Dead to Her(67)
The memories wouldn’t stop stabbing her. William’s face so red. Spitting at her, hot and wet as he raged, his words just noise as she’d wished he’d die right there on the spot, that throbbing vein in his skull that taunted her when he was angry and when he was huffing and puffing and fucking her. The loathing in his eyes, so obvious even with her junkie itching skin and thoughts so confused no wine could ease them. “I’ll deal with you later. I’ve got bigger problems than a drunk, slutty wife. And to think I believed I could make something of you.” Make something of her. Reshape her. Break her. He was worse than her family back home.
He didn’t cancel the party. How could he? The show had to go on; appearances were everything. She’d tried to be witty and charming and elegant, she really had, but her brain was on fire, and once she’d seen William talking to Noah, eyes darting her way, no doubt discussing cutting her out of his life like a cancer, she’d become too loud and too bright, like one of the circus acts she’d hired rather than a woman of substance, spinning and whirling from one group of people to another, welcomed by none without her rich husband by her side. Then there was Marcie—Take care of your own shit—who wouldn’t even listen to her and then had vanished.
She’d drifted then. Drifted and drank. Flashes of the night came to her. Emmett and Jason around the side of the house, away from the crowd. Jason shouting, gesticulating. Emmett shrugging and walking away, leaving the handsome man to beat on the wall. Jason hadn’t even wanted to speak to her, instead barging past to go inside. Julian and Pierre exchanging a look, darkly entertained, Keisha not the only one watching the party from the outside. Emmett and Virginia dancing, Emmett with his eyes on William as he talked to Iris. Everyone smiling and laughing and pretending to have fun, but all the while simply vipers in a nest, watching and waiting to strike or be struck. That’s how she’d felt. She’d wanted to cry and laugh and dance all at the same time, and that’s when she’d seen her.
Zelda. Just standing there on the grass, watching. A spider in her web. Who else would have taken that picture and sent it? Who else wanted Keisha gone so badly? Keisha couldn’t remember much of what she’d said or how she’d said it, but she stormed through the party and raged at the housekeeper. Noise came out of her, coarse, crude words, angry, upset, accusing, and then there were Iris’s dry, cool hands—Good lord dear, what on earth has upset you, what’s the matter—Virginia’s arm wrapped around her, surprisingly strong, so much floral perfume on her skin.
They pulled her away inside, sending Elizabeth running to get a glass of water in the kitchen, where she collided with Jason coming the other way, and then Elizabeth sent him to help get Keisha into a quiet room as if she were an invalid like the last wife. It was like some poor farce. She couldn’t remember if he helped. She couldn’t remember much before being left alone upstairs while the party emptied out, Iris and Virginia smoothing everything over with a wave of their hands, guests melting into the night as the music stopped, Julian and Pierre left to survey the desolation that had been their great pièce de résistance, before even they were ushered out.
Keisha had waited like a frightened, chastised child until finally she and her husband were the only ones left. William hadn’t spoken to her. He hadn’t even come to their bedroom but instead had gone straight to a guest suite. She’d been relieved and panicked at the same time. She didn’t have to have him near her and she didn’t have to face his wrath, but it was also obvious that their farce of a marriage was over and they’d made a laughingstock of each other. He would not forgive that. He would want to destroy her for it. Maybe if he’d let her have the pills she’d needed then none of this would have happened. If he’d been a kinder husband. If, if, if. Now he was going to take everything and leave her back where she started. Worse than where she started. Back in the gutter, stripped of her Versace and dressed only in stinking humiliation. Her breath caught in her chest. It had all crumbled so fast.
She got to unsteady feet, one hand still gripping the bottle of champagne she’d brought up from the party wreckage downstairs and drained to try, in vain, to help her sleep. What would happen tomorrow? A small suitcase? A plane ticket?
Flies buzzed in her head, scratching at her skull, making it hard to process anything. She should have gotten that prescription. She’d maybe have been able to think on her feet like she used to, found a way to explain that photo, make him feel sorry for her all over again. But still. That was done. It was all done.
She went to the window and stared out. How many nights had Eleanor gazed out from here while she was dying, too afraid to sleep? Looking down at the wonderful gardens and thinking how bittersweet their beauty was, how soon she’d be nothing, like her boy had become, and they’d all still be here and so would her husband and her friends and there would be a new, cheaper, younger woman sliding into her place. Would it have given the sainted Eleanor a last laugh to see how it was turning out for Keisha?
The sky had cleared and the stars twinkled, fairy lights in the night, and for a moment, in the shadows under the trees, she was sure she saw the flicker of a silver dollar being tossed in the night, and her soul calmed. She wouldn’t give all this up. Not yet. There were many dark hours before morning. Anything could change by then. Anything.
She’d always thought that when a body was found, screaming would wake the whole house. It turned out not to be true. No one screamed when William was found and it was at least fifteen minutes before anyone thought to wake Keisha, and by the time she was up, bleary, dazed, and confused, the ambulance was there and people were shouting commands and asking questions that she didn’t understand.