What She Doesn't Know: A Psychological Thriller

by Andrew E. Kaufman

  “And here we go again with the paranoia . . . Riley, this isn’t ten years ago. And every police department in Northern California isn’t out to get you. Not one thing has happened to indicate that. You haven’t even seen any sign of Sloan since we left Glendale.”

  “That doesn’t mean she’s not still out there watching me.”

  “Oh, for crying out loud. Don’t you see? Your fear isn’t real! It’s all in your head!”

  “History is my proof, and that’s good enough for me.”

  “It is not proof. It sounds screwy.”

  “So you’re calling me crazy.”

  “No, but you’re giving me another migraine.” Erin groans. “Look, I seriously doubt there’s anything of substance here, but I do know a gal who works with the fire department. Maybe she can check into it for me, but just to quiet you down.”

  “Thank you.”

  “In the meantime, could you please do me a favor?”

  “What?”

  Erin makes her voice solemn. “If this Samantha woman is as dangerous as you claim, you need to take precautions to protect yourself. Put aside your unfounded fear of the police. Get in touch with them and make a report.”

  “Okay.”

  But when they end the call, she’s thinking, You’ll have to forgive me, sis, but I can’t do that.

  62

  Riley will take precautions to protect herself—just not the way Erin wanted.

  She gives serious thought to moving. Someplace with better security. Someplace not right under Samantha’s nose. There’s only one problem. She doesn’t have the money to do it. She’s living from paycheck to paycheck.

  She feels stuck.

  She pulls down every blind and closes every curtain in the apartment. She repeatedly checks the security bar, which she obviously can’t engage after leaving her place. She’s got to find a way to keep Samantha out when nobody’s here.

  Aileen won’t change the lock, and she’s given Riley a stern warning not to, but this is no time to worry about that. Safety comes first.

  She calls the locksmith again for a re-key and, while he’s at it, also has him fortify the door frame with a stronger strike plate to prevent it from being kicked in. Samantha probably isn’t powerful enough to do that, but Riley isn’t taking chances.

  But she needs to do more. She visits the hardware store and picks up a portable door alarm, which only costs about thirty-five bucks. It won’t alert the police, but it will make a lot of noise if Samantha tries to break in. She also grabs a can of Mace. The law forbids her from buying a gun because of her psychiatric history, but she’ll spray the shit out of anyone’s eyes who comes too close.

  At home, Riley sits in her self-made fortress and finds a whiff of measured relief.

  At least for the moment.

  Before work, Riley stops at Wendy’s apartment. She commits two raps to the hollow aluminum door, then waits.

  And waits.

  But if she’s learned anything about her isolated friend, it’s that she’s not a quick responder.

  Riley knocks a few more times, shouts, “Wendy! Please come to the door! It’s really important!”

  “What’s happening?” Wendy at last answers.

  “I’m in a mess and . . .” She stops to slow her mind. “And I can’t talk to a door. Could you open up?”

  Wendy must sense her anguish, because she immediately pulls her door open wider than ever before. For the first time, Riley is able to see her from head to toe. She’s a tiny woman, even smaller than Riley realized. Sympathetic eyes look back at her. Pretty blue eyes, in fact, that shed an entirely new light on the woman. Wendy doesn’t say anything; instead, she waits, giving Riley time to sort through her thoughts.

  “This isn’t how it was supposed to be. This isn’t how I planned it,” Riley says.

  “Planned what?”

  “You see, I had a strategy . . .”

  Get out. Stay strong. Trust your truth.

  “And I was going to make it work. I was going to take care of things, but they started going haywire. And you were right about Samantha. I should have listened. The woman is bad news. I didn’t realize how dangerous she’d become. Now I’m caught in the middle and can’t find my way out of it.”

  “You can.”

  “How?”

  “Riley, you’re one of the strongest people I’ve ever seen. Look at what you’ve been through. I wish I had half your courage.”

  “Yeah, so much of it that all I want to do is go back behind Glendale’s locked doors where I felt safe and protected.”

  “You don’t.”

  Riley doesn’t answer. She looks away with disgust.

  “You do not,” Wendy again asserts. “Trust me. Closed doors don’t give you safety—they just make you their prisoner, squeeze the life from you. Then one day you wake up and ask yourself, ‘Is this it? Is this what I was meant to do? Live one meaningless minute after another inside these screaming four walls?’”

  “Why should I believe you?” Riley says. “How can you possibly know that life is better on this side of the door when you never walk through it?”

  Wendy raises her brows. She reaches out for Riley to take her hand.

  Riley does.

  Then, as if walking an unsteady emotional tightrope, Wendy takes steps, slow and wobbly, through her doorway until she’s standing in the middle of the hall. After a shaky breath, she gazes at Riley.

  “Believe me now?” she asks.

  The two women look at each other while contentment builds across their faces.

  And somehow for Riley, in some small way, the world outside Wendy’s door feels a little less weighted, a little more secure.

  63

  The feeling doesn’t last.

  Trouble is back. Not that she ever really left.

  Riley’s trying to work, and her phone is again blowing up with texts and calls from Samantha. It’s not just frightening—it’s completely disruptive, and Francine is shooting her dirty looks.

  The phone rings again. Riley’s jaw clenches.

  Enough is enough.

  Fear and patience take a back seat to irritation. She hoofs it out into the Pancake House parking lot, fumbles for her phone, and shouts, “LEAVE ME THE HELL ALONE! STOP CALLING. I MEAN IT! DO YOU HEAR ME?”

  “Riley?” Erin says, alarm so tangible that it nearly sends a charge down from the cell towers.

  Shit.

  “I didn’t have a chance to look at the number,” is all Riley can come up with.

  “I—I was calling to let you know I’m out here in the parking lot.”

  She looks off to the right and sees her sister waving through the car’s windshield.

  “How perfectly random of you,” she quips. “Hang on. I’ll be there in a minute.”

  She looks through the restaurant window, sees Francine trooping off to her office, then slips away to see Erin.

  “Are you checking on me?” she asks.

  “Given the way you answered my call, somebody should be. What’s wrong now?”

  “It’s Samantha.” Riley does a cursory skim of the parking lot, then turns back to Erin. “She’s been calling all day. She won’t leave me alone.”

  “Did you file that complaint?”

  “Not exactly.”

  Erin slaps her hand against the steering wheel. “Oh, for fuck’s sake, Riley. It’s a black-and-white sort of thing, kind of like being dead or alive. Either you have or you haven’t.”

  “I haven’t.”

  Erin’s disapproving hush says it all.

  “So, want to tell me why you’re here?” Riley asks, sounding clumsy while trying to dance around a volatile topic on the verge of a cataclysmic explosion.

  “Well, in addition to my persistent worry about you, I came to give you some information. I spoke to my girl at the department.”

  Riley leans in closer toward the window. “What did she find out?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Huh?�
��

  “Absolutely nothing. The tenant even admitted to investigators that he fell asleep with a burning lung dart in his hand. Textbook case of an accidental fire. It doesn’t get any more slam dunk than that.”

  “But Samantha still could have used the opportunity to steal a new key, right?”

  “Riley, stop.”

  “Stop what?”

  “Stop jamming your gears. Let this go.”

  “I can’t!”

  Erin sighs. “I’m not asking this again to irritate you. I’m asking out of love. Are you sure you’re feeling okay?”

  “I’ve got the she-hound from hell on my tail, so the answer would be no.”

  “I’m not talking about that.”

  “What, then?”

  “Don’t take this wrong, but our conversation last night had me worried, and you sounded absolutely hysterical just minutes ago when I called.”

  “With good reason.”

  “Riley, it’s not like all this is new. Your behavior has been strange for a while, and it keeps getting stranger. It started with you lying about those bare spots on your headboard. When I later pressed you on that, the story changed to an intruder who carved a nasty message on it. But you couldn’t even tell me what that message was.”

  “You think I was lying about it?”

  “Did I say that?”

  “You don’t have to. I know the way you say things without saying them.” Riley feels the heat of anger spread across her face. “It said, ‘Child Killer,’ okay? Are you happy now?”

  Erin grimaces.

  Riley says, “And as I’ve already explained, I think that intruder was Samantha.”

  “Do you? With the arson theory put to rest, you’ve got nothing.”

  “She went wacko on me. Isn’t that enough?”

  “No, it’s really not. In a court of law, that wouldn’t fly at all.”

  “But we’re not in a courtroom. We’re two sisters, talking.”

  “And as your sister, I listened and tried to help by gathering more information.”

  “I thanked you for that.”

  “Then I saw the chair shoved next to the window with a pair of binoculars, and you gave me an improbable story about someone trying to break into your car.”

  Riley’s not sure how to respond. What can she say? That she used the binoculars to spy on Samantha? That she’s the one who created this mess, which has spun so far out of control that she can no longer stop it?

  A few brisk knocks go off behind Riley. She zips around and through the restaurant’s window glass, sees Ms. Pancake Dictator herself, head wigwagging, hands bolted to her boney hips and, of course, with that disapproving glare splashed across her puss.

  Riley holds up her index finger. Francine gives Riley the stink eye.

  “And another thing,” Erin adds, “how come I’ve never met this Samantha woman?”

  “Would you please stop referring to her as this Samantha woman?” Riley says, still distracted that Francine hasn’t left her roost behind the window. “It’s very condescending and implies that I’m making her up.”

  “I’m starting to wonder about that, too.”

  “She’s real! And you haven’t met her because I didn’t feel compelled to introduce you. My God, Erin! I’m trying to create my own life. How can I do that when each step of the way you misinterpret my every move? Look, I appreciate everything you’ve done for me—I do—but that doesn’t give you the right to make judgments about my mental state. I was seeing a shrink for that. If there were a problem, she would have been the first to let me know.”

  “Except she’s dead, and she only knew what you told her. I’m seeing you in real time.”

  “Damn it! I was released from the hospital for a reason! Because the doctors think I’m well enough. I’m trying to find my place in this world, but it’s been hard. Really hard . . .” Riley chokes back tears. “I’m doing the best I can, so please, stop looking at me cross-eyed every time I pick up a pair of scissors!”

  “I haven’t done that, and you know it!”

  Francine pokes her head out the door and calls, “You’ve got about ten seconds to get in here and keep your job. Comprende?”

  Riley gives Francine a fast nod, then looks back at Erin, who says, “I care about you. I’m concerned, okay?”

  “Here’s an idea. How about finding a better way to show it?”

  “Riley . . .”

  “Look, I have to go. Bitch for a Boss has crawled so far up my rear end that she may puncture a lung soon.”

  “Will you please give me a call after you’re home so we can talk some more?”

  “Fine. I’ll call you.”

  Erin starts her car, then leaves the parking lot, and Riley turns to go inside.

  “HEY, BITCH!”

  Her feet stop moving, then her hands shake and rattle like jingles on an old tambourine.

  When she wheels around, Samantha stands before her.

  64

  Riley looks into the eyes of a madwoman but can’t speak. She can barely move, paralyzed by bloodless terror.

  “I was totally playing with you!” Samantha says through a boisterous laugh. She slaps Riley’s back. “Damn, girl! Don’t be so sensitive!” She doesn’t seem angry at all; in fact, her joviality is so convincing that, for a fleeting moment, Riley wonders, Is she crazy, or am I?

  “Wha-what are you doing here?” Riley says, words catching on their way up.

  “What do you think, silly?” Samantha lets out an innocent giggle that drives a chill into Riley’s bones. “Did you forget already? I’m picking you up to go shopping. Oh! And I found a new mall to try this time, since you couldn’t find anything you liked the other day.”

  The other day? What is she talking about?

  “Westland, I think it’s called?” Samantha rambles on. “Or something like that. Have you heard of it? Westland?”

  Riley adds being freakishly dumbfounded to being scared out of her wits.

  Samantha has entered a strange new state of mania. One that sends nerves prickling beneath Riley’s skin like tiny dancing stilettos. And that hyperanxious look on her face. The kind that could burst into menacing hysteria at any second. All Riley knows for sure is that she’s in danger. This woman is a ticking time bomb, and Riley has to avoid doing anything that might set her off, which means getting as far away from her as possible.

  She opts for the Abrupt Departure Strategy: she reels around, but with daunting speed, Samantha digs her thumb and forefinger into Riley’s clavicle, squeezing so tight that it induces tooth-gnashing pain. All Riley can do is close her eyes, let out a shivering moan, and pray for a solution.

  “WHATDIDIJUSTSAY?” Samantha isn’t just speaking—she’s growling her words through gritted pearly whites. Her anger is volatile and tactile, a different kind, the likes of which Riley hasn’t yet witnessed. Anger that totters dangerously close to combustion. Anger that, if provoked, promises to be hotter than melting steel.

  Riley’s body trembles beneath the inescapable death lock. The pressure ratchets up. Her agony hits a fever pitch.

  “Please! Stop!” Riley cries out. “You’re hurting me!”

  Samantha releases her hold, and a grin cracks across her face, then she moves right along as if nothing ever happened. “So what do ya think? Shopping? Yes? Then lunch? Maybe our favorite coffee shop after that. Lovely, right?”

  It’s a lose-lose situation no matter how she answers. Unless . . .

  “You know what? Why not?” Riley says, checking the restaurant window. Francine has momentarily stepped away. She looks back at Samantha. “I’ve finished my shift, so let me go grab my purse from the car, and then we’re off.”

  Samantha claps and claps, rubs her palms together, and says, “Yay!”

  Riley pulls the keys from a pocket on her way to the car. Inside, she slams the door, starts the ignition, and jets into reverse, leaving Samantha alone on the black tarmac, body motionless, face robbed of expression.


  65

  Riley blows along asphalt at a rate fast enough to make any traffic cop’s head spin. Several feet ahead, a red light pulls her to a stop. She checks the mirror: no sign of Samantha, but that may only be temporary.

  “Come on, come on, COME ON!” she yells at the light, pounding the wheel as if doing so might cause the signal to change.

  It changes. She takes off, then hears this on the radio.

  “We have new information for you today about the murder of a Lincoln Heights psychologist found bludgeoned to death in her office a few days ago. A confidential source tells NEWS One Hundred that Patricia Lockwood’s face and body had been beaten so badly that the medical examiner had to use dental records to confirm her identity.”

  Riley swallows hard against what feels like a golf ball–size lump in her throat. She didn’t need to hear that. She turns off her radio and, for a moment, considers calling in a tip about Samantha being Patricia’s killer.

  Don’t.

  Too risky. She’d love to put Samantha behind bars, but the effort could backfire in a huge way. She doesn’t have proof that the woman actually did it, and authorities are probably already looking at Riley as a potential suspect. By now, they’ve figured out that she was Patricia’s last appointment for the day. Then there’s that troubling note Riley left. Detectives will soon come calling with questions. Offering a tip would bring her worst fear to life even quicker, moving the spotlight of suspicion directly over her.

  Nope. Steer clear of the police.

  Keeping her mouth shut is imperative to survival—that and doing everything possible to avoid becoming Samantha’s next victim.

  Riley sees a Mercedes logo in her rearview mirror.

  Son of a bitch!

  Seconds later, Samantha is driving right alongside Riley’s car. Her stalker unveils the smile of a psychopath, glacial, confident, beaming with menace from corner to corner. Then Samantha falls behind Riley, and she knows vengeance is chasing her.

  And this busy road is a hazardous place for it. Samantha has raised the stakes, and from here this situation can only take a turn for the worse. Riley needs to make a fast getaway—her life depends on it—so she jams her foot into the gas pedal and juts forward, leaving her follower several feet behind.