The Last Widow: The latest new 2019 crime thriller from the No. 1 Sunday Times bestselling author

by Karin Slaughter

  If Gwen had let herself think about it, she would’ve known that Dash was finished with her. The constant child-bearing, the lack of medical care and nutritional support, the relentless demands of either breastfeeding or carrying a new baby for so many years, had depleted her body of the ability to give Dash more children.

  Sister, let’s go with plan B.

  Sara would not revel in Gwen’s death, but neither could she mourn it. Finally, after a lifetime of abuse at the hands of Martin Novak and then Dash, after turning that abuse around on her own children, on the entire Camp, Gwen had run out of ways to supply the men in her life.

  Esther. Charity. Edna. Grace. Hannah. Joy. Adriel.

  All of the children at the Camp had been autopsied. All of them had shown signs of sexual and physical abuse.

  Sara covered her eyes with her hands. She was plagued by her own ifs. If she had realized sooner that the children were being abused. If she had connected the droopy eyelids, the paralysis, the slurred speech. If she had confronted Gwen. If she had stopped Dash. If she had managed to break into the greenhouse and destroy the botulism before anyone else could be infected.

  If-if-if.

  Sara had known about botulism since childhood, but only in an abstruse way. Cathy canned vegetables every summer. Tessa and Sara had been more interested in arguing over who got to read the thermometer than asking why the temperature mattered.

  In medical school, Sara had been made aware that hypotonia, colloquially called Floppy Baby Syndrome, could be a sign of infant botulism, but the symptoms—lethargy, difficulty feeding, an altered cry, a descending flaccid paralysis—were difficult to translate onto adults.

  The only other time Sara could recall learning about the neurotoxin was when she’d read a paper in the Journal of American Medical Examiners. A prison inmate had died with no obvious cause. Guards had found a bag of pruno under his bunk. The prison wine had been fermented by combining a potato, a handful of hard candy, and a sock with a piece of bread inside. The sealed bag and the low temperature had created botulism.

  Will’s dog barked in the kitchen. The sound echoed down the two feet of hallway to the bedroom. Sara could hear Betty tapping her head against the flap in the dog door. This was normal morning behavior. The Chihuahua used the door to come into the house, but she refused to use it to go out. She would head-butt the flap until Will or Sara got up and opened the door.

  Betty barked again.

  Sara closed her eyes. Tiny pieces of white confetti floated across her eyelids.

  She got out of bed. She opened the door for Betty. The kitchen TV was on, but muted.

  Gwen and Martin Novak were being profiled again. Sara was glad that the sound was off so that she didn’t have to hear Novak speaking by phone from his government safe house. The bank robber was taking full advantage of his First Amendment rights, granted to him by the legal system he claimed was irreparably corrupt.

  On the television, the trip to Mexico was being documented with maps and photographs. MSNBC had located Inspector Jefe Norge Garcia, who was more than happy to discuss the racist American pedophiles he had kicked out of his country.

  The image changed before Sara could look away.

  Her hand went to her throat.

  Dash.

  The banner below had his real name—

  Douglas Alejandro Shinn.

  Sara turned off the television. She already knew that story.

  All of Faith’s guesses had been wrong. Dash’s nickname was derived from his initials. The Douglas had come from his father. The Alejandro was courtesy of his mother. Shinn was from the medieval English for skinner.

  Dash’s formal way of speaking and his amateur understanding of United States history finally had an explanation. His father had been in his early sixties, working for an American oil company in Argentina’s Neuquén Basin, when he’d met Dash’s thirty-year-old mother. They were married in 1972. Dash had been born a year later. The family had lived in Latin America for twelve years before moving to Texas, where Dash had lived an unremarkable, upper-middle-class life.

  All of which made his hatred of immigrants and minorities even more nonsensical. He embodied almost everything he claimed was wrong with America.

  It’s not you, brother. It’s everybody else.

  At the age of seventeen, Douglas Alejandro Shinn had been arrested in Uruguay for molesting a nine-year-old girl. At twenty-three, he had been accused by Colombian police of raping a twelve-year-old girl. There were more charges filed in other countries, but most of them had been dropped. Dash’s money and his fluency in Spanish and English had worked to his benefit. He’d used his Argentine and US passport interchangeably, avoiding any possibility that his fingerprints or DNA would ever flag him for a crime committed in the United States.

  Was Dash’s pedophilia the source of his rage? Sara had nothing but disgust for anyone who raped a child, but she wanted to understand why Dash, the product of a wealthy American father and a successful immigrant, had become filled with so much hate.

  Will’s theory pointed to Martin Novak. Dash had been a teenager when his father had died. Novak would have filled those shoes, enticing Dash into the fold by offering up his own eleven-year-old daughter.

  One of the most depressing parts of this whole tragedy was that, in the end, Dash had gotten exactly what he craved: attention. The video of his speech outside the Capitol had over ten million views on YouTube. His manifesto had been found at the Camp and was already available online. Dash’s screeds expounded on the highlights he had hammered Sara with during her captivity. Capitalism had ruined America. Access to birth control and abortion gave women too much power. White men were being marginalized. Minorities were taking over the country, changing our Judeo-Christian values. The only way to save the world was to destroy it.

  Worse, if not wholly unexpected, all of the news outlets were bending over backward to show the other side, as if racism was something to be tolerated and understood rather than condemned and rejected. Martin Novak’s scratchy voice could be heard over the phone line as he railed against mixing the races. Avowed Nazis in suits and ties were appearing alongside Holocaust scholars and hate crimes experts, as if they shared equal legitimacy. Apparently, their heated arguments were great for ratings and retweets. There were memes and Instagram stories and YouTube videos where everyone was shouting and no one was remembering that they were all Americans.

  To Sara’s thinking, the platforms were doing what they excelled at: commodifying hate.

  Betty darted through the flap in the dog door. Her toenails scraped the hardwood as she made the sharp turn into the bedroom, then scooted back out to look for Sara’s greyhounds in the living room. The walls were so thin that Sara could hear their collars jingle as Betty settled in between them.

  Sara sat down at the table. She practiced some deep breathing, ridding her body of the earthquake that took hold every time she let herself think about Dash for too long.

  She opened her laptop.

  There were too many work emails to count. Sara scrolled down to one from Faith’s Gmail account. She smiled as she watched a video of Emma giving a three-minute explanation on the difference between mozzarella and Swiss cheese.

  Sara found her glasses so that she could read the body of the email message. Faith had pasted a few lines from Michelle Spivey’s autopsy report:

  Muscle tissue positive for botulinum toxin … concentrated levels of HBAT around needle tracks between toes of left and right feet as indicated.

  Sara took off her glasses. She let the information settle. Michelle must have been micro-dosing the anti-toxin. That was why the metal seal on the vial of HBAT had been open. She had probably known from the beginning that Dash would poison her. Or maybe she had injected herself with botulism just to get it over with. The woman had a wife and child at home who were under constant threat from the IPA. In the beginning, Michelle must have thought that she could hold off. And then Dash had sent in Carter to work on he
r. The cigarette burns and open wounds on her body had told the story. Michelle had held out for twenty-nine days before she had finally given Dash what he wanted.

  Another reason Sara could not watch the news. The reporters were obsessed with the question of Michelle’s culpability. She had created the toxin. She had armed Dash with a biological weapon. Sara had felt ill watching pundits and commentators and the average American on the street claim that in Michelle’s circumstances, they would’ve been stronger.

  Stronger.

  So many people thought they were invincible.

  Until they were raped.

  “Babe?” Will’s keys clinked against the bowl by the front door. He was smiling when he walked into the kitchen. He kissed the top of her head. “Sorry, I had to go to the bank to get some cash for lunch. I didn’t want to wake you.”

  She brushed her palm along his smooth face. “Betty woke me. Again.”

  He studiously avoided the topic, taking out peanut butter and jelly to make a sandwich because he couldn’t last another hour and a half until lunch.

  Sara watched the ropey muscles work along his shoulders. His shirt was stuck to his skin. The heat index had already reached one hundred, but God strike them all dead if the thermostat for the air conditioner went above the 78-degree mark.

  She watched his fingers work the tie off the bread. She thought about holding his hand under the door at the cabin.

  His left. Her right.

  Their fingers intertwined. His thumb stroking her skin. Sara’s eyes closed as she reveled in the thought of kissing him, holding him, being with him eventually, maybe, possibly for the rest of her life.

  Another one of Cathy’s edicts from Bella’s kitchen came back to haunt her:

  What the hell are you waiting for?

  Sara asked, “Will?”

  He grunted as he took a knife out of the drawer.

  She asked, “Why do you pay for everything with cash?”

  “Habit, I guess.” He wiped the knife on a wet paper towel. The dishwasher was older than both of them. “I tried to get a credit card in college, but one of my foster parents stole my social security number and wrecked my credit. I could probably get one now, but the last time I checked, I don’t even have a credit score.”

  Sara was both horrified and confused. “Why didn’t you tell me about this before?”

  He shrugged, a tacit acknowledgment that he didn’t tell her a lot of things.

  She asked, “How did you get a mortgage?”

  “I didn’t.” He slathered peanut butter onto a slice of bread. “I bought the house for cash at a tax auction. I fixed it up when I had the money, but the land is worth way more than the house. Same thing with my car. It was burned out in a vacant lot. I paid some homeless guys to help me carry the frame down the street. It wasn’t as heavy as you’d think.”

  “That’s—” Sara couldn’t articulate a proper response.

  She had always thought of Will as frugal rather than cheap, but she had never put herself in his financial shoes before. Every hardship in Sara’s life had sent her running to the safety of her family. Will had always been completely on his own, even when his noxious wife was around. He could never go home because the Home had told him to leave.

  The chair that she was sitting in, the table, this room, this house—that was all that Will had.

  And Sara.

  “It’s no big deal.” He leaned down to make sure that the entire surface area of the bread was evenly covered before he moved to the next slice with the jelly. “I like my car.”

  She said, “There’s a new jar of jelly in the fridge.”

  “This is plenty.” Will used the knife to scrape out the .0001 ounces of jelly left in the very bottom of the jar. The clanging was like a Salvation Army bell.

  She said, “Babe?”

  Will grunted. He shook the jar over the bread. A drop fell out. He ate the sandwich in two bites. The bread and peanut butter went back into the cabinet. The jelly was returned to the fridge because there was still enough to cover one tenth of a piece of bread.

  She asked, “Do you like working for the GBI?”

  He nodded, wiping down the counter with the wet paper towel.

  Sara waited for him to expound, or to at least ask her why she had asked the question, but then she remembered that he was Will.

  She asked, “Why do you like your job?”

  He hung the paper towel over the kitchen faucet to dry. He turned around. Sara could tell he wanted to say something, but that was hardly an indication that he would.

  He finally shrugged. “I like the hunt.”

  “The hunt?”

  “Chasing down the bad guys. Outsmarting them. I know I do stupid things and take risks.” He was watching her carefully, trying to read her reaction. “I’m sorry.”

  “Why are you sorry?”

  Another shrug.

  “Did you think I hadn’t noticed how competitive you are? You won’t even let the jelly win.” The serious look on his face was the only thing that kept her from laughing. “Will, this isn’t shocking news. I know you get enormous satisfaction from your job. The fact that you’re so good at it is one of the many things that I love about you.”

  He rested his hand on the counter. He was confused. He never understood when she didn’t yell at him about the things that he thought she should yell about.

  She asked, “How much money do you have?”

  His wallet was in his hand. “How much do you need?”

  “No, I mean how much money do you have in total.”

  He closed his wallet.

  Sara tapped awake her laptop. She opened a file. She pointed to the number at the bottom of a spreadsheet. “This is my net worth.”

  His face turned pale.

  She asked, “Does it bother you?”

  “Uh …” He looked like he wanted to disappear into the floor. “It’s not shocking news.”

  “But, does it make you feel—” Sara hated that Dash was back in her brain again. “Less?”

  “Less?” He reached down and typed some numbers on the keyboard. “That’s about what I have. Minus the house. It’s—less.”

  Sara could see that.

  “Does it bother you?” Will rubbed his jaw the way he always did when he was anxious. “Because, being an agent, making an agent’s salary, that’s probably not going to change. Like, I don’t want Amanda’s job. I don’t want to be stuck behind a desk.”

  “You would be miserable behind a desk.” Sara told him, “Baby, I’m really lucky that the job I love to do pays well, but a paycheck doesn’t define success. Being fulfilled by your work, finding meaning in what you do, is my definition of success.”

  “Okay. Good.” He nodded, as if that settled it. “I should take a shower before—”

  “Wait.” Sara felt a weird flitter in her heart. She pushed the words out of her mouth before she could stop herself. “I want us to talk to a real estate appraiser to find out how much your house is worth.”

  He stared at her, speechless.

  Sara felt speechless, too. This wasn’t how she had planned to have this conversation, but apparently, they were having this conversation. “Whatever number comes back, I’m going to spend the same amount of money remodeling your house.”

  Still no reaction.

  She said, “I can’t sleep late when you’re banging around the kitchen.”

  “What?” Now he was irritated. “I can keep it down. There’s no need to—”

  “I want a second floor,” Sara told him. “I want a big soaking tub, one that can hold more than two inches of water. And I need my own closet. And I’m not going to share a bathroom with you, so you can take the guest bathroom.”

  “Guest bathroom?” He laughed. “How big is this mansion?”

  “I’m going to hire a contractor to do the work.”

  He looked appalled. “Is this a joke?”

  “You can do the trim work. That’s it. I’m paying other pe
ople to do the rest.”

  Will huffed out an incredulous laugh. “You’re fucking with me, right?”

  “There’s one last thing, and I need you to hear me on this.” Sara waited for his attention. “If we’re going to live together, I have to control the thermostat.”

  Will started to protest, but then he seemed to realize what she had said.

  If we’re going to live together.

  His mouth was already hanging open. He closed it.

  Betty walked into the kitchen. She laid down in front of the refrigerator. Will watched the dog roll onto her back as if it required his complete and total attention.

  This wasn’t his usual kind of silence. Something was wrong. Sara was wrong. Embarrassment rushed heat into her face. She had hit him with way too much. He hated being pushed. They had just been to hell and back. She had told him she was going to destroy his little house with all of her mansion money. They had both been happy with their current arrangement. Why was she always trying to fix things that weren’t broken?

  “Will.” Sara tried to find the right apology. “We don’t have to—”

  “Okay,” he finally agreed. “But we’ll have to get married in a church. I want your mother to be happy.”

  Acknowledgments

  First thanks to the usual suspects: Kate Elton and Victoria Sanders. I’d like to add the fabulous ladies at the VSA team, led by the indomitable Bernadette Baker-Baughman, as well as Hilary Zaitz Michael and Sylvie Rabineau from WME. At HarperCollins: Liate Stehlik, Emily Krump, Kaitlin Hairi, Kathryn Gordon, Virginia Stanley, Heidi Richter-Ginger, Kathryn Cheshire, Elizabeth Dawson, Miranda Mettes, Annemieke Tetteroo, Chantal Hattink, Alice Krogh Scott and last but not least, Adam Humphrey, my dear friend of thirteen years, who has generously lent his name to humiliation and patheticness. And also to my fiction.