In the Shadow of Lakecrest(86)
“You’ve seemed so happy, ever since the children,” she said soothingly. “Why would you want that to change? I’ll talk to Matthew and see if we can’t find some money to freshen up your bedroom. That would help, wouldn’t it?”
A classic Lemont tactic: buying me off.
“There’s no need to worry about school yet,” Hannah went on. “We should consider all possibilities carefully rather than make rash decisions. You can’t understand what’s appropriate for our sort of family”—she made a show of looking conflicted—“given the way you were raised.”
Allusions to my upbringing used to make me wilt with shame. Now, I held my ground, giving Hannah my iciest glare. Aching to shock the smug expression off her face.
“I should trust you to raise my children?” I asked sarcastically. “Look how well you did with Matthew and Marjorie! How old were they before you noticed they were taking each other’s clothes off?”
My words hit their mark. Hannah’s lower lip dropped, and her cheeks sagged. She stared at me with horrified eyes, her self-possession so quickly shattered that I knew I’d gone too far.
Hannah turned away and stumbled toward the lake, as if the open panorama held the promise of escape. I tried to savor my victory, but the taste made me sick. Tentatively, I approached the edge of the bluff. The water rippled in gentle circles around the rocks below. My hair was sticky with sweat underneath my hat, and I thought longingly of that coolness lapping around my feet on the beach. I would apologize, we would rejoin the children, and the day would continue as usual.
“I’m sorry . . . ,” I began, but Hannah turned so quickly that I went silent. Her eyes were blazing.
“Don’t you ever speak of Matthew that way. Your own husband!”
“I was angry. It was wrong of me.”
“You think you’re a fit mother for Matthew’s children? A liar and gold digger? I promise you, Kate, if you continue to defy me, I will tell Matthew everything. The truth about his sweet, innocent wife. I have the documents to prove it—safely locked up where you’ll never find them.”
The reports from Mr. Haveleck. Interviews with Aunt Nellie and Mrs. Llewellyn. If Matthew read them, would he ever forgive me?
“I could easily talk him into a divorce once he found out about your lies,” Hannah said. “He’d get custody of Stella and Robert, of course. A man like Matthew wouldn’t want to be a bachelor father for long. When he married again, I’d make sure it was someone with money, someone who made a useful contribution to this family.”
The words came at me like blows, each one landing with a crush of pain. Everything I had was at Hannah’s mercy. Whenever she wanted, she could show those papers to Matthew and get rid of me; maybe she was already working up to it. She would take Matthew and Stella and Robbie and Lakecrest, a place I’d once hated but now felt bound to because it was my children’s home. She had the ultimate power over everything I loved.
Rage swelled up in my belly and surged through my chest and arms and face. It expanded into a heat that burned so strong I was propelled forward under its force. My hands flew out and pushed. Hannah’s feet caught on the edge of the cliff. Her knees buckled, and she seemed to hover for a moment, her face looking up in disoriented panic. Then she fell onto the rocks below.
She died instantly, the doctor told us later, after I’d tearfully described her tripping and losing her balance. Thank God the end was swift. If I’d seen her move or heard her moan in pain, would I have had the courage to finish the job?
I heard Stella’s cascading laughter and Robbie’s high-pitched shrieks. Soon, I’d have to go back to the house and tell Edna and the maids, call Matthew at the office. There’d be a funeral to plan and guests to put up. It would all be hard on the children—why not allow them a few more minutes of blissful, ignorant play?
I looked down at Hannah’s lifeless body and thought of my mother lashing out at my father with a swipe of her knife. Of Hannah telling Cecily what she’d done with her own brother. Women who’d done terrible things for the sake of their children. Hannah’s last outburst—the insults that had driven me to murder—had been her last futile attempt to claim Matthew for herself.
“Mrs. Lemont?” I heard the nanny call out.
I turned away from the lake and prepared to do my duty. From now on, there was only one Mrs. Lemont. And I would get what I wanted.