Do Not Disturb(52)

To his credit, Nick doesn’t push me. “Okay.”

He kisses me one more time, then he goes off to the motel. I watch him walk across the pathway from our house to the front of the building. I wait until he’s inside before I reach for my binoculars.

I focus on Christina’s room. I recognize there’s a chance he might go up there to tell her it’s over between the two of them. He knows I can see the room from here, even though he doesn’t know about the binoculars. So I’m sure he’ll be careful.

But when I zero in on the room, it’s still dark.

I look down at my watch. Nick usually doesn’t head over there until later in the morning, and it’s nearly ten o’clock now. Surely she would be up by now, right? Unless she checked out. Or went out somewhere.

But no. Her Nissan is still in the parking lot. There’s nowhere she could have gone on foot.

Christina is still in the motel.

So why is her room dark?

_____



It’s just after seven when I see Nick leaving the motel with a large Tupperware container of Greta’s stew.

I’ve kept my eyes on Christina’s room the entire day. I haven’t seen the lights go on once. There’s been no movement inside the room. As far as I can see, there’s no one in that room.

Yet her car is still in the parking lot.

I hide my binoculars once again when I hear the front door slam shut, followed by Nick’s steps on the stairs. I feel a tinge of fear in the pit of my stomach. I felt so many things for my husband in the time we’ve been together, but this sensation of fear is new.

The door to the bedroom sticks a bit, and it takes a few seconds from him to get it open. He bursts into our bedroom, a grin splitting his face. He proudly holds up the Tupperware container with two plates on top.

“Dinner!” he announces.

I attempt to return his smile. “Oh. Great.”

“Do you want it up here?” He sets down the Tupperware on a dresser. “Or we could go down and eat in the dining room. We haven’t done that in a long time. I could carry you and—”

“Did you ask Christina to leave?” I interrupt him. It’s all I can think about.

“I’m sorry.” Splatters of red appear on his neck. “No, I didn’t. I tried to tell her but every time I knocked on her door, she didn’t answer.”

“I see…” I tug at the sleeve of my shirt. “And she’s definitely still in the motel?”

“Well, yeah. I mean, her car is still there.”

“Yeah…”

He runs a hand through his hair. “I wasn’t with her at all today. I swear to you. I’ll only see her one more time to tell her to leave. That’s it.”

I want to believe him. But where is she?

And what was he doing at three in the morning?

He sits on the bed, close to me. He reaches for my hand, and I allow him to squeeze it in his own. “You believe me, right, Rosie?”

What can I say to him but yes?





Chapter 32


The next morning, I’m in my eternal perch by the window when the police cars arrive in the motel parking lot. Not just one police car. Police cars. Plural. And not just that, but there’s also an ambulance.

Fear grips my stomach. Is it Greta? She’s so old. Maybe she fell and broke her hip.

But why would the police cars be there?

I retrieve my binoculars from the dresser drawer and look out at the parking lot, although I don’t need them. The police officers are getting out of their vehicle and heading straight to the entrance to the motel. They’re not here to book a room, that’s for sure.

I grab my phone and call Nick. Naturally, it goes right to voicemail. So does my second call. After several more tries, he finally picks up.

“I can’t talk, Rosie.” His voice is low and serious. “The police are here.”

“Why? What’s going on?”

The silence on the other line seems to last for an eternity before he answers. “Christina is dead.”

“Dead? What are you talking about?”

There are muffled voices in the background. “I’ve got to go. I’ll talk to you later.”

And then he hangs up on me.

I try calling him again. And again. But he must’ve turned off his phone, because all the calls go right to voicemail. I get out my binoculars again and look out at Christina’s room. The police officers are in there now, and so is Nick. They’re talking. It doesn’t look like they’re handcuffing him or anything like that—that’s a good sign.

But what happened to Christina? If she’s dead, what are the chances that it was from natural causes? She was only in her twenties. People don’t just drop dead randomly at that age.

I watch all morning, intermittently browsing my phone to see if there are any news stories about her, except I don’t even know her last name. They bring out the stretcher, with a sheet covering the body underneath.

So it’s true. Christina is dead.

The woman my husband was kissing two nights ago is dead.

Now there’s a police officer talking to Nick outside the motel. I shove my binoculars back in the drawer and wrench the window open, but I can’t hear what they’re saying. But then Nick points to our house. The officer nods, and now they’re both walking toward our front door.