“Cover our trail?”
His brown eyes are still pinned on his wife’s body. “I’ll buy a train ticket to New York using her phone. Her family lives in New Jersey, and I’ll say she planned to visit them. We’ll drive her car to the commuter rail station, and we’ll leave it there.”
“But…” I can’t look at Mrs. Bennett. It’s too awful. “What about her?”
“We bury her in a place no one will find her.”
There’s a coldness in his voice that surprises me. This is his wife, for God’s sake. At one point, he loved her enough to marry her. And now he’s talking about burying her body.
“I… I don’t know,” I stammer.
He looks up at me sharply. “Why not?”
“Because…it’s… It’s not right…”
“Okay, fine.” He scratches at his already messy hair. “Let’s call the police and tell them what you did and why. Then I’ll see you again in twenty-five years to life.”
He’s right. The truth is more damning than anything else.
Nathaniel doesn’t wait for me to respond. “I need you to go upstairs,” he says. “In the linen closet, you’ll find some fresh sheets. Grab one of them to wrap her up in.”
I don’t want to do it. I don’t want any part of this. But he’s doing this to help me. To keep me out of prison, so that he and I can be together like we have always wanted.
I’ll do anything he says.
OceanofPDF.com
Chapter Fifty-Seven
EVE
I WAKE up feeling utterly confused.
First of all, I am not in my bed like I usually am when I wake up. I am lying splayed out on a hard surface that I soon recognize to be the floor of my kitchen.
The next thing I become aware of is a throbbing pain on the right side of my head. It feels like somebody clocked me in the head with a brick. Repeatedly. I reach for my scalp, and my hair feels wet and sticky. When I pull my fingers away, I see blood.
Finally, I become aware of the presence of my husband. I am lying on the floor, and he is standing over me. He has my phone in his right hand, and he’s scrolling through the screen.
What’s he doing? Why am I lying on the floor?
And what is Nate doing with my phone?
I try to sit up but my head spins. For a moment, it seems like I might throw up, but the feeling passes. The floor feels so cold under me. I wish I were in my bed. What’s going on?
“Nate?” I croak.
Nate’s eyelashes flutter in surprise. He must have come back for something and discovered me lying unconscious on the kitchen floor. “Eve?”
“What…？” My throat feels parched. Again, I get a wave of overwhelming dizziness. “What happened?”
Nate doesn’t answer. He doesn’t try to help me up. He just stares down at me.
What is going on here? Why would he…？
Wait.
I get a flashback to a conversation with Nate from earlier in the evening. I want a divorce. I said those words to him. I told my husband I wanted him to move out. Why would I have said that?
And then, while I lie on the cold kitchen floor, it starts to come back to me. The meeting with Higgins, finding Addie and Nate kissing in his classroom, the ultimatum followed by Nate moving out, and then last of all, Addie breaking into my house. I went to try to talk some sense into her, and then…
She hit me! That girl hit me with a frying pan right on the head!
And now I’m confused. Because I told Nate to move out, and he did. Yet he’s standing over me now, holding my phone. How long have I been lying on the kitchen floor? I definitely did not invite him back.
“Give me my phone,” I croak.
Again, he doesn’t answer me. He just keeps looking at me, a dark expression on his face.
“I… I need you to…” My head throbs with each word. My God, Addie sure clocked me hard. “Call 911.”
He narrows his eyes at me. “Do you remember what happened?”
I attempt to sit up again, and this time, it’s a sharp jab of pain in my temple that pins me to the floor. “Addie…she…she knocked me out with a frying pan.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.” My head clears slightly. I make another attempt to sit up, and this time, I’m successful. “Nate, that…that girl is very troubled. We need to talk to Higgins about her.”
“Easy for you to say.” He sneers at me, and for a moment, it’s hard to remember why I ever loved him. “It won’t destroy your life to talk to her.”