Page 49

After she recovered from her nearly fatal injuries, Greta got this idea in her head that she wanted to travel the world.

I don’t have much time left. I want to see everything.

At first I thought she had forgotten about the whole thing, but then a few months ago, she told us she had booked plane tickets.

Her flight is at seven in the morning tomorrow.

I look doubtfully at the tickets in the window. “Are you sure you can handle it?”

“Go! I promise, I’ll be fine.”

To prove his point, Nick strides over to the pass and starts expertly studying the tickets and making sure that all the plates are up to standard. He winks at me, and I smile back. I suppose it won’t hurt to be gone for half an hour.

As I pass through the restaurant, I see Quinn Alexander sitting at one of the tables with her boyfriend—one of the police officers who had been involved in the case.

Nick told me she had asked him to set aside a table for tonight.

The two of them are holding hands across the table, and he’s looking into her eyes.

They look really happy. Good for them. After what she’s been through, she deserves a happy ending.

The latest bit of construction Nick did was making sure the path from the restaurant back to the motel was paved, so it would be easy for my power wheelchair to glide across.

I can’t lie—doing everything I used to do before has been a challenge, but Nick has done everything he can to make sure the transition has been as smooth as possible.

I’m lucky to have him. Although he claims he’s lucky to have me. Maybe we’re both lucky.

One thing we can’t do is make the second floor of the motel accessible to me.

The cost of putting in an elevator would be prohibitive, and it’s not like I need to go up there anyway.

And the lobby is beautiful now. Nick put in new carpeting last year that’s a striking royal blue.

He also patched up the ceiling after we fixed the leak in room 201.

It’s an interesting story—the husband of that woman, Claudia, came by to talk to us soon after her arrest, to offer an apology and explanation for what his wife had done.

But when he noticed the leak, he offered to go up and fix it free of charge.

Apparently, he’s a plumber. That pipe had been leaking on and off for years, and the rust from the pipes turned the water brown—almost red—staining the ceiling.

Fortunately, it hasn’t leaked again since he fixed it, and we got the stain on the ceiling repainted. Robert Delaney knows what he’s doing.

That said, we still haven’t had any guests in Room 201. Nick still keeps the room closed all the time with the “DO NOT DISTURB” sign on the door. Eventually, he’ll have to open it up, but he’s not ready yet.

When I wheel into the lobby, Greta is already waiting for me. She is sitting in a wooden chair, wearing a dress rather than one of her many nightgowns with a long black coat over it. I almost don’t recognize her in normal clothing.

“Let me guess,” I say. “Your psychic premonition told you I was coming.”

She laughs. “No. Nick said you were going to stop by.”

“Ah.”

She tilts her head. “You look beautiful tonight, Rosalie. You’re glowing.”

I roll my eyes. “My pregnancy glow?”

“Pregnancy… love…” She reaches for my hand, and I let her take it.

Her fingers are so frail and spidery. I can’t believe she survived being stabbed in her belly—Nick and I thought for sure she was a goner.

But she told me she had survived much worse.

“You and Nick are going to live happily ever after. I told you. I told you there was happiness in your future.”

I remember when she said that to me. I let her tell my fortune, and she told me those exact words. And I laughed at the time, because I couldn’t imagine a happy future for myself. Yet here I am.

“I guess you really have a gift,” I say.

“I will tell you a secret, Rosalie.” Her fingers linger on mine. “I cannot really read the future. Or the past. I am just an ordinary woman.”

“ Really .” There’s a note of sarcasm in my voice, but I’m a little surprised by her admission. Not that I ever believed in that stuff, but sometimes Greta did seem truly clairvoyant. After all, she predicted a happy ending for me and Nick when it seemed impossible.

“Yes. It is true.”

“Well.” I shrug. “It looks like your prediction about me and Nick came true after all.”

“Yes. It did. Of course, I had to help it along.”

“Help it along?”

She hesitates as her eyes stare into mine. “Rosalie, I want you to know that I never had children. And I always thought of you like a daughter. I wanted you to be happy.”

“Yes…”

“Nick would have left you,” she says. “That girl, Christina… she was a vixen. She set her sights on him—she wanted him. And no offense, my dear, but you were not doing much to hold on to him. You were delivering him to her on a silver platter! She told me how she thought Nick would be better off without you.”

My mouth falls open. I didn’t know about any of this. I had always assumed it was a fling—not that I asked for many details.

“So you see,” she says, “I had to do what I did.”

I pull my hand away from hers. “What did you do?”

“I saved your marriage!”

“Greta…” I feel a cramping sensation in my lower abdomen. “ What did you do? ”

Greta’s blue eyes are wide. “She deserved it. Look at what she did. Fooling around with a married man. I’m disappointed in Nick too, but I understand what he was going through. She had no excuse. Terrible person.”

My stomach turns. “Greta, you didn’t…”

“She barely felt a thing.” Greta strokes her long white hair. “I got the key from where Nick keeps them downstairs, and I let myself into her room during the night. I did it while she was sleeping. She only woke up for a minute, and it was too late by then. Nothing anyone could do.”

All these years, I had been scared Nick was the one who killed Christina Marsh. I should have known he would never do something like that.

But I never dreamed Greta could have done it either.

“I’ve done it before.” She says it casually, like she’s talking about going roller skating instead of committing a murder. “There was a woman at the carnival who wanted my Bernie. And then she just… disappeared. That’s what the police decided anyway.”

I clasp a hand over my mouth. “Oh God…”

“I was trying to get rid of the other one for you too,” she says.

“Quinn. When she was downstairs, I looked through her bag, found out her real name. Then I said all the scary stuff about how she was in horrible danger. Left a few threatening messages for her in the Bible in the drawer. Got her on the run. Of course, it turned out she was in horrible danger.”

“Greta…”

“Rosalie.” She reaches for my hand again, but I yank it away. “Are you feeling poorly? You look so pale. It’s not the baby, is it?”

“No, I…” But that cramp hits me again. Still, I’ve got an entire month to go. I’m not in labor. I’m just having a panic attack that a woman is dead because of me. “Greta, how could you do something like that?”

She blinks at me. “I did it for you, Rosalie.” Her eyes darken. “If I hadn’t, you would have none of this! He would have left you. No restaurant, no baby. Christina wanted him. You did not meet that woman. She thought I was on her side so she confided in me.”

“She… did?”

“You do not know how she spoke about you. Nick’s invalid wife. Frigid—won’t even touch him. He deserves better. That’s what she used to say.”

Those Tarot cards were right all those years ago about my future. Death . Because Nick and I got married, a woman is dead. But he wasn’t the one who killed her. It was Greta .

Greta reaches deep into the pocket of her long black wool coat. She pulls out a rectangular sign with the familiar words “DO NOT DISTURB” stenciled on it. She holds it out to me.

“I took this off the door of Room 201,” she says. “It’s time to open the room up again to guests. Let the past be the past.”

I take the sign from her, but it drops from my fingers and flutters to the floor, the letters of “DO NOT DISTURB” staring up at me, looming before my eyes.

I lean forward as my head spins. I get that cramping sensation one more time.

I can’t believe what I’m hearing. Greta killed a woman.

I can’t just pretend I didn’t hear this.

I have to call the police. I have to tell them what I know.

“You do not look well, Rosalie.” She purses her lips. “Are you sure it’s not the baby? Should I fetch Nick?”

“No, I…” But before I can protest, I feel this strange popping sensation inside me. I look down at the growing stain on my skirt. “Greta…”

“Your water broke!” She claps her hands together. “How exciting! I’ll go get Nick.”

I watch her run off to the restaurant to get my husband. My head is spinning. I’m about to have a baby. I’m in labor.

But I’ve got to call the police. I’ve got to tell them that Greta killed Christina Marsh. I can’t let her get away with murder, even if she did it for me.

Where is my phone? Where did I put it?

It seems like less than a minute later, Nick is dashing into the motel. His face is pale, but he’s grinning. “Greta said you’re in labor. She said your water broke. Are you okay?”

“I’m okay, but…” I take a breath. “Nick, my phone…”

“Don’t worry about your phone. I’ve got mine. Come on, the hospital bag is in my trunk.”

“But I need to—”

“Rosie, we have to go!” His eyes are shining. “Come on—let’s get you to the hospital and have this baby!” He reaches over and wraps his arms around me. “I can’t wait. I love you so much, Rosie.”

“Where’s Greta?” I say.

“She said she had to go. She ended up getting a flight late tonight and had to run, but she said to tell you that you’re going to be a wonderful mother.”

I look up at him, my head throbbing. Another cramp seizes my lower abdomen. I’ve got to get to the hospital—he’s right. There’s no time to call the police now. And by the time I do, Greta will be out of the country.

She planned it this way. She knew that if she told me, I would feel compelled to report her.

She didn’t tell me until the last second for that reason.

But she wanted me to know. She wanted me to know that everything I have is because of her.

She’s right—Nick very well might have left me for Christina.

If she hadn’t done what she did, I wouldn’t have him anymore.

I wouldn’t be on my way to the hospital, about to have my first child. I might not even be alive.

It was wrong that she murdered that woman. She should never have done it. But I can’t say I’m sorry. And at that moment, I decide.

If we have a girl, we will name her Greta.

THE END