I regard the scan more closely. My mood shifts down another gear. I set the scan down and walk into the living room area. My eyes are drawn by the maintained garden beyond the big sliding doors. At the rear of the garden is a bushy hedge and trees. The property appears to back onto a laneway. I turn and catch sight of the two massive paintings on either side of the fireplace. And I freeze.
Stone cold.
Can’t move.
Can’t think.
A high-pitched shriek begins in my brain. It rises in a crescendo—like a desert sandstorm blasting against the windows of my mind, banshees screaming and scratching to get in. My feet are rooted to the wooden floorboards. My pulse begins to race. I’m going to faint. A panic attack. My body is reacting before my mind can catch up.
My therapist told me—when she was discussing trauma—that the body keeps the score even when the mind can’t. Sometimes a person has no reasonable narrative for a traumatic event, so the conscious mind blocks it completely, trying to act as though nothing unusual occurred. But the body remembers. She explained it like this: A woman has a terrible car accident, and she saw people die horribly. The woman tries not to think about it. She tries to “get on” with life. And she does. She thinks she is fine. Months or years go by, and then she drives past the exact spot where the bloody accident occurred. And a chemical trigger is pulled. All the survival fight-or-flight hormones swamp into her body. Her neural memory is once more alive. And because the woman never developed a narrative to cope with the event, she short-circuits.
My body is short-circuiting, reacting to the paintings. They dominate the room. Maybe seven feet tall by four feet wide each. They depict a warrior of a ski racer in a helmet and goggles, his muscled body clad in Lycra, thighs like pistons. He’s bombing down a mountain. And it feels as though he is coming down at me. In one painting his body is at a wild angle as he barely clears a slalom gate. In the other painting he’s skidding to a stop in a spray of snow, one bent ski pole held high in victory.
I try to swallow. Try to breathe.
It’s him.
I tell myself it doesn’t mean I’m in his house. It doesn’t mean the ultrasound baby is his. Rose Cottage could belong to anyone. Someone could have bought those paintings at an auction. The Rose Cottage couple could be ski fans.
I glance around in a sweat. There are several framed photographs on a bookshelf. I lurch toward them. A wedding. An engagement photo. Photos of a happy couple in settings with pyramids and lions and elephants and oceans and jungles and mountains. One after another. The same couple through the years of their life together.
It is him.
Jon Rittenberg.
With his wife, Daisy.
He’s here. Back. In my city—this is my place now. He left. Long ago.
Yet here I am. I’m inside his house. I’ve been hired to clean his mess.
A bolt strikes me. I whirl around to face the kitchen. The scan on the counter—Jon Rittenberg has a baby on the way.
My hands fist at my sides, nails cutting into my palms. My vision blurs. I’m shaking. All this time. All the new life that I have worked so hard to build over the past years—new friends, a measure of peace. Happiness finally. And suddenly I’m back as though nothing at all has happened in between.
My stomach heaves, catching me by surprise. I run for the downstairs bathroom. I retch into the toilet bowl. I sink down to the cool tiles, and holding on to the bowl, I throw up again.
First my mom’s ashes. Then this.
Two things.
Triggers pulled.
I’ve dropped through that trapdoor, Dear Diary. And everything has changed. I am inside Jon Rittenberg’s house . . . and I have a key.
MAL
November 1, 2019. Friday.
Mal and Benoit knock on the front door of Beulah Brown’s house.
The knife missing from the block in the Northview kitchen was found at the bottom of the infinity pool. It’s being sent to the lab along with the other trace evidence. Mal has also tasked local uniforms with a canvass of the neighborhood. She hopes to find additional witnesses. Her team at the station is working to locate homeowners Vanessa and Haruto North. They’ll gather for a briefing later this afternoon, when they have a better idea what they’re dealing with.
Benoit knocks again, louder. Ivy grows thick around the door. The entryway is dark and gloomy compared to the starkness of the glass structure next door.
A man with a pale, round face opens the door. “Yeah?” He holds on to the knob, unsmiling.
“I’m Sergeant Mallory Van Alst, and this is my partner, Corporal Benoit Salumu.” They show their IDs. “We’re investigating the incident that a Beulah Brown from this address called in. We’d like to have a word with her.”
“My mother? She dials 911 at least once a month since she’s been on opioid medication. She’s got end-stage cancer. She imagines all sorts of things. Noises in our house. She sees stalkers in the garden, lights in the bushes at night, boaters spying at us from the water. The local cops send officers, and I have to wake up and explain to them that nothing’s going on. They take a look anyway, because they never trust the guy who answers the door and says everything’s fine, right? But same result each time—nothing apart from a stray cat or raccoon in the garbage, or an old bum collecting cans from the recycling bins.” He doesn’t move his position at the door. He holds it against his body so Mal can’t see inside.
She keeps her features neutral. “And your name, sir?”
“Horton. Horton Brown. This is my house. Well, it’s my mother’s, but I live here.”
“Can we come in? I understand from dispatch that Mrs. Brown is confined upstairs.”
He exhales heavily and steps back, allowing them entry. Mal exchanges a quick glance with Benoit. He gives a small nod and says, “Mr. Brown, I have some questions for you, too. Shall we talk down here in the living room while Sergeant Van Alst goes up to chat with your mother?”
He grunts and leads Benoit into a living room furnished with overstuffed chairs upholstered in a cabbage rose print. Crocheted doilies hanging over the backs. Clearly Horton’s mother’s furniture. A dirty-looking Maltese follows Horton, nails clicking on the wooden floor.
Mallory climbs the steps, wondering how often Beulah Brown manages to get downstairs, if at all.
She reaches a landing with a small window that looks out toward the sea. A door stands ajar.
“Mrs. Brown?” Mal knocks on the open door. “This is Sergeant Mallory Van Alst. I’ve come to talk to you about the 911 call you made.”
“Come in.” The voice is thin.
Mallory enters a large room. It’s equipped with a hospital bed, an oxygen compressor, a wheelchair, a comfortable-looking sofa, and reading chairs. A bathroom leads off the room, and a small kitchenette has been installed along the rear wall. The front windows face the sea. The corner window has a clear view of the house and driveway next door. French doors lead onto a small balcony. At least she can get out, thinks Mal.
Beulah Brown sits dwarfed in a wingback facing the ocean. Her legs are swollen and propped up on an ottoman. A crocheted throw covers her lap. A flask, a teacup, cookies, and a pair of binoculars rest on the small round table at her side.
“I didn’t think anyone would come,” the old woman says.