Reputation(88)

Then I see a figure. Two figures, actually—women, one of them in the bathroom, the other cowering against a wall. I blink hard, wondering if this is the drugs at work. But I don’t see Kit. I see a slight, beautiful redhead and a tall, broad-shouldered blonde. They see me, too. The shock rolls through all of us like wildfire.

Patrick leaps away from the corner, where he’s standing with one of the girls. “Lynn?” His pants are around his ankles, though he’s still got on his boxers. He blinks hard at me—not menacingly, exactly, but certainly shocked. “What the hell?”

“You drugged me,” I whisper. “Who are these people? Where’s Kit?”

Patrick’s eyes darken. He opens his mouth, but no sound comes out.

“Put on your fucking clothes!” I gesture at his bare legs. “What the hell are you doing? Who the hell are these girls? What’s with that mask?” I stab my finger at it. The empty eye and mouth holes look ghastly, ghoulish, on the floor. My skin is snapping. I’ve never been so disgusted and humiliated in my life. And still: Where is Kit?

Patrick yanks up his pants. Behind him, the girls are scrambling to get dressed, too. As they lean over, I see they’re both wearing thongs. I also notice that one of them is putting on an Aldrich University T-shirt. It’s then that I realize that I know who she is. She sat in the front pew at Greg Strasser’s funeral—with Kit’s daughter.

I glower at Patrick again. “Are these girls even legal?”

Patrick stands in front of them to block my view. “We can talk about this later.”

I roar with laughter. “I’m not going anywhere!” I notice that the girls have moved far away from Patrick, all the way to the opposite corner of the room. “Are you two all right?”

The girls have baby skin. Long baby eyelashes. They lower their eyes and nod mutely. Both of them look shaken but not beaten up. The blonde looks more pissed than anything else.

Patrick grunts. “They were trying to get money out of me,” Patrick snarls. “These bitches were trying to play me—us.”

The girls exchange guilty glances. The blonde breathes in. “We made a video. But I’m going to destroy it. I-I promise.”

A video? But before I can ask, the blonde scuttles over to the television. She reaches on top of the screen and pulls off a little device no bigger than a button. I can see that she’s about to drop it into her purse, so I clear my throat.

“Give it here,” I say, extending my palm. “If there’s anyone who’s going to screw Patrick over, it’s his wife.”





36





LAURA


FRIDAY, MAY 5, 2017


A sign above me flashes that a turnpike interchange is coming up and that I need to get my E-ZPass ready. I fumble for it in the glove compartment before closing my fingers around the hard plastic square. I place it on the dashboard and feel relief as the green light flashes, saying that it still works. The last thing I wanted was to have to slow down and fumble for change. I just want to keep moving.

My plans have changed. On the road, I suddenly had a change of heart: There’s no way I can go to my mother’s. Ollie would look there first, and then I run the risk of him hurting not just me but my parents as well. So I’m going to drive all the way to New Jersey. I have enough gas for that. From there, I’ll buy a plane ticket out of here. Ollie will see the charge on my credit card, but by that time, we’ll be long gone.

When I arrive, I’ll change my name. Freddie’s name. We’ll disappear. We need to disappear. I hate that I’m leaving behind my family, my job . . . but it’s the only way. The only thing that matters to me is Freddie. I glance at him in the rearview mirror, and my heart breaks. This is the right thing, I tell myself. Freddie will grow up without a father, but it’s better than being around someone who’s violent.

I’m sure Ollie killed Greg. I would have never believed it a few weeks ago . . . but then, there’s a lot I would have never believed a few weeks ago. Like the slap marks on my cheek. And those sharp, acidic words whispered in my ear. This isn’t the behavior of a rational man. It isn’t even the behavior of someone whose heart is broken. Ollie snapped. Maybe he’s always been this way and just hidden it well, I’m not sure—that’s something I’ll have to work through later. And while I wish I could tell the police what he did, it also doesn’t help that Ollie is revered at the station. No one will believe my story—or, at the very least, they’ll have to jump through all of the hoops in order to make a conviction stick. And in the time it takes them to do that, Ollie will have his way with me. I probably won’t live to see the end of it.

Rain spatters the windshield.

I don’t even notice the flashing blue and red lights behind me until they’re almost on my tail. At first, I move toward the shoulder, figuring the police car wants to pass me, but he keeps pace, the sirens still whirring. I stare at the gauges on the dashboard. Have I been speeding? Is a taillight out? This is not what I need right now.

Nervously, I pull over to the side of the road and stop the car. Freddie’s eyes pop open in the back seat, and he starts to whimper. “It’s okay, bubba,” I coo, rummaging in his diaper bag for a bottle, one of the few things I actually brought with me. I pop it into his mouth and hold it there—he’s not old enough to hold it on his own. I remain this way, cramped and twisted, as the police car doors open and two officers step out. Two? Is that some sort of new policy? Usually, when people are issued a ticket, they only send one guy . . .