“That doesn’t give you the right.”
“I know you’re cheating,” he bit out. “You realize you signed a prenup, right? If you leave me, you get nothing. No money, no friends, no dignity. Everyone will know.”
“Ah.” I locked eyes with Jamie. “So the private investigator’s building a case to string me up in court.”
Jamie’s eyes widened.
I could hear Cal take a deep breath. “Shay. Just come home. We’ll go to therapy. Couples’ counseling, however long it takes. Please, try putting yourself in my shoes. A year of newlywed bliss, and one day, out of nowhere, you run away. You won’t tell me what you’re doing. It’s like you don’t even like me anymore. I tried to talk to you, to fix it, but you’re barely answering my calls. I don’t have a lot of options here.”
I did see it from Cal’s perspective. It wasn’t his fault I’d confused safety with love, that what I’d wanted out of marrying him was a place to hide, and then I’d decided that wasn’t good enough. He hadn’t reacted well, and that was revealing, but to him it must have seemed like I’d lost my mind. I pictured him telling his friends about me, the Highland Parkers, and I imagined their incredulous faces, could hear them saying, in shocked voices, She’s insane.
Maybe I was, in his version of the story. I finally felt secure enough in mine that I was okay with letting him have it.
The sharp edge left my voice. “Cal, I’m sorry. I really am. But the truth is, I don’t want to be married to you anymore. You can put these photos of me on a billboard for all I care. I’m not interested in your money, either. I’m sorry to tell you over the phone; it’s just…” It was just that I’d woken to the truth, and now I was simply uninterested in wasting any more of my time. “I’m sorry,” I finished lamely.
“I can’t believe you’re doing this,” he hissed. “I can’t believe I ever loved you. I never want to—”
I hung up and shoved the phone in my pocket. “Sorry,” I said to the private detective. “I think your pictures just got a whole lot less valuable.”
The detective stalked away, muttering obscenities, but Jamie turned still as a statue. “You ended your marriage,” he said, looking at me in a way I couldn’t read. “Right there on the phone.”
I had to make my move. “Come on.” I started in the direction of the hunting shop. “You said I needed a knife I could hide in my dress.”
Jolted, Jamie hurried to catch up. His footsteps made a quick patter on the street—or maybe that was the sand rushing through the hourglass, the sound of time moving fast.
***
Across the cold, briny Hudson, I stood at the far end of Campbell Island, examining the hunting lodge. It was large but looked like it had grown out of the island itself, a mass of fir and spruce, tangled over with green vines and moss. One of those expensive places that took pains to hide their value.
Daughters milled around outside it, all of us in our carefully ironed dresses, trying not to move too much and snag our pantyhose. It was a chilly day, and wet air clung in pearls to the tree leaves, but there was a roaring fire, with a pig on a spit roasting in the middle. The whole place was decorated for a party: red and cream banners waved from the trees, a round oak keg was propped against the house, leaking red wine from the spout, and laurel crowns hung on nails from the side of the house, the kind they awarded victors of the ancient Olympics.
I had to force my gaze from the laurel crowns, whose presence gnawed at me, to the daughters themselves. There were more than I’d noticed before, and I wondered if the Paters had recruited new women. I studied them, smiling warmly when someone caught me looking. I was hoping for a daughter who’d catch my gaze and keep it, or one who’d smile back and let me into her confidence. If Jamie wanted to hand over our evidence soon, I needed to get more daughters on the record talking about what they knew.