The End of Her - Shari Lapena Page 0,73

that?’ she asks.

‘Of course he can, according to the terms of the partnership agreement.’ He adds, ‘He’ll buy me out.’

She feels a stab of fury. ‘With friends like that,’ she says bitterly, ‘who needs enemies?’

Erica sits in her apartment, nursing a cup of coffee.

Undetermined. Now the ball is in the sheriff’s court. He will have to do something, after hearing the evidence. Patrick must be terrified. She thinks for a moment about his wife, Stephanie. She’d looked awful at the inquest. Thinner, but not in a good way. Her face was hollow. She must be going through hell, Erica thinks now. She tells herself that’s not really her problem. She’s doing Stephanie a favour. She should know what she married. She hopes they arrest him.

She tells herself that every cloud has a silver lining. She certainly thinks this one does.

CHAPTER FORTY

FOR STEPHANIE, THAT first day back is a blur of fatigue, caring for the twins and worrying ceaselessly about the future. The weather has turned dark and wet, and people have begun preparing their yards for Halloween.

Stephanie can’t stop thinking about the bruises on Lindsey’s body. Did Patrick push her down the stairs? Could he have? She’s seeing signs of stress in him, cracks in the façade that make her wonder. He’d snapped at her that afternoon for allowing them to run out of milk. She’d snapped right back.

Late that night, staring into the dark, she finds herself wondering what it was like for Lindsey, to marry so young, to be pregnant, to be alone all day in a place away from her family. They didn’t have much money. Love flies out the window when the wolf is at the door. Did she know he had cheated on her? Did she suspect? Did she accuse him? Maybe she did, and he didn’t like it. Maybe that’s why he pushed her down the stairs … No. She can’t think this way, she can’t. It’s just anger making her think like this, anger at him, at everything. Anger that he cheated on his first wife and brought all of this on himself, on her and their beautiful daughters. They could lose everything because he slept with an attractive woman a couple of times when he shouldn’t have. She’s angriest of all at Erica – for sleeping with a friend’s husband, for persisting with this crazy story about murder. For lying on the stand about the blackmail.

She tries not to blame Patrick for what he’s done. Sleeping with his wife’s best friend is unforgivable. So why has she forgiven him?

Has she forgiven him?

She still hasn’t decided. She goes back and forth. He hasn’t cheated on her, as far as she knows. Should she leave him anyway, on principle? Because once a cheater always a cheater? Even if nothing more happens with the case, and it all just goes away – the best they can hope for – people will look at her for the rest of her life and wonder if she’s married to a murderer. She remembers the expression on Hanna’s face when she offered to take Teddy.

If she left him now it would look like she didn’t believe him, that she thought he was a murderer. She can’t do that to him. And she has the babies to think of – he’s their father. They can’t grow up thinking their mother believes their father murdered his first wife. Especially since it isn’t true.

The next morning Patrick is out picking a few things up at the grocery store when the phone rings, and Stephanie reluctantly answers. ‘Hello?’

‘May I speak to Patrick Kilgour?’ a man asks. Immediately her body tenses. The voice is serious, authoritative.

‘He’s not here. May I ask who’s calling?’ she says, her heart racing.

‘It’s Sheriff Bastedo with the Grant County Sheriff’s Office. Could you please have him call me as soon as he gets in?’ He gives her a number, and she writes it down, her hand trembling, her mind panicking. When she hangs up the phone she walks into the living room and collapses onto the sofa. It’s happening – they’re going to arrest him. She feels dizziness wash over her. She puts her head down between her knees before everything goes black.

Moments later she hears Patrick return home. He must see her, she thinks, bent forward in what looks like a faint, but she can’t lift her head.

‘Stephanie, what is it?’ Patrick cries. And then he’s kneeling in front of her, his voice worried. ‘Are you all right?’

But