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We are in the bedroom, and Blake is staring at the bottle of bleach I’ve got in my hand. The same bottle I stashed there after Goldy went belly-up.

“What’s this doing in our closet?” I demand to know.

Blake has a baffled look on his face. As much as I hate him, part of me almost wants to reach out and give him a level ten hug, because he truly looks like he needs it. He can’t figure out how his phone ended up in Amanda’s bed or how her lipstick ended up on his collar. He has no choice but to blame her for everything. He’s lost.

“I have no idea,” he gulps.

“Did you kill Goldy to frame Whitney?”

He looks like he’s about to be sick. “No. Christ, of course not. You can’t possibly think…”

This gives me the chance to start ticking off his sins. All the strange things he’s done lately, although many aren’t things he has actually done. He listens to me, wanting to protest but knowing in his gut that I won’t believe him. All the while, I’m packing my clothes.

“That psychic woman was right,” I conclude. “If I stay long enough, God knows what you’ll do.”

“No. No .” He looks almost like he’s about to burst into tears. “I would never cheat on you, and I would never hurt you.”

Well, that’s a load of bullshit. I zip up my suitcase. “I think I better go.”

And then he stands in front of me, blocking my exit from the room. “Blake, get out of my way right now,” I say.

He doesn’t budge. The tension builds. And for a split second, I am scared that I have pushed him too far. That my mild-mannered fiancé might have really snapped. And maybe somebody really is going to find my body on the first floor in a pool of blood.

But then he steps out of the way.

He’s not done though. He follows me down the stairs to the first floor, pleading with me the whole time. He doesn’t realize his night’s going to get even worse if he eats the leftover Chinese food for dinner tonight. I grabbed a handful of Amanda’s hair from the brush she left in the bathroom and stirred it into his noodles as a little something extra. He never takes them out of the container or heats them up before eating them.

Blake is still begging and pleading when I get to the front door, and he doesn’t stop as I’m putting on my jacket and my sneakers. He even follows me outside.

“I love you, Krista,” he says.

Yeah. Right.

Blake seems surprised by the taxi that shows up at our front door because they’re relatively rare on our street. He doesn’t realize I called for one, and the timing is impeccable. I step inside, relieved I don’t have to listen to more of his lies.

As the taxi is pulling away, I turn to look through the rear window. Blake is still standing there, watching from the street. I notice Mr. Zimmerly coming out of his house, and again, the timing is incredible. At the worst possible moment, he starts yelling at Blake, probably to take in his garbage cans—I can’t hear them, but that seems to be all he ever talks about. Just for fun, I’ve been adding a little fuel to the flame by pulling the bins back out after Blake puts them away. I’ve caught Blake staring at the bins he’s sure he put away and scratching his head. It really is the little things. As we turn the corner, Blake has started yelling back at Mr. Zimmerly.

Blake hates Mr. Zimmerly. I know it, and everyone else on the block knows it. If anything ever happened to him, Blake would be the first suspect.

And that gives me an idea.