He turns on the shower and looks at me expectantly. “Get in, Megan.”
I love that he doesn’t call me Reya in this moment. When he says my real name, it makes it seem like he really is jealous. I step into the shower, just as he starts to remove his own clothes.
I know he locked the front door, but Michael could come back. If he forgot something and came back…
My thoughts are broken when Saint steps into the shower with me. He grabs the shower head and pulls it off the holder. He places it between my legs, and I gasp because the water is still cold.
“What are you doing?”
He presses his mouth to my ear. “Washing him off your cunt so I can eat it.”
His words make me physically shudder. I lean my head against the shower wall and forget all about Michael.
NINE
THINGS HAVE BEEN relatively calm since Michael and the girls left. Saint has spent most of those nights with me but said he couldn’t stay with me last night.
I didn’t ask him why. I know why.
Saint works day shift as a detective, but he can be called in at any time. I assume that’s how he can get away with not being with his wife some nights, because she believes he’s out working calls.
I don’t ask. Not because I’m not curious, but because I have no room to pry. He doesn’t ask me about Michael and the girls, so I don’t ask him about his wife.
When we’re together, we’re Cam and Reya.
Saint and I have spent several nights together in complete character. We pretend we’re in love, and we make love. Then he leaves in the mornings and I spend the entire days writing.
He’s good at this. So good, I’m dreading having to leave the day after tomorrow. I suppose I could extend my stay, but I’m not sure that’s a good idea. When a person starts to form an addiction, it’s easier to get over that addiction if they quit it cold turkey. That’s what I plan to do with Saint. When I go home, I don’t plan on interacting with him again. Ever.
I’ve gotten most of the book loosely written, anyway, so there’s no need to stay. It’s a shitty first draft, but they usually are. This book has guts, though. A soul. Maybe even a heartbeat. I can feel myself in this book, and it might be the first one I’ve ever written that I’m excited to release.
I write so much when Saint isn’t here, I haven’t even had time to answer Candice’s calls. She’s fine with it, though. We both have days when we don’t want to be interrupted. Those are good days. It means we’re being productive, so it’s actually a positive thing when we don’t answer each other’s calls.
I don’t know if I’m going to tell her about Saint. She’s my best friend, but sometimes even a best friend can’t look past a betrayal that has nothing to do with them. She knows how much I love Michael, and if I could betray Michael like this, she’ll wonder if I would be able to betray her in some equally terrible way.
I don’t think I’ll tell a single soul what I’ve done. I want what happened in this cabin to stay between me and Saint.
He’s supposed to come over this afternoon—after his shift ends. I don’t know if he’ll be spending the night, but I hope he does. We only have two nights left to spend together and I selfishly want him here for both.
I’m cooking for him tonight. I just left the grocery store with all the ingredients I’ll need to bake lasagna.
Michael hates lasagna. Maybe that’s why I’m making it. I tend to dig for all the ways Saint and Michael are different.
I’m a few miles from the turn for the cabin when I pass a gas station. I’ve been wanting a local newspaper and should probably fill up on gas before my drive back to Sacramento.
I go inside the store before getting gas so I can check to see if they even sell newspapers here. I’ve been wanting to read about the incident that occurred the night Saint showed up to my cabin. I thought about adding it to my book. I tend to change a lot of scenes during the rewrite phase, and I’m tempted to rework the scene where Cam and Reya meet.
At this point, I think Saint might actually read this book. I’m sure he’d like it if I included some of what happened between us. Of course, I’d never admit any of the scenes were inspired by true events. That will be mine and Saint’s secret.
I flip through the only choice of newspaper on the stand, but this town is so small, they only put out one paper a week. I can’t find anything about the police chase that ended in a suicide. It’s been two weeks since the guy shot himself near my cabin, and the new paper comes out tomorrow, but it should be in this one.
Maybe they didn’t write about it. Or maybe I skimmed over it.
I take the newspaper to the counter and hand it to the clerk. He’s a bald man who looks to be in his fifties. His belly is so round, it’s resting on the counter.
“What time does the new paper come out tomorrow?” I ask.
He shrugs. “Lennie delivers them, so there’s no telling. Sometimes he gets here when I open up. Sometimes when I close.” He says that like I should know who Lennie is. “Why? You gonna be in the paper or something?”
“No. Just looking for more information on the suicide from two weeks ago.”
The man punches some buttons on the cash register. “That’ll be one dollar and twenty-five cents.” He looks at me and adds, “What suicide?”
I hand him five quarters. “I can’t remember the guy’s name. It was a police chase that ended in a suicide on my road.”
“What road?”
“Hunter Trail.”
The man chuckles. “If there was a police chase and a suicide on Hunter trail, I woulda heard about it.”
The door to the store chimes and we both look to see another customer entering the store. The customer sees I’m about to leave, so he holds open the door. The clerk speaks to the man holding the door for me. “Louie, you heard of any police chase or suicide in the last couple weeks?”
I pause and stare at the man he just called Louie.
Louie looks from me to the clerk and laughs. “Not around these parts. We haven’t had a self-inflicted death since 2014. Been even longer than that since we had a police chase.”
I feel my insides begin to buzz with anxiety. I shake my head. “But…something happened on my road. In the middle of the night. A detective came to my door…”
Louie looks me up and down. “A detective? We don’t have a detective, ma’am. You from Los Angeles or something? You a reporter?”
“No. I’m a writer…fiction. Not a reporter.” I reach into my purse and pull out my phone. My fingers are trembling. I scroll quickly through my screen until I find my private folder. Two nights ago, I took a selfie of me and Saint and hid it in my phone. I wanted to remember what he looked like.
I hold the phone up to Louie and show him the picture of Saint. “Is this guy a police officer in this town?” I ask.
Louie takes the phone from me. He stares at Saint’s picture and then laughs. “Honey, we got two policemen who patrol this area, and both of them only wish they could look like this man.”
This can’t be right.
Louie looks at the clerk and waves me over to him. “Ask Bill. He’s the only gas station around, so the man has probably been here to the store for gas or what-not. Unless he drives a Tesla,” he mutters.
I walk back to the register and hold the phone for Bill, the clerk. “Do you know who this is?”
Bill shakes his head. “Don’t know him. But I’ve seen him. That’s a face that’s hard to forget. Tall guy. Drives a black car.”
I grasp on to that morsel of information. “Where did you see him? Here?”
Bill nods. “Yeah. He’s come in a couple times in the past week. I reckon he’s staying in one of the rentals because I’ve never seen him before last week.”
“Maybe he’s new to the area,” I say, trying to rationalize all of this. “Maybe he just started working here as a detective.”
Louie can sense I’m starting to panic. His eyebrows draw closer together and he steps
forward, letting the door fall shut behind him. He folds his hands over his belly when he says, “Ma’am. I don’t know who this man is to you…but I can assure you he is not from around here. And he definitely don’t work around here. Me and Bill know everything about everyone in this town, unless they’re here on vacation in one of the cabins.”
I shake my head, refusing to believe Saint isn’t a detective in this town.
If he isn’t a detective, what is he?
Where did he come from?
How do these two not know who he is?
Why was the police chase not written about in the paper?
I feel like I might be sick from all the unanswered questions. I push open the door and rush outside. I can hear Louie calling after me, but I walk straight to my car. I don’t bother getting gas. I drive as fast as I can to the cabin because I need to get there before Saint shows up.
I need my computer.
I need to figure out who he is before he figures out I know who he isn’t.
• • •
When I searched the name Nathaniel Saint, I came up with nothing. A few dead ends, but no social media presence, no birth records or marriage licenses. At least not for a Nathaniel Saint younger than eighty years old.
He lied about his name. I know that much.
My leg is bouncing wildly under the table. I’m on edge, so I stand up and begin to pace. To focus.
If Nathaniel Saint isn’t his name, how am I supposed to figure out what his real name is? I have nothing to go on. No information. I’ve never even asked him what his wife’s name is.
The picture!
I have the selfie I took with him. Maybe I can do an image search on Google.
I sit back down to my laptop and email the image to myself. I open it up on my laptop, download it, then upload it to a Google image search.
Several images are returned to me. I begin to scroll through them, but none are of Saint. They’re all men who vaguely resemble him. I keep scrolling and scrolling and then I see a picture that makes my heart drop.
It looks just like him.
Please be him.
I click on the picture and it takes me to a Facebook page. The page is private, but the name isn’t. Eric Kingston. The only thing available to the public is profile pictures. I scroll through them and there’s no doubt that this is Saint.
Saint is Eric Kingston.
Who is Eric Kingston?
I close my eyes and blow out a shaky breath.
I close out the private Facebook page and open up Google. I type in the new name and several hits come back.
I scroll through them until I find a link for Instagram. I click on it, but that page is private, too. Fuck.
I notice the display name on Instagram does list a middle name of Merrell.
Eric Merrell Kingston.
My hands are shaking as I reach for my wallet. I take out my credit card and open up a background check website. I enter my payment information and the name Eric Merrell Kingston. I wait for the results to come back.
There are so many Eric Kingstons. I scroll through them, looking at all the Eric Kingstons that could possibly be a match. Only one of them has the middle name of Merrell. I click on it so hard, I’m afraid I just broke my trackpad.
I click on a link for his LinkedIn page and find Eric’s résumé. I read through it, learning more about him in one minute than I’ve learned in two weeks.
Eric is a screenwriter. He’s worked on several film projects—even ones I’ve heard of. Under interests, he states that he’s a reader. The site hasn’t been updated this year, but everything seems recent. Nothing on this page reveals he’s a detective.
Maybe he’s undercover?
Maybe he gave me a fake name because he’s not allowed to give me his real one. And maybe there was nothing about the suicide and police chase in the paper because it’s not something he wanted revealed to the public.
I realize I’m grasping at straws, here. But as long as there are straws to grasp, I’m going to hoard them.
I open up on the screen that lists a phone number for Eric Kingston. I compare the phone number to the number I have in my phone for Saint.
It’s a perfect match.
I drop my phone and stand up, backing two steps away from my computer as if it’s going to hurt me.
Why would he lie to me about who he is?
It makes no sense.
I scan the screen and see that his address is listed in Los Angeles. That’s hours away from here. Why would he pretend to live here?
At this point, I don’t care. I just want to leave.
I grab my phone and slip it into my pocket. I rush to my bedroom and pull my suitcase out from under the bed. I don’t bother folding anything. I toss everything from the closet and the dresser into the suitcase, and then pile my toiletries on top of that.
The whole time I’m packing, I’m crying. Shaking. Praying. Trying not to think about everything I’ve done in the past two weeks.
How could I be so careless?
I pull my charger out of the wall, zip my suitcase, and grab my car keys off the dresser. I know I’m leaving half of my stuff lying out around the cabin, but I don’t care. I need to get out of here.
I walk into the kitchen and scream.
Saint doesn’t even turn around at the sound of my voice. He’s standing at the table…staring down at my laptop screen.
I take a step back into my bedroom. I try to map out escape routes, but unless I can somehow climb out of the bedroom window before he reaches me, the only way out of this cabin is through the front and back doors.
And I’d have to pass Saint to get to either.
I bring my hands up to my mouth to stifle my cry. Saint reaches a hand out to my laptop and slowly shuts it.
When he begins to turn around to look at me, I take another step back. His eyes land on my suitcase first. He clenches his jaw. Shakes his head. “You’re leaving?”
I bring my hand down to my stomach and clench my shirt. My whole body is shaking now. “You aren’t a detective,” I whisper.
He doesn’t say anything. His eyes move from the suitcase to my face. He just stares at me, and I’m certain I’d much rather him be talking than quietly staring. It’s terrifying—the way he’s looking at me.
“Are you…” I swallow. “Are you going to hurt me?”
He shakes his head. “What? No.” He answers me as if that’s a ridiculous question.
How could he possibly think my reaction right now is ridiculous? I have no idea who he is. None.
I slide my hand in my back pocket and pray I can unlock my phone without him knowing what I’m doing.
I take another step back. “Why did you lie to me?”
He takes a step forward. “It’s what you wanted, Megan.”
I can’t help but grow angry at that answer. “It’s what I wanted? I didn’t even know you existed before you showed up here pretending to be a detective! Was anyone even shot that night? Was there even a police chase?”
He tilts his head a little, narrowing his eyes in my direction. “Do you not remember your words two nights before I showed up here?”
My words? What is he talking about?
“Your live video,” he says, taking another step toward me. “You said you wished you could experience the things you write about. You said your character was a cop. I brought that to you.”
This makes no sense. If he showed up here pretending to be a cop because of the live video…that means he knew who I was before he showed up here.
He was watching the video as it was live…two days before I even met him.
Which means he follows me online.
My hand is still in my back pocket, trying to figure out how to dial 9-1-1 on my phone without looking at it. I keep talking, hoping he won’t focus too much on the arm behind my back.
“How long have you been watching my live videos?” I ask. My voice is a whisper.
He shrugs. “A while. A
couple of years, maybe.”
I cover my gasp with my hand, then I bring my hand to my chest. “Are you even married?”
He shakes his head. “Marriage isn’t really my thing.”
I see it the second it happens. He tilts his head as he drops his gaze to my arm. The arm I’ve been hiding behind my back.
I spin around and rush toward the bathroom, hoping to be able to lock myself inside long enough to get the call made.
I don’t make it.
He reaches me, just as I reach the bathroom door. He grabs my arm and yanks me back, then rips my cell phone out of my hand. He looks down at it and sees that I was trying to call the police.
“I haven’t done anything wrong, Megan!” He tosses my phone angrily behind him, then pushes me toward the bed. I fall onto it, then crawl to the headboard, attempting to get as far from him as I can. “What would you even tell them when they showed up here? That I role-played too well?”
“You’ve been impersonating a cop!” I say through clenched teeth.
He throws a frustrated hand up in the air. “Oh, come on! You wanted this! Your online Q&As are like an open invitation into your life. You tell your readers where your writing retreat is, you let the whole world know when you’re here alone. You even answered my question in your last video when I asked if you would be willing to do something like this. You said, and I quote, ‘I would do anything.’”
Oh, my God. He’s the one who asked that question?
He thinks I was asking for this?
“That wasn’t an invitation to show up here and lie to me.”
“We’ve both been lying,” he says. “You aren’t innocent in this.”
“You attacked me in the middle of the night!”
“You asked me to, Megan!”
I shake my head adamantly. He’s not turning this around on me. I didn’t ask for this. Just because I said I wanted experience in a live video does not mean that was an invitation for him to actually locate me and act out some sick fantasy of his.
One More Step Page 59
