The House Across the Lake(31)

“It sounded like a person to me,” I say.

“Why would someone be screaming at that hour?”

“Why does anyone scream, Eli? Because she was in danger.”

“She? You think it was Katherine Royce you heard?”

“I can’t think of anyone else it could have been,” I say. “Have you seen any sign of her today?”

“No,” Eli says. “Then again, I haven’t exactly been looking. You worried something happened to her?”

I tell him no, when the opposite is true. Katherine’s lack of a response to my text and calls has me feeling unnerved, even though in all likelihood there’s a perfectly good reason for it. She could still be sleeping, her phone silenced or in another room.

“I’m sure everything’s fine,” I say, more to convince myself than Eli.

“Do you want me to stop over there and check?”

Because he’s the lake’s one-man neighborhood watch, I know Eli would be happy to do it. But this is my worry, not his. It’s time to pay the Royces a visit, and hopefully all my concerns will be put to rest.

“I’ll go,” I say. “It’ll be good to get out of the house.”





Tom Royce is on the dock by the time I reach it. Clearly, he saw me coming because he stands like a man expecting company. He’s even dressed for casual visitors. Black jeans. White sneakers. Cashmere sweater the same color as the pricey wine he brought over two nights ago. He offers an exaggeratedly friendly wave as I moor the boat and join him on the dock.

“Howdy, neighbor. What brings you by this afternoon?”

“I came by to see if Katherine wanted to come over for some girl talk and an afternoon cocktail on the porch.”

I prepared the excuse on the trip from my dock to his, hoping it would make it look like I’m not overreacting. Which I suspect I totally am. Katherine’s fine and I’m just worried because of something I saw and something I heard and something that happened to my husband more than a year ago. All of which are completely unrelated.

“I’m afraid she’s not here,” Tom says.

“When will she be back?”

“Probably not until next summer.”

The answer’s as unexpected as a door slammed in my face.

“She’s gone?”

“She went back to our apartment in the city,” Tom says. “Left early this morning.”

I take a few more steps closer to him, noticing a red patch on his left cheek where Katherine had punched him. Considering that, maybe her departure shouldn’t be a surprise after all. I can even picture the events leading up to her decision.

First the fight, ending with a haymaker to Tom’s face.

Then my phone call, likely made after she’d already decided to leave. Thinking about her brief appearance at the bedroom window, I now see that strange wave in a different light. It’s entirely possible it was a wave goodbye.

After that there could have been some frantic packing in the darkness of their bedroom. Finally, just as she was about to leave, the fight flared up again. Both of them trying to get in their last licks. During that final showdown, Katherine screamed. It might have been from frustration. Or from rage. Or simply just a release of all the emotions she’d had pent up inside her.

Or, I think with a shudder, maybe Tom did something that made her scream.

“What time this morning?” I say as I eye him with suspicion.

“Early. She called me a little while ago to say she arrived safely.”

So far, that tracks with my theory about when Katherine left. What doesn’t track is Tom’s Bentley, which sits beneath the portico that juts from the side of the house. It’s slate gray, as sleek and shiny as a wet seal.

“How’d she get there?”

“Car service, of course.”

That doesn’t explain why Katherine hasn’t called or texted me back. After last night—and after making casual plans to meet again for coffee this morning—it seems unusual she hasn’t told me herself that she went back to New York.

“I’ve tried reaching her several times today,” I say. “She’s not answering her phone.”

“She doesn’t check her phone when traveling. She keeps it in her purse, silenced.”

Tom’s response, like all of them so far, makes perfect sense and, if you think about it too much, no sense at all. Six days ago, as Ricardo drove me to the lake house, sheer boredom kept me fixated on my phone. Then again, most of that time was spent Googling to see if any liquor stores in the area delivered.

“But you just said she called you from the apartment.”

“I think she wants to be left alone,” Tom says.

I take that to mean he wants to be left alone. I’m not ready to do that just yet. The more he talks, the more suspicious I get. I zero in on the red mark on Tom’s cheek, picturing the exact moment he got it.

Him jerking Katherine away from the window.

Her lashing out, punching back.

Was that the first time something like that happened? Or had it occurred multiple times before? If so, maybe it’s possible that Tom took it one step further just as dawn was breaking over the lake.

“Why did Katherine leave?” I say, being purposefully nosy in the hope he’ll reveal more than he’s told me so far.