now. He comes upstairs and hands me an Ambien and a glass of water. I take it wordlessly and fall into the abyss.

  It is dark and silent when I wake, and I already miss my kids more than I can say. Luis is lying next to me, watching me. I turn to face him.

  “Luis?”

  “Yes, babe.”

  “I’m really scared.”

  He takes my hand. “I know.”

  We go downstairs and he makes ham and cheese sandwiches for us but I can’t eat anything.

  “I didn’t do it,” I tell him. “She was fine when I left.” But I also tell him we have to make plans, because it’s not looking good for me.

  “I’m so confused,” I say, my mouth trembling. “I’m so scared, Luis. They’re going to put me in jail.”

  “No, they won’t, we’ll get the best lawyers—we can afford it, right? We can use your prize money. We’ll get the very best.”

  I don’t tell him the prize money is a mirage right now. “Yes,” I say. “You’re right. We’ll be fine. But if we’re not—”

  “You have to think positive, Anna.”

  “Luis, please. Listen to me. I want us to talk about the children, if something happens to me.”

  He sits down at the table next to me, runs a hand through his hair.

  “Will you promise me that you will look after them, that you will keep them safe? Matti spends too much time on his Xbox and we need to do something about that. And try to keep Carla off social media for as long as possible? They love you so much, Luis. You’re a wonderful, incredible father. But you’ll have to be strong.”

  He’s crying. “I can’t do it without you, Anna.”

  I reach for his hand. “Sure you can. You’re the best father, the best parent. Do you remember when Mateo fell off his bike that time?” I laugh through my tears. “Do you know how jealous I was that he called out to you instead of me? They adore you, Luis. You’re their whole world.”

  He squeezes my hand. “I have to tell you something.”

  I can’t. I just can’t deal with anything else right now. I press my fingers against my temples. “What?” I say, without looking up.

  “I asked Matti to fall off his bike that day and call out for me.”

  I wait, feeling a smile on my lips. “You didn’t.”

  “I did. I paid him five bucks, too. I wanted to show you I was doing a really good job bringing up our children. You were flying, Anna. You were so smart, so successful, you were like a shining star and I wanted you to see what a good job I was doing at home. Five bucks was a bargain, I think.”

  “The ninja turtle plasters?”

  “All part of the plan.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Cross my heart.”

  “Wow.”

  “I know.”

  “He fell quite hard.”

  “He’s a great little actor.”

  “He could have cracked his head.”

  “True, true.”

  “And Matti went along with this?”

  “Five bucks.”

  I’m laughing now. I brush off my tears and rest my head on his shoulder. “I can’t believe you did that just to impress me.”

  He caresses my hair. “I’ll look after them, I give you my word.”

  But that’s not what I wanted to hear after all. I wanted him to keep saying how it was all going to be okay, and we didn’t even need to have this conversation.

  Because if Luis doesn’t believe in me, then nobody wil
l.

  Thirty-Eight

  I lie in bed most of the morning. Luis brings me cups of tea and watches me, his eyebrows knotted together. “Can I get you anything?” he asks. He makes it sound like I’m ill and I need tending. He sits on the bed next to me. “I think the kids should stay with my dad another night.”

  “Yes,” I reply. “Yes, you’re right. They all right? They got to school okay?”

  “It’s Saturday,” he says.

  “Of course.”

  “They’re good, they’re with their friends. They don’t know anything.”

  “Okay, good. That’s good,” I say, then wait till he leaves the room to bury my face into the pillow and bawl my eyes out.

  At one point I think there’s a knock on the door and my heart lurches because I think it’s them, they’ve come to arrest me, and I sit up, but it’s next door. I should get up and get dressed, though, because they will come, won’t they? I don’t want them to find me like this. I reach for my phone to call June. She must be worried sick. I want to tell her I understand she had to tell them that my alibi was a lie. She must feel terrible. She doesn’t answer and I leave a message. “Hi, it’s me.” My voice breaks. “I’m home,” I say, in case she thought I was arrested. “God, that was scary. Call me soon.”

  I take a shower, get dressed in practical clothes, flat shoes, pants that don’t require a belt—you never know, what if they take it away from me? I think about these things.

  I expected to hear back from June but there’s no message. Luis made some calls and has found me a lawyer. “He’s the best,” he says. I promise him that I’ll call this afternoon. I don’t tell him there’s no money, there probably never will be.