Page 84 of The Wife Upstairs

I imagine him, taking it to read somewhere, maybe at the office, maybe on his lunch break, and shoving it back in a pocket, forgetting about it.

I’ve seen Eddie reading plenty over the past few months, but always some boring military thriller. This is a romance novel, an older one with a pretty lurid cover, which doesn’t strike me as Eddie’s thing.

Maybe it was Bea’s. A favorite read, something he kept close to him.

I open the cover.

It takes me a minute to realize what I’m seeing, the spill of words written over the typed pages confusing and messy to my eyes.

And then I seeBlanchescrawled on a page, and feel like my heart stops beating.

Murdered my best friend.

Locked me away.

My shaking hands turn the pages so fast, I can hear paper tear.

And then there’s my name.

Jane.

Bile floods my mouth, and I whimper, muscles seizing up.

Killed Blanche, locked me away, fucked him, Jane.

The words are blurring, and I’m so sure I’m going to be sick, but I can’t be, I can’t because Bea Rochester is not in that lake, rotting away like Tripp said, she’s here, she’s right over my head, and oh my god.

I rush out of the closet, my feet skidding on the marble floor in the hallway.

Adele looks up and barks once, sharp, as I run for the stairs, the book still in my hand.

A code, the same one as the lock at the lake house.

Another closet, this one smaller, one I’ve never even paid attention to because I hardly ever come upstairs, and oh god, oh god, the thumps, those noises,transitional seasons,that asshole, it was her, it was Bea—

My hands shake so badly I can barely open the panel at the back of the closet, but I manage it, punching in the numbers even as a part of me says she won’t be in there. That this can’t be fucking real.

A whirring sound, a click, and I push the door open.

At first, I’m just surprised to see what a big room is behind the door. Like a hotel room, almost, decorated, cozy despite the lack of natural light. A big bed in the center.

And next to that bed, a woman.

Now I really think I will be sick.

Bea Rochester didn’t drown in the same accident that killed Blanche.

Bea Rochester never died at all.

Bea Rochester is standing right in front of me.

“Is he here?” she asks.

30

My head is spinning, and my stomach is still lurching.

Nothelp me,notwho are you,butis he here?