Someone recorded that night.
This is the visual proof that underpins the contents of the documents that Daisy hides under lock and key.
I watch in mounting dread. Then I hear something in the footage. A laugh. It rises above the music and the voices. A high, whooping laugh. It winds up, higher. I go ice cold. I can’t breathe. I hit STOP.
I sit back, struggling to catch my breath.
I rewind a little, hit PLAY again. There it is. Barely audible at first, buried in the party noise. But then it rises, goes higher. Winds up into the whoop. My eyes burn. My heart races. I rewind, hit PLAY again. Then again. And again. I lean close to my monitor. I can identify many of the faces in the footage from that terrible night, including my own. But I can’t see Boon. He never said he was there. But he is. He’s here, in this footage—not a doubt in my heart. That’s his laugh. I’d know it anywhere in this world. No one has a laugh like Boon’s. Surely?
I slump back, energy punched out of me. All this time. All these years of friendship, of him caring for me . . . and he knew. He was there. He saw. And he never came forward.
He never told the police what he surely must have witnessed, given this footage. Not only that, Boon appears to have found the assault that night laughable.
He’s told me only that he believed my claims from “back then.” But he never confessed to me he was there. Not even close. The betrayal is overwhelming. Especially on the back of those signatures at the bottom of one of the documents in Daisy’s safe. I can’t seem to even begin to process yet how this changes everything that I thought was true in my life over the past two decades. Talk about dropping through a trapdoor. Talk about ambiguous images. When you suddenly see the old, evil hag in the image of the beautiful young woman, you cannot unsee her.
I begin to cry. Great big body-shuddering sobs.
Fuck.
I’ve lost a friend. If he ever was one.
I put my hands over my eyes. I press my head. The pain is intense. Bam Bam Bam. A mallet that hammers inside my skull.
But now I have proof. After eighteen years, I have proof. It’s all here. It’s been here all this time, all those lost and painful and dead years. Locked in fucking Daisy Rittenberg’s safe.
What in the hell for? Why does she keep it? Surely she must know what this will do to her husband if it gets out? Maybe that’s exactly why she keeps it. To control Jon.
Charley’s warning slithers into my brain. “I don’t know what you want with the Rittenbergs, Kit, but be careful. You might think Jon Rittenberg is bad, and he is, but he’s just your generic entitled male asshole. His wife, though—Daisy Rittenberg—she’s dangerous.”
I sit there, staring into nothingness, trying to comprehend, until the night grows black as ink. I sit there while it stays black. I sit until I hear the rain begin. Until I know what I am going to do. Those weeks since I first walked into Rose Cottage, since I first laid eyes on those paintings—they have been leading to this. All the pieces have been slotting together for a purpose.
I pick up my phone. I struggle to compose myself, suck in a deep breath, and I call Boon.
“Kit?” He sounds sleepy. I woke him. “Are you okay, Kit? Do you know what time it is? What’s going on?”
“I’m not okay, Boon. I need to see you. I have something I must show you.”
DAISY
October 25, 2019. Friday.
Six days before the murder.
Daisy is irritable as she drives to Vanessa’s house for a late lunch date. It’s Friday—maid’s day—so she needs to be out of her house, but she’d prefer to be in bed with her swollen legs up. She’s two days shy of thirty-five weeks pregnant, and she feels the world closing in on her in all ways. Her body is uncomfortable. She’s deeply rattled by the Chucky that arrived in the envelope last week. And Jon’s weird behavior is worrying. Plus she’s increasingly paranoid, feeling followed, forgetting and misplacing things. She couldn’t find her diamond teardrop pendant this morning. She swears she left it on the bathroom counter. And Jon was yelling at her about where she put his damn shoes.
She just wants Baby Bean out now. She wants to feel normal.
But as Daisy turns her BMW into the lane near the water and sees Vanessa North’s shining glass house ahead, her spirits lift. Vanessa has invited her for a late lunch, and Daisy has to admit to herself that the autumn weather is glorious. Blue skies, a balmy temperature, leaves everywhere turning bright shades of red and orange and yellow. She tells herself the Bean will be here soon. Meanwhile she’ll continue to keep off social media. Jon’s job will sort itself out. This phase will pass.
Daisy parks in the Glass House driveway. As she exits her car, a flock of tattered black birds erupts with a clatter from a nearby tree. She startles, then watches them—ragged harpies fluttering up into the blue sky. Crows. Ugly, bloody crows. Creepy scavengers. What does one call a flock of crows again? A murder. She shivers because at the same moment the word murder enters her head, she catches sight of the tombstones on the front lawn across the street, and a skeleton dangling by its neck from an upstairs window. Stupid Halloween.
“Daisy!” Vanessa steps out of her glass front door, wearing an emerald-green jersey dress that shows off her pregnant tummy. She looks utterly gorgeous.
Daisy and Vanessa hug and exchange air-kisses.
“It’s such a gorgeous day,” Vanessa says, “I thought we’d eat by the pool. Are you good with that?”
“Absolutely.”
Vanessa takes Daisy through the living room and leads her out to a table set for two beside an infinity pool that overlooks the inlet. Daisy is instantly green with envy. Her and Jon’s home is on the opposite shore and nowhere near waterfront. Daisy would much rather live on this side, and right on the water. Being on this side of the inlet would also place her closer to her parents. In fact, the more Daisy thinks about it, Rose Cottage does not convey the sort of image she would like to project. The property was a hasty $7.7 million purchase from afar, something they could move into the moment they arrived from Colorado. A stopgap, really. Because the idea is to relocate to the new resort once Jon is offered the COO job. Now Daisy isn’t at all certain it’s going to happen.
“Take a seat,” Vanessa says. “I’m just going to fetch the food.”
Daisy sits facing the pool and the ocean, relieved to get off her throbbing feet. Vanessa comes back out, carrying a charcuterie board with an assortment of cheeses, smoked meats, pickles, olives, grapes, sliced vegetables, and nuts. She sets the platter down, hesitates. “I thought—no, never mind.”
“‘Never mind’ what?” asks Daisy.
“I miss my wine so badly. I was thinking . . . maybe just a little spritzer.” Vanessa pulls a wry mouth. “Or some sparkling rosé. But—”
“Oh, let’s do it. Just a little drink. It’ll be relaxing.” Daisy grabs on to the idea. They’re both due in a month or so. Surely it can’t harm the babies now?
Vanessa frowns. “Are you sure?”
Daisy smiles. “Of course I’m sure.”
Vanessa puts her hand on her chest. “A woman after my heart, thank God. Can you cut that salami while I get the drinks? The knife’s over there.” She disappears into the glass doors of her beautiful house.