Trouble Me (26 page)

“I need a drink.” I look at him, level my eyes on his.

“No, you don’t. Be here. Be present. Live in this moment, as awful and terrible as it is.”

“I know.” I feel tears threaten and shake my head, refuse the emotion. No more fear, whatever the outcome might be. Just strength and determination. Kelly deserves at least that.

I take his phone from him one more time, pull up the pictures. Not a single one of them is with Kelly. There are some where it’s clearly me walking down the street with Kelly, or playing in Central Park with the boys and Kelly, but Kelly’s not in the pictures. They’ve all been cut carefully. Some are taken with a camera. Some come from magazines. The hair on the back of my neck stands up. Comments from conversations with Kelly begin to drift back into my brain as the adrenaline clears. Her worries about pushing me away. Her remark about the insta-family, me wanting my old life back. “I think Mari was gaslighting Kelly.”

“What does that mean?”

“You ever heard of that movie?
Gaslight
?”

“No.” He’s scribbling on the pad. “Short-cut it for me.”

“Charles Boyer convinces his wife, Ingrid Bergman, that she’s going crazy. Those times when Kelly’s really fallen apart, she’s mentioned talking about us to Mari. Mari kept telling her not to be so clingy, not to drive me away. Then all the other stuff—the note at the shower.”

“Mari wrote it.” Tucker seems to say this before he realizes who he’s saying it to. “She’ll push Kelly into labor if she can, force delivery, steal the baby. She’s trying to take over Kelly’s spot in your life. Or maybe erase everything you care about—” He leaves off. “That was totally out of line.”

“No. Kelly’s said a couple things. Like that she’s driving me away with the way she’s acting.”

“Mari’s been calling her attention to it. Mari’s ready to slide in and take over. She’s been convincing Kelly
and
herself. Auditioning for the job. Lots of these kinds of people swing between wanting in on your life and wanting to end it.”

The plane lurches. The guy in glasses nods at me. “Sorry, Mr. Pettigrew. We’re going to hit some serious turbulence.”

“Who are you?” I don’t know when we picked this guy up.

“Paul Prescott. FBI. I’m communications manager on the incident, until someone with bigger credentials takes over.”

Tucker shakes his head at him. “No one else’ll make it in this storm. We’re the last flight out of LAX going north. And the Portland airport is on the verge of shutting down altogether. You’re it.”

The plane shakes again, lurches up and then to one side.

Prescott looks sweaty. “Your friend the Navy pilot?” he asks Tucker.

Tucker doesn’t look up from his phone. “He can land in weather like this on an aircraft carrier. He flew into hurricanes, on purpose. Let him do his job.”

“Sorry.” Prescott ducks his head in apology.

Tucker’s phone buzzes again. “This just gets more and more insane.”

“What?” I ask.

He hands the phone to me again. “We pulled the data from her phone. Look at the picture.”

It’s the back of someone. In a suit. In an Escada suit, as a matter of fact. “She’s the one who shoved me into traffic.”

“That crazy bitch.” Prescott shakes his head. “Sorry again.”

“Insane.” Tucker’s brow clouds. “Andrew, I should’ve seen this coming. This is sloppy. I got too comfy, too close to you and the kids, to Kelly. If I’d been at a distance, I would’ve seen this coming.”

“No, you wouldn’t have. She’s smart.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because she never pushed too hard. Kelly wanted a friend in New York, but Mari wasn’t too overbearing. She gave her some space. But Jesus, she was always around—when stuff was about to happen or just happened.”

“Like?”

“Like the attempted break-in. It happened the week after Mari came out to LA. Tucker, I flew her out for the baby shower. Jesus. I’m the reason Mari came to LA. I led her right to us.”

“I wish I was one hundred percent clear on her motives.” Tucker shakes his head. “If she wants you, and that’s it, there’s a big problem. But maybe she likes Kelly. That could work to our advantage.”

“Nothing works to our advantage if Kelly’s stuck at the beach house by herself with Mari, and I can’t do anything to help her.”

The plane hops to the side again. Prescott the redheaded guy grips the armrests on his seat and appears to be praying.

Tucker fastens his seatbelt. “We’ll get there. Right now we’re about to put the plane down, hard. Buckle up.”

W
HEN
I O
PEN
T
HE
D
OOR
T
O
T
HE
H
OUSE
, the smell of cedar and salt hits me. I walk in, set the house keys on the entryway table, and start turning on lights. Since Andrew bought the house, we’ve been able to come up a few times, settling in, furnishing it, getting comfortable.

But this visit is different. The day is darkening early, the storm clouds gathering and blocking the sun. I try to breathe, sound calm when I speak. “I don’t know how long we’ll have power.” It’s four thirty p.m. Back at the house in LA, someone—Andrew or my parents, with the boys—someone has to have come home by now. I’ve been driving since ten thirty last night, and I ache all over, from terror and fatigue.

Mari comes in behind me. She’s been vigilant. I don’t know that she’s slept in the eighteen hours we drove. I haven’t had any chance to try to get away, or get my phone from her. As soon as we stopped the car in the driveway here, she had the car keys in her hand. Then she tucked them into the pocket, the one with the gun.

I try to keep my voice calm. “We better get the stuff out of the car. We might have to seriously batten down the hatches. It could get ugly out there.” I’ve done all I can to keep every word I say as casual as I can. Mari hasn’t made threats against me, nothing outward. She’s an unstable person with a gun, but maybe I still count as her ally. Maybe I’m not a person she wants to hurt. I want to keep it that way, keep the baby safe.

The wind howls as I step outside. It’s getting serious out here. The salt wind and mist bites at my face. I wrestle to get the car door open in the wind, and when it finally gives, the force of it knocks me over. I land hard on my hip, and it feels like the baby just got knocked too.

“Kelly? Are you all right?” Mari helps me up. Her eyes seem clearer. Maybe her break, her episode is lifting. Maybe she’ll be lucid, and we can call Andrew and go home.

“I’ll be okay.” I rub my hip. That’s going to hurt like crazy tomorrow. “We better get inside.”

“Are we safe?” Mari’s voice is small, like a little girl’s.

“Up here on the cliff? No doubt. It just might be a while before we’re going anywhere.” As if on cue, a contraction tightens over my belly. It’s a big one. I take in a breath, try to rub it out.

“What?” Mari looks at me suspiciously. “What was that?”

“Contraction. They happen on and off a lot in the last month.”

Inside, I try the TV. It’s all gray fuzz. “Satellite’s already out.”

Mari smiles for a minute. “Nothing to worry about. The storm knocked out cell service too. I can’t get a signal on my phone or yours.” My heart sinks. She doesn’t look upset; she looks happy. Maybe this isn’t a breakdown; maybe this is premeditated.

She comes over and hugs me. It’s so tight, I feel a little breathless. “We’re here now, and inside, safe. I know I’ll feel better now that I’m here.”

She stares at me, her eyes so intense I feel my skin prickle.

Even if she falls asleep now, there’s no one to call.

I start to plot how to escape.

I make dinner, trying to sort through a thousand different thoughts as I stir a pot of soup on the stove. Mari seems calmer. At times, though, she looks straight through me, as though I’m a ghost, and if I call her name, only seems to acknowledge my presence faintly. Just when I begin to consider walking past her, straight out the door and down the lane, she’ll have a moment of clarity and circle the room, pacing nervously. Now she stands at the edge of the great room and watches me, hands still in her pockets.

I look again at her wrists, the bandages. Does she want to kill herself? Kill me? What is the gun for? Why are we here?

I sift through all of our interactions, try to find the thread. Every time, I feel blind panic rising from the base of my spine. None of this feels good.

Whatever the case, she’s slipped into a dark place.

“Mari, please.”

“What, Kelly?”

“You must be so tired. I’m tired. We need to rest.”

She points to the master bedroom down the hall. “You should go sleep.”

I turn everything over in my head. I’m exhausted. I’ve been up, drove through the night without stopping, and now, I can feel the exhaustion sit on my spine, press on the baby. “What will you do? You need to rest too, Mari. It could help. Help you feel more yourself.”

She nods. Her eyes soften. “I’ll sleep. Then we can decide what to do in the morning.”

Maybe she’ll listen to reason. Maybe after sleeping she’ll feel better, be back to herself.

Maybe when she sleeps, I can get the gun away from her.

She watches me go into the bedroom, stands outside the door for a while as I lie there, fear pulsing through me. But the heavy, heavy fatigue climbs up my arms and legs and weighs on me until I am out.

I wake up with a start sometime later. This could be my chance. Maybe Mari’s fallen asleep too. Maybe the weather has cleared, and the phone will have a signal. Maybe Tessa will arrive. I texted her the night I invited Mari, and then, the following morning, had every intention of calling and canceling. But then Mari arrived.

Tessa might show up here. I could get away from Mari, slip out with Tessa.

I pray for Tessa to get here. She might not make it today, with the weather, but she’s Tessa. She might show up when I need her most.

The hall has a tiny sliver of light from the guest bedroom. Mari’s still awake. I can’t hear anything as I near her door, but I knock softly.

“Mari? You awake?”

The light on the bedside table is on. I hear water running in the bathroom. She’s taking a shower.

I stand still for a minute. Where is the gun? Where are the car keys?

“Mari?” I call to the bathroom door.

No response.

I walk around the bed, looking for the car keys.

“Mari?”

I take one more step and side-swipe the comforter. It starts to slide off the bed, so I catch it. A notebook falls off and lands open on the floor.

It’s one of Mari’s design books, her sketch book. I can see a long, lean figure of a woman with a soft flowing dress, lines blurred and smudged, on the open page.

I pick it up off the floor. It’s got a leather cover, red, with a heart etched into it, a rendering of a real heart, its chambers with items flowing from them like blood: musical notes, small letters of the alphabet.

I turn the page. There’s a pencil drawing of a young boy, in color, with pale blond hair, like Mari’s. His hair flows up around his head, soft and undulating. His lips are blue.

He’s underwater, staring at me from the page. It must be a drawing of Mari’s brother. Drowned, still and staring with blue, cold eyes.

I shiver, chilled by the image, and flip the page.

There, staring back at me, are Andrew’s eyes. His face. She’s meticulously drawn his hair in his eyes, and his hand up, about to push it back, like he always does. The resemblance is unnerving.

I flip to the next page. It’s another drawing of him. He’s floating in the pool, the black-and-white-tile pool from New York. He has his eyes open, floating with a woman, holding her hand.

But it’s not me. It’s Mari holding his hand.

I turn the page.

It’s Andrew in another pool. The pool at our house in LA. He’s floating on an air mattress, and there are currents around him, indicating a slow twirl. And there’s a smudge of colored pencil, trailing out from the mattress. Blood.

I look more closely and see that she’s drawn a bullet hole over his heart.

Below this image she’s copied a line from
Gatsby
, about Nick finding Gatsby dead in the swimming pool, the holocaust being complete.

It’s the last page of the sketch book.

I go to the first pages, and all of them are filled with Andrew. Some have little clippings from magazines, and then she’s illustrated them, drawing out the news, capturing Andrew’s life.

One is of Andrew and me leaving the doctor’s office. Except my figure has been shaded black. Pitch black.

The water in the bathroom stops. She’s getting out of the shower.

I am in the same house as a woman who wants Andrew dead, me erased. There can be no more waiting, no more caution.

I find her hoodie, and the keys are in the pocket.

The gun is gone.

Suddenly every threat, every moment of fear since New York races through my head, but I force myself up and step as quietly and quickly as I can out of the guest bedroom. I creep down the hall to the front door. I will slip out, escape. The storm is safer than this.

The front door flies open.

It’s Tessa. She’s made it, and the wind whips and blows the door wide. It cracks against the siding of the house.

“What the hell?” She stands on the step, lost.

“Tessa, we’ve got to go.” I grab her fiercely, keeping my voice quiet.

“Hello?” Mari’s voice, from the end of the hall, from the guest bedroom.

I flip the hall lights off and grab the Mag Lite by the front door, which is there for when the power goes out, or for night trips out with the dog. “Tessa, go upstairs, hide. Hide and don’t come out.” I grab her arm again and squeeze, whispering roughly to her.

I don’t think Tessa’s ever seen me like this. She’s never, ever quiet, and right now she does not speak. Her eyes widen, and confusion crosses her face for a moment, but she nods and puts her hand out for the flashlight.

Tessa races up the landing with the Mag Lite in hand. I can see her in the patches of light from the outside porch that stream in through the windows.

I go back to the door and shut and lock it, turning off the outside light. I can’t hear Tessa anymore. She’s at least made it upstairs.

“Kelly? Where are you?”

Mari’s voice sounds calm, flat.

“I was just headed to the kitchen to get some Tums.”

I can see her figure now, silhouetted by the light from the guest bedroom. She’s in a bathrobe. It has pockets.

“What are you doing down by the front door, then? I heard a commotion.”

“The door blew open. The wind’s screaming out there now.”

“Oh.” She still sounds calm. I can’t tell if I sound normal or not.

“You want me to make you a cup of tea?” I ask. “I thought I might have one.”

I have to get past her to get to the kitchen. I don’t know if I can keep my face calm and still walk by her.

“Sure. I need to put my pajamas on.”

“You go do that. I’ll get the kettle started.”

I walk toward her. She hasn’t gone back in the bedroom yet. I hold my breath.

“What’s wrong?” she asks as I’m about to pass her.

“Nothing. It just spooked me.” As I walk by, a contraction tightens over my belly, and I can’t help it, I pause, stooped a little by the surprise of pain.

“What? What is it?”

“A contraction. No big deal.” I lean over for a second, breathing. I am just past her, and I can see into the guest bedroom. The sketchbook, the one with all the awful, terrible sketches inside of it, is sitting on the edge of the bed.

But it’s not in the place I left it.

“You want to sit down?” She swings the door wider.

“Naw, I’ll just walk it off. Meet you in the kitchen in a minute.”

I stand up, sucking in and pushing through the last of the contraction, and
will
myself down the hallway.

Mari’s shadow disappears.

I race down the hall as quietly as I can. I need my phone. It has to have a signal. It just has to.

I search for it in the kitchen. As I race around the island, I grab the kettle and set it on the burner. I can’t find the phone.

I hear footsteps in the hallway. Panicking, I grab two teacups and set them down by the stove. Where am I going to go? If she comes in, I’ll have to make a break for the back hall, the one that leads to the TV room.

Mari walks in the kitchen, slowly. She holds up the sketchbook.

“You were snooping while I was in the shower.”

I don’t know what to do. I stand frozen, my mind racing, and all of a sudden, there’s a huge crack from outside, and the house is black. A transformer must have blown.

I run. I run and fly to the back hallway, swing the back door open as noiselessly as I can. Out on the deck, I grab a poker from the fire pit. I slide back in the door and press myself flat against the hallway wall. I can’t hear anything except the wind howling.

There’s a mad woman in my house. Tessa is hiding somewhere.

I have no idea what I’m going to do.