My Wife Is Missing(112)

Then she saw the source.

Tina lay on the edge of the pool, her arms splayed open in the shape of a cross, legs straight out in front of her, feet pointing toward the ceiling. Her shoulders hung over the pool’s edge with her neck flexed at a grotesque angle, her head partly submerged under water. Even with a distorted view, Natalie could see that one side of her head was crushed and through a hole in her skull, poured a steady stream of blood.

Natalie caught a flash of silver glinting from the bottom of the pool, shimmering like a mirage. It was the knife used to kill Audrey Adler.





CHAPTER 46





MICHAEL


He felt like he was drowning.

He couldn’t breathe. There was something down his throat, choking him. He thrashed about in an unfamiliar bed, noticing now that there were tubes and wires hindering his mobility, so many that he felt like a puppet on strings. Alarms rang out. He heard commotion coming from the hallway outside his room. Then there was indiscriminate shouting, strained voices, and the high-piercing whine of several more alarms.

His eyes fluttered open slowly; everything appeared blurred. He shook his head from side to side, trying to dislodge the discomfort in his throat. No use. There was no getting rid of it. Soon there were hands all over him, tugging, pulling out the tubes. He gagged. Coughed.

“Michael, can you hear me? Take a breath, you can do it on your own now. Breathe in slowly, out slowly. Relax, Michael, you’re okay.”

He thrashed in his bed.

“We need to sedate him,” he heard somebody cry out.

Michael understood what that meant. He had something important to say before they sent him back into the abyss.

“Natalie,” he managed to croak out. “I need to see my wife.”



* * *



Michael opened his eyes to find her standing at his bedside. Her arm was in a heavy-duty black sling. Bruises and scrapes covered her face but didn’t dim her smile or her beauty. His heart lifted.

“Hey, you,” Natalie said, running her hand across Michael’s stubbly cheek.

“Hey, back,” he said in a hoarse whisper. “What happened? You’re hurt.”

He lifted his arm weakly, gesturing to her sling.

“The old Michael would ask if I got the license plate of the truck that hit me,” Natalie said.

“I’m still heavily sedated,” he managed, which coaxed a little smile from Natalie. She got him some water, which he drank through a plastic straw.

“I’m so sorry,” she said. “For what I’ve done. I’m so sorry.”

A few tears slipped out of her eyes.

Michael didn’t know what she was sorry for, so she told him, enduring a fresh stabbing pain in his abdomen as her story unfolded.

“You told me that you killed Audrey.”

Michael nodded, though he didn’t quite remember.

“I was dying,” he said. “You were all I cared about, you and the kids.”

“Our kids are fine,” she told him.

The pleased look on Michael’s face disappeared as Natalie shared what had happened at the Oakmont Athletic Club.

“Tina … I can’t believe it. She’s gone?”

“Gone,” said Natalie. “Died instantly when she hit the side of the pool.”

They talked more about Tina and Audrey and the gruesome scene the police had found at the club; about Natalie’s dislocated shoulder and the cut she’d sustained to her arm, which needed twenty stitches to close. She told him, too, about how Kate Hildonen got on the first flight out of St. Louis when she’d heard the news reports.

Then Natalie made her confession.

“I wasn’t ever charged with Audrey’s murder, just so you know. Kennett and I came up with the plan. We set it all up. Did it to try to trap you, make you think I was going to go to prison for something you did. We were playing to your conscience when we weren’t even sure you had one.”

“He played me well this whole time,” Michael admitted. “So, I confessed, did I?”

Natalie answered with a nod. “Yes, you did it to save me,” she said. With that, she broke into tears, heaving and sobbing, fighting for each breath, just as Michael had done when the tubes finally came out. He put his hand on hers.

“Is it too late to save us?” he asked. “Are we done, too? The doctors are pretty sure I’m going to get out of here alive, so you can’t get rid of me that easily.”

Michael coughed again. His throat felt like sandpaper.

Natalie touched his face. He saw love in her eyes—not a flame, but a spark, a hint that something could ignite again.

“We can talk about that later,” she said. “When you’re stronger, healthier. Now isn’t the time.”

“I need you to know the truth about me,” Michael said. “I won’t recover well if I’m holding it inside. Nat, I have to talk. Now.”

“Michael, I don’t—”

“Please,” he begged again. “Please.”

Natalie took time between his request and her response.

“Okay,” she eventually relented. “Talk. But before you do, I think you should know that your mother got in touch with me. She wants to come and see you.”