The Other Mrs.

by Mary Kubica

  If he killed Erin, how did he do it? Was it in a fit of rage, or was it premeditated? And what about Morgan? How, exactly, did she die?

  I feel the letter opener slipping deeper into my pants. I hoist it up. My hands are trembling, unsteady, and so the wine spills as I do, the glass getting cocked too far to one side. I lick the rim of the glass to wipe it clean. I purse my lips, not liking the bitter taste of the Malbec. Regardless, I take another sip, force it down as tears prick my eyes.

  A noise from behind startles me and I turn, seeing only the shadowy foyer, the indefinite dining room. I hold still, watching, waiting, for movements, for sound. This old home has so many dark corners, so many places where someone can hide.

  “Will?” I say lightly, expecting him to reply, but he doesn’t. No one does. No one’s there, or at least I don’t think someone is there. I hold my breath, listen for footsteps, for breathing. There’s none. A blunt headache lingers, worsening in intensity as the moments go by, and I find myself becoming hot and bothered because of it. Under my armpits and between my legs, the skin is tacky. I take another sip of the wine, try to calm my nerves. The wine doesn’t taste as bad this time. I’m getting used to the bitterness.

  I see my phone on the table. I quickly cross the room and grab for it, stifling a cry when I turn it over to see that the battery is dead again. It will take a couple of minutes for the phone to charge well enough to use. There is another option, the landline, which is corded. The only way to use it is here in the kitchen. I’ll have to be quick.

  I walk back across the kitchen. I grab the landline, a dated thing. Officer Berg’s business card is tucked in the letter holder on the counter, which I’m grateful for because, without my cell phone, I don’t have my contacts. I dial the number on the card. I wait desperately for the police officer to answer, sipping nervously from the glass of Malbec as I do.

  WILL

  I follow her as she goes from one room to the next. She looks for me. She doesn’t know that I’m here, closer than she thinks.

  She’s monkeying around in the kitchen now. But when I hear the spin of a rotary dial I know it’s time to intervene.

  I come into the room. Sadie whirls around to face me, eyes wide. A deer in headlights is what she is, clutching the phone to her ear. She’s scared shitless. Beads of sweat edge her hairline. Her skin is colorless, damp. Her breathing is uneven. I can practically see her heart thumping in her chest, like a scared little bird. It’s reassuring to see that a third of the wine’s been drunk.

  I’m on to her. But does she know that I am?

  “Who are you calling?” I ask calmly, just to see her grapple for a lie. But Sadie’s never been a good liar, and so instead she’s a deaf-mute. It’s telling, isn’t it? That’s how I know that she knows that I know.

  My tone shifts. I’m tired of this game.

  “Put the phone down, Sadie.”

  She doesn’t. I step closer, snatch the phone from her, set it back on the cradle. She tries to hold on to it, but Sadie lacks physical strength. The phone gives effortlessly.

  “That,” I tell her, “was not your brightest idea.” Because now I’m mad.

  I weigh my options. If she hasn’t drunk enough, I may have to coerce her into finishing the wine. But gagging and vomiting would be counterintuitive. I think of another way. I hadn’t been planning on disposing of a body, not tonight, but it’d be just the same to make Berg believe she ran away as it would to make it look like a suicide. A little more laborious than originally thought, but still doable.

  Don’t get me wrong, I love my wife. I love my family. I’m quite torn up about this.

  But it’s unavoidable, a necessary consequence of the can of worms that Sadie has opened. If only she’d have left well enough alone. It’s her fault this is happening.

  SADIE

  I feel woozy. Disoriented. Panic-stricken. Because Will is angry, livid in a way that I’ve never seen him before. I don’t know this man who stands before me, glaring intimidatingly at me. He looks vaguely like the man I married, and yet different. His words are clipped, his voice hostile. He jostles the phone from my hand, and that’s how I know I wasn’t imagining things. If I had any doubts about Will’s part in Morgan’s death, they’re gone. Will did something.

  I take a step back for each step he draws near, knowing that soon my back will be to the wall. I have to think quickly. But my mind is foggy, thick. Will goes out of focus before me, but I see his hands, coming at me, in slow motion.

  I remember the letter opener just then, tucked away in the waistband of my pants. I grope for it, but my hands are trembling, careless; they get caught up in the pants’ elastic, knocking the letter opener loose by mistake, sending it sliding down my pant leg, crashing to the floor.

  Will’s response time is far faster than mine. He hasn’t been drinking. I feel drunk already, the alcohol hitting me harder than it usually does. Will leans down to the ground quicker than me, plucks the letter opener from the floor with nimble hands. He holds it up for me to see, asks, “What did you think you were going to do with this?”

  The meager kitchen lighting glints off the end of the stainless-steel blade. He points it at me, dares me to flinch, and I do. His laugh is heinous, mocking me.

  How well we think we know those closest to us.

  And then, what a shock to the system it is to find out we don’t know them at all.

  In his anger, his rage, he no longer looks familiar.

  I don’t know this man.

  “Did you think you were going to hurt me with this?” he asks, stabbing his palm with it, and I see that, though the edge is sharp, sharp enough to slice paper with, the point is dull. It does nothing but redden his palm. It leaves no other mark. “Did you think you were going to kill me with this?”

  My tongue thickens inside of my mouth. It makes it harder to speak.

  “What did you do to Morgan?” I ask. I won’t answer his questions.

  He tells me, still laughing, that it wasn’t what he did to her, but what I did to her that matters. My eyes turn dry. I blink hard, a series of times. A nervous tic. I can’t stop.

  “You don’t remember, do you?” he asks, reaching out to touch me. I draw swiftly back, thwacking my head on the cabinet. The pain radiates through my scalp, and I wince, a hand going involuntarily to it.

  He says condescendingly, “Ouch. Looks like that hurt.”

  I drop my hand. I won’t satisfy him with a reply.

  I think of all the times he was so solicitous, so caring. How the Will I once knew would have run for ice when I hurt myself, would have helped me to a chair, pressed the ice to my aching head. Was that all in jest?

  “It wasn’t me who did something to Morgan, Sadie,” he says. “It was you.”

  But I can’t remember it. I’m of two minds about it, not knowing if I did or didn’t kill Morgan. It’s a terrible thing, not knowing if you took another’s life. “You killed Erin,” I say, the only thing I can think to say back.

  “That I did,” he says, and though I know it, hearing him admit to it makes it somehow worse. Tears well in my eyes, threaten to fall.

  “You loved Erin,” I say. “You were going to marry her.”

  “All true,” he says. “The problem was, Erin didn’t love me back. I don’t take well to rejection.”

  “What did Morgan ever do to you?” I cry out, and he smiles wickedly and reminds me that I’m the one who killed Morgan.

  “What did she ever do to you?” he quips, and I can only shake my head in reply.

  He tells me. “I don’t want to bore you with the details, but Morgan was Erin’s kid sister, who made it her life’s mission to blame me for Erin’s death. While the rest of the world saw it as an unfortunate accident, Morgan did not. She wouldn’t give it up. You took matters into your own hands, Sadie. Thanks to you, I’ve come through this thing uns
cathed.”

  “That didn’t happen!” I scream.

  He’s the epitome of calm. His voice is even, not mercurial like mine. “But it did,” he says. “There was this moment when you came back. You were so proud of what you’d accomplished. You had so much to say, Sadie. Like how she would never get between us again, because you took care of her.”

  “I didn’t kill her,” I assert.

  His laugh is a giggle. “You did,” he says. “And you did it for me. I don’t think I’ve ever loved you as much as I did that night.” He beams, claims, “All I did was tell the God’s honest truth. I told you what would have become of me if Morgan made good on her threats. If she was able to prove to the police that I killed Erin, I would have gone to jail for a long, long time. Maybe forever. They would have taken me away from you, Sadie. I told you we wouldn’t ever see each other, we wouldn’t ever be together again. It would be all Morgan’s fault if that happened. Morgan was the criminal, not me. I told you that and you understood. You believed me.”

  The look on his face is triumphant. “You never could live without me, could you?” he asks, looking quizzically at me, like a psychopath.

  “What’s the matter, Sadie?” he asks, when I say nothing. “Cat got your tongue?”

  His words, his nonchalance make me see red. His laugh makes me enraged. It’s the laugh, the awful, abominable laugh, that gets the better of me in the end. It’s the self-satisfied look on Will’s face, the way he stands there, head cocked at an angle. It’s the complacent smile.

  Will manipulated my condition. He made me do this. He put an idea in my head—in the part of me known as Camille—knowing this poor woman, this version of me, would have done anything in the whole wide world for him. Because she loved him so much. Because she wanted to be with him.

  I feel saddened for her. And angry for me.

  It comes from somewhere within. No thought comes with it.

  I lunge at Will with all my might. I regret it as soon as I do. Because though he stumbles some, he is much larger than me. Much stronger, much more solid. And again, he hasn’t been drinking. I shove him and he steps back. But he doesn’t fall to the floor. He inches backward, latching down on a countertop to regain his balance. He laughs even more because of it, because of my paltry shove.

  “That,” he tells me, “was a bad idea.”

  I see the wooden block of knives on the countertop. He follows the gaze of my eyes.

  I wonder which of us will get to it first.

  WILL

  She’s weak as a kitten. It’s laughable, really.

  But it’s time to end this thing once and for all. No use putting it off any longer.

  I come at her quickly, wrap my hands around that pretty little neck of hers and squeeze. Her airflow is restricted because of it. I watch on as panic sets in. I see it in her eyes first, the way they widen in fright. Her hands clamp down on mine, scratching her little kitten claws to get me to release.

  This won’t take long, only about ten seconds until she loses consciousness.

  Sadie can’t scream because of the pressure on her throat. Other than a few insubstantial gasps, all is quiet. Sadie never has been much of a conversationalist anyway.

  Manual strangulation is an intimate thing. It’s much different than other ways of killing. You have to be in close proximity to whoever it is you’re killing. There’s manual labor involved, unlike with a gun where you can fire off three rounds from the other side of the room and call it a day. But because of the work involved, there’s a sense of pride that comes, too, of accomplishment, like painting a house or building a shed or chopping firewood.

  The upside, of course, is there isn’t much of a mess to clean.

  “I can’t tell you how sorry I am it’s come to this,” I say to Sadie as her arms and legs flail and she tries pathetically to fight back. She’s tiring out. Her eyes roll back. Her blows are getting weaker. She tries to gouge my eyes out with her fingertips, but her thrust isn’t strong or quick. I draw back, her efforts wasted. There’s a pretty tinge to Sadie’s skin.

  I press harder, say, “You’re too smart for your own good, Sadie. If only you’d have let it be, this wouldn’t be happening. But I can’t have you go around telling people what I did. I’m sure you understand. And since you can’t keep your own mouth closed,” I tell her, “it’s up to me to shut you up for good.”

  SADIE

  I deliberately collapse, my weight suspended only by his hands around my neck. It’s a desperate attempt, a last-ditch effort. Because if I fail, I will die. As my vision blurs, fading in and out in those final moments, I see my children. I see Otto and Tate living here alone with Will.

  I have to fight. For my children’s sake, I cannot die. I cannot leave them with him.

  I have to live.

  The pain gets worse before it gets better. Because without the strength of my legs and my spine to hold me upright, his grip on my neck intensifies. He bears the weight of my entire body in his hands. There’s a prickling sensation in my limbs. They go numb. The pain is excruciating, in my head and in my neck, and I think that I will die. I think that this is what it feels like to die.

  In his arms, I am limp.

  Thinking he’s succeeded in his task, Will loosens his hold. He eases my body to the floor. He’s gentle at first, but then drops me the last couples of inches. He isn’t trying to be gentle. He’s trying to be quiet. My body falls, colliding with the cold tile. I try not to react, but the pain is almost too much to bear—not from the fall itself, but from what this man has already done to me. There’s the greatest need to cough, to gasp, to throw my hands to my throat.

  But if I want to live I have to suppress the need, to lie there motionless instead, unblinking and unbreathing.

  Will turns his back on me. Only then do I steal a single short, shallow breath. I hear him. He starts making plans of how to get rid of my body. He’s moving quickly because the kids are just upstairs and he knows he can’t delay.

  An unwanted thought comes to me and I fill with horror. If Otto or sweet little Tate were to come down now and see us, what would Will do? Would he kill them, too?

  Will unlocks and pulls open the sliding glass door. He tugs open the screen. I don’t watch. But I listen and hear him do these things.

  He finds his keys on the counter. There’s the sound of metal scraping against the Formica countertop. The keys jangle in his hand and then are quiet. I imagine he’s forced them into his jeans pocket, making plans to drag me out the back door and into his car. But what then? I’m no match for Will. He can easily overpower me. There are things I can use in the kitchen to defend myself with. But outside, there is nothing. Only the dogs who love Will more than they love me.

  If Will gets me through the doors, I don’t stand a chance. I need to think, and I need to think quickly, before he’s able to haul me out.

  Still as a statue on the kitchen floor, I’m as good as dead to him.

  He doesn’t check for a pulse. His one and only mistake.

  It’s not lost on me, the fact that Will doesn’t show remorse. He doesn’t grieve. He isn’t sad that I am gone.

  Will is all business as he leans over my body. He quickly assesses the situation. I feel his nearness to me. I hold my breath. The buildup of carbon dioxide burns inside of me. It becomes more than I can bear. I think that I will involuntarily breathe. That, as Will watches on, I’ll no longer be able to hold my breath. If I breathe, he will know. And if he discovers I’m alive as I’m lying flat on my back as I am, I’ll have no capacity to fight back.

  My heart beats hard and fast in fear. I wonder how he can’t hear it, how he can’t see the movement through the thin pajama shirt. Saliva collects inside my throat, all but gagging me, and I’m overwhelmed by the greatest need to swallow. To breathe.

  He tugs on my arms before reconsidering. He grabs me by the a
nkles instead and pulls roughly. The tile floor is hard against my back and it takes everything in me not to grimace from the abrading pain, but to be limp instead, dead weight.

  I don’t know how far away from the door I am. I don’t know how much farther we have to go. Will grunts as he moves, his breath wheezy. I’m heavier than he thought.

  Think, Sadie, think.

  He pulls me a handful of feet. Then he stops to gather his breath. My legs drop to the floor; he gets a better grip on my ankles. He tugs gruffly in short bursts. I slide, inches at a time, knowing the time to save myself is running out.

  I’m nearing the back door. The cold air is closer than it was before.

  It takes great willpower to get myself to fight back. To let Will know that I’m alive. Because if I don’t succeed, I will die. But I have to fight back. Because I’ll die either way if I don’t.

  Will lets go of my feet again. He takes a breath. He helps himself to a sip of water straight from the tap. I hear the water run. I hear his tongue lap at it like a dog. The water turns off. He swallows hard, comes back to me.

  When he leans down to gather my ankles back into his hands, I use every bit of strength I have to sit suddenly upright. I brace myself and smash my head into his. I try to use his growing fatigue to my advantage, his state of imbalance. His equilibrium is thrown off because he’s hunched over my body, pulling. For this one second, I have the upper hand.

  His hands go to his head. He staggers suddenly backward, losing balance, falling to the floor. I waste no time. I press on the ground and force myself to my feet.

  But as the blood rushes down, the world around me spins. My vision fades to black. I nearly collapse before the adrenaline rushes in and only then can I see.

  I feel his hands on my ankle. He’s on the floor, trying to pull me down with him. He calls me names as he does, no longer worried about being quiet. “You bitch. You stupid, stupid bitch,” he says, this man I married, who vowed to love me till death do us part.