The End of Her

by Shari Lapena

  He glances toward the lobby and wonders if there’s an ATM out there. He needs to get some cash. Erica meets his eyes and they both know what’s going to happen next.

  They smile at each other and he pays the lunch bill with his business credit card and then they leave the restaurant. He withdraws cash from the ATM and takes a room under an assumed name while she goes to the ladies’ room. He texts her the room number when he gets into the elevator. On the ninth floor, he lets himself into the room with the key card and takes off his jacket and loosens his tie. He sends a quick text to Kerri that his lunch is running late and to reschedule his 3:00 p.m. meeting, then he hears a soft knock on the door.

  He’s doing it again. Nancy must not find out. And then he opens the door and forgets all about his wife.

  * * *

  • • •

  IT’S A LOVELY SUMMER DAY, perfect for an outing to the wading pool in the park beside the public library. Stephanie and Hanna had arranged to get together, and Stephanie had invited some of the women from her moms’ group to join them. Amy and Jen are there with their baby boys, and Barb with her little girl.

  Stephanie wiggles her bare toes in the warm, shallow water, sitting on the concrete edge of the pool. Hanna is nearby, splashing with Teddy beside her. Jackie and Emma happily gurgle at each other in front of her. All the babies are in swim diapers and brimmed hats, and Stephanie has her girls in bath rings to help support them because she can’t really hold them both up at once. The women chat about the babies companionably. They’ve already been in the library and picked up some baby board books to take home—a caravan of baby strollers. They all had lunch in the park, Stephanie and Hanna sharing tuna sandwiches. By the time she gets the twins home, Stephanie thinks, she will be able to put them down for their afternoon nap and she can get some sleep.

  “Isn’t this great?” Hanna says grinning, watching Teddy laugh.

  Stephanie has to agree with her. She feels a little more rested than usual today and it’s done wonders for her mood. She felt able to reach out to these other women, whom she doesn’t really know well. It’s hard to be social when you’re exhausted. She looks at her two baby girls, their big, round blue eyes, so cute splashing in the baby rings, chortling with glee. She’s lucky, and she knows it. She’s so lucky to have Patrick, and Emma and Jackie—two perfect, healthy babies. She has everything she ever wanted. The colic will pass.

  “Oh, looks like somebody’s getting sleepy,” Hanna says, smiling at Jackie, who is yawning.

  They all start to pack up for the walk home.

  7

  Toward the end of the workday, Patrick gets a call on his cell from Erica. He’s been expecting it, but his heart still begins to pump uncomfortably when he sees her number.

  “Meet me for a drink?” Erica asks. “Same place? In half an hour?”

  He briefly considers refusing. But he knows he must meet her. “Okay.”

  For him, at least, the attraction is gone; if anything, she frightens him a little. He will be absolutely clear that he’s faithful to his wife, and then he will leave. He’s not going to make the same mistake twice. And she needs to know it.

  On his way from the office to the bar, he tells himself that things have changed. He’s with Stephanie now. He has a family.

  He spies her in the same corner as the day before. He tells himself to relax. He’s got nothing to worry about. He’ll set her straight and he can be on his way. He sits down across from her—he can smell her perfume again, and it bothers him.

  She gives him a conspiratorial, seductive look over her beer. For a long moment neither of them speaks. Finally she says, “So . . . you’re probably wondering what I’m doing here.”

  He smiles uncomfortably. “I am, actually.”

  She tilts her head at him. “You know, Patrick, we could pick up where we left off . . .”

  He smiles—as if with regret—and shakes his head firmly. “No. It was a long time ago.” He exhales heavily. “I’m not going to cheat on Stephanie.” He leans back, putting distance between them.

  “Really?” She raises her eyebrows at him as if she doesn’t believe him.

  “Yes, really.”

  “Why not? It didn’t bother you to cheat on Lindsey.”

  It hits him like a blow. “That was different.”

  “How was it different?” Her voice has surprise in it, and a bit of an edge.

  He hesitates. “I was younger then—I was only twenty-three, for Christ’s sake. I was a kid. I only thought about myself.”

  “Aren’t you going to order a drink?” she asks.

  He hadn’t been planning on it, but now he changes his mind and beckons the waiter over. He orders a Scotch and they both wait until the server is out of earshot.

  She considers him for a moment. “Do you love her, your new wife?”

  “Yes, I do. With my whole heart.”

  “So that’s what’s different,” she says. “You didn’t love Lindsey.”

  “That’s not true,” he says quickly. “Of course I loved her.”

  She watches him closely and says, “That’s not how I remember it.”

  He looks back at her, feeling a chill.

  He’d slept with his wife’s best friend. He had behaved badly, but so had Erica. He had betrayed his wife, she had betrayed a friend. He studies Erica sitting across from him in the dimly lit bar. He has to put this to rest once and for all.

  “Look, Erica . . .” He tries to read her expression as she looks back at him. She’d avoided him after the accident. He thought it was remorse for what they’d done. He remembers how she’d caught his eye across the room, the casket between them, and pushes the memory away. “I’m married, with newborn twins. I’m not looking to have an affair. I should have made that perfectly clear yesterday. I came here today to make sure you understand that.”

  She answers him. “I see.” Her mood seems to have changed on a dime.

  For a moment he simply stares at her. She can’t seriously be hoping to rekindle what they had. What is she doing here? His uneasiness grows.

  “It’s been almost ten years,” she says. “A long time to think.”

  “About what?”

  “The accident.” She looks at him intently. “Do you still think about it?”

  “I try not to. But sometimes.”

  “I do, a lot.” A silence descends between them.

  “You miss Lindsey. Of course you do,” he says finally. “I do too.”

  She looks up at him. “That’s not what I mean. I think about how she died.”

  He stares back at her, unnerved. “You blame me.”

  “Of course I blame you. Everyone does.”

  It’s like a punch to the stomach. “I blame myself too,” he says. His voice is bitter. “Every day. But it was an accident.”

  Into the fraught silence Erica says, “Just because they said it was an accident doesn’t mean it was.”

  He recoils in surprise, his heart pounding. “What?” When she doesn’t respond, he says, his voice low, “Are you saying—are you accusing me of killing my wife on purpose?”

  “It’s crossed my mind.”

  “Why—why the hell would you think that?” he asks. His heart is racing now. It had been ruled an accident. There was no question. No suspicion at all. It was a sad, tragic event. At the time, everyone had shaken their heads, looked at him with terrible pity, but no one had suggested that he’d done it on purpose. That he’d deliberately murdered his wife.

  She spells it out for him now, and there’s cold calculation in her voice. “You remember. You told me you felt trapped, you were unhappy. I thought you were in love with me. Imagine what it was like for me when she died. I thought—I was afraid—that you’d done it on purpose.” She adds, “And I’ve had to live with that ever since.”

  Patrick’s
mind reels. Where was this coming from? He’d told her no such thing, and they both know it. He remembers again how she’d spurned him at the funeral, turned her back on him. “You’re out of your mind,” he says shortly.

  “Am I?”

  He looks back at her in growing horror. So this is why she’s here. Then he takes a deep breath and speaks, trying to keep his voice steady. “You’re wrong. I was a bad husband, and you were a bad friend, but that’s it,” he assures her. “I didn’t kill her so that I could be with you, and you damn well know it.”

  “And I’m supposed to just take your word for it?” Her voice is sly.

  His uneasiness spikes; he can feel his heart pounding hard in his chest. He says, trying to keep his voice even, “I don’t know what else to tell you, Erica. It was an accident. The police thought it was an accident. The press thought it was an accident. You’re the only one who seems to think otherwise—and we both know you’re pretending.” He tells himself that he has nothing to be worried about.

  But he still hasn’t told Stephanie the truth about what happened to his first wife. He wants to tell her at some point, he always meant to. And he will. He’d told Stephanie that his first wife had been killed in a car accident. But Erica knows what really happened. What if she tells Stephanie? Now, when she’s so worn out and frazzled with the twins? It wouldn’t be the best time—it would be the absolutely worst possible fucking time. Stephanie wouldn’t be able to deal with it rationally. She wouldn’t understand.

  Why the fuck had he come here today? He should have known better.

  As if reading his mind, Erica says, “Does your wife know about what happened?”

  He feels himself coloring. He must not give himself away, but he’s afraid he already has.

  “Ah, she doesn’t,” Erica says, confirming his fears. “You never told her.” She’s goading him now. “I mean, who would marry a man who cheated on his first wife? A man who killed her—even if it was by accident?” He stares back at her stonily, saying nothing. “I wonder if I should tell her?”

  “Why the hell would you do that?” he asks.

  “Maybe she should know who she married. What if you have something like that in mind for her?”

  He’s struck with a sudden fury. “You miserable bitch,” he says. “You have a twisted, fucked-up mind.” They eye each other in silence. He feels sick. “What’s going on here, Erica?” he asks coldly. “Why are you here? What do you want?”

  “Money.” Her blue eyes stare back at him, cool and unwavering.

  It hits him like a blow. That’s what this is. She’s blackmailing him. She wants him to pay her so that she won’t say anything to his wife. Why didn’t he see this coming? How could he have been so naive? He snorts. “Well, that’s too bad, because I don’t have any.”

  “A successful man like you?”

  So that’s what she’s been doing, snooping around the edges of his life. Coming to his office, trying to get an idea of what he’s worth. He can feel himself sweating with nerves. “Look,” he says, trying to sound reasonable, “business has been bad lately. I haven’t got any spare cash to give you, even if I wanted to.”

  She leans in closer to him. “Who do you think you’re dealing with? I’ve done my research. I know your business is doing just fine. And I happen to know that your wife is loaded.” She pulls back and looks at him, very matter-of-fact. “Money is not one of your problems.”

  He feels his stomach drop. How does she know about that? Now he’s truly frightened. He sees it all, how his future might unfold—so very differently from what he’d planned. He must shut this down. He musters every ounce of resolve he has and says clearly, “I’m not going to pay you anything. You need to understand that.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Yes. I’ll tell Stephanie everything.” He’ll tell her as soon as he gets home today, and then Erica will have nothing to hold over him. He has to hope—to believe—that Stephanie will stand by him, even after he admits to cheating on his first wife, even after he tells her exactly how she died.

  “Everything?” She looks at him, disbelieving.

  “I’ll tell her the truth,” Patrick says. “And I’ll tell her about you and what a liar you are and what you’re trying to do. Because I don’t lie to my wife.” He leans forward so that he’s right in her lovely face and says, “I’m not afraid of you, and I’m not paying you a fucking cent.”

  She says, “Maybe it’s not your wife you have to worry about.”

  “What?”

  “Maybe I’ll finally go to the authorities and get them to take another look at the death of your first wife.”

  “Why the fuck would you do that?”

  “Because I can.”

  He stares at her in shock, finishes his drink in one go, gets up, throws some bills on the table, and walks out. He doesn’t look back.

  8

  The twins are in their high chairs and Stephanie is in the middle of giving them their little bit of baby cereal mixed with breast milk. Patrick hasn’t come home from work yet and she tries not to resent it. She’d smelled the Scotch on his breath the day before—he’d obviously been out for a drink after work, but she didn’t mention it, tries not to begrudge it. She expects him any minute. She could use a hand. She’s got a high chair on either side of her and she’s spooning the milky cereal into one little mouth after the other. My little birds, she thinks fondly.

  There’s a sound at the front door but she’s focused on the babies. She hears Patrick come in, but he lingers in the front hall for a moment. Another spoonful for Emma—most of it ending up on her chin—then Stephanie scoops it from the baby’s face with the spoon. She wonders what Patrick is doing. Why doesn’t he come through to the kitchen and help her? “Patrick?” she calls.

  “Yeah, I’m coming,” he says.

  “What’s wrong?” she says, the moment he appears in the kitchen, looking as if he’s had terrible news. Her stomach clenches. It must be worse than she thought at work. Maybe he has been shielding things from her after all, because she’s got her hands full with the twins. Her anger flares, along with anxiety.

  He pulls out a kitchen chair and slumps into it. “There’s something I have to tell you.”

  She imagines the worst. A serious problem—a lawsuit of some kind, a mistake. Architecture is a fraught, difficult field. And she’s never completely trusted Niall, even though Patrick does. “Is it work?”

  He looks at her, surprised. “No.”

  Now she’s the one who’s surprised. What else could it be?

  “Christ, I don’t know where to start,” he says.

  She’s forgotten about the cereal and now Jackie and Emma start to whimper. She goes back to feeding them, trying to remain calm, fake smiling at the babies. “There you go, yum-yum,” she says, in a singsong voice. Then, to Patrick, “Just tell me. I can handle it.”

  “You know I love you, Stephanie,” he says earnestly.

  She turns her head away from the twins and stares at him. Now she’s really worried. He has the tortured look of someone about to confess. What has he done? They haven’t had sex since the twins were born. Is that what this is about? She waits.

  “You know I told you that my previous wife, Lindsey”—now tears are coming into his eyes—“died in a car accident.”

  “Yes.” Her voice is uncertain. She can’t imagine what he’s about to say next.

  “I didn’t tell you everything.”

  She goes absolutely still, staring at him.

  His face has gone pale. “I never told you because . . . it was my fault.”

  Oh, dear God. Her entire body tightens, as if for a blow. This is coming at her out of the blue; she’s not prepared for it.

  He sags further into the kitchen chair. “I have to tell you what happened.”

  “Okay,” she says.

&nb
sp; “It was winter,” he begins. “There was a storm. We were going to visit her mother. There was so much snow. I didn’t want to go, but she insisted. . . .” His face is anguished and he stops, as if he can’t go on.

  It’s difficult for her to look at him in such obvious, raw pain. “You were driving?” she whispers. Even the babies are quiet now, as if they can sense the tension in the room.

  He shakes his head. “No. We never got off the street.”

  She doesn’t understand. He’s not making sense.

  “She got in the car to get warm. Lindsey was always so impatient. I told her to wait inside the house, but she came out before I was done. I didn’t know it was dangerous.” He swallows.

  “What was dangerous?” she asks, confused.

  He takes a deep breath. “I had to shovel out the car. It was taking a long time because the snow was almost up to the roof. She was so desperate to visit her mother and her sister.” He hesitates. “She was finding it hard, being away from her family—she was eight months pregnant—and I was working such long hours.”

  Stephanie feels her stomach turn. She hadn’t known his wife had been pregnant when she died. She steels herself for the rest.

  “She wouldn’t stay inside. It was very cold. I told her to go back in the house, but she got in the car. And I just kept shoveling—I had no idea that the exhaust pipe was plugged with snow, that carbon monoxide was getting into the car—killing her.” He chokes back a sob.

  Stephanie gapes at him in horror, but he doesn’t meet her eyes.

  “When—when I finished, I put the shovel away and went up and got the bags from the apartment and locked everything up. I put the bags in the trunk. And then I opened the driver’s-side door.” He pauses, and it looks to Stephanie like he can’t catch his breath. “At first I thought Lindsey was just asleep.” He glances at her, and quickly looks away. “But then suddenly it struck me that she didn’t look right somehow, that she didn’t look normal. I grabbed her by the shoulder and shook her, but her head just fell forward. And—I knew she was dead. I started to scream. I lost my mind for a minute. I backed out of the car, screaming for help, fumbling for my cell phone. I called 911. Some of the neighbors came running out. I was hysterical—I don’t remember much more than that, other than people dragging Lindsey out of the car and lying her down on the snow. Someone did CPR on her. The paramedics got there really fast, but it was too late. She was declared dead. The baby too.”