Her phone pinged again. Graham again.
Oh, shit.
What?
The cops are here.
If it was a ploy, which he was not above, it worked. She dialed his number but the call went to voice mail. Her throat was dry, belly clenched.
Why would the cops be there so early?
She put the phone down and walked into Will’s beautifully appointed kitchen—where coffee had already been brewed in a gleaming machine that cost about as much as a used Volkswagen. Grabbing the remote, she flipped on the television, then felt the room spin and pitch as the bottom dropped out of her world.
On the screen was a picture of Geneva—smiling and lovely, her wheat hair whipping around her face. The pretty image was made ominous by the red type beneath it reading: Missing Nanny.
“Twenty-five-year-old Geneva Markson didn’t turn up for work yesterday, after her sister reported her missing this weekend,” said the svelte, heavily coiffed newscaster. “On Monday, police discovered her abandoned car in the well-heeled neighborhood of her employers. Though there is no immediate indication of foul play, neither is there any clue as to her whereabouts. Two local men are being brought in for questioning, police say.
“If anyone knows the location of this young woman, police are asking that they please call this tip line.”
Will came up behind Selena. “Oh, shit. Someone called the media.”
“The police are at the house now,” she managed, though she felt like she was sucking air through a straw. “Graham just texted.”
“I’ll get dressed and get over there.”
She heard his voice, felt his presence—just before she passed out cold, knocking her head on the marble countertop on her way to the tile floor.
PART 2
ALL OUR LITTLE LIES
“Three may keep a secret, if two of them are dead.”
—Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard’s Almanac
TWENTY-FIVE
Selena
There was a kind of midafternoon light that Selena associated with illness. The way the sun had filtered through the gauzy pink drapes in her childhood bedroom when she was home sick from school. There was a special rosy hue to it, a hush to a house kept quiet so that she could rest. Maybe she’d hear her mother in the kitchen. Her father would be at work, her sister at school, and in that special glow it was as if time had slowed.
Today, in the living room of her own home, the light that came in through the drapes was a cruel white. There was a sickness, to be sure. The world outside was waiting, a wolf at the door, huffing and puffing.
Geneva was officially missing. Her husband, Graham, and Erik Tucker, her former employer, had both been brought in for questioning.
Selena sat on her couch with Detective Crowe across from her. His hair was wild, suit rumpled, purple fatigue shadowing his eyes. She was numb, head throbbing. She held an ice pack to the lump on the back of her skull. She’d just passed out cold. Who did that? What if there was something seriously wrong with her?
Her husband was going to prison.
Her children would be all alone.
Reign it in, she told herself. Pull yourself together.
It was almost one, and her mother would be picking up the boys from school soon. She’d promised Oliver answers by the time he got home. She didn’t have any. Not one. And now there were only more questions.
Where was Geneva?
What had Graham done?
How was she going to hold their life together for the boys?
She was shaking from deep in her core. She sat on her free hand, so that Detective Crowe wouldn’t see how scared she was.
Detective Crowe had questions, too. She knew she shouldn’t answer any of them. But here he was. There was something safe and upright about him, in the way he leaned toward her, gaze steady. Something comforting about his presence.
“How long did you know that Geneva Markson and your husband were having an affair?” he asked, voice gentle.
There was no point in lying now. The police apparently knew everything.
On the table in front of her, she stared at a printout of texts between Graham and Geneva. Somehow these had also been leaked to the media. Who would do that?
Graham: I’m still raw from fucking you. Hurts so good.
Geneva: I can still taste you in my mouth.
God. How disgusting. There were two full pages. She’d barely read any of it. But she’d read enough.
“About a week,” she said. She sank back into the plush of the sofa. “I caught them on the nanny cam.”
“So—you lied.” He seemed tired with the knowledge. She was just another liar sitting before him, one of many probably.
“Yes,” she said with a nod.
She almost apologized and then didn’t. Because why should she? Why should her husband have fucked the nanny, and then that woman disappear?
And then, as if that wasn’t bad enough, why should Graham and Geneva’s disgusting, raunchy texts—revealed when police accessed Geneva’s phone logs—have been leaked to the media this morning?
And then, after all of that, why should Selena have to apologize for trying to protect her children—her life—from the shameful actions of her husband?
“Why?” asked Detective Crowe. “Why did you lie to me?”
“Hmm,” she said, putting a hand to her chin in mock wondering. “I don’t know. Shame. Fear. A fervent hope that I could hold my life together until this was all revealed to be a silly mistake. Denial, maybe.”
“Okay,” he said, lifting a hand. “I get it. I do.”
He’d come alone, without his partner—who was no doubt interrogating Graham. Will was at the station with them. She’d watched enough police procedure shows to know that this was probably by design. Separate the husband and wife. Catch Selena at home when she was weak and afraid, when the lawyer had bigger fish to fry.
She should have turned him away when he came to the door. That would have been the right and smart thing. I can’t talk to you without my lawyer present, she should have said. But she hadn’t. And now here they sat.
Maybe if she hadn’t been alone reading those texts online, and all the comments about them on Twitter, on Reddit, she wouldn’t have been so desperate for any kind of company. She was actually happy when she saw him standing there on the porch, an honest person looking for answers. Just like Selena.
“Can we agree to move forward with the truth?” he asked.
The truth. What a slippery concept.
“Yes.”
“Did you know about the texts?”
“No.” Heat rose from her neck to her cheeks.
The raunchy, dirty, humiliating missives added a new layer to Geneva’s disappearance. There was some violence to the exchange—threats of bondage, punishment.
I want to spank you till you scream.
I’m going to tie you up and take you from behind.
Really? Not Graham’s thing, Selena wouldn’t have thought. But what did she know? Also leaked: Geneva’s affair with Erik Tucker. There was apparently a text chain associated with that relationship, as well. Equally vile.
On Twitter there was already a trending hashtag: #TheNaughtyNanny.
Selena’s phone was ringing and pinging every few minutes. She kept checking it to make sure it wasn’t her mother or the school. The last text from Beth: I’m coming to your house.