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It hits the wall and shatters.
Tom storms back to the sofa, reaches for the lamp, and, with a flick of his fingers, an uneasy darkness returns to the house across the lake.
I’m startled awake by a sound streaking across the lake. With my eyes still closed, I catch only the last breath of it. An echo of an echo fading fast as it whooshes deeper into the woods behind my house.
I remain frozen in place for half a minute, waiting for the sound to return. But it’s gone now, whatever it was. The lake sits in silence as thick as a wool blanket and just as suffocating.
I fully open my eyes to a gray-pink sky and a lake just beginning to sparkle with daylight.
I spent the whole night on the porch.
Jesus.
My head pounds with pain and my body crackles with it. When I sit up, my joints creak louder than the rocking chair beneath me. As soon as I’m upright, the dizziness hits. A diabolical spinning that makes the world feel like it’s tilting off its axis and forces me to grip the arms of the chair for balance.
I look down, hoping it will steady me. At my feet, rocking slightly on the porch floor, is the whiskey bottle, now mostly empty.
Jesus.
Seeing it brings a rush of nausea so strong it eclipses my pain and confusion and dizziness. I stand—somehow—and rush inside, heading for the small powder room just off the foyer.
I make it to the powder room, but not the toilet. All the poison churning in my stomach comes out in a rush over the sink. I turn the tap on full blast to wash it down and stumble out of the room, toward the staircase on the other side of the living room. I can only reach the top floor by crawling up the steps. Once there, I continue down the hall on my hands and knees until I’m in the master bedroom, where I manage to pull myself into bed.
I flop onto my back, my eyes closing of their own accord. I have no say in the matter. The last thought I have before spiraling into unconsciousness is a memory of the sound that woke me up. With it comes recognition.
I now know what I heard.
It was ascream.
NOW
Tell me what you did to Katherine,” I say again, twisting the towel that had just been in his mouth. It’s damp with saliva. An icky, warm wetness that makes me drop the towel to the floor. “Tell me and this will all be over.”
He doesn’t, of course.
There’s no reason he would.
Not to me.
Not after everything I’ve done. And what I’m still doing.
Holding him captive.
Lying to Wilma.
I’ll have a lot of explaining to do later. Right now, though, my only goal is saving Katherine. If that’s even possible. I have no way of knowing until he tells me.
“What happened to her?” I say after a minute passes and the only sound I hear is rain pounding the roof.
He tilts his head to the side, unbearably smug. “You’re assuming I know.”
I mirror his expression, right down to the thin-lipped smile that conveys anything but friendliness. “It’s not an assumption. Now tell me what you did with her.”
“No.”
“But youdiddo something?”
“I want to askyoua question,” he says. “Why are you so concerned about Katherine? You barely knew her.”