NOT MY HUSBAND

BORIS BACIC

© 2023 by Boris Bacic

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced mechanically, electronically, or by any other means, including photocopying, without permission of the publisher or author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission from the publisher or author.

Contents

Prologue

Part 1

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Part 2

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Part 3

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Epilogue

More Books in the Series

Prologue

My name is Chloe, and I have the biggest crush on my husband, Lucas.

I know what you’re going to say: Of course you have a crush on your husband. He’s your husband!

But you don’t understand. I don’t just love Lucas. Whenever I look at him, I get butterflies in my stomach just like when we first met. We could do something as innocent as watching a Netflix show, and I’d be staring at him more than the TV, amazed that I’m married to such a perfect man.

He could talk about the most boring thing ever, and I would listen with fascination—and sometimes arousal. He has a slight accent that he took on when he suffered a concussion as a kid, and it makes him sound so sexy. It’s just barely noticeable—when his hard h sometimes slips or an i sounds like an e. Almost Russian, I think.

He has a scar from that accident on the back of his head. It’s shaped like a tiny letter c. I often gently run my fingers down that scar when he’s sleeping.

He’s very caring. Every morning, when we wake up, he says, “Good morning, gorgeous,” and plants a kiss on my lips. Whenever he leaves for work or anywhere else, he tells me that he loves me. He often comes back with gifts.

Whenever I’m sick, he takes care of me and cooks meals for me.

When I’m stressed or worried, he puts my mind at ease.

If I doubt myself, he reassures me. In fact, I’d say he believes in me more than I believe in myself.

Really, he’s the best husband a woman could wish for. I don’t know how I got so lucky with him.

There’s only one tiny thing that bothers me about Lucas.

He has a secret he’s not telling me about.

How do I know about this? Because every Friday night, he goes out somewhere. He says it’s to play cards with friends, but I think he’s lying. I know that because of the conversation I had with his card buddy Frank two Fridays ago just minutes after Lucas left.

“Hey, is Lucas there?” Frank had asked.

“No, he just left. He’s on his way to your place now,” I said.

“To my place? Why?”

That question was how I knew something was wrong.

“You know? To play cards?” I ask. When Frank remained silent, I added, “Just like you do every Friday?”

“Oh, right. Right,” Frank said. “Sorry, I heard you wrong. I thought you said… Okay, yeah, I got it.”

But it was obvious Frank only just then realized what was going on, so he was trying to cover for Lucas.

That’s how I first suspected Lucas was cheating on me. I stayed awake in bed that Friday, waiting for Lucas to come home. I heard the door opening at 2 a.m., and then he slid into bed next to me, kissed me on the neck like he always does, and fell asleep.

I didn’t smell perfume on him or anything indicating another woman touched him. Only the faint scent of cigarettes that clung to his clothes. Frank’s living room was big, but most of them smoked. Not Lucas, though.

I wanted to give Lucas the benefit of the doubt. He lied to me, but would he really cheat on me? This loving husband of mine? No way. I refused to believe it.

It didn’t make sense. Why would he cheat on me when he obviously loves me so much? Only men who are unhappy in their marriage cheat. And also, why only Fridays? If Lucas is a cheater, he would find excuses to go play cards more often than just on Fridays.

I held my suspicions inside me for two days before Lucas noticed how cold I was. That’s when I confronted him about it. I told him about my call with Frank and asked him outright if he was not telling me about someone else.

His face sagged, and he said, “It was supposed to be a surprise for your birthday. I’m working on a little something, so I’ve been skipping card nights for a while.”

I felt guilty for ruining his surprise. My birthday is almost six months away, but Lucas is already working on it. I apologized and offered to make it up to him. He said it was okay, and that’s how it ended.

Life was back to normal once again.

Until tonight when I accidentally stumbled upon a loose floorboard in the corner of Lucas’s office and removed it to find a locked box inside.

PART 1

Chapter 1

It’s not like I went into Lucas’s office looking for evidence against him. I’m nothing if not trusting. Some people would even go as far as to call me naïve.

I’m cleaning the apartment and figure Lucas’s office could use some of that, too. I normally don’t clean his office because he doesn’t like having anything disrupted there, but I suppose some vacuuming won’t hurt.

I won’t touch anything else, though—the piles of papers on his desk, the mound of clothes on the chair in the corner, the cables that spool around the floor…

Well, scratch that. I have to lift the cables to vacuum. But I return them exactly how they were as soon as I’m done.

There are two kinds of people: People who have everything OCD–tidy and sorted and people who thrive in a mess and still somehow know where each item is. I’m the former. Lucas is the latter. We see eye to eye, though, because he lets me keep the entire apartment tidy while he gets to have his office look like a jungle.

Anyway, I wouldn’t have even noticed the loose floorboard in the corner of the room if I hadn’t moved the chair out of the way and felt my heel dip slightly. I immediately turn off the vacuum and stare at the gaping hole under my foot.

My first thought is, oh no, we’re going to have to replace that. But that’s when I notice something sticking out. I can’t pry my gaze away from it.

It’s one of those moments when you’re staring at something, and you know it’s there, but your brain simply refuses to accept it, so you keep blinking in the hopes it would go away.

I suddenly feel like I’m trespassing. I feel eyes on me. I give in to the urge to look at the door just to make sure Lucas isn’t standing there, scowling at me. Something tells me he’d get angry if he saw me in his office, staring at the loose floorboard.

The silence in the apartment is oppressive. I remove my foot from the loose board and it instantly falls back into place. It’s too late, though. I can’t unsee how it differs from the rest of the floor—like one of those optical illusion tests where you see one thing, and then someone tells you to flip the image, and you see something else on it, and then you can’t see the first thing anymore.

I rush out into the living room just to make sure Lucas really isn’t home.

“Honey?” I call out.

My voice sounds timid and weak. Silence greets me back.

Lucas isn’t home. Of course not. He’s at work and will be for another five hours.

I go back into his office and stare at the floor. For a moment, I can’t locate the impostor board, but then my eyes fall on it. It sticks out like a sore thumb when you look at it, but it’s easy to miss because it’s in the corner of the room, and the desk is in the way.

Add on top of it that I don’t often enter Lucas’s office, and it’s probably no surprise this is the first time I see the loose board.

Am I just making excuses for not noticing this in the past two years since Lucas and I got this apartment? Probably. But I’ve always been the kind of person who prefers trusting people and getting hurt over keeping people out with paranoia.

I stride across the desk and stop in front of the loose floorboard. I’m staring down at it, and I feel as though it’s staring back up at me.

Don’t do it. Don’t remove me from the floor. Trust me, you won’t like what you’ll find. Just walk away and continue living your care–free life, I hear the board speaking in my mind.

A part of me knows it’s right. I won’t like what I find in there, but I’m too curious to see what Lucas is hiding there. Whatever it is, it must be really important if he kept it hidden from me all this time.

I bend down and grab the floorboard. It slips from my fingers three times, so I push down on one end and pinch the other one that sticks upward. I take the floorboard out and stare into the hole in the floor.

It’s so deep that light can’t reach it. I run back to the living room and locate my cellphone on the coffee table. I’m turning on the torch while running back inside the office. As soon as I’m back, I fall to my knees and point the light into the hole.

It’s not nearly as deep as I had originally thought. A few inches, maybe?

Sitting at the bottom of it is a metal box. It’s covered in layers of dust, indicating it must have sat there for a long time, maybe even years.

Hope surges through me that maybe Lucas doesn’t even know about this. Maybe this was left here by the previous owner?

It takes my brain a moment to correct itself.

What previous owner? This is a new building. There is no previous owner.

No, this is Lucas’s doing. It’s Lucas’s box down there. Maybe he’s keeping important memorabilia in it?

Okay, but why would he need to hide it under a loose floorboard? Why would he need to hide it? When the hell did he even create that hole? I’m sure it wasn’t there when we first moved in.

My mind wanders to the day Lucas and I first set foot inside the apartment. It was completely empty. Moving out, such a sight would have made me sad because I would look at the empty apartment and see all the great memories I’m leaving behind.

But we were moving in, and I saw memories that we hadn’t created yet—beautiful memories that had yet to happen. We were both so happy that day.

I fast–forward my mind to the moment I stepped inside the empty room that would become Lucas’s office. The walls and the floor were pristine, without any blemishes. In an empty room like that one, surely I would have noticed a loose floorboard.

Is it possible that I simply missed it in all the excitement I felt that day? No, Lucas would have noticed, and he would have told me. I know that because he’d complained that day about a couple of tiny things in the apartment not being to his liking. I find it hard to believe he’d complain about a flake of paint missing from the windowsill and not about a loose floorboard and a four-inch-deep hole under it.

That brings me back to my initial question—what could Lucas be hiding in the box, and why?

Whatever it is, it’s something he doesn’t want you to know about, the floorboard says from the side.

I turn my head toward it to shoot it a venomous look, but it’s just a floorboard, an inanimate object incapable of sentience.

Averting my gaze back to the box in the hole, I’m no longer trying to convince myself that Lucas’s secret is innocuous. Whatever he’s hiding here has nothing to do with a hidden birthday gift or a surprise. This is something he doesn’t want me to know about.

Maybe even something that would destroy our marriage.

I reach into the hole and gently take the box into my hand. It’s small enough for me to grab it with one hand. I carefully fish it out. The rays of sun that fall through the window reveal just how dirty the thing is. I do my best to touch the box as little as possible, not because I’m disgusted but because I don’t want Lucas to see the missing dust that would indicate I’ve been snooping around.

It’s a plain metal box, its edges slightly dotted with rust, but more importantly, I can see that the box is secured with a four-digit padlock.

“Damn it,” I say aloud, and then again, “Damn it!”

The first “damn it” was because the box is locked. The second one is because I recognize the padlock.

I remember seeing Lucas bring it home one day, sometime last year. I had asked him what he needed it for, and the funny thing is, I don’t remember what he told me. I just remember saying, “Oh, okay,” and then asking him what he would like for dinner.

See? That’s how trusting I am.

The word “trusting” is starting to sound more and more like “naïve” in my mind. But can you blame me for trusting my husband, the person who means everything in the world to me, so wholly and without a shred of doubt?

I don’t think I should guilt-trip myself for loving someone so unconditionally that I never thought they’d betray me. I don’t think I’m the first nor the last person to make that honest mistake.

If there’s anything I identify as, it’s being a happily married wife. Everything else is secondary. I never was the kind of person to put my career first, and it’s going to be a cold day in hell when I put my job as a salesperson at IKEA in front of anything.

I focus on the padlock keeping the box secure. I try to open it, but it’s locked. Of course. What else was I expecting?

The box opens about one inch, which is about as much as the padlock allows it to, and I’m able to peek inside. I can see a piece of paper in it and something else that produces a shuffling noise as it slides across the box’s interior at various angles.

What is that? A piece of jewelry?

I move the box around to look at it from various angles, hoping the light would reveal more details, but it’s no use. It’s like trying to catch something in your peripheral vision that keeps evading you whenever you look in its direction.

Four digits.

What could the password be?

Maybe it’s Lucas’s birthday. I input 0404. Nothing. I try my birthday. Nope.

Year of his birth? Year of my birth?

Think, Chloe. Think. What four numbers would Lucas put on the padlock? What numbers are important to him?

I know he always adds eleven at the end of his passwords, but that’s only two digits. I try inputting four ones. I pull down at the padlock body and, for a moment, I think it’s detaching from the shackle until I realize it’s not.

Damn it.

I spend the next five minutes thinking of possible combinations for the lock. I can’t think of any, so I leave the box on the floor—my fingers have wiped the dust off of it in streaks—and go out into the living room.

My intention is to look around the apartment for anything that would remind me of something important to Lucas that might lead to the password. When I find nothing, I go into the bedroom. Nothing there, either.

Maybe the answer is right in front of me, somewhere in Lucas’s office. I return there and sit in his chair. I feel like I might see from that position something that isn’t ordinarily visible.

I’m wrong, of course.

I lean on his desk and tap my foot on the floor as I scan the room. I notice a baseball cap sitting on a shelf. It’s a cap he got signed by Seth Brown earlier this year after a game at the Walker Stadium.

I’m not very happy about touching it because I feel like I’m devaluing it just by getting close. I flip it over to see Seth Brown’s crude signature. I look for a date, but it’s not there, so I decide I’ll have to do the math in my head.

It was sometime in March that we went to see the game. What date, though?

It doesn’t matter. I have two of the four digits, so I can guess the other two.

I input the first two numbers as 03 and then try all combinations for the last two numbers. Even after trying all of them, the padlock remains firmly locked.

“Damn it!” I exclaim for the millionth time.

I barely have time to contemplate my next move when I hear the front door opening.

“Hey, baby,” Lucas says from the foyer.

Chapter 2

Oh shoot. Shoot-shoot-shoot-shoot.

What am I supposed to do?

“Honey? Are you home?” Lucas calls out.

I don’t respond. If I do, he’s going to come in here.

He’s going to come in here anyway, so I need to act fast, whatever I planned on doing.

“Chloe?” Lucas calls it.

I hear his footsteps in the living room.

I shove the box inside the hole and grab the loose floorboard off the floor. I swear I see a smile on it formed from the annual rings decorating it. I put the board across the hole, but my panic is making me forget basic geometrical rules, and I can’t seem to fit it inside.

Lucas’s footsteps are drawing closer to the office.

The floorboard somehow falls in place, and I’m immediately on my feet. I grab the vacuum just in time for Lucas to step inside.

“Chloe,” he calls out.

I jerk my head toward him, pretending that I haven’t seen him until then.

“Oh, hi, sweetie. You’re home already?” I ask with a grin.

I let go of the vacuum and walk up to him to give him a kiss. I don’t lean into him like I usually do because I don’t want him to feel how fast my heart is beating.

“Well, yeah. It’s five p.m.,” Lucas says.

“Is it?” I ask.

Really, is it? I’ve been so focused on opening the padlock that I lost hours without even noticing it.

“Yeah.” Lucas gives me a weird look. “Babe, are you okay?”

“Yeah. I’m fine.”

“You don’t look so good. Why are you all sweaty? Are you coming down with a fever?”

He touches my sweat–covered forehead.

“I’m fine,” I say. “Just been busy cleaning.”

Lucas smiles, but I see his eyes flitting behind me.

To the loose floorboard.

“You don’t mind that I’m cleaning your office, do you? I’ll put everything back the way it was as soon as I’m done,” I say.

“Of course.” He gives me a kiss on the cheek and walks outside. “What’s for dinner, by the way?”

I forgot to cook dinner, too.

“I was thinking we could maybe order today. Is that okay with you?” I ask.

“Sure,” he calls out from the living room. “I’m gonna take a shower. You order for me, would you?”

“Okay!”

I pick up the vacuum and hurriedly stride to the door. I give the office one final look to make sure I haven’t left any evidence of snooping around.

The dust has been wiped off the metal box but only in spots. If Lucas takes it out, he’s going to notice that someone’s found it. And he’ll know it was me.

And if he knows what numbers he left the padlock on, I’ll be in even more trouble.

No time to fix that mistake now, though. Besides, I’m in too much of a panic to consider going back there and fixing what I might have messed up.

I close the door to Lucas’s office and hope for the best.

There’s no way he’ll know. Right?

There’s not a chance in the world he would know I found out about his secret stash.

Whatever the heck it is.

Chapter 3

For the rest of the day, Lucas doesn’t mention anything about me having been in his office. He doesn’t act cold or suspicious, either. He’s his regular, affectionate, and perky self.

The same cannot be said about me.

I’m too distracted by what I found in that hole. Even when Lucas is talking to me, my mind drifts to the loose floorboard and the locked box. Twice, Lucas’s voice snaps me back to reality, and he asks me if I’m really feeling okay.

If I tell him I’m fine, he will know I’m lying because I’ve already been behaving strangely today. So instead, I tell him he was right and that I don’t feel too hot.

Being the caring husband he is, he tells me to go to bed earlier and that he’s going to take care of me. I wish I could feel touched by his gesture, but I feel as though I’m staring at someone who’s not my husband but an impostor.

Do I even know this man anymore?

Have I ever known him?

I try to tell myself I’m exaggerating, but the tightness in my stomach refuses to let go. Eventually, I do go to bed earlier, and I tell Lucas he doesn’t need to hurry. He and I usually go to bed at roughly the same time, or if one of us goes earlier, we wait for the other.

I don’t feel like waiting tonight. My mind is still stuck on the padlocked box. Maybe if I just talk to him, he’ll clear things up, and I’ll realize what a stupid reason this was for me to worry about.

But if I talk to him about it, he’ll know I found the box, and he might get angry. What if it really is something harmless or something he’s preparing as a surprise, and I ruin it? I don’t want to be that person.

My eyelids become heavy. Eventually, I fall asleep before Lucas comes to bed.

I wake up sometime during the night, startled from a dream. I can’t tell what it was, though, and the more I think about it, the further it seems to slip from my memory. I turn on my side, away from Lucas, and then remember the box again.

Slowly, I turn and crane my neck toward him. He always sleeps on his stomach, and I can see his head turned away from me. His chest slowly rises and falls, indicating he’s asleep.

I’d be lying if I said I’m not tempted to go into his office and try to open the box. The padlock enters my mind, and I realize I would need the passcode anyway. I can’t do anything without that.

But what could the passcode be?

I gently pull the blanket off of me and swing my feet off the side of the bed. I grab my phone off the nightstand, unplug it from the charger, and press the phone against my chest to conceal the momentary illumination of the screen caused by unplugging the charger.

As sneakily as I can, I stand and tip-toe out of the bedroom. I close myself into the bathroom, sit on the toilet, and open the internet browser on my phone.

Four digits.

There can’t be that many combinations. I can just try and guess it. It wouldn’t take too long.

I type into the search box how many combinations.

The suggestions that appear below the search bar complete my sentence.

How many combinations with 4 numbers

How many combinations with 6 numbers

How many combinations in chess

Won’t need that last one.

I tap on the 4 numbers result, and my mouth falls open at the result that appears at the top of the screen.

There are 10,000 possible combinations that the digits 0–9 can be arranged into to form a four-digit code.

“Oh, come on,” I whisper to myself.

Yeah, there’s no way I can brute force it. Still, I’m hopeful the paragraph is wrong, so I tap on the first search result, and it leads me to a forum thread. The question of the thread is how to calculate the number of possibilities for a four-digit code made with numbers 0–9.

The top answers confirm that it is, indeed, ten thousand combinations. One of the answers raises my hopes, though.

If you took 5 seconds for each combination, it would take you roughly 14 hours to crack it. That’s not too bad if someone has a $2000 piece of jewelry in a safe with this lock. You’d be making $142.85/hr. Even if it took you thirty seconds per combination, you would still do decently.

For comparison, 6–digit codes would take 2 months of constant work, and 8–digit codes would take 16 years.

I guess I should consider myself lucky, then. Fourteen hours isn’t so bad. And I bet I could do it faster than five seconds per combination and cut the time down to ten hours. And this is only considering that I go through all ten thousand combinations. I might get lucky and crack the code in the third hour.

Knocking on the bathroom door startles me so much that I almost drop my phone.

“Chloe? Are you in there?” Lucas’s croaky voice comes from the other side of the door.

“Yeah. I’ll be out in a second,” I say.

I hear his feet shuffling away from the bathroom. I delete my search history and return to bed hopeful.

Four digits. Ten thousand combinations.

If I spend at least one hour a day, I could crack it in two weeks, but I’ll spend more than that.

There are days when I won’t be able to do it because our shifts overlap, but then there’s Friday, too, when he leaves for “card night.”

I can spend extra hours playing with the box then.

I don’t care if it’s Lucas’s private stuff. I need to find out what it is.

Chapter 4

I work the morning shift the following day. I can’t focus because I didn’t get enough sleep, and all I can think about is that damned box. When I get home, I’ll have about an hour before Lucas comes home. That’ll give me some time to test out some combinations.

I’ve thought about how to start. Either from all zeroes or from all nines. No, let’s not complicate it. I’ll go from 0000 and work my way up to 0001, 0002, and so on. I’ll have to memorize how far I’ve come each day, and I’ll have to remember to reset the padlock to the numbers I found it on.

I have no idea how often Lucas checks the box, but if he does it every now and again, it’ll only be a matter of time before he realizes the numbers are changing. If that happens, he’ll know it was me.

The day at work is slow, and we barely get any customers. When we do, it’s the annoying ones—those who complain that the discount isn’t big enough or the ones who ask if they can take the piece of furniture home to test it (Yes, we get those), and those who resort to aggression and personal insults because I can’t give them a refund without a receipt.

I’ve been working here for a few years now, so I’ve learned to smile through the pain while I’m dealing with those kinds of customers. When I can’t handle them, I call my manager for backup and let him take care of the situation.

When you’ve worked in retail long enough, you learn to shrug off anything the customers throw at you. You have all these grown-ups having meltdowns in public because they can’t have things their way, and you learn a lot about them through the interaction.

Some of them are acting like babies because they’re too rich and spoiled. Most of them, however, lash out because of suppressed anger or accumulated stress, a result of someone yelling at them at work or having an unhappy marriage.

And some of them are just plain terrible human beings who enjoy being petty.

As soon as I clock out and get home, I drop my things on the floor and enter Lucas’s office. I go behind the desk and look for the loose board. Part of me is afraid it’s not going to be there anymore, but it is, much to my relief and dismay.

I pull out the box and memorize the numbers that are on it.

“Nine-five-nine-three,” I recite aloud three times.

I then reset all the digits to zero and start rotating.

I was right. I can definitely do each combination in less than five seconds. Even if I cut one second for each combination, I’m saving a lot of time. I try not to go too fast, though, because the last thing I want is to not align the number properly and miss the passcode.

This is taking a long time, but I’m making progress. I check the clock on my phone from time to time to make sure I don’t get caught in the same situation as yesterday when Lucas comes home.

If he finds me in his office again, he’ll know for sure this time something’s up.

I get to combination 0500, and that’s when I stop. I haven’t made as much progress as I hoped I would, but that’s fine. I memorize the digits then return them to 9593 and place the box back inside the hollow floor before covering it with the loose board.

Less than ten minutes later, Lucas comes home to find me cooking dinner.

For the next two days, I’m unable to access the box because I work the same shifts as Lucas, and I have to stay a little later. It frustrates me, and it frustrates me even more to know how obsessed I’ve become with the box.

But then comes Friday night–card night.

Lucas informs me he’s going to play with Frank and the others.

I give him a look. “Are you going to play? Or are you going someplace else?”

“It’s card night for real this time,” Lucas says. “Call me, and I’ll put you on speaker so you can hear the boys.”

“Big mistake. I might ask you to do that every time you go out,” I joke.

Or do I? I don’t even know myself anymore.

Lucas smiles, plants a kiss on my lips, and says, “I love you.”

“Love you, too. Have fun,” I say.

Truthfully, I just can’t wait for him to leave so I can access the box.

I remind him not to forget his wallet, keys, and cellphone. I just don’t want him coming back unexpectedly within five minutes because he forgot one of those things.

Once he’s out of the apartment, I’m back in his office. This time, I take the box out into the living room, take a seat on the couch, and start playing with it.

It’s so much more comfortable doing it here. I find the task relaxing, even. I have the TV on, and a host of a show is speaking in the background while I’m focused on the padlock.

About an hour later, I tell myself I’m going to take a break just as soon as I finish this row of nines. It’s what I told myself around fifty combinations ago.

I get to numbers 1359 and pull on the padlock when it smoothly slides down from the shackle, unlocked. I stare frozen in disbelief for what feels like an eternity.

1359.

That was the code. I got so lucky to open it so early on. And to think I had wanted to start backward from 9999. That would have sucked.

I’m so dumbstruck that all I can do is stare at the open padlock. I’ve spent the past week fantasizing about this so much that it feels surreal to actually experience it. The box is open. I can finally see what’s inside.

The problem is I’m not sure if I should.

Now that the box is open, I feel as though I should lock it back up, put it back, and pretend I never found it, just like the loose floorboard told me the first time I lifted it.

No. I’ve come all this way for a reason. I’ve spent hours on this box to find out what Lucas’s secret is. I’m not going to give up now.

I lift the padlock to remove the shackle from the box’s hole. I gently place the padlock on the coffee table, my eyes fixed on the numbers 1359.

Then, I slowly lift the box’s lid and look inside.

Chapter 5

A single slip of folded paper and a necklace. That’s what’s inside. Just like the first time when I peeked into the box through the crack.

I think I would have preferred if the box were filled with multiple items because then I’d simply go through each of them one by one without thinking. Faced with these two items in the box, though, I feel as though I’m staring at something so important that my mind can’t possibly comprehend it.

As if reading it will change my life forever.

I can’t close the box and walk away from it, though. Doing so will only pique my curiosity even more. I’ll lie in bed, constantly wondering about it. I’ll be tempted to go into Lucas’s office and retrieve the box until I eventually give in.

No. I’m doing this right now.

With a trembling hand, I reach into the box, and my fingers graze the necklace. It’s a simple but elegant necklace with a heart hanging from it. It looks old, so I assume it’s not what Lucas wants to gift me. What could this…

It hits me like a falling piano.

Before me, Lucas had a fiancé whose name was Ellie. The two of them had been engaged when she died. That was years before he and I met. Lucas never told me how Ellie died. It was something that brought him so much visible pain that he couldn’t even mention her in more than one sentence before stopping.

Did she die of a disease? Did she die in an accident? Was she murdered?

For the first six months, I had tried to talk to him about Ellie, but he would clam up at the mere mention of her name. It was obvious it was something that immensely impacted him even years later.

Death always does.

After a while, I stopped trying to ask because I didn’t want to reopen his old wounds. Eventually, Ellie became completely forgotten—by me, at least.

I can see now that Lucas still hasn’t forgotten about her, though. He still holds on to her, and I’m unsure how I should feel about it.

This necklace must have belonged to his fiancé, Ellie. He must have kept this to remember her, and he didn’t tell me because he was afraid I’d be jealous.

Oh, Lucas…

I’m touching things not meant for me to touch. Lucas’s secret no longer seems harmful, and I feel like a terrible person for snooping.

Gently, I lay the necklace back inside the box, but I can’t stop staring at the piece of paper. I really, really want to know what it is.

Despite my previous statement that I feel like a terrible person, I reach for the slip of paper. I take it between my forefinger and middle finger and carefully lift it out. I then place the box on the couch next to me and unfold the paper.

I unfold it once, then a second time, and then once more to finally reveal the contents.

It’s a printed text from a news article. I can’t see the headline because it’s cut off, but the text itself is clear. Moreover, it looks as though the paper has been cut around the text itself.

Mirstone man who had gone missing returned home three months after his disappearance. L.S. (26), had disappeared two months prior in August when he went for a hike in the woods. His roommate had informed the authorities of his disappearance, and they promptly organized a search and rescue party.

After being unable to find traces of L.S., the police called off the search one month later, stating that venturing deeper would be dangerous for the search party.

“These woods stretch so far that you could be walking in one direction for months and still not run into any civilization. After 24 hours, the chances of survival in the wild drop significantly. I’m afraid we’d only be looking for a body if we continued the search,” Brian Davis, the chief of the police had said.

Just two days ago, L.S.’s roommate had called the police to inform them that he had returned home, alive and well.

“I heard someone ringing the doorbell. I had stopped hoping it would be him, so you can imagine my shock when I opened the door. He was dirty, distressed, and malnourished. But he’s alive. Praise the Lord, he’s alive,” L.S.’s roommate recounts.

So what exactly happened to L.S. while he was lost for those two months? How did he survive in the wilderness?

“He refuses to talk about what happened, and that’s completely understandable. The last thing we want to do after surviving something terrible is to keep remembering it. It’s important that we give him some space now. He’s been through a traumatic experience, and it’ll take time for him to readjust,” Doctor Butcher, lead psychiatrist at the hospital where L.S. is being treated said.

The paper cuts off there.

My heart is wildly beating in my chest. I reread the article again, then again, then once more but slower, convinced that I missed some crucial information. I feel like there’s more to the article that I’m missing. No, that’s it. That’s how news articles usually end, right?

But I need to know more. I need to learn what happened next. I need to know if this article is somehow related to Ellie.

Most importantly, I need to know why Lucas would hide something like this from me.

In case it’s not already obvious, I don’t need to guess who the missing person, L.S. from the article is.

Because L.S. is Lucas Smith.

Chapter 6

I don’t try to hide the box or the paper or the necklace or the padlock. I leave them all splayed on the coffee table and anxiously wait for Lucas to return home.

The necklace makes my mind race with imaginative thoughts. I picture Ellie opening a beautiful jewelry box to find that necklace. I picture Lucas putting it around her neck and telling her he loves her.

I know it’s absurd, but I feel a pang of insecurity. Not jealousy, just insecurity, as if I will never be able to live up to Ellie. Oftentimes, people get talked up only after they die. That’s when all their flaws are erased and replaced by praise.

I can’t pry my gaze away from the paper that I left inside the box. I folded it back to the way I found it, but the words flash in front of my closed eyelids whenever I blink.

L.S.

Missing for three months.

It said he went missing when he was twenty-six. He’s twenty-nine right now, and we met just two months before his twenty-seventh birthday in April.

The article mentioned Lucas went missing in August. If he had been missing for three months, then he returned sometime during November.

It means he was lost in those woods while it was freezing. How did he survive that?

Come to think of it, Lucas and I never went camping. I had suggested it once, but he said he wasn’t much of an outdoors person. He never liked hiking in nature, either. He’s okay going on walks in parks, but whenever I mention driving out to the mountains, he finds every excuse on the planet for us not to go.

The thing is… I just haven’t noticed it.

Until now.

How could I have been so blind? How many other things have I failed to see because of my inattention?

The article mentioned Mirstone. That’s a small town close to where we live, just a few hours away. Lucas has never told me he lived there. I specifically remember him telling me he was born and raised a few states away and then moved here a couple of years back.

Is he simply trying to forget about that town entirely? But then, why move somewhere that’s so close to it?

Missing for three months.

Why did he not tell me about it? As the shock subsides, I’m starting to feel offended. I trust him with my entire being, and I share all my secrets with him, even the darkest ones, like the time when I was a kid, and I added acid to the shampoo bottle of the cousin I disliked, and her hair ended up falling out.

Does Lucas not trust me enough?

No, trust has nothing to do with this. This is about the fact that he’s been through immense trauma. Maybe it’s something he doesn’t want to talk about because he doesn’t want to remember.

But then, why keep the newspaper article?

I can understand keeping the necklace, but the article?

Maybe it’s a sort of trauma bonding. As much as we hate trauma, we’re drawn to it, and sometimes, we enjoy punishing ourselves.

Maybe that’s what he’s doing. Maybe it’s a part of him he can’t let go, like a ghost. Maybe he doesn’t want to forget and chooses to keep the reminder of pain close for a reason I can’t comprehend.

Whatever it is, I need to talk to him about it. It may be selfish, but I need to know.

I just hope it won’t evoke any terrible memories in him.

At around 2 a.m., the front door opens, and Lucas walks in. He smiles when he sees me, but then his eyes drift to the open box on the table. The smile on his face drops like an anchor.

“We need to talk,” I say.

He should be the one who’s nervous, but it’s me feeling that way instead. I don’t often see Lucas angry. When he does get that way, it’s pretty scary. I’m fully expecting that to happen now, and in such a volatile way that I regret snooping around his things.

Lucas exhales, drops his bag onto the floor, and quietly strides into the living room. He puts his hands into his pockets and stares at the box as if trying to determine how much I know and if he can do any damage control.

I’m not accusing him of anything, though. I just want him to be honest. So, why do I feel as though he’s cheated on me and I’m confronting him about it?

Our eyes meet, and he smiles. It brings me slight comfort to see him like that, but I’m still apprehensive.

“Took you long enough to find it,” he says.

I straighten my back and rest my palms on my knees. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

He turns away from me and paces around the room. “About the necklace? It’s obvious. How do you think I’d feel if you kept a memento of your ex-boyfriend in our apartment?”

“That’s not the same, Luke. I’d never forbid you from wanting to keep something to help you remember the woman you cherished.”

And it’s true. It’s one thing when two people break up. Then Lucas and I would have been able to badmouth his ex to our hearts’ content. But Ellie was a woman Lucas loved dearly and a person who died. She never wronged him in any way that I know of. Therefore, she deserves to have her memory honored.

“Come on. You would have gotten jealous,” Lucas says.

“You don’t know me, then,” I say, offended. “And what about… this? Why didn’t you tell me about this?”

I gesture to the news article.

“I couldn’t. When we met, the trauma I’d experienced was still too fresh. And then we got engaged, and I felt as though it was too late to drop such a bombshell. It’s already a big enough shock that I have one dead fiancé behind me. But the fact that I was missing for such a long time…”

“Oh, honey. You know you can tell me everything,” I say.

“I know. But not this. I know you. If I’d told you about it one year into the relationship, you’d wonder what else I could have hidden from you if I managed to hide… that.” He takes one hand out of his pocket to gesture to the box. “Just like you’re wondering now.”

The bad thing about having a person in your life who knows every single thing about you is that you can’t hide anything from them.

Lucas is right. It has crossed my mind that, if he’s able to hide such a big secret as getting lost in the woods for three months, then he would have no trouble hiding smaller things from me.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Lucas is not that kind of person. He didn’t hide his secret from me for selfish reasons. He did it to protect me.

I love him even more because of it. How many times has he woken up in the middle of the night, drenched in sweat because he had a nightmare that he was still in those woods? How many times did he get the urge to talk to me about it and about Ellie and have me hold him and tell him it would never happen again?

All those times, he stifled those urges because he didn’t want to worry me or make me jealous. Husbands can’t cry to wives about other women.

I stand up, walk up to him, and give him a tight hug. We hold each other for a full minute, and when I pull back, I tell him, “You can tell me everything.”

Chapter 7

Lucas and I are sitting on the couch. Hot chocolate that I’ve made a few minutes prior sits in front of us. Whenever you’re in distress, chocolate in any form is the answer.

Stressed? Chocolate.

Hungry? Chocolate.

Just survived an incident that will scar you for life? Chocolate.

Freezing? Hot chocolate.

“August,” Lucas says. He’s staring at the steaming cup on the table in front of him. “That’s when I got lost. Every weekend, I went on walks in the woods with Ellie. After she died, I continued going there. And every time I went there, I tried to challenge myself by taking longer routes. I had been preparing to run a marathon in memory of Ellie. She had wanted to do one herself but never got the chance before… Well, you get it.”

I nod. “So, what happened?”

“Well, the day I went missing, I felt really confident. Figured I’m gonna take one of the more difficult routes available. Except, about an hour of walking later, I ran into a sign that said the trail is dangerous and that I should turn back unless I’m adequately prepared.”

“But you didn’t.”

“Nope. I let my ego get the better of me.” Lucas grins. “I thought I could conquer the trail. And a few hours later, when I got exhausted and the end of the trail was nowhere in sight, I turned to go back. Along the way, though, I slipped and slid down into a ravine and off the trail. You know those scars I have on my back and thighs? It’s from that fall.”

“Oh my God.”

“I was lucky to survive that fall. But the problem was I couldn’t get back up to the trail, so I started to look for a way to climb up. By the time I reached an elevation, the beaten path was nowhere in sight, and I had no sense of orientation whatsoever.”

“Jesus, Luke. That must have been terrifying,” I say.

My hands and feet are sweating profusely as I listen to his story. I know how the story ends—Lucas survives—but I’m still terrified while I’m listening to him.

“How did you survive?” I ask.

Lucas shrugs. “I know a little bit about survival in the wilderness. I ate berries, made snares to catch rabbits, and moved in one direction. Or whatever seemed like one direction to me.”

“You survived for three months off of berries and rabbits?”

“Yeah. But it was a close call. I once ran into a bear, but he didn’t come close to me, so it was good. He probably would have killed me easily, though, because I was pretty weak by then.”

“Lucas…”

“Anyway, three months later, I stumbled out of the woods and onto a road close to Mirstone. I barely made it back to town before collapsing.”

“Mirstone,” I taste the word on my tongue. “You lived there before, right?”

“Yes. Sorry for not telling you.”

“You have nothing to apologize for.” I put a hand on his thigh.

“I just didn’t want to remember or talk about that town anymore ever again. If I told you about it, you would have asked questions, and you would have insisted we go there. I couldn’t deal with that.”

“I understand.”

“I stayed in Mirstone until my treatment was over, and once I recovered, I moved out. Everything in the town reminded me too much of those three months in the woods… and even more of Ellie, and I couldn’t stand to run into all the same faces every day. I hated how they felt sorry for me and treated me like I was this weak infant, you know?”

If there’s anything I know about Lucas, it’s that he hates being pitied and feeling weak. He’ll work through a fever rather than admit he’s feeling ill, and if something bad happens, the last thing he needs is for me to put his head on my chest and stroke his hair. In those moments, he prefers to be left alone and to deal with the emotions however he sees fit.

“But if everything in Mirstone reminded you of it, why did you keep this newspaper clipping?” I ask.

Lucas sighs. “To remind myself why I left Mirstone. To remember what the last straw for me was.”

“Baby, I’m sorry,” I say. “If I had known, I wouldn’t have snooped.”

“It’s fine. I would have done the same.” His hand squeezes mine.

I lean toward him, and we kiss. The hot chocolate in our cups has stopped producing steam. It’s still chocolate, so who cares if it’s not hot?

“Lucas, what about the necklace?” I ask.

“It was Ellie’s. I gave it to her for our anniversary,” he says.

“You never told me how she…”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

It’s the same reaction as the one I got years ago. I know better than to keep pushing.

“There’s, um, one more thing I need to tell you,” Lucas says.

“What is it?” I ask.

“You know the accent I have? The one I told you I got when I hit my head as a kid?”

“Uh-huh?”

“Well, that’s not how it happened.”

“You got it in those woods?”

“I didn’t speak for three months. I made sounds and all that, but it was mostly grunting.” He lets out a chuckle, but I don’t find anything about it funny. Something tells me he doesn’t, either. “The doctors said that another extra month and I would have lost the ability to pronounce some words. They said the accent would probably go away after some time, but it’s still here.”

“I don’t want it to go away. I love your sexy accent,” I say.

He smiles. “That makes one of us, at least.”

“What about the scar?”

“Got it from a branch in the woods.”

I can tell he’s feeling vulnerable tonight. I’m sorry that I’ve reopened that old wound, but I had to know. Besides, he no longer has to worry about me finding out about it anymore.

I kiss him, gently push his chest so that his back leans against the couch, and I swing one leg over to sit in his lap.

“Whatever happens, we’re going to deal with it together, okay?” I ask.

He doesn’t answer. He just kisses me back passionately.

Tonight, I’m going to remind him he doesn’t need to deal with his problems alone anymore.

Chapter 8

The following day, Lucas tells me he’s thinking about throwing away the box.

“Don’t,” I tell him. “You said you needed a reminder of the last straw. I think you should keep it. Plus, it’s Ellie’s necklace. I really think you shouldn’t throw that away.”

I’m essentially telling him I’m okay with him remembering his dead fiancé.

“Really?” he asks.

“Yes.”

“Okay. I guess you’re right.” He nods. “I’ll leave it on the shelf, then.”

“Just fill the hole in the floor, will you?” I smile.

Everything is back to how it was. Or so I think for a while. I go to work. I come back home and make meals. I spend time with Lucas. We occasionally visit friends… pretty much everything we did before the whole box thing.

But the problem is I often think about Lucas lost in those woods. It’s a new part of him that I haven’t gotten used to just yet, even though I’m trying to. It’s supposed to be no big deal, and Lucas tells me that, too, but I can’t shake it.

Even seeing a park from a distance makes my imagination go wild—Lucas wandering through the woods in torn and dirty clothes, his face sunken and ribs protruding due to malnutrition, his hair matted, his eyes lost and confused.

I want to ask Lucas how I never heard about that news, but I don’t want to open that can of worms again. I had my chance to ask all the questions when we talked that Friday when he returned from card night, but I didn’t.

My mind had been too feverish and ran with so many questions that I forgot to ask most of them. But now they’re constantly in my mind like an itch of a healing scar that I can’t quite scratch.

I don’t ask Lucas about it. Instead, I look up articles online, in secret, of course.

If Lucas knew I was looking things up behind his back, he’d be upset—and rightly so. It doesn’t matter that I’m doing it because I don’t want to bother him with those questions.

Not much can be found online other than two short articles—one that I read in the box, and the other that’s pretty similar. Both were from the town of Mirstone. The news hadn’t made it further than that.

It was strange because reporters usually flocked to survivors like Lucas to interview them for a juicy story. Maybe Lucas declined to talk to all of them. Mirstone is a small town, so it’s possible he managed to pull some strings and ask the local media not to bloat the story unnecessarily.

The more I investigate, the more the itch grows. It’s like I’m scratching myself, but the itch is migrating elsewhere, frustrating me more and more. It’s now behind my back where I can’t even reach it.

I need answers.

Why, though? Why am I so obsessed with this? Part of me wants to know the full story so I can understand just how serious Lucas’s suffering had been.

I have no doubt in my mind that it was terrible, but I feel like I’m unable to grasp just how horrible it was because, to me, it’s just a story in theory. To Lucas, it was a real-life experience. A terrifying horror story that has scarred him enough never to step into the woods again.

I want to be able to share in his pain, but I also feel like there’s something that’s missing. A piece of a puzzle that I don’t even know exists.

Convinced that I’m just being bratty, I decide to let time pass and tell myself I’ll forget about it after a while. After two weeks, I’m still thinking about it, and the itch is still there.

So, on a whim, I make the decision to go to Mirstone the following week.

I can’t just up and go there, though. And I definitely can’t tell Lucas about it. I know, I know. I’m being a terrible wife by doing things behind Lucas’s back, but put yourself in my situation. How would I ever tell him my plans without causing an extreme reaction?

Hey, babe, you know that town where you went missing for three months and almost died? Well, I’m thinking of taking my next vacation there.

I’m not doing anything bad, but Lucas would see it as such. So, I quietly book two days off work for next week. I tell Lucas I’m having a business trip with the company, and I look up routes to Mirstone.

Lucas doesn’t once question anything about my “business trip.” He asks me where I’m going, how many days I’ll be gone, and tells me to feel free to spend some money while there. I guess he’s as trusting toward me as I am to him.

I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel guilty. Yet, in the end, I need those answers. But even when I return from Mirstone, I won’t tell Lucas anything about the trip. I’ll keep that secret just like he’s kept his from me.

I’m doing this because I love him and he is my whole world.

I will do everything in my power to stop something bad from happening to him.

Chapter 9

Sunday night comes, and I start to have second thoughts. It’s too late to back out now anyway since I’ve already booked my days off. Besides, it’s only two days. It should be more than enough time to gather all the info I need, right? I mean, it’s a small town.

I looked up Mirstone before the trip to get ready. Only after applying for my days off did I consider that I had no idea what I would even do in Mirstone.

I’d talk to the police about Lucas’s case, sure, but what else? Maybe I could go around the town asking the residents about Lucas. The population of Mirstone is roughly three thousand, and I’m sure most if not all knew Lucas.

Another place I could visit is the trail where he went missing. I wouldn’t go too far, of course, but I’d want to know where it happened.

Part of me is hoping I might find Lucas’s family there. Maybe some relatives since his parents died before he and I met. Maybe that roommate who contacted the authorities. The police would know who he is.

Either way, visiting the police should be my first step, and I’m sure they would clue me in on where to go later in case I wanted to find out more.

Whoever I speak to, though, I would need to ask them to be secretive about it because the last thing I’d need is for one of them to inform Lucas of his wife being in Mirstone. I don’t know if Lucas is still in touch with any Mirstoners, but better safe than sorry.

“You got everything you need for your trip, honey?” Lucas walks into the bedroom to me packing my suitcase.

“I’ll pack light. It’s a short trip,” I say.

“Cool. What are you going to be doing there again?”

“Attending some workshops and presentations. The usual boring stuff like every year.”

“I thought that was supposed to take place months from now.”

“It is, but they decided they’re going to have two different events this year,” I say, hoping my quick recital won’t give away how nervous I am because of the lie.

I look in Lucas’s direction briefly to see if he’s buying it. His face remains blasé, but then he smiles and says, “Okay, cool. I made you your favorite sandwich, by the way. I’ll pack it for you and leave it in the fridge.”

I’m lying to Lucas about the trip, and when the time comes for me to take my days off for our vacation, I’ll have to lie again and tell him that I have to use fewer of them. When I’m back from Mirstone, I’ll have to lie about that, too. I’m sure Lucas will have a ton of questions, and I’ll have to go into details, but not too many details.

This stupid expedition is burying me deeper and deeper with lies. The bad thing about lying is you have to remember what you said. It’s like walking through a minefield.

It makes me feel even worse that he’s helping me pack my favorite food and reminding me to bring a jacket and some extra clothes in case it gets cold there. I can hardly look him in the eye because of the guilt that’s enveloping me.

Maybe I can tell him the truth when I’m back. Well, not right away but maybe in a few months. Maybe in a year.

If I wait long enough, then I can bring it up someday.

Hey, remember that business trip I had last year? Yeah, well I lied. There was never a business trip. I took some days off to go to Mirstone. Yeah, the town where you went missing for three months and then moved out of it, that’s the one.

Or maybe it’s better not to say anything at all. I guess I’ll decide once I’m back.

Right now, I need to focus on the trip itself. This isn’t a field trip. It’s an investigation, and I only have two days for it.

When we go to bed, Lucas snuggles up to me under the blankets.

“Can’t let you leave without giving you something to think of,” he says as he starts kissing my neck.

Early the next morning, I get up, make a cup of coffee and, after taking three sips, I gently kiss Lucas on the forehead while he’s still sleeping.

I haven’t thought about the biggest problem until now—I’ll have to go two days without seeing my husband. I’ll have to sleep in a bed away from him. The thought terrifies me.

I’m so used to being able to roll over in the middle of the night and spoon him or hold his hand that I don’t know if I’ll be able to fall asleep tonight in whatever motel I find in Mirstone.

“I love you, Lucas,” I whisper into his ear.

He moans, stirs, but doesn’t wake up.

I grab my things, which I left in the foyer last night, and prepare to leave. I almost forget the sandwiches Lucas has packed for me, so I open the fridge to grab them, and then I’m out.

After stuffing all my things into the car, I sit behind the steering wheel and input “Mirstone” into my map application. It’s a three-hour drive to that place. Not too far.

I blast loud music on the radio and start driving.

PART 2

Chapter 10

I’d seen the pictures of Mirstone online before arriving, but those photos are usually presented in the best possible shape with deceptive filters and added elements that make it look like something out of a fairy tale.

The town I’m in—if it’s the same Mirstone—is veiled in perpetual gray caused by the overcast sky. It darkens my mood, but I don’t allow it to impact my resolution for answers.

I’m also focused on every shop, every school, every church, park, etc. I imagine Lucas in those places as a young person. I wish he were here with me so he could tell me more about how he spent his time here.

The town has only one motel, so I get a room there. The chubby man who works behind the counter is the first Mirstoner I interact with, and it’s less satisfactory than I imagined it would be.

The guy doesn’t make eye contact with me once. His gaze is plastered on a magazine with a half-naked chick on the cover he’s reading. He tells me how much the room is when I ask and tosses a key on the counter as soon as the money is in his pocket.

I have cash on me, and that’s what I’ll be using for the next two days because I don’t want to leave any traces for Lucas to find.

The guilt I’d felt earlier is now faint, stretched thin like the distance I put to Lucas and our home. I hope it stays that way so I can focus on the job at hand.

It’s almost noon and I’m feeling a little hungry even though I’ve eaten the sandwiches Lucas had prepared for me. I really want to start my investigation, though, so I suppress the hunger and drive out to the police station.

People in the streets are polite enough to greet me, but they also stare at me like I’m a specimen they’ve never seen before in their lives. That’s a normal thing in small towns, I guess.

When I enter the police station, I approach the lady working at the desk.

“Hi, how can I help you?” the woman asks with a wide smile.

“Hi. I would like to know more about the Lucas Smith case,” I say.

The woman’s smile turns into a frown. I bite my lip as I wait for her reaction. Is she going to kick me out? Give me a weird look? Tell me she can’t help me?

“Are you a reporter?” she asks.

“No, I’m actually Lucas’s wife. My name is Chloe,” I say.

The woman’s smile returns to her face, “Oh, really? I didn’t know Lucas got married. Good for him!”

She doesn’t sound like she’s just saying it out of courtesy. She sounds like she’s genuinely happy for Lucas. Her attitude also proves what I had already assumed—everyone, or almost everyone, in town knows who Lucas Smith is.

“So, where is Lucas now? Is he with you?” the woman asks.

“Um, no. Actually, he doesn’t know I’m here. I’d prefer to keep it that way,” I say.

“Oh.” The woman’s face slackens again. “I see. Give me one second.” She picks up the phone, dials a number, and says, “Chief, can you come out here for a second? Cool, thanks.”

She hangs up, smiles up at me again, and says, “He’ll be here in a bit. You can have a seat if you like.”

“Thank you.” I nod and retreat to one of the chairs.

Minutes later, a tall man shows up at the desk and speaks to the woman. She tells him something I can’t discern, and he nods and proceeds in my direction.

“Mrs. Smith?” he asks.

I stand up. “Just Chloe is fine.”

The man in front of me has a thick mustache, a protruding belly that falls over his belt, and oversized hands that look like they can crush a watermelon.

“My name’s Brian Davis.” He puts one hand forward for a shake.

I take it, feeling the coarseness of his fingers.

“The Chief of Police. You worked on Lucas’s case, right?” I ask.

He smiles. “That I did. I take it you have some questions about your husband’s case that need answering?”

“Yes, sir. Would it be a bother for you to spare a few minutes of your time?”

“No bother at all, ma’am. Right this way.”

He motions for me to follow him past the desk and up the stairs. We enter his office, and he offers a seat in front of his desk. His own chair creaks when he leans into it. He pulls a cigarette pack out of his pocket, puts one into his mouth, and offers me one. I politely decline, and he lights his up.

“Gotta say, I’m surprised to hear anyone’s still interested in the Lucas Smith case, least of all his wife. I’m glad he found someone like you. You seem like a nice gal.”

“You knew Lucas personally?”

“Knew Lucas since he was still a kid. Played pool and darts with his dad a few times a week before he passed.”

I’m glad there’s familiarity between the chief and Lucas. It’ll make it easier for me to get my answers.

“Lucas ain’t with you?” Chief Davis asks.

“No, sir. I didn’t tell him I was coming here.”

The chief nods slowly as he blows out a plume of smoke. “Makes sense that Lucas would never want to come back to Mirstone after what happened.”

“That’s actually what I’m here for. I only recently found out about… well, the incident in the woods.”

“Recently?”

“Yeah. Like, a few weeks ago.”

Chief Davis frowns. “He didn’t tell you nothing about it?”

“No, sir.”

“Well, I guess I can’t blame him. It was traumatic enough as it is,” he says as he shakes some of the ash off the cigarette into the tray on the desk. “I reckon the reason why he skipped town was to start from scratch in the first place.”

“That’s right. To be honest, the whole thing was a shock to me.”

“Oh, trust me, darling. It was a shock to everybody in Mirstone, too, for a good fella like Lucas to lose his lovely fiancé and go missing in the woods. Lemme tell ya, I don’t often get a lot of work ‘round here. Some fights between drunk people and all that, but back during that time when Lucas went missing, I had my hands full because it just so happened to be around the same time as that one inmate that broke out of prison.”

I sit straight up at that last bit of information.

“Wait, what inmate?” I ask.

“I guess Lucas didn’t tell you about it, did he?” the chief asks.

He puts his cigarette in the tray and leans toward his computer. The chair creaks again, and I wonder if it can hold his weight. He types and clicks for a minute or so, and then he turns the monitor toward me.

My eyes grow wide at the screen that shows a mugshot of Lucas. I blink furiously and then realize… no, it’s not Lucas.

The man in the picture has a buzzcut, his cheeks are round, and his mouth is hanging open just enough for me to see the remnants of yellow teeth.

“That’s Terry Koplin,” Chief Davis says. “He was serving a life sentence at a max security prison for stabbing his girlfriend to death fifty-seven times.”

Chapter 11

I can’t pry my eyes away from the screen. I no longer see Lucas on it like I did in the first split second. In fact, the longer I stare at it, the more I wonder how I saw Lucas there in the first place.

They have similar eyes, that’s how. Lucas has the same brown eyes, even though the shape is slightly different.

“You said he was serving a life sentence?” I ask.

“Yes, ma’am. Sometime before Lucas went missing, Koplin broke out of prison, which is a few miles south of here. We still don’t know how he did it, exactly, and the prison can’t review the surveillance footage because the power was down for five minutes at the time when he made his escape. I’m guessing he was somehow involved in that. Either him or an accomplice.”

“I’m guessing they never found the accomplice?” I ask.

“No. Koplin was in contact with some people outside of prison, but all of them checked out with an alibi.”

I’m nodding, but every now and again, I look at the picture of Terry Koplin. He doesn’t look remorseful in the mugshot. If anything, his look portrays annoyance.

The chief can see that the screen is distracting me, so he turns the monitor back toward him. “Our prime suspect was a former inmate named Christopher Payne, who had been released from prison a little before Koplin. We even tracked him for a while, but he’s clean.”

“Any chance I could get Christopher Payne’s contact?”

The chief frowns as if I’ve just asked the stupidest question ever. “Why in the Lord’s name would you need that?”

“I probably won’t, but I want to have it just in case I do.”

The chief blows smoke out as he shakes his head then says, “All right.”

He writes it down on a piece of paper and passes it to me.

“Thank you,” I say.

“Anyway,” he says. “Koplin fled into the woods, and that’s where they lost all traces of him.”

“The same woods where Lucas went missing, I assume.”

The chief nods. “It was my job to find two missing people: one being a Mirstone resident, the other a dangerous convict.”

“Jesus.”

“Problem is we couldn’t find either. We didn’t have enough manpower to look for both, and we definitely didn’t have enough time to comb through the entire forest. You’d need a small army for something like that.”

Brian Davis’s cigarette has burned almost to the filter, so he crushes it in the tray and pulls out another one. He flicks his lighter three times before the spark turns into a flame and finally catches the tip. He takes another moment to inhale and exhale the smoke before leaning back in his chair—with another loud creak—before continuing to speak.

“About four months after Lucas returned, we found Koplin’s body in the woods.”

“He died there?”

“He got killed, Mrs. Smith. And not just killed. His head, arms, and legs had been cut off. The body was burnt beyond recognition. There was nothing there to help identify the body except the remaining fabrics of the jumpsuit.”

My mind is going crazy. I’m imagining Lucas and that inmate in the same woods—my Lucas starved and weak, and this monster of a man crazed and ready to kill. I’m being ridiculous. Those woods are huge. There’s no way Terry and Lucas were anywhere near each other.

But what if they had run into each other? Terry would have killed Lucas, and I never would have lived the happy life I have right now.

“Who did that to him?” I ask. “I mean, who mutilated him like that?”

“Well, ‘round the time when Koplin got out, a lot of people started volunteering to look for him. Mostly family and friends of Koplin’s victim. Except they weren’t looking to bring him back to prison. They aimed to kill him. Now, this was outside Mirstone, so it wasn’t my jurisdiction, but I can’t blame the folks for wanting some justice. A little savage, maybe, but when you’ve been in this line of business long enough, you learn that scum like Terry Koplin deserves no better.”

“So you think those people tortured and killed him?” I ask.

“I believe so. They had all these secret meetings and organized searches and whatnot, so I’m pretty sure they happened to run into Koplin and…” He shrugs. “Well, you know the rest. No need to go into the gruesome details. We interrogated the suspects, but they all hummed the same tune. It was impossible to find any evidence of their involvement.”

“I’m surprised Lucas never mentioned this to me,” I say.

“He couldn’t have known. He went missing then returned all delirious and malnourished, and as soon as he was better, he got out of Dodge. Some dead inmate is the last thing that would’ve been on my mind if it were me.”

“Yeah, that makes sense.”

I’ve heard enough about Terry Koplin. Listening about him only creates a growing sense of anxiety in the pit of my stomach. I keep thinking about what could have happened if he ran into Lucas in the woods. He would have killed him and taken his clothes. Some crooks were known to do much more horrid things for much less.

“I want to get back to Lucas,” I say. “Can you tell me more about his disappearance?”

“Well, not much to say that you don’t already know.” Chief Davis shrugs. “His roommate was the one who had informed us of his disappearance. She was also the one who called us when he returned.”

“Wait, she?” I ask. “Lucas had a female roommate?”

The chief makes an expression that I can tell is regret for telling me this piece of information.

“Yeah. For a short time only, though,” he says.

“Was it by any chance his fiancé, Ellie?”

“No, ma’am. This happened after Ellie died. It was just some girl who moved from a town a few miles over. Her name was Mary. She and Lucas shared a house for a little bit just before Lucas went missing.”

“Were they, um…?” I can’t bring myself to finish the question.

“You’d have to ask Lucas, ma’am. I’m afraid I don’t know if they were romantically involved or not.”

“Where is Mary now?”

“She’s not in Mirstone anymore. We actually thought she and Lucas got out of town together, because we went to talk to her after he left, but she wasn’t there anymore.”

“You never tried to find her?”

“What for? She didn’t commit any crimes, and we couldn’t stop Lucas from leaving the town.”

“I see.”

I look down, thinking hard. Ten minutes in the chief’s office and I’m already finding out way more than I want to.

An escaped convict.

A secretive roommate named Mary with whom Lucas may or may not have shared a romantic interest.

Call me crazy, but that last one bothers me the most. Jealousy is a powerful thing. And yes, I know Mary happened before me, but I still can’t suppress a wave of pain that hits me.

She was there with him during his most difficult time. Her, and not me.

“So, Lucas had been missing for three months, right? How did he survive for that long?” I ask.

“Well, let’s just say he got extremely lucky. His wits helped him, too, but he was also really lucky to be in the lush part of the woods where there’s lots of edible berries and whatnot. If he stayed out there just a bit longer, I’m afraid we might have never found out what happened to him.”

“He wandered back into Mirstone, right?”

“He did. Found a road and followed it back to town. There’s one thing that I don’t quite get, though.”

“And what’s that?”

“He got out of the woods so close to Mirstone.”

“So?”

“Well, you’d need to know Mirstone to know what’s bothering me about it. Like, I’d understand if he happened to find a road hundreds of miles from here. He was gone for three months, after all, and missing people like those are found not just in different counties but in different states. But Mirstone is surrounded by all these bridges, roads, streams, and even a river. If you get lost, you can easily find your way back to town because you’ll run into something that’ll lead you there sooner or later.”

He must realize I’m not following because he leans his elbows on the desk and raises one eyebrow.

“Let me put it this way. Hypothetically, if you have three doors, and only one leads to your doom, Lucas chose that one door.”

“Three to one aren’t such terrible odds, are they?”

“No. But imagine if you open that door, and you see three more doors behind that, and then three more, and so on, about five times over, and each time you open the door, you have a one in three chance to choose wrong. Lucas would have had to choose the bad door every time to wander off the radar like that.”

“What are you saying?”

“I’m saying he got really unlucky. Which is a huge coincidence. And then to find the road leading right back to Mirstone… what are the odds of that happening?”

“What you’re saying almost sounds like Lucas planned the whole thing and never got lost in the first place.” I frown because I don’t like how accusatory the chief’s suggestion sounds.

“It does sound like that, doesn’t it? And yet, it’s absurd. If you’d seen him in the condition he was in when he returned, you’d know that. Some people just tend to have bad luck in life. But Lucas survived. And he has you. That tells me he might be luckier than I initially thought.”

There’s a moment of silence in the office. A question lingers on my mind. Before I can ask it, the chief intercepts me.

“I can see your cogs turning,” he says. “What do you want to ask?”

I smile at his impressive people-reading skills.

“I was just wondering…” I say. “You don’t happen to think Lucas had anything to do with Terry Koplin’s death, do you?”

My entire body is tense as I wait for the chief’s response.

Brian Davis throws his head back and cackles. It’s a hearty, wheezy, and contagious laugh.

“Sorry, darling,” he says at last. “No, absolutely not. Lucas would never hurt anyone, not even a piece of filth like Koplin. Besides, Koplin was found almost two hundred miles north of here. He and Lucas were never even close to each other.”

That makes me feel so much better that I let out a sigh-laugh.

“So, what about Lucas’s accent? Did he have one before disappearing?”

“Nope. He had a pretty neutral dialect that he got from his parents. That’s why I was so surprised when I heard him speak after he came back. For a moment, I was convinced it wasn’t him because he looked like a mess. After all, he was hardly even recognizable. Anyway, the doctor said it’s normal to acquire some kind of speech impediment after such an experience.”

“Yeah, that’s what Lucas told me, too.”

The chief shrugs. I contemplate whether to ask the next question. I bite the bullet and do it.

“Chief Davis, do you happen to know how Ellie died?” I ask.

The chief’s face turns dark. For a second, I think he’s going to kick me out of the office. He shifts uncomfortably in his seat and says, “She was found dead in the woods off the road leading to Mirstone. Strangled.”

“Jesus.”

“It was a tragedy for Lucas. For the whole town, really. Everybody loved Ellie. Lucas never was the same after that. If you ask me, that accent he has is partly due to her death. After she died, he had started stuttering from time to time. The woods only did him in more. It makes total sense that he would leave Mirstone after that.”

“Do you know who killed her?”

“No. We never did manage to find any suspects.”

Brian Davis crushes the second cigarette in the tray. I think for a moment he’s going to reach for a third one, but he just sits there, waiting for my next question.

I’m out of questions, though. For now. I hope I don’t find myself in the same situation as with Lucas when I questioned him and then thought of more questions when it was already too late.

“Thank you so much for your time, Chief Davis,” I say as I stand.

“Sure thing, Mrs. Smith. Here’s my number if you have any more questions in the future.” He pulls out a visit-card from a stack on his desk and hands it to me.

“Thank you. Is there anybody else I can talk to in Mirstone? Does Lucas have any family here?”

“Afraid not. His parents died early on. He doesn’t have any relatives. I can give you the address of the doctor who treated Lucas if you like.”

“Sure, why not,” I say.

I don’t know if I’ll visit the doctor, but it can’t hurt to know his whereabouts. On my way out, I thank the chief and leave. My mind is so distraught that I don’t hear the polite lady at the desk saying goodbye to me until I’m at the door.

As soon as I’m out, I feel like I’m able to draw breath after being underwater for too long. By then, rain has already started, synchronized with my mood.

I thought I would feel better once I got my answers. I feel as though I have even more questions now instead, as if every answer I get leads me down a new rabbit hole. If anything, the pit in my stomach has grown, and I feel even worse than before this trip.

One thing in particular bothers me more than anything, though. One thing I failed to admit to myself while I was in the chief’s office, which has now hit me so hard that I feel like I’m going to puke.

The serial number that Terry Koplin held in the picture said M-1359.

1359.

Just like the code on Lucas’s box.

Chapter 12

I need to clear my head, so I rush back to the motel. I sit in the dingy room in silence, staring at the floor and replaying the conversation with Chief Davis in my head. I should have turned on my phone’s voice recorder.

M–1359.

The same four digits as the padlock in our apartment. Why would Lucas have that?

Imagine you have three doors. And then three more, and then three more, and so on. Lucas would have to choose the wrong door every time.

It’s a huge coincidence.

He got unlucky.

The answer is right in front of me, but I refuse to believe it. Lucas had something to do with Terry Koplin’s death. Even as those words manifest in my mind, they’re only that—words. I cannot even begin to fathom it as a reality.

It’s like telling a blind person to imagine a color they’ve never seen in their life.

The paper with Christopher Payne’s number is in my hand. On a whim, I dial it on my phone. I think I do it only half-conscious. What do I even want to ask him? He doesn’t have any answers.

On the first ring, I drop the call.

I have to talk to Lucas. I know there are probably some more people I should talk to in Mirstone, but I can’t think about it right now. I have to get home, and I have to talk to Lucas.

My phone rings. It’s Christopher calling me back. Damn it. I decline the call. I have nothing to talk about with an ex-convict.

My things are still unpacked in my car, so I at least don’t need to worry about that. I drive back home while ignoring the speed limit signs. I’m going twenty over the limit when a BMW driver overtakes me, and I see flashing blue and red lights emerge off the side of the road.

The cop vehicle was hidden so well that I never would have seen it. The cruiser pulls the BMW over, and I see that as a sign that I won’t dodge the bullet next time. I reduce my speed to the limit shown on the sign even though I’m dying to get home as soon as possible.

My adrenaline is soaring even when I park inside the garage. It’s high even when I barge inside the apartment like a cowboy.

Lucas is on the couch in the living room, watching TV. When I burst inside, his head snaps up at me. His face takes on a look of both shock and amusement.

“Hi, honey. What are you doing here?” he asks.

“We need to talk,” I say.

I’ve had hours in the car to think of what to say, but I didn’t. So, the words spill out of me like rapidly played notes on a piano.

“I didn’t want to tell you this, but I have to. I was going to keep it a secret, but I’ve found out so many things that I just can’t keep quiet. I understand you might get angry, but I refuse to live like this any longer until I get the full truth. I’m not going to—”

“I know you went to Mirstone,” Lucas’s calm sentence cuts me off.

It effectively silences my shouting, and I’m left staring at him blankly.

“What did you say?” I ask.

Lucas purses his lips. “Chief Davis called me to let me know he spoke with you.”

That bastard.

“He did?” I ask.

“Yes. Guess one of the perks of working in the police is being able to find anyone you want.”

“That son of a bitch.”

“Hey, don’t blame him. He was only concerned for you. He and I had a nice chat.”

I cross my arms. The adrenaline has turned into anger, and now it’s slowly morphing into nervousness. What I’m about to ask him might be a turning point in our marriage. I’m starting to feel sick. I have to ask my question before I chicken out.

“I know everything about how you got lost,” I say. “The chief told me how difficult it is to lose your way in those woods. Be honest with me. Did you really get lost there, Lucas?”

Lucas hesitates for a moment then says, “No.”

I feel a weight drop into my throat.

“I saw Terry Koplin’s picture. His prison number is the same as the padlock on your box. Is that a coincidence?”

“It’s not,” Lucas says.

I was hoping he’d say it is. I would have chosen to believe him because it’s the easier thing to do.

“Did you have something to do with Terry Koplin’s death?” I ask.

Just say no. Just lie about it. I don’t care. Just tell me you have nothing to do with it.

Longer hesitation this time. I already know the answer because of it, but it still pains me to hear it.

“Yes,” Lucas says. “And not just his death. His escape from prison, too.”

I’m giving him every chance I can to save himself. He doesn’t. He’s being honest, and for once in my life, I wish he wouldn’t be.

I put my hand over my mouth to stop an oncoming wave of vomit. I take shallow breaths, swallow, and only then realize that Lucas’s hand is on my shoulder and he’s asking me if I’m okay.

I step away from him. I open my mouth to demand an explanation when the doorbell rings.

Worst fricking time!

“About time,” Lucas says and strides over to the door.

Has he ordered food? How can he think about food at a time like this?

I’m facing away from the door when I hear Lucas open it and say, “Hi. Come on in.”

That last sentence catches my attention. I spin around to see a woman step inside the apartment. I don’t notice anything descript about her because of the garish post-surgery mask wrapped around her face that makes her look like a mummy.

“Hi,” she says to me.

“Um. Hi?” I say.

Lucas closes the door and says, “Chloe, this is Mary, my old roommate from Mirstone. She’s the one who helped Terry Koplin break out of prison.”

Chapter 13

“I’m sorry we have to meet under these circumstances,” Mary says. “I also apologize for my appearance. I had a nose surgery recently.”

She points to the obvious mask on her face. She’s so polite that I almost disregard the last thing Lucas said.

She’s the one who helped Terry Koplin break out of prison.

And yet, despite such an astronomical discovery, my mind is focused on something else. Something every female mind would worry about as absurd as it is.

“This was your roommate in Mirstone?” I ask as I ogle Mary.

She’s cute when she smiles. Even the mask can’t hide her ocean-blue eyes and thick lips. I wonder if Lucas thinks she’s prettier than me. She definitely has a better body. Those boobs must have given Lucas a great time if he and Mary ever were a thing.

I’m so jealous all of a sudden that I want to scream at Lucas, but I also don’t want to cause a scene in front of Mary, and all of that makes me feel like there’s immense pressure inside me that’s going to make me burst like a balloon.

“Yes. Mary and I were roommates in Mirstone when she moved there. She’s like a sister to me,” Lucas says.

That causes a rock to drop from my shoulders. I only then realize that I’m focused on the wrong thing, and guilt swaddles me.

“I see.” I nod.

“Let’s have a seat in the living room. We have a lot to talk about.” Lucas gestures.

For the first two minutes, the air in the apartment feels awkward. Mary and I are pretty much forced to sit together, and we don’t know anything about each other. But somehow, when she and Lucas begin explaining everything, the atmosphere shifts from awkward to work-like.

“This is all going to be a shock to you, Chloe,” Lucas says. “I won’t blame you whatever you decide after this. All I ask is that you refrain from involving Mary in whatever you do.”

“I don’t understand.” I shake my head.

“You will, soon. Mary, wanna take the reins on this one?”

Mary shifts in her seat and sits ramrod straight. “Okay, so… Where do I even start? I understand you know about Lucas’s fiancé, right?”

“Ellie?” I ask then turn to Lucas.

“Yes.” Lucas nods.

I’m jumping ahead with conclusions, but I don’t say anything. I want to let Mary and Lucas finish their story so I can decide whether I’m assuming right or not. Whatever the reason to mention Ellie now, I’m pretty sure she somehow fits into the whole picture with Terry Koplin and Lucas’s disappearance.

“I never told you how she died,” Lucas says. “Just like with the disappearance, I didn’t want too many questions to be raised. But I guess it was inevitable.”

I don’t say anything to that. I can’t tell him I already know.

“Ellie was murdered by Terry Koplin,” Lucas says.

I guess I know less than I thought I did.

My heart rate quickens.

“Oh God. Luke, I’m so sorry,” I say. “Chief Davis had told me she was murdered. But by Terry Koplin? Jesus…”

“She, uh…” Lucas starts, and I can see he’s hesitant. “Her, uh, car broke down close to Mirstone when she was coming to pay me a surprise visit. Terry happened to see her. He offered to help, and, um… Well, they found her body in the woods.”

A feeling of immense dread unlike any I’ve felt before in my life washes over me. My mind forces me to see images of Ellie running into the woods and screaming while Terry is chasing after her. He pins her down and starts ripping her clothes. She’s begging him to let her go, but—

Stop.

I can’t stomach those images. Those things really do happen in the world, but they’re too much for me to bear. And if it’s so terrible for me, I can’t imagine how it was for Lucas to live through the pain day after day.

“Terry Koplin never got convicted for murdering Ellie because there was no evidence. But it was him. After he killed his girlfriend, he got arrested and convicted for life, but that wasn’t enough for me,” Lucas says. “I wanted him dead. You have no idea what hell that’s been. I woke up every morning, and all I could think was, ‘That monster is still alive, and I’ll never get to see Ellie again.’ I…”

He probably realizes he’s said too much because he gulps and recomposes himself. Maybe he’s afraid I’ll feel jealous when he talks about Ellie.

As strange as it sounds, I’ve never thought of Ellie that way. I felt nothing but respect for her for treating Lucas so well. I know Lucas will always love her even though she’s gone, but I also know I’m the most important person in his life.

Also, it simply feels disrespectful to be jealous of a dead person.

Mary is the one who continues where Lucas left off. “We devised a plan to help Terry escape from prison so we could lure him into the forest and…”

“Kill him,” I finish the sentence.

Mary nods. Lucas is staring down, as if ashamed of the confession.

“The chief of the police had told me Terry might have had an accomplice in helping him escape. Was that you?” I ask.

“Yes,” Mary says.

“Why?”

“I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’d do plenty of things for my friends, but something that might land me a hefty prison sentence? I’d probably pass.”

“Ellie was my sister,” Mary says.

“Oh shit. I’m so sorry.” I put a hand over my mouth.

“Mary helped Terry escape and led him into the woods,” Lucas says. “She took him to a cabin and told him to wait there while the dust settles and while she looked for fresh clothes to help him blend in. Except, she didn’t come back with clothes.”

“She came back with you,” I finish the sentence.

“Yes, Chloe. She came back with me.”

There’s a crazed look in Lucas’s eyes. For a split second, I’m staring, not at him but at Terry Koplin on the screen of Chief Davis’s computer. As soon as I blink, that illusion is gone. I can’t possibly compare Lucas and Terry.

“You killed him then?” I ask, but I already know the answer.

“Not right away.” Lucas shakes his head.

I don’t need to ask him to elaborate.

An awfully long silence fills the room. Mary and Lucas are waiting for me to process everything and give them my reaction.

To be frank, I don’t know how to react. Everything is still bubbling inside me, and I need to give it time to settle down.

“So…” I say after what feels like forever.

There’s no continuation to that word.

“So, now that you know the truth,” Lucas says, “do you, um, want to rethink things?”

“Rethink things? About what?” I ask.

“You know? About… us?”

“You mean because you killed Terry Koplin?”

There is so much information to absorb that it’s the first time I consider the fact that my husband is a murderer. He deliberately lured a person into the woods to torture and kill him.

Okay, it sounds bad when I say it that way, and that’s not how it was. He killed a murderer responsible for the death of his fiancé. A murderer who had it coming because he hurt innocent people.

I don’t judge Lucas for it. I don’t know what I would have done if someone took Lucas from me. I wouldn’t construct such an elaborate plan, sure, but I would at least fantasize about hurting that person. And if I got presented with a chance to do to them what Lucas did to Terry, you bet I would make them suffer.

“If you need some time to think about things, I understand,” Lucas says.

I stand up, walk up to him, and plant a kiss on his lips. “I love you, Lucas. Nothing will ever change that. And that man got what was coming to him.”

Tears glisten in Lucas’s eyes. He hugs me tightly, and we hold each other for a long time.

I then remember that Mary is still in the room, and I pull away from Lucas and apologize for subjecting her to our private emotional moment.

“Well, I guess I’m free to leave now,” Mary says.

I should offer her to stay for coffee, but I don’t. I just don’t see how we can transition from such a dark and heavy topic to casual small talk over coffee. Maybe next time.

Probably not, though. This was a pretty heavy way to introduce Mary into my life, and I doubt I’ll ever be able to hang out with her.

One thing’s for sure, though—I’ll keep her and Lucas’s secret safe.

“It was nice meeting you, Chloe,” Mary says at the door. “It’s a shame we had to meet under these circumstances.”

“Well, what can you do,” I say because I don’t know what else to say.

She turns to Lucas and says, “Lucas, you take care of her. She’s a good one. I can tell.”

I chuckle.

“Thanks, Mary,” Lucas says as he puts his arm around me.

We say goodbye, and then she’s on her way.

I can sense there’s still some tension in the air from Lucas’s side. He’s still unsure how I’m going to react, so he’s extra careful around me.

“So, what now?” he asks.

I pull him closer and give him a kiss. “Now, we continue living our life like before.”

Chapter 14

But I can’t. I keep thinking about things. About Lucas in those woods. About Terry Koplin.

Mostly, I think about Terry Koplin, and there’s something I can’t get out of my head no matter how hard I try.

Whenever I look at Lucas, I see Terry. It happens sporadically, and so briefly that it’s gone as soon as I blink, but an echo of the imprint remains, like staring at the light for too long.

Lucas notices how cold I am, too. He doesn’t say anything when I shy away from his touch. I suddenly feel like the apartment is too small, and even the inside of my head doesn’t feel safe. I know I can’t keep this up for too long. Anyone who knows me sees how obvious this all is.

So, one day I decide to confront Lucas.

I come home from work with the intention of talking to him. When I open the apartment door, he’s already sitting on the couch, and he has that look I know all-too well. The grievous look that says “We have to talk.”

I try to play it off by saying hi and asking him how his day was, because I’m suddenly crippled by the fear of opening this can of worms.

“Chloe? Can we talk?” he asks.

There’s no way out of this for me, so I feign a smile, place my bag on the kitchen counter, and take a seat across from Lucas. He’s staring at me, as if he expects me to start the conversation. I can’t stand that stare for long, so I look down and break the silence.

“Lucas, look, I… I don’t know how to… What I’ve been thinking…” However I want to start feels wrong.

“I want to do a DNA test,” Lucas says.

The sentence takes me by surprise. I look up at him to gauge whether he’s serious. He sure looks like it.

“A DNA test? Why?” I ask.

He smiles. “Chloe, come on. I know exactly what you’re thinking, and I don’t blame you. You think I’m Terry Koplin.”

“No. What? No, I…”

But I can’t even bring myself to deny it convincingly. Now that he’s said it, it feels a lot more real. I see Terry Koplin sitting in front of me again. I suddenly can’t get the sweat off my palms no matter how much I wipe them on my jeans, and my heart feels like it’s going to burst out of my chest.

“Baby, you have perfectly normal doubts, because this situation is anything but perfect. I haven’t been fully honest with you, but I want to do what I can to reassure you. I’m your Lucas.”

I don’t know what to say. There’s a rift between us. It’s been there ever since I went to Mirstone. It’ll widen if I agree to the DNA test, but in the end, I can’t say no. I can’t continue living my life wondering.

Sure, the doubts would eventually fade away, but never completely. The question would pop up in my mind from time to time, in the quietest moments when I least expect it.

“I don’t know, Lucas,” I say, only because I’m trying to find a way to do the test without further damaging my marriage.

“I do. And I’m doing this whether you want it or not,” he says.

“Lucas…”

“Please, Chloe. Do it for me. I can’t stand to see you looking at me like I’m a stranger that wants to hurt you.”

“You’re not—”

“I want us to be back to the way we were before. Please.”

I sigh and think for a moment. Finally, I nod. “Okay.”

***

Waiting at the clinic is nerve-racking. The waiting room is small and quiet. Lucas and I are the only ones here.

He is sitting next to me, sipping coffee. The spot where they drew blood on his forearm looks red and painful. Whoever jabbed a needle in him did a terrible job.

“Does it hurt?” I ask.

He shakes his head.

Minutes pass like hours, and then finally, a technician emerges from one of the labs and calls Lucas’s name. He stands at attention as the technician approaches him. He gives him the paper, Lucas thanks him, and then it’s just me and him again in the waiting room.

He turns toward me, staring at the paper, as if there’s some piece of information written there he needs to find out. I tentatively approach him and ask, “What’s it say?”

“Take a look,” he says.

I take the paper from him with trembling hands. It takes my brain a moment to read the mumbo-jumbo written there, but eventually, I manage to connect the dots.

I look up at Lucas. Lucas, not Terry. My husband, Lucas. Just as the paper confirms without a doubt. Just as he’s been this entire time.

He smiles at me. There’s no grudge there. No hate. No resentment. It’s a look that says he hopes we can put everything behind us now, despite the fact that I accused him of being Terry Koplin. I never said it aloud, sure, but it was so very obvious.

Before I can do anything, he runs up to me and hugs me.

Chapter 15

I’m glad things are back to the way they were before. I don’t want any more surprises. No secret stashes in the apartment, no new discoveries, etc. There’s no resentment on Lucas’s side, either. He doesn’t hold anything against me.

For some time after the DNA test, I kept thinking—and dreaming—about Terry Koplin. After some time, Terry Koplin became only a name, and then fell into oblivion.

I knew ever since I grew up that monsters were real, and they’re humans, but it’s one of those things you don’t actively think about until they happen to you or someone you know.

I’m extra affectionate toward Lucas these days, and I try to spoil him as much as possible. When I look at him, I see this strong man that I fell in love with and that holds things together when they’re falling apart, but I also see hurt behind those eyes. Pain that he’ll probably never recover from, no matter what he does, even if he were to kill Terry Koplin a hundred times over.

He’s down. I can see that, so I try to talk to him. The first thing I notice, though, is the bruise on his vein where they drew blood at the clinic. It spreads down to his forearm in a thin line. I worry it might be an infection.

“Ouch. They really did a number on you. Does it hurt?” I ask.

“No,” he says.

“Maybe we should go to a doctor.”

“It’s fine.” He brushes me off.

“What’s wrong, baby?” I ask.

He sighs. “I guess I just tried to forget about the whole thing, but now it’s resurfaced.”

I feel guilty because I’m the reason why he was forced to remember in the first place. I know what it’s like to bury the pain deep inside under mounds and mounds of dirt. But that’s not a healthy way for dealing with it because it’s buried, but not dead. And when it resurfaces, it’s just as painful as it was the first time.

There isn’t anything I can do to eliminate Lucas’s pain. If I could, believe me, I’d take it all upon myself. But since I can’t, I’m there for him. I hold him, stroke his hair, whisper into his ear, just to assure him I’m still here and won’t be leaving. I gently run my fingers down the C-shaped scar on the back of his head.

He usually doesn’t like those things. They make him feel more vulnerable. But he needs them right now, I can tell. I can see the way he looks at me with fear in his eyes. He’s afraid that I’ll end up like Ellie.

Fears can form really fast, but it takes years to dispel them. I’m determined to help Lucas get rid of that fear, even if it takes me forever, because he’s my husband, and I love him.

About three weeks later, Lucas finally looks like he’s getting back to his old self. He’s not quite there yet, but he’s close. And that’s when he comes home from work one day, visibly distressed. I drop the book I’m reading because I can tell something bad has happened.

“What’s wrong, honey?” I ask.

“We need to talk.” He gulps.

I can tell it’s serious, and I’m already becoming nervous because I have no idea what he wants to talk about.

Maybe now that the entire thing is over and some time has passed, Lucas realizes that I had no right to snoop around and he’s angry. I can’t say I would blame him. I mean, no matter how big of a secret it was, it was still his secret, and I’m a firm believer that every person should have something to keep to themselves, no matter how small, no matter how much they trust their partner—even if I myself don’t abide by it.

“Okay, sure,” I say.

We sit, and he takes my hands into his. That’s a good sign. It means he’s not angry with me.

“I want to go back to Mirstone,” he says.

The sentence catches me off guard, and I almost pull away from him.

“You want to go back?” I ask.

“Not to live there. Just to visit,” he says.

“Oh.”

That does make me feel better, especially because I initially thought he wanted to move there. I’m still surprised, though. Mirstone is full of bad memories for Lucas.

When you get out of a place that scarred you so badly, you don’t think about going back. It’s like fantasizing about returning to school where you got bullied.

“Why would you want to go back there?” I ask.

“That place scares me. And that’s exactly why I need to go back.”

“Luke…”

“No, listen. All this time, all I did was run away from my past. When Ellie got killed, I ran away from myself. Even after I avenged her by killing Terry Koplin, I kept running. I’m still running. But our demons always find a way to catch up with us. I need to face them.”

“Lucas…” I put a hand on his cheek. I can’t stop looking at the bruise on his arm. I hope it doesn’t hurt him. “You’ve already faced your demons. You don’t need to do this. You don’t owe it to anyone to prove you’re stronger than them.”

“I owe it to myself. I owe it to Ellie.”

I realize he’s right. Ellie wouldn’t want him to suffer like this, just like I don’t want it, either. I can tell he’s given this a lot of thought. I’m proud of him because it takes a lot of guts to dig out your fears and put them to rest once and for all.

“Okay, Lucas.” I nod. “If you want to do it, then let’s do it. Do you want me to come with you?”

The only reason why I ask is because I don’t want to intrude. There are certain things in life we can only do alone. For Lucas, it’s going back to Mirstone and facing his demons.

But that doesn’t mean I can’t be there to hold his hand and remind him to keep going. I can’t help him fight his demons, but I can nudge him forward.

“Yes. Please. Come with me. I want you to visit Ellie’s grave with me,” Lucas says.

“Of course I will,” I say. “When do you want to go?”

“Now.”

My determination falters for a microscopic moment. “Now? As in, right now?”

“Yes. If I wait until tomorrow, it might be too late. I might change my mind. I don’t want that to happen,” he says.

I have a slice of chocolate cake in the fridge with my name on it. My TV show is waiting for me to watch it. I even have my favorite, warm blanket ready to snuggle into.

None of it matters.

Lucas has something important going on, and that means I’m going to drop whatever unimportant stuff I’m doing and devote my attention to him.

“Okay, Lucas,” I say. “Let’s go to Mirstone.”

Chapter 16

We’re mostly quiet during the first hour of the drive. I try to strike up a conversation with Lucas, but all he does is offer curt, one–word responses. Eventually, I let him drive in silence and decide to let him speak when he feels like speaking.

Which happens when we’re halfway there. He turns on the radio and starts humming to the music. He suddenly looks like he’s in a good mood. That instantly puts me in a good mood, too.

Until I feel buzzing in my pocket.

I pull out my phone and see a name I hoped I wouldn’t see again.

“What’s wrong?” Lucas asks.

He must have noticed how the smile dropped from my face.

“Nothing.” I offer a reassuring smile.

“Who’s that?” he asks.

I can see him glancing at my screen. I quickly decline the call and put the phone into my pocket.

“Spam callers,” I lie.

As soon as I find a quiet moment, I’ll have to send a text to Christopher Payne to stop calling me. I’m no longer interested in receiving information about Terry Koplin. And as soon as this visit to Mirstone is over, the topic will be closed forever.

Lucas and I will put a lock on it and never mention it again. Unless he feels the need to open up about it, but Lucas isn’t that kind of a person. When he’s done with something, he’s done.

“Do you want to talk to people when we arrive in Mirstone?” I ask.

“Nope.” Lucas shakes his head.

“Are you sure? I think there are a lot of people who would be happy to see you.”

“Yeah. I just hate catching up with familiar faces is all.”

“Can you at least talk to Chief Davis? He really seems to care about you.”

I hate that I sound like a concerned mother, but I don’t want Lucas to regret coming to town and not talking to his friends and family.

“Okay, sure. If we have a minute, we can meet up with him. I just don’t want anyone else to know I’m in town.”

I can understand that. With his arrival, lots of questions would be raised. And then, when you run into an unfamiliar face, they are overly enthusiastic to see you again, and you can’t match that energy, and then they ask you where you’ve been, and you try to explain it in as few words as possible, and then you see them giving you a concerned look.

If that’s not bad enough, in Lucas’s case, they would show pity because it’s a small town and everybody knows he’s the guy whose fiancé got killed, and everybody in small towns knows that, when you lose a loved one, you pretty much go crazy. And even if it’s not true, someone must have started that rumor at some point, and it spreads like wildfire because people in small towns have nothing better to do than to spread gossip.

I want to avoid subjecting Lucas to such an awkward experience, but Chief Davis seems different. He willingly helped me, and he seemed genuinely concerned about Lucas. I want to return the favor.

By the time we arrive in Mirstone, the sun is no longer hiding behind the clouds. I was worried the weather would be bad like last time, which would only further dampen our moods.

Mirstone’s streets are occupied more than the last time I visited. It must be the sun that got them out of their houses. They don’t stare at Lucas’s car as we drive past them, though. I guess they’re not concerned with every single vehicle that passes through their town like I initially thought they’d be.

Lucas doesn’t stop anywhere. He doesn’t look at any of the faces on the street. I’d think he would at least give them a lingering look because I’m sure he knows most of the people here.

He is completely uninterested. He’s also become silent again. His back is straight. He’s clutching the steering wheel with both hands, and his eyes are darting in various directions around the road. His mind is obviously focused on visiting Ellie’s grave.

Or maybe I’m reading it wrong. Maybe he’s fighting the urge to scream or cry. Maybe he has a lump in his throat because he remembers things. He sees all these familiar places in the streets, and he might remember all the times he spent with Ellie.

All the times he was robbed of.

I still don’t feel any jealousy toward her. It would be wrong.

Many women would feel inadequate in a situation like mine. You have a husband who had this seemingly perfect fiancé before me, whose loss he still mourns. I admit I’ve felt that way in moments, but I no longer look at it like that.

I know Ellie was flawed. I know she was only human like me. It becomes easy for us to forget all the bad things and memorize only the good after a person dies. We start to regret not cherishing them more while they were still alive. We blame ourselves for their death. We wonder what we could have done differently and if they would still be with us today.

Those thoughts don’t ever kill. They devour to the bone and leave us with agonizing wounds. They reopen those wounds the moment they start healing. Eventually, when we can no longer bear the pain, we end ourselves.

Lucas is past that. Or, at least, I’d like to believe he is. If he’s not, I’ll be here for him.

“Well, we’re here,” he says as he parks in front of a cemetery.

It’s not a huge place. I can see an army of headstones that sprout from the lush, grassy ground. There’s a chapel in the distance. The entire area is gated off.

Lucas kills the engine then puts his hands back on the steering wheel. He’s staring into empty space, bracing himself for what’s to come.

I put a hand on his thigh.

“Come on. Let’s go see Ellie,” I say.

He looks at me, and the gaze of confusion is replaced by warmth. He knows I’m here for him, and I can see that it’s causing relief to wash over him.

“Yeah,” He nods.” Let’s do it.”

We get out of the car and step inside the cemetery.

Chapter 17

“It’s… it’s over there.” Lucas points.

I think I detect trembling in his hand, but I’m not sure. His voice, though, is very perceptibly shaking.

“Do you need some time alone with her?” I ask.

“No. I want you with me,” he says.

I take his hand and we walk across the grass. We stop in front of a lonesome headstone. The name ELLIE DANNER adorns it. It’s well-maintained. The grass around it is trimmed, the grave kept clean.

“Hi, Ellie,” Lucas says. “It’s been a while. Three years, I think? It’s funny how time flies. It feels like I stood here only yesterday. If I’d known I’d leave so soon, I would have returned to say goodbye. I couldn’t bear the thought of saying goodbye, though. I guess I felt as though it would mean I’d have to let you go. If I never said goodbye, it means you’d be with me forever.”

I’m staring at the headstone but listening intently to everything Lucas is saying.

“But I have to let you go,” he says. “I can’t hold on to you forever.”

He pauses for a moment. “Terry Koplin is dead. I killed him with my own hands. But I know that’s not what you would have wanted. That revenge was for me.”

This time, the pause is longer, around a minute from what I can estimate.

“You always told me that, if something happened to you and I started dating again, you’d haunt me as a ghost. I know you were just joking. I know you’d want me to live my life. Plus, I haven’t experienced anything paranormal, so…”

He lets out a small chuckle that ends with a choke. I resist the urge to hug him. It’s not what he would want right now. If I hold him, he’s going to start crying, and what he really wants right now is to finish talking to Ellie.

“You know, it took me a long time to actually get out of my cave and start dating again. I’m married now, Ellie,” he says. “To the kindest and most loving woman in the world. She’s right here with me. Her name’s Chloe. You would have liked her. I’m sure you would have liked her.”

It sounds as if he’s trying to convince himself.

“I guess I just wanted to see you one last time. I’m not going to spend any more time regretting the past. I thought revenge would make the pain go away, at least a little, but that big hole was still here. You were still gone, and nothing I could do would bring you back. There are some things in life that are out of our control, and it’s how we deal with them that defines what will happen to us.”

He reaches into his pocket and pulls out Ellie’s necklace—the one I found in the metal box.

“You remember when I got this for you? It was our anniversary. You never said you wanted it, but I saw you eyeing it in the window one time when we were at the mall. I noticed such small things about you. I didn’t need to ask you. I just snuck out and bought it one day. I loved seeing the look of happiness on your face. It wasn’t even so much the necklace that made you happy. It was the fact that I knew you so well I could tell you wanted it.”

He lets out another somber laugh, sniffles, and wipes his face.

“It’s time for me to let go, Ellie. It’s the only way I’ll ever be able to move forward. I know you’d understand.”

He sniffles, bends down to gently place the necklace on the grave, and straightens his back.

“Thank you for being a part of my life,” he says.

He finally turns to face me. Tears are glistening in his eyes and sliding down his cheeks.

Now’s the right time. I hug him tighter than I ever have. We both cry for what feels like hours. When we’re done, he kisses me. I feel his salty tears on my lips.

“I love you, Chloe,” he says.

“I love you, too,” I say.

He casts one final glance in the direction of Ellie’s grave. The necklace that sits on top of it looks divine. I wonder for a moment if anyone’s going to steal it. It’s a possibility, but that doesn’t matter anymore.

It’s not about what happens to the necklace. Even if it stays here, time and the elements will erode it away, just like the grave, until Ellie’s name is no longer discernible.

Visiting the grave and leaving the necklace was a symbolic way for Lucas to finish the final chapter of his book with Ellie.

Sure enough, the moment we’re outside the cemetery, Lucas’s demeanor seems to change. He’s smiling more and is more talkative. When we’re in the car, his mood drops once more.

“What’s wrong?” I ask.

He looks in my direction for a long moment as if contemplating whether to tell me or not. Finally, he does. I can tell even before he opens his mouth that visiting Ellie’s grave was not the last of it. It was supposed to be, but Lucas is not done just yet.

“I want to go back to those woods,” he says.

Chapter 18

Lucas is staring at me expectantly. I can vaguely feel my mouth forming into shapes, but I’m unable to speak. He just stares at me, waiting for an answer. I can tell this means a lot to him.

“You want to go back to the woods?” I finally manage.

“Yes.” He nods.

“The ones where you…”

The ones where you killed Terry Koplin, I want to say, but I don’t finish the sentence.

“Yes, the one where I went missing for three months,” Lucas says.

“Jesus, Lucas. Why would you ever want to go there?”

Lucas exhales. He stares down for a moment before responding with, “Redemption.”

“What? Redemption for what? For killing Terry?”

“Yes.”

“Lucas, he killed Ellie. He deserved it.”

“I shouldn’t have killed him.”

“You did what the justice system failed to do right.”

“It wasn’t my choice to make.”

I shift slightly in the car seat so that I’m facing Lucas. “Luke. He’s dead. And even if he were alive, you think he’d forgive you? No, because scum like him doesn’t do that. If God himself climbed down and gave Terry another chance, he wouldn’t use it to forgive you. He’d use it to kill you because that’s what people like him do. They take, and they leave broken messes behind.”

I’ve raised my voice too much, but I don’t care. It makes me angry that Lucas wants to offer any kind of sympathy toward a man like Terry Koplin. It’s clear that Lucas is a lot harder on himself for the murder than I am on him.

“You don’t understand, Chloe,” Lucas says. “This isn’t for him. It’s for me.”

“You want to forgive yourself?”

“Yes.”

“You don’t have to go to that awful place to do that, Lucas.”

“No, I do. I really, really do. I have to go there so I can fully feel the guilt of my crimes. It’s the only way I’ll ever be able to change for the better.”

I don’t like this. This doesn’t sound like the man I married. Then again, I’ve never seen him in such emotional distress, and that makes me realize something.

This is a turning point for our marriage. What stance I take will determine how much he’ll trust me in the future when he has another emotionally painful situation like now. If I show I’m not willing to support him, he won’t trust me again.

“Lucas…” I say, realizing I’m cornered.

“Chloe, look,” he interrupts. “I’m going there whether you like it or not. I’m sorry, but I have to. And I’m going there without you.”

“Are you out of your mind? I’m not letting you go there on your own.”

“You’re not my mother, Chloe.”

“I’m your wife! And if you think you get to just walk away again because you’re feeling lost, and leave me to wonder if you’re ever going to come back again, then you’re out of your damn mind because I’m coming with you even if I have to walk barefoot through thorns!”

I’m crying. I don’t want to cry, but I can’t stop the tears from flowing.

“Chloe, babe…” Lucas wipes my tears away.

“Don’t you understand? You’re not alone anymore. Every decision you make impacts the people around you who care about you. What would I do if something happened to you? Huh?!”

“Honey.”

“I wouldn’t have a reason to stick around, either. You wouldn’t be ruining just your life. You’d be ruining mine, too. Do you ever think of that?”

“Chloe.” His hands firmly grab my shoulders, and it’s enough to snap me out of my hysteria. “You’re right.”

“I am?” I ask.

“Yes. About going to the woods. You’re right. Let’s not go there.”

I start crying even harder. Lucas embraces me and holds me tightly until I calm down.

“Let’s go home,” he says.

I nod and wipe the remainder of my tears. He turns the key, and the engine whirs to life. He turns onto the road and starts slowly driving out of Mirstone. I guess we won’t be talking to Chief Brian Davis after all. I think right now, the best thing we can do is leave this place.

There’s something about this town I don’t like. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but there’s a sad aura around it, or maybe it’s the setting sun that’s making me feel that way. An orange sky has always made me sad for some reason, and I could never explain why.

As we’re driving down the street, I see Lucas looking both ways, as if absorbing the sights of Mirstone one final time before we leave. I see a profound sadness on his face that he’s not sharing with me. We’ll be out of here soon, and I’m hoping he’ll get better then.

I’m staring at the coniferous trees stretching off the side of the road. Somewhere deep in those woods is where Lucas killed Terry Koplin. Somewhere in there must be dozens, if not hundreds of dead bodies belonging to hikers who get lost every year.

I wonder if Koplin even would have survived those woods had Lucas not killed him. Just navigating them must be difficult as hell when you’re well-supplied and not running from every police department in the country.

Nature is unforgiving. If you don’t respect it even for just a second, you’ll find yourself dead. Nobody can outsmart it or defeat it by force. Nature was here before any of us, and it will continue to ravage the planet long after we are gone.

The sign NOW LEAVING MIRSTONE looms ahead of us. Once we get past it, the trip home will become smooth.

I look at Lucas. I can no longer gauge what he’s thinking. His expression has taken on a reticence that’s impossible to read. There could be a hundred thoughts racing through that head, or there could be nothing.

Lucas claims he’s a terrible poker player, but I bet he’s just being humble. I can imagine him with that face on card game night, winning round after round.

What am I doing?

The NOW LEAVING MIRSTONE sign is only a few dozen feet away. My eyes keep drifting to the trees.

I’m being selfish here by not letting Lucas do what he came to do. He came here for a conclusion, and I’m taking that away from him because I’m too selfish to let him go back.

Ten feet away.

“Stop the car!” I shout.

Lucas slams the brakes so hard I lurch forward. The seatbelt saves me from slamming my nose against the dashboard.

“Jesus, Chloe!” Lucas shouts. “What gives?!”

“Sorry. Sorry,” I say, fixing my hair. “Turn the car around.

“What?” he asks.

“Turn the car around.”

“Why?”

“Because we’re going to the woods.”

PART 3

Chapter 19

We still have at least two hours of daylight left. More than enough to do what Lucas wants to do.

Honestly, I don’t even know what he’s going to do. Sit in the woods and meditate until he gets a sign?

Whatever it is, I’m coming with him.

The woods themselves don’t seem as daunting as they did in my mind. There’s a certain serenity to them. It’s been a while since I went out for a hike like this, and I start to remember why I like it.

The air that smells of pines and grass, the sight of branches swaying from the wind, the sound of the birds chirping all add to the experience.

“Chloe?” Lucas calls out to me on the trail.

“What is it?” I ask.

“Thanks for coming here with me,” he says.

I don’t reply. I take his hand, and we continue walking.

The trail splits multiple times, and each time, there’s a sign that says where it leads and how many miles it is.

“So, where exactly are we going?” I ask.

“To the cabin where I killed Terry Koplin,” Lucas says.

The mood of the woods suddenly shifts. I somehow knew we were heading there, but it still chills me to hear Lucas say it.

I don’t question him. If he needs to go there to face his demons, I won’t stop him. I don’t know if I can enter the cabin because it would be too much for me, but I will at least wait outside.

About thirty minutes later, Lucas starts looking left off the trail for something. I ask him what he’s staring at, but he gives me a vague response. Then, he stops and says, “Here.”

He points to a thin, overgrown path leading away from the trail. It would be easy to miss it if not looking closely. It’s clearly not a part of the designated trail.

“What’s that?” I ask.

“This will lead us to the cabin,” Lucas says.

“Is it safe?”

“Sure. I know the way. Come on.”

He motions for me to follow him and steps onto the trail. He has to push the foliage out of the way, which swallows him as soon as he takes a few steps deeper. Out of fear of losing him, I rush after him.

The path we’re traversing makes me realize that I like going out in nature but only when it’s in a controlled environment, meaning I’m on a trail that I know is safe according to the safety standards of whoever decides those things.

On this trail here, I feel like anything can happen.

It’s so thin I have to be careful with each step I take, and I have to walk behind Lucas. I need to spend a lot of the time stooping or stepping over roots. I also need to keep pushing brambles and swatting insects out of the way.

It’s also much, much darker in here because the canopies and everything else in the way are obscuring the sun. And it’s slowly setting.

“How much longer, Lucas?” I ask.

“Just a bit more,” he responds after a moment of delay.

It might be my imagination, but I think he’s increasing his pace. No, it’s not my imagination. I’m forced into a light run to keep up with him. I keep asking him every now and again how much longer we’ve got. He stops responding after a while.

I dread the thought of going back this same way. How much more daylight do we have? I hope we make it out before sundown because I’m already panicking at the thought of being stuck overnight in these woods.

The same woods where Lucas supposedly disappeared.

“Lucas, I think we should turn back,” I say at one point.

He cranes his neck toward me from the front. It’s the first time since we stepped onto this path that he looks at me and shows concern. That alone is enough to slightly alleviate my panic.

“Just a few more minutes, honey. I promise,” he says.

“Okay.” I continue after him.

Another five grueling minutes later, and suddenly we’re out in a clearing. I can’t express how relieved I am to be out of that claustrophobia-inducing path. I don’t care anymore that we’ll have to use it later. Right now, I’m just happy to have space to move more than two-dimensionally.

“Here we are,” Lucas says.

Only then do I see the old cabin standing in the middle of the clearing.

Chapter 20

Old doesn’t even begin to describe the cabin.

Part of the roof has caved in. The logs it consists of have started to rot. The door looks like it’s barely hanging onto the hinges.

“Is this it?” I ask and then realize what a stupid question it is.

No, this is a different cabin than the one we’re supposed to visit, I jokingly think to myself.

“This is where it happened,” Lucas says.

His tone is somewhat different—deeper, laced with a darkness I have never heard from him before.

“Come on,” he says.

“Um… I think I’ll wait here, Lucas,” I say.

If I didn’t know any better, I would have thought this old cabin was just that. But I do know what happened, and my mind is conjuring up all sorts of images of the interior—severed limbs, rotting strips of flesh, bloodstained walls and floors, rusted tools left abandoned in the middle of a workbench…

Chances are, nothing like that is in there, and it’s only my wild imagination playing tricks on me, but it had happened to Terry Koplin, right inside this cabin.

Lucas is facing me, baffled by my response. Even before he can try to convince me, I feel the first droplets of cold rain on my face. I look up and realize why I thought it was so dark back on the pathway.

The sun has disappeared behind the bevy of dark clouds, and rain is coming.

“Guess we have no choice. Come on, we’ll wait for the rain to stop inside the cabin,” Lucas says.

I can be miserable soaking wet in the rain, or I can be miserable but dry inside the cabin where Terry Koplin got killed.

I choose the latter.

Lucas opens the creaking door and gestures for me to go inside. I barge in just as the rain picks up. Lucas steps inside and closes the door behind us.

The hole in the roof lets enough light pour in so that it’s not completely dark. The cabin is empty, and I never would have known anything happened inside if I happened to stumble into it.

Still, my eyes dart from spot to spot as I wonder where and how it happened.

Was Terry Koplin strapped to the floor and sliced bit by bit? Did any of the hikers hear his screams echo in the woods and shrugged it off? How long did it take for him to die?

Lucas is staring through the crack of the door. He shakes his head and says, “Looks like a downpour. I hope it stops soon.”

I don’t say anything. I’m standing with my arms crossed, staving off the uneasy feeling in my chest. I feel trapped in here even though I know that’s not the case. It feels as though someone is still lurking nearby.

Perhaps the ghost of Terry Koplin.

I immediately dismiss that thought as soon as it enters my mind.

“Hey. You okay, babe?” Lucas is next to me, his hand reassuringly on my cheek.

“Uh-huh.” I lie.

I can tell he knows I’m not fine.

“We’ll be out of here before you know it,” he says.

I try to smile, but I don’t think I manage more than a rictus.

Lucas goes back to the door and stares out into the rain. I see his eyebrows downturning into a furrow.

“What’s wrong?” I ask.

“I think I just saw someone out there,” he says.

“Who?” Another stupid question on my end.

“I don’t know.” He shakes his head.

He opens the door wide, which lets the sound of falling rain seep into the cabin much louder.

“Hello?” he calls out. “Is someone there?”

I don’t know why, but the whole ordeal makes me feel uneasy.

“Lucas, maybe you were just imagining things,” I say.

“No, someone was definitely out there,” he insists. “I’m gonna go check it out.”

“What?! You can’t, it’s pouring!”

Frankly, I’m afraid of staying inside the cabin on my own, but I’m also afraid of letting Lucas go out into the rain with whoever is out there. Logic tells me that whoever’s skulking around this cabin so deep in the woods can only be trouble.

“I’ll be right back, okay?” Lucas asks.

“Lucas, wait!”

But before I can protest any further, he’s out the door and racing out of sight while shielding his head from the rain. It’s futile because his hair and shoulders are drenched within seconds. A minute out there and he’s going to be soaking.

“Lucas!” I shout and hardly hear myself over the downpour.

But Lucas has disappeared somewhere around the cabin. The rain splashes the front steps with such intensity that it’s soaking my shoes and ankles, so I retreat, close the door, and pray for Lucas to come back soon.

The cabin doesn’t have any windows, which only makes me even more claustrophobic.

I feel buzzing on my thigh and immediately recognize it as my cellphone. I pull it out, expecting a call from Lucas. It’s not him.

It’s Christopher.

Bad time, Christopher. Bad frigging time.

I’m compelled to decline the call, but I think being stuck in this cabin makes me want to hear another person’s voice even if it’s Christopher. On a whim, I slide the button to answer the call, not considering what would happen if Lucas caught me speaking to him.

“Hello?” I say.

Someone on the other end clears his throat, and then a gruff voice speaks up. “Hello? Who am I speaking to?”

“Uh, this is Chloe.”

“Chloe? Chloe who? Do I owe you any money?”

“No, sir.”

“Are you with the police?”

“I’m not.”

“Well then, what do you want? I had a missed call from this number a few weeks back, and you refused to answer.”

I don’t have time to elaborate before he cuts me off with each question.

“I called to ask about Terry Koplin. I heard the two of you were cellmates,” I say.

The line goes silent.

“Hello? Are you still there?” I ask.

“Listen, I don’t know anything about—”

“I’m not going to get you in trouble or anything like that, Mr. Payne. I just wanted to know more about Terry Koplin.”

“Why?”

I hesitate. I can’t tell him it’s because Lucas killed him. “Because he killed my husband’s fiancé.”

Christopher lets out a sound. It could be laughter or just clearing his throat.

“Koplin was a monster. He killed lots of people.”

“What can you tell me about him?”

“Listen, I don’t think I should be talking about it.”

“Mr. Payne, please. I just need some information, and then I swear you’ll never hear from me again. I know you’re out of prison and you’re trying to turn your life around. I won’t do anything to jeopardize that.”

Christopher exhales then asks, “What do you want to know?”

I approach the door and crack it open to look for Lucas. He’s still gone, and I’m starting to become worried. This phone call is helping me take my mind off things.

“Anything,” I say.

“Well, like I said, Koplin was a monster. He and I didn’t share a cell for long, thank Jesus for that.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because he was the worst inmate in prison. One time, he stabbed another inmate’s eyes out just because he looked at him the wrong way. I reckon he spent more days in the shoe than he did in gen pop.”

I cannot imagine being in a place like that, always having to watch your back, even when you’re sleeping.

“You said you shared a cell with him for a little bit?” I ask.

“Mhm. About two months or so. Worst two months of my life. I’d go to sleep and wonder if I’d wake up in the morning. He was a psychopath. Good with mind games, too.”

“What do you mean?”

“You never knew where you stood with him. One day, he would act all polite and offer you a cigarette, no strings attached. Another day, he’d get in your face and threaten to kill you if you didn’t return double what he gave you.”

“Sounds like a psychopath.”

“Yeah. I still shudder when I hear someone speaking like him in the street.”

“Speaking like him? What do you mean?”

“His accent.”

I’m waiting for Christopher to continue. I vaguely realize I’m shivering, and I don’t know if it has anything to do with the rain.

“Accent?” I ask.

“Yeah. Terry’s parents moved here from overseas when he was a teen, and he retained a slight accent because of that. Hello? Are you still listening?”

“Yes, Mr. Payne. I’m here,” I say with a ghastly voice. It takes me a lot of effort to focus because my mind is stuck on what Christopher just said. “Um… what kind of an accent did Terry have?”

“I don’t know. Russian or some shit, I don’t even know.”

My heart is pumping vigorously. I no longer feel cold. In fact, my palms are clammy, and I feel suffocated in the cabin.

“And how strong was it? His accent, I mean,” I ask.

Christopher lets out phlegmatic coughs, spits, then says, “Not very. You could only hear it in certain words when he slipped. Look, can I go now? I really don’t want to talk about Terry Koplin anymore. The man still gives me nightmares.”

My lungs feel like they’re being pressed by a vise. I gulp against the lump in my throat and say, “One final question, Mr. Payne.”

“Fine. What is it?”

“Did Terry happen to have a small scar on the back of his head? Shaped like the letter c?”

An eternity passes. I hear the door open behind me.

“False alarm. No one’s there,” Lucas says.

I’m frozen. I can’t move a muscle. The phone is pressed tightly against my ear, and I hear Lucas’s footsteps slowly drawing closer to me. I feel his breath on the nape of my neck.

“Yes,” Christopher finally says.

Chapter 21

“Hello? Lady? You still there?” Christopher’s voice resounds on the line.

I don’t respond. I lower the phone from my ear—slowly because I don’t want to arouse suspicion—and I hang up. My fingers are trembling as if I’m suffering from Parkinson’s disease.

I can still feel Lucas’s breath on my neck. It’s even closer now.

“Who were you talking to?” Lucas asks.

Does he know? What do I tell him? Is he going to kill me if I give him the wrong answer?

Is he going to kill me regardless?

“Chief Davis,” I lie.

“Oh?” Lucas raises his eyebrows. “What did he want?”

“Some folks in town recognized our car, so he called to see what we’re doing here.”

“Interesting.”

“Yeah. He said we should stop by and catch up if we find the time.”

I’m impressed with myself at how smoothly the lie leaves my mouth. Lucas’s nodding tells me he bought it.

We’re locked in a staring contest, and I’m struggling not to show how utterly scared I am. Just when I think I can no longer stand his gaze, he averts his head toward the door.

“Um, I think the rain’s stopping. We should probably head back before night falls,” I say.

I try to walk past Lucas, but he outstretches a hand to block my path and puts it on the wall next to me.

“Why the rush, honey? I still haven’t made my amends,” he says.

“I really want to go home, Lucas.”

“Why?”

“Please let me pass. I can’t stay in this cabin a moment longer.”

But Lucas doesn’t comply. He keeps staring at me with a look of bemusement.

“I know you didn’t speak to the chief, Chloe,” he finally says.

Those words are sharp enough to cut through stone.

“What do you mean?” I ask. “Chief Davis is the one who called me.”

“No, he isn’t. I know you’re lying.”

“Please, let’s just go home, Lucas.”

“Why would you lie to me about something like that?”

“It’s going to get dark soon. We should really head back.”

“I know the way even in the dark. I was here for three months…”

“I know, but—”

“…when I killed Lucas Smith and took his identity.”

The air freezes in an instant. It’s like a mini-ice age is happening right inside the cabin. It becomes so quiet that a needle dropping to the floor could be heard. I don’t even hear the patter of the rain outside anymore.

I can see my husband’s face slowly twisting in a sadistic grin. Lucas—no, Terry—is enjoying this. He’s planned this all along, and I realize too late that I don’t know this man and never have. The life I’ve built with Lucas is a lie because Lucas is dead and had been long before we ever met.

I’m suddenly hit with a bunch of emotions.

Some of them are familiar like the pain of losing a loved one. Despite never having known Lucas, I strangely feel as though I’ve just been told my husband has died.

With that comes the pain of a million knives stabbing every inch of my body. It’s as if all the pain in the world had been sealed into a jar, and now that jar is finally open, unleashing every agony all at once. My gut urges me to double over, but I resist that instinct.

Many of the other emotions are foreign to me, and I can’t even pinpoint if they’re good or bad, let alone what they are. I’m assuming I would have figured them all out in time if I lived to tell the tale.

Which I won’t because Terry Koplin is going to kill me here just as he killed Lucas.

“Why?” I manage a cracked word.

“Why what?” he asks, still grinning.

“Why bring me here to kill me? Why kill me at all? We had a happy life!”

Tears are streaming down my face.

“No, you had a happy life,” he says.

I take a step back. I think for a moment he’s going to come after me, but he remains still with his hand on the wall.

“They’re going to know you killed me, and they’re going to find out who you are. You’re gonna go back to prison, Terry,” I say.

“I wouldn’t count on that, honey,” he says.

It disgusts me to hear him call me that. I look left and right for something to help me. The cabin is empty.

My ribcage tightens. I don’t want to die. Not in here. Not like Lucas, so deep in the woods that no one would ever hear me scream and where no one would ever find me.

Just like Lucas.

That sheer panic is more than enough to make my rational thinking pop like a balloon.

I break into a dash past Terry. He doesn’t try to stop me until I’m already past him. His fingers graze the hem of my sleeve. It spurs me to bolt even faster.

As I swing the door open, I fully expect to feel Terry’s arms wrap around me from behind, which they don’t. I run out into the rain, and straight across the clearing toward the foliage.

I don’t see the path Terry and I took to get here, and I don’t have time to look for it, so I just run in the general direction of where I think it is. Either it’s luck or something else, but I stumble directly into the path, and I thank God as I run.

The low branches whip and scratch my face, and the cold rain batters me no matter how sheltered I am by the trees. My shoes splash with each step, and my socks are completely drenched.

Then, I step into deep mud, and as I go to take another step, I fall headlong as my foot slips out of the stuck shoe. Mud splashes me in the face and enters my mouth, but the heavy rain is here to wash it all away.

I look back, and I hear the rustling of the branches. I can’t tell if it’s from the wind or from Terry coming after me.

Rather than waiting, I plant my palms on the ground, ignoring that they sink into the soft muck, and propel myself into a sprint forward. I don’t even mind not having one shoe on. I just want to get out of here and reach the town so I can call for help.

In my mind, I’m already calculating how long it’s going to take me to get back to the road. Too darn long. Terry will have a chance to catch up with me ten times by then.

He’s faster, and he’s definitely stronger, and the rain would muffle my screams even if I’d get close to the road and some passerby happens to be close.

The rustling seems to be getting closer, or maybe that’s just my panicked mind conjuring such thoughts. I keep pushing through, constantly looking behind myself. I don’t even see the figure in front of me until I bump into it.

The next thing I know, I’m on my rear, and I’m staring up at Terry, pleading with him not to hurt me.

Except the figure isn’t Terry. It’s a person clad in a raincoat. I don’t immediately see who’s under that hood, but then the person speaks up.

“Chloe?”

I recognize that soft voice, and I’m so relieved that I’ve run into anyone other than Terry.

“Mary!” I shout as I hop to my feet.

I only then see Mary’s eyes scanning me with confusion. I look behind.

No rustling, but I know we’re almost out of time.

“Chloe, what are you doing here?” Mary asks.

“Mary, there’s no time. We have to get out of here!”

“What’s going on? Where’s Lucas?”

“We have to get out of here right away!”

But Mary isn’t listening. I’m trying to pull her so we can get away from here, but she’s stopping me and telling me I’m not making any sense.

I then hear rustling behind me. For real this time.

“Oh, no. No-no-no. He’s coming. Please, we have to go, Mary!”

“Is that Lucas?” Mary asks. “Lucas, we’re here!”

“You don’t understand! If he catches us—”

“Don’t worry, Chloe, Lucas will be here in a bit, and we can then sort all this out, okay? Just try to remain calm.”

“Stop! You don’t get it!”

The brambles behind me are moving. Whoever is in them is getting closer. I know I can’t spare any more time trying to convince Mary.

I try to push past her, but her hand is firmly on my wrist, and she’s reassuring me that everything will be okay and that Lucas will be here any moment now.

“Stop it! Let me go!” I shout.

“Please, calm down, Chloe,” Mary says.

The rustling is getting closer and closer until I hear it directly behind me.

That’s when it stops.

I don’t need to turn around. I can feel Terry’s presence right behind me. Mary’s eyes flit to him then back at me. Her mouth stretches into a lopsided grin just as a hand squeezes my wrist from behind.

“You know I couldn’t let you get away, sweetheart,” she says.

Chapter 22

Being shoved back toward the cabin while I struggle and plead with all my might feels like sinking into water with weights strapped to my ankles.

“Please! Don’t do this to me, please!” I beg them.

It’s futile. Terry’s grip is way too strong. Every time I resist, he pulls my hand up behind my back slightly higher so that it causes a twinge in my arm. If he continues, my arm is going to break.

More than once, I get the urge to call out to him and tell him to spare me by using his fake name: Lucas. I stop myself before even the L comes out of my mouth because it’s not Lucas.

Lucas is dead. Killed by Terry Koplin.

My pleading turns into whimpering when we break into the clearing and I see the cabin in front of me again. It no longer looks like some abandoned house where a person got killed long ago. It looks like an execution chamber.

My execution chamber.

The rain has slowed from a downpour to a light sprinkle. I don’t feel it anymore. I’m solely focused on the cabin. That dark, damp place will be the last thing I see before I die.

Terry pushes me through the door so hard I fall on the floor. I just barely manage to stop my face from hitting the wet, wooden planks by putting my palms out in front of me. My hair falls into my face, and I lie there for a second, regaining my breath.

It’s difficult to breathe because of the physical exertion I’ve subjected myself to and the sheer terror that grips my chest like an iron claw.

Mary and Terry’s footsteps gyrate around me, and I hear the door closing. I push my hair back and get up into a sitting position. I see the two of them standing above me, staring down like I’m a garbage bag that needs to be disposed of.

“What are you going to do to me?” I ask.

There’s a need for answers in what we think are our final hours of life. We need to know there’s a reason behind all of this. That it’s not just sadistic slaughter—so that we can find comfort in our death, no matter how tiny it is.

But sometimes, a kill is just a kill.

“All right, you bring the tools?” Terry asks.

Mary pulls the hood of her raincoat back. She still has the post-surgery mask on her face. Some droplets of rain had made it onto her face, making the visible parts of her skin glisten, but she doesn’t seem to mind.

She takes her raincoat off and drops it on the floor, revealing a backpack she’s had this entire time beneath it.

“Knock yourself out. Just make it quick. I want to get to our new home soon,” Mary says.

She slinks out of the backpack straps and drops the bag on the floor on top of the raincoat.

Terry smiles at Mary.

“Our new home,” he echoes what she said.

She smiles back, and they kiss each other passionately.

“What’s going on?” I ask. “Why are you doing this to me?”

They both turn to face me. Both have amused looks on their faces.

“You won’t get away with this. The police will realize I’m missing, and they’re going to look for me,” I say.

Any reaction I hoped to get from them falls short when they continue smiling.

“Whatever do you mean?” Mary asks.

She reaches up and starts unwrapping the bandages. They fall to the floor where they’re soaked from the rain. Then, Mary gently takes the mask off and lowers it.

I gasp.

“I’m you. And I’m not going to disappear. You are,” Mary says.

Her face is swollen and bruised from the plastic surgeries, but I can’t not notice the uncanny similarities between us. Her facial features look exactly like mine.

“What the hell are you talking about?! What is this all about?” I snap.

Meanwhile, Terry is squatting above the backpack, rummaging through it. I hear something metallic rustling inside. Moments later, he takes out a tool that makes my blood freeze.

A bone saw.

What else is in that backpack? If I could get a tool that could hurt these two enough, I could get out and call for help.

Something tells me running isn’t an option, though. No. Mary and Terry will need to die if I ever am to live peacefully again.

“This plan took us a long time to create,” Mary says.

“Yeah. And you almost exposed us when you found that box,” Terry says. “See, I knew that you had found the box that one day when I caught you in my office, but I knew you hadn’t opened it yet. I couldn’t just remove it, though, because you’d know I was hiding something. So, I left a little bit of evidence inside while removing the rest. Too bad for you, though. You found the article and the necklace, but if you had managed to open it earlier, you would have found my old ID locked up in there, and you’d know who I was all along.”

He puts the bone saw on the floor and digs through the backpack until he fishes out a giant cleaver.

“Why are you helping him?” I turn to Mary.

She shrugs. “Because we love each other.”

“I knew Mary and I were made for each other the moment she sent me that first letter to prison,” Terry says.

“It took us a while to find someone who looks as close to Terry as possible. What a coincidence that it happens to be the guy whose fiancé Terry killed.”

“But the DNA test…” I’m confused.

“Oh, that? That was easy.” Terry waves. “That bruise on my arm? It wasn’t from how they drew blood. It was from a tube I had inserted under my skin.”

“What?”

“A thin tube containing Lucas’s blood. I got it in there so that when they draw it, they got his DNA. You gotta admit, that was clever, right?”

“You monsters,” I hiss.

It makes sense how he got Ellie’s necklace now. He must have stolen it off her corpse after he strangled her in those woods. These two people are murderers.

“But after Terry killed another person, he got arrested, the poor thing. Not long after Terry and I started exchanging letters, I moved in with Lucas, helped Terry break out, then lured Lucas into the woods where Terry and I killed him. That was so much fun. He cried so much while we cut him up. I wonder how loud you’ll be.”

“Why three months, though?” I ask.

I’m only stalling while I desperately look for a way out of this predicament.

“I needed to lose weight and grow my hair and beard to look like him,” Terry says. “Three months lost in the woods and anyone would become unrecognizable, and Lucas and I already looked alike.”

It would be easy for anyone to mistake Terry for Lucas. Chief Davis had said himself that Lucas hadn’t looked good ever since Ellie’s death. And then the disappearance…

Terry was able to roll in and claim he was Lucas.

“And you and I look just alike, too,” Mary says.

“You plan to take my identity?” I ask.

“I don’t plan to. I will.”

“It will never work. People will know it’s not me,” I retort.

“Unfortunately, you’re going to be lost in the woods far longer than poor Lucas. When you come out… when I come out, I’m going to tell them I got lost and everything is okay now. By then, the plastic surgeries will make it impossible for anyone to tell it’s not me.”

“And if people go looking for Mary?”

“Mary has no family. Nobody cares about her enough to go looking for her.”

“Enough talk,” Terry says. He stands from the backpack with a scalpel in his hand. “You want to have the first cut?”

“I sure do,” Mary says as she reaches for the scalpel.

They’re distracted. Now’s my only chance. The only thing I have is the phone in my pocket.

Without thinking, I pull it out and chuck it at Mary.

I’m very bad when it comes to throwing things. When I want to toss a chocolate bar or something to Lucas from the kitchen to the couch, it usually ends up on the other end of the room.

That’s why I think God is protecting me today because the phone lands directly on Mary’s nose with its edge. I hear a crack, and Mary yelps as she drops the scalpel and raises her hands to her face.

I’m already on my feet and bolting for the door, ignoring the sight of Mary holding her face with blood running down her nose.

“Bitch!” she yells.

They’re too late. I’m already through the door and running out into the clearing.

“Stop her!” Mary shrieks.

A hand wraps around my ankle. I hit the ground for the nth time tonight, and I don’t even care anymore. My palms are abraded. I’m muddy all over and drenched from the rain.

But alive. For now.

“You’re not going anywhere!” Terry shouts.

I don’t even need to scan the ground for a weapon because I immediately notice the rock in front of me. I close my fingers around it just as Terry’s hand grips my shoulder. I spin as fast as I can and swing the rock in my hand.

I hope I’ll at least graze his face enough to stupefy him.

Once again, God must be on my side tonight because the rock hits Terry directly in the temple. A dull whack comes from the impact, and he topples sideways without a sound. That’s all I need to scramble up to my feet and run for the pathway leading back.

Chapter 23

Except I don’t make for the pathway this time. It would be too easy for them to catch me again.

I run directly into the tree line.

It’s much easier to run here, and I contemplate whether I’ve made a mistake going here because they’ll catch up easier. I look behind, and I don’t see them following. I hear Mary’s furious voice shouting after me like a banshee, and I know it won’t be long before she closes the distance.

I run between trees, not maintaining one straight direction because I don’t want them to locate me.

Only when I can no longer hear anything except my own panting do I realize just how much my lungs and legs are burning. I slink behind a tree and press my back against it, regaining my breath while listening for anything that might sound human.

The moment of respite also gives me enough time to contemplate how I got myself into this situation. My mind runs on 8x fast-forward as I replay everything that has happened in my life since I met Lucas… I mean Terry.

It’s as if the past few years have all happened within a matter of days. I feel new tears welling up in my eyes because it’s the only way I can express the overwhelming emotions that are battering me like the rain. I suppress the tears because survival is my priority right now.

I won’t get any second chances. Not with Terry and Mary.

The voices I hear in the vicinity jerk me back into survival mode. At first, I don’t hear what they’re saying, but then Terry’s voice cuts clearly through the thicket.

“She’s gotta be close by!” he says.

I dare to peek around the tree, ready to retreat the moment I feel like I’m in danger. I immediately see them a couple hundred feet away.

Mary and Terry are standing in the middle of the woods, their heads swiveling as they scan the treeline for me. Terry says something and motions in one direction then starts walking the opposite way. I can see that he has that giant knife in his hand. Mary is holding something, too, but I can’t tell what it is.

I yank myself back behind the cover of the tree trunk and take shallow breaths. It isn’t long before I start to hear wet footsteps approaching me. I have waited too long because they’ve reached me. It’s too late for me to move. If I do, they’ll know exactly where I am.

So, I stand still, press my back against the tree so hard that the bark digs into my skin, and hope they don’t notice me.

The footsteps travel from one end behind the tree to the other. They draw farther away then closer. They’re to my right now.

My eyes can’t see that far, so I turn my head, and a scream catches in my throat. Mary is standing twenty feet to my right, staring away from me, her head slowly turning in my direction. My eyes fall on the hammer in her hand. She’s gripping it so hard that her fingers have turned white.

I could try to tackle her. I have the element of surprise.

No, it’s too much distance. She’d hear me long before I got to her, and then I wouldn’t be able to run away.

Plus, she has that hammer. And she’s stronger than me.

I spend too long contemplating what to do because her head turns toward me. Her nose is still bleeding profusely. She hasn’t bothered to wipe it.

She sees me.

Her mouth stretches into a wide grin, revealing rows of bloodied teeth.

Her hammer is raised above her head as she breaks into a run after me. I let out a scream and dash in the opposite direction.

The panic causes me to stumble and almost hit the ground again, but I manage to remain on my feet.

“Stop running, bitch!” Mary shouts.

She’s right at my heels. Her fingers grab the collar of my shirt firmly, slowing me down. I know I have no choice but to fight her off.

I flail my arms as I spin, not aiming at anything in particular. The back of my hand connects with Mary’s nose once again and she stumbles back. Her heel catches something on the ground and she falls on her rear, the hammer slipping from her hand.

I’m so glad she did that surgery that makes her face so vulnerable to hits.

I don’t wait for her to get up. I run, run, run wherever my legs take me. I have no idea where I am, and I suddenly realize that the more I run, the deeper into the woods I might be going. I might end up lost.

Not lost like Terry but actually lost.

“Stop!” I hear Mary shout behind me.

I’m way ahead of her. I could laugh with relief. And then the worst possible thing that I can imagine happens.

My ankle twists, and I tumble onto the ground.

“Agh!” I let out a shout of pain as my ankle explodes with heat.

I don’t have the time to worry about it now. I push myself into a standing position, but the moment I put weight on my injured foot, it feels as though the bone in there is being put through a meat grinder. All I can manage is to hop on my good foot, but it’s slowing me down significantly.

Mary is catching up. I hear her laughter draw closer.

She’s right behind me, cackling like a maniac. Then she’s next to me. Then she’s in front of me, running backward while grinning at me.

I turn to run in the opposite direction but she blocks my path. Wherever I go, she blocks my path. The hammer is playfully dangling in her hand as she readies herself to use it.

That’s it. I’ve got nowhere to go.

Mary raises the hammer.

“Please, don’t!” I put my hands in front of myself in defense.

She brings the hammer down on my fingers. I manage to jerk my hands back just before the tool swipes the air, missing my digits by mere inches. I recoil so hard that now I’m the one who’s on the ground.

Mary takes a menacing step closer.

“Please, don’t kill me!” I beg as I scoot backward.

Mary’s grin grows wider. She’s not doing this just so she can take my identity. She’s enjoying this. Who said you can’t have a job and love it at the same time?

“I won’t kill you just yet,” Mary says. “I’ll put you to sleep. And then when you wake up, the fun actually starts.”

There’s absolutely no need to torture me before killing me. They can just kill me and be done with it. But Mary and Terry are psychopaths. They are going to make the final moments of my life a living hell just because they can.

Mary is right in front of me. The hammer is raised above her. I wonder how much it will hurt to be hit by it. I wonder how many hits I’ll have to take to go unconscious. I hope she overdoes it and kills me on the spot.

Mary’s face contorts into twisted pleasure. I see her arm tensing up as she readies to hit me, and then…

“Drop it!” a voice shouts.

Mary’s rigid expression goes slack as her eyes focus on something behind me. I twist my head to see Chief Brian Davis standing in the middle of the woods with his gun pointed at Mary.

Mary doesn’t do as he says. She remains frozen, staring at the chief with a baffled stare as if wondering what the hell another person is doing in the middle of the woods.

“You’re making a mistake, officer,” Mary says.

“Drop the weapon right now!” Davis orders.

But Mary’s lips curl into a smile.

“No,” she says, and I realize where her eyes are drifting.

I turn back to the chief to see a figure sneaking up to him from behind, an enormous knife in its hand.

“Chief, behind you!” I shout.

Chief Davis turns around just as Terry brings the knife down on him.

At the same time, Mary brings the hammer down on me.

Chapter 24

At the last moment, I roll to the side, and the hammer softly hits my shoulder. I use that opportunity to kick at Mary’s face with my good foot. My heel crushes her nose, and I hear a loud crack this time.

Three for three.

The cries that she lets out this time are that of a person in utter agony. She’s already dropped the hammer, and I don’t run this time. I squeeze my hand around the handle, and I swing the blunt side at Mary’s face.

The thud against her temple instantly silences her cries as she falls to the ground.

I turn around to see Terry and Chief Davis wrestling. Davis had managed to stop Terry’s knife by blocking his forearm, and they are now locked in a clinch, spinning in various directions.

Terry is stronger. He pushes at the chief with all his weight, and they both topple to the ground. The back of Davis’s uniform is immediately completely muddy. A gunshot explodes, but no one is evidently hurt because the two continue rolling on the ground for control.

Chief Davis is holding Terry’s knife hand while Terry is holding Davis’s pistol hand. Terry slams Davis’s hand on the ground over and over until the chief drops the pistol. Terry then reaches for it, but before he can get it, Davis punches him in the face and rolls on top of him where they continue fighting for the knife.

“Chief!” I cry out and break toward the pistol on the ground.

Before I take the third step, something collides with me from behind. Mary’s screaming is in my ear as she wrestles me to the ground.

In my moment of weightlessness, I’ve dropped the hammer, so I’m now completely unarmed, and Mary’s weight is on top of me, her hands gripping my shoulders.

“Enough games, bitch!” she hisses in my ear.

On a whim, I grab a clump of her hair and pull. She screams, but her fingers dig deeper into my shoulders. I clench my teeth against the pain and pull her hair harder. It feels as though I’ll rip it out like a handful of grass directly from the root.

I pull as hard as my remaining strength lets me, determined to get Mary off of me. Her nails finally release my shoulders, and her weight is off me. I scramble forward, right past the hammer.

“You stupid bitch!” Mary laughs.

But I don’t care about the hammer. I fall in front of Chief Davis’s handgun and grip it with both hands. It’s slick with rain and mud, but I hold a firm grip on it.

As I spin to point the gun at Mary, she stops laughing, the smug grin wiped off her face. She had already picked up the hammer and stood, ready to kill me with it.

After the initial moment of fear passes, she smiles again and asks, “What are you going to do? Shoot me?”

I’ve never used a gun in my life. I don’t even know how to take the safety off.

I do know one thing about it, though.

To use it, you have to point and pull the trigger.

That’s exactly what I do.

The bang and recoil that come from the gun startle me. A red dot appears in the middle of Mary’s chest, and her confident expression turns into a look of utter shock. She looks down at the ever-expanding red circle.

The hammer drops from her hand, and then she, too, falls. She ceases moving in seconds.

If this were a cliché Hollywood movie, I would have spent the next ten minutes harrowed at how I killed another human being. Instead, I take one look at Mary to make sure she’s dead, then I twist and point the gun at Terry.

He’s on top of the chief and using all his strength to bring the knife down on his throat. I can see the chief losing the battle. The tip is inching closer to his throat, and he won’t be able to hold it at bay for long.

In an attempt to divert the knife, the chief pushes Terry’s hands sideways, but it doesn’t stop the blade’s descent. Rather than embed itself in the chief’s throat, the knife pierces his shoulder. Blood blooms around the blade that sank into his flesh.

Chief Davis lets out a scream. Terry’s eyes are wide with enjoyment.

I fire a warning shot that whizzes right above Terry’s head.

He looks in my direction, surprise on his face.

“Get off him!” I command.

Terry lets go of the knife and backsteps. The chief groans as he scoots away, the knife still stuck firmly in his shoulder.

“Chief! Are you okay?!” I ask.

He gives me a ghost of a nod.

The moment I spend staring at Davis, I can see Terry closing distance toward me.

“Don’t move!” I point the gun more firmly at him, and he steps back with his hands in the air.

His face somersaults from one expression to another. He’s looking for a way out of this situation, I realize.

His features go slack, and he takes on a saddened expression. In that moment, he looks like Lucas. Like the man I fell in love with. The man whom I got married to and bought an apartment with, and built everything I know today with.

“Chloe, don’t do this, honey. Please,” he says.

It’s so convincing that I truly believe it’s Lucas standing in front of me, not Terry. I see the loving look in his eyes, and I suddenly feel the need to be held by him while I cry.

Tears blur my sight, and I shake my head to tell him to stay back. But he doesn’t. He keeps sauntering toward me, and I don’t stop him.

“We can go back to the way things were. Just you and me. We can be happy again,” he says.

“Shoot him!” Chief Davis says.

Terry is getting closer and closer with slow and deliberate steps. His eyes are locked on mine, and they are pleading eyes, eyes full of compassion and love.

“I love you, Chloe,” he says.

I love you too, the sentence is poised on my lips, but I don’t say it.

The compassion on his face is nothing more than a veil, broken when his eyes fall to the gun in my hands. In that instance, his face transforms into a rigid grimace, but it’s already too late.

Before he can even get a chance to steal the gun from me, I squeeze the trigger.

Another loud bang echoes in the air.

Terry stumbles backward. For a moment, it looks as though I’ve missed him, but then red spreads on his stomach.

He notices it and falls to his knees. He grabs his stomach with his hands, but blood flows abundantly between his fingers. He looks up at me, and he once again looks like Lucas. My Lucas, the man who I loved so hard that it hurt.

I can’t stop the whimper that escapes my lips. I fall to my knees in front of him as I begin sobbing. He puts a hand on my cheek, and I do the same to his. That touch is so familiar and yet so foreign, like trying to remember a cake you ate on vacation years ago.

“I loved you. I loved you more than anything,” I say through tears.

“I loved you, too,” he says.

I shake my head. “No. You didn’t.”

I press the barrel of the handgun to his stomach and pull the trigger again.

Terry slightly jackknifes. His mouth falls open in shock as he stares up at me with a pitiful glare. He lets out a small cough as he falls sideways. His eyes are fixed on me even as they become glassy.

I drop the handgun into the mud and bury my face in my hands. I sob like a child on my knees. I sob even as strong hands lift me up and carry me out of the woods. I sob on the way to the ambulance.

When the tears dry out, only numbness remains.

Epilogue

“How are you doing today, Chloe?” Doctor Elsa Warden asks with a wide grin.

I stare at her perfect teeth.

“Did you do something with your teeth, Doctor Warden?” I ask, skipping the pleasantries.

Last time I was here, her teeth were just as pretty, but not as perfect as today. I’m also noticing that she’s not wearing her eyeliner today. Her hair is glistening under the light slightly, indicating she hasn’t washed it in a couple of days, and her previously manicured nails now need a revisit to a beauty salon.

“Yes, Chloe. I had a bridge done. It’s something I’ve wanted to do for a while,” she says.

I keep staring into her eyes, trying to detect traces of familiarity. She definitely looks like Elsa Warden. The only different thing is the teeth, but that’s only from what I can see, and that’s why I’m looking at her hands.

The thick veins that usually protrude on the back of her hands are gone. Then again, it’s a little cold in here today.

Her body language seems unchanged, though—one leg across the other, back straight, shoulders squared, her hands resting one atop the other on her knee. It’s a very specific sitting position and one that only someone who knew Elsa Warden would know how to replicate.

There’s also a tiny mole on her neck. It was here the last time I visited.

I never noticed these things before. Nowadays, even the tiniest details don’t go unnoticed. Someone can change their perfume or use a different brand of makeup, or wear something they don’t usually wear, and I would immediately become suspicious of who they are.

That’s why I can’t help but wonder: Who is the person sitting in front of me? Doctor Warden or someone who only looks like her?

“Is something bothering you, Chloe?” the Doctor Warden impersonator asks.

She flashes me a tight-lipped smile. The dimples on her cheeks show up as she does so, and I decide that I have enough evidence to believe this is no impostor.

“No. Everything is fine,” I say.

“I can tell something’s bothering you. It’s the new teeth, isn’t it?”

“I’ll tell you what’s bothering me, Doctor Warden. The fact that I don’t know who’s real anymore. I reach a rational conclusion about someone, but then I keep overthinking, and I go from considering myself crazy to believing I’m not wrong.”

“Chloe, we talked about this before.”

“And I’ll tell you what else bothers me.” I lean forward. “It bothers me that I can’t tell if I’m real anymore, either.”

“What do you mean?”

“Every morning when I wake up, I look in the mirror and notice when something’s different. Sometimes it’s my hair jutting at a different angle. Sometimes my eyes look different—the circles under them either darker or shallower. Sometimes, I see a new blemish on my cheek or a mole on my body that I’m sure wasn’t there before. How can I trust myself anymore that I’m me? How can I know I’m not already dead and someone else is living my life?”

Doctor Warden sighs. It feels like the millionth time that we’re talking about this topic. We may have to talk about it a million more until I stop believing that the entire world is full of people who have stolen someone else’s identity.”

“Chloe,” Doctor Warden says calmly. “What you’ve been through is a terrible, terrible experience. It’s only natural that you’d be skeptical. Whenever you’re in doubt and you start overthinking, stop yourself. Not everyone is out to get you or to lie to you.”

“I know, and I keep reminding myself of that, but my thoughts are stronger.”

“Keep repeating the mantra I taught you, and one day you’ll wake up, you’ll look yourself in the mirror, and you’ll forget to scrutinize all the suspicious details.”

The scenario Doctor Warden is talking about seems like a dream. Being able to meet someone and not have to worry if they’re a murderer living a lie. It also seems far, far away. I cannot imagine myself being so careless again.

“I don’t see how that’s going to happen, doctor.” I shake my head. “Just now, I got this close to running out of your office because I wasn’t sure who you were. I’m still not completely sure you’re my real doctor.”

Doctor Warden smiles again, a warm and motherly smile. I can’t trust that smile because I know how deceiving smiles can be. I saw it firsthand on Terry. Even eyes can hold lies. Not as well as lips but sufficiently so.

Those who believe their own lies transform them into a truth.

“That’s why we have our code phrase, remember?” Doctor Warden asks.

I nod, but I’m still not completely convinced. What if someone else learns about that phrase? No, Doctor Warden wouldn’t break that doctor-patient confidentiality. But if I do feel like she’s up to something, I’ll be ready.

I’m already taking the necessary precautions to keep myself safe. I don’t have a gun because I feel like I’d be a danger to others if I had one, but I do have cameras and an alarm system set up in my new apartment.

I sold the apartment Terry and I lived in and bought a smaller place outside the city because I couldn’t stomach living inside that old apartment anymore. I tried, but I couldn’t sit still for five minutes, let alone get some sleep without disturbance.

All the time, it felt as though Terry’s ghost was still there, haunting me, standing right behind me, grinning that malicious grin, and waiting for me to notice him. I would turn around and see nothing, but I’d still be on edge.

Wherever I looked, I’d see the two of us happy together, kissing, cuddling, watching movies, cooking, having sex…

“Happy.”

Of the two of us, I was the only happy one, and that happiness was a borrowed one waiting on death row. When the life you built turns out to be false, you question the authenticity of everything around you daily.

“How did that date with Michael go?” Doctor Warden asks.

“Bad,” I say.

“And why’s that?”

“I caught him lying about something, so I don’t think I’ll see him anymore.”

“What did he lie about?”

“When we first chatted, he said he comes home from work around four-thirty. On our date, he changed that story and said he comes home around five.”

“That’s it?”

“Isn’t it enough?”

“Chloe, he might have misspoken.”

I shrug.

“Have you thought about clarifying it with him? You could ask him which one it is,” Doctor Warden says.

“He’d probably lie,” I say, not interested in what the doctor has to say.

Doctor Warden’s face becomes serious. “Chloe, I know it’s difficult, but can you at least try?”

“What’s the point? I’m not making any progress.”

Really, most days I feel like crawling into a hole and waiting for death. What’s the point of all this anyway? I’m broken because of Terry, and, no matter how many times I glue all the pieces together, they keep falling apart.

“You’re making plenty of progress. Remember two years ago when we had our first session? You were a recluse and refused to even leave your apartment unless it was to have these sessions. And even when you did so, you were very, very careful and thorough about everything.”

That’s right. I was so careful that I insisted Doctor Warden give me a fingerprint every time I visit. I even checked her fingers to make sure nothing was on them to fake the print.

When did I even stop doing that? Whenever it was, it happened gradually.

“Not only that, but you wouldn’t even hear about going on a date with another man. Now look at you. You’re putting yourself out there, Chloe, and that’s significant progress.”

“I mean, I guess that makes sense.”

“And not to mention I’ve lowered the dosage of your medication because you don’t need it so much anymore. I bet you haven’t even noticed that, have you?”

“Um… No, I haven’t.”

“So, see? You’re making excellent progress, Chloe. You can’t expect to mend all your wounds overnight. Imagine where you’ll be a year from now if you continue working on yourself like this.”

I hear her, but I once again find myself wondering if it’s something Doctor Warden would say or an impostor who has the intention of lulling me into a false sense of safety.

It’s all in my head. These aren’t my own thoughts, I recite just as Doctor Warden taught me to.

Sometimes, the mantra works. Other times, I feel as though it’s just a way to brainwash me into making me a more susceptible target.

Doctor Warden slightly shifts in her seat, and I know the session has come to an end.

“Well, that’s all the time we have for today, Chloe. I’ll see you again next Thursday. In the meantime, think about everything I’ve told you, okay? If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me, be it day or night.”

“Thank you, Doctor Warden.”

The sessions sometimes feel like a waste of money. But now that the doctor has put things into perspective, I realize she’s right—I’ve made a ton of progress. Two years ago, I wouldn’t be using public transport and staring at my phone as I am now.

I would have ridden in the back of an Uber with pepper spray in my purse, ready to assault the driver if he just so much as turned toward me too suddenly.

I’m glad I never did anything like that, though, because I would have been arrested and then probably committed to a mental hospital once they looked at my medical records.

When I return home, my cat Fluffy greets me by purring and nuzzling against my ankles.

“I missed you too, beautiful,” I say as I bend down to pet him.

He lets me do it for a few seconds and then moves away from me.

That’s enough cuddling for today.

I take a frozen pizza out of the freezer and leave it on the counter and sit on the couch to take a short break. I turn the TV on and stare at Fluffy as he takes a seat next to me. His body feels nice and warm.

I initially took him in as a suggestion by Doctor Warden to help me cope with my depression. He’s since become my best friend.

He can be annoying at times when he wakes me up in the middle of the night, but I can’t hold it against him. Cats are nocturnal creatures, and it’s in their instincts.

I don’t see the show that’s playing on the TV. I keep thinking about my session with Doctor Warden and about her perfect teeth. I’m once again met with the suspicion that it’s not her but someone else impersonating her.

It’s all in my head. These aren’t my own thoughts.

My phone vibrates, and I pick it up to see what it is. A message from someone I never expected to message me again.

Hey. How’s it going? I know it’s been a few days, but I was wondering if you’d like to go out somewhere tonight. There’s some kind of event downtown and I was thinking we could go see it if you’re up for it.

It’s Michael. He had messaged me a few days ago, right after our date, but I never responded. He sent me another message after that, which I also promptly ignored. I had hoped that he would take the hint and stop bothering me.

He’s been nothing but respectful, though. Even this last message is very polite, and I can’t just ignore it.

How do I politely tell him no?

Hey, sorry for ghosting you. I appreciate the invite, but I have way too much on my plate right now, and it would be unfair to you. Sorry again.

I type that message but then delete it. I type a similar version, and I delete that, too. I do that three more times.

But then I remember something Doctor Warden said that makes me consider if saying no is even the right answer.

I know it’s difficult, Chloe, but can you at least try? You’re making plenty of progress. Remember two years ago?

She’s right. I’ve made a lot of progress since then. I’m still very broken, and it will take me years until I’ve fully recovered from the injuries Terry has inflicted on me, but I’m on my way there. I’m using crutches, but once I’m able to run freely, I’ll be able to ditch them.

But to be able to get rid of those crutches, I have to walk. And to walk, I have to take that first, most daunting step.

But what if the person texting me isn’t Michael but an impostor?

It’s all in my head. These aren’t my own thoughts.

I hover my finger above the keyboard on my phone’s screen. After a moment of hesitation, I type my answer.

I’d love to go out.

THE END

More Books in the Series

Not My Husband

Never Leave Me

Feel Free To Scream

Maria