by A. J. Banner
Chantal told me everything that night, after we brought Bella home from the babysitter’s house. About how she saw photographs of Kieran and Jenny on his computer when we broke into his farmhouse. About how she had thought about killing him and how to do it. She had failed the first time—Brandon had been deranged but not a murderer—and she was going to try again, but then she had realized how much Bella and I needed him. She had been conflicted.
But when she’d felt I no longer needed Kieran to help care for Bella, and when she thought he might kill me at any time, Chantal had seduced him, and he had readily slept with her. She had pretended to support him, to covet material things as he did. He had admitted to wanting me dead, but he’d been waiting for Bella to be born. He couldn’t kill his own child.
I don’t remember eating the bread or drinking the tea, which Chantal said I’d done. I don’t remember what Kieran might have said to me before he walked out. But I know he gave me the Juliet powder, which Chantal had mixed up and had assured him was lethal. The last thing I recall, even today, is finding the telephone number and condom in his clothes. I don’t even remember him coming back into the house. In my mind, he’s forever out in the driveway, returning calls.
My husband tried to kill me.
My husband tried to kill me.
When I tell myself these words, they don’t seem real. I feared Bella would become like him, but I needn’t have worried. Her restlessness, her crying and sensitivity, reflected her early empathy, her awareness of the world as both a beautiful and terrible place, full of happiness but also heartache and suffering. And she felt—she feels—all of it. I don’t know how—she is just wired that way. As if the universe needed to tip the balance, to right itself.
She lifts her closed fist to me, her eyes bright with tears. “We have to find the fairy. It lost a wing.”
“Show me,” I said, dreading what she carries in her hand.
Chantal smiles in our direction, her shiny hair catching the sunlight. She nods slightly as Bella opens her hand to reveal a delicate, translucent pink rose petal in the shape of a heart, and I feel a twinge of memory, a recollection of a heart-shaped anniversary card from years ago, better left in the past. “See?” she says. “It was on the ground. All by itself. She can’t fly. The fairy can’t fly without her wing.”
“Yes, she can,” I say. “Not many people know this, but fairies have special powers.”
Bella’s large brown eyes grow even wider. “They do?” she whispers.
“Yes,” I say, hugging her. “When fairies lose their wings, they’re shedding them, leaving them behind. The fairy left her wing on purpose for you to find. When the wings fall off, they always grow back. Soon she’ll be flying again.”
“Oh, goodie!” Bella laughs, buoyant once more.
She is everything now—morning, night, darkness, and light. I close her little hand around the petal, relieved to know that she has not picked a flower from the Juliet plant, which has not reappeared since her birth. But we stay vigilant, Chantal and I, for any sign, for we know what the plant can do.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
As always, I’m deeply grateful to my brilliant editor at Lake Union Publishing, Danielle Marshall; fabulous developmental editor, David Downing; literary agent extraordinaire, Paige Wheeler; and the entire production and author relations teams at Amazon Publishing, including but not limited to Nicole Pomeroy, Gabriella T. Dumpit, Kristin King, James Gallagher, Kellie Osborne, and Elise Taubenheim. I depend on valuable input from my incomparable writing peeps. Sandy Dengler, Anne Clermont, and Leigh Hearon came through with excellent comments at the eleventh hour. I’m also grateful to Susan Wiggs, Sheila Roberts, Kate Breslin, Elsa Watson, Randall Platt, Patricia M. Stricklin, Lois Dyer, and Dianne Gardner. I received valuable information and feedback from Detective Glenn Kerns, Ret., Seattle PD; Stephen Messer; Dr. Don Williamson; Rich Penner; Marilyn Lundberg, LCSW; Annis Pepion Scott and Professor Donald Edward Scott; Paula Siddons; and my amazing early readers—you are the best. Thank you to Karyn Schwartz, proprietor of the wonderful SugarPill Apothecary in Seattle, for a fascinating interview. I’m grateful to all the supportive bloggers and reviewers who’ve shouted out about my books, and the readers who’ve contacted me to say they love my novels.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Thank you so much for reading The Poison Garden! I hope you enjoyed the journey. I love setting novels in the mysterious, wild environs of Washington State, where I currently live in a cottage in the woods. Chinook Island, featured in this book, is not a real place but a fictional amalgam of Pacific Northwest islands I’ve visited: Whidbey Island, Orcas Island, San Juan Island, and Vashon Island.
Also, while the physician in the story may have shady leanings, he does not represent most doctors. I appreciate ethical medical practitioners everywhere, especially my own family physician, an exceptionally gifted and compassionate man, who even called in a prescription for cough syrup in the middle of the night on Christmas Eve for me one year when I had the flu. All characters in this book, and the deadly Juliet plant, are figments of my fiendish imagination.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Photo © 2015 Carol Ann Morris
Born in India and raised in North America, A. J. Banner received degrees from the University of California, Berkeley. Her previous novels of psychological suspense include the bestsellers The Good Neighbor and After Nightfall. She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband and six rescued cats. For more information, visit www.ajbanner.com.
