The Stranger Inside

by Lisa Unger

  “Knowing what you know about me, about us, about what we did,” I continue. “What compelled you to do this story? Weren’t you afraid of where it might lead?”

  You bow your head, twist at the ring on your finger.

  “I’ve thought about this, too,” you say.

  I wait for you to go on. I have some theories of my own, not the least likely of which might be your desire to self-destruct. When I think of all the choices you’ve made since Kreskey—to cheat on Greg with me, to follow me back to Kreskey, to lure Tess’s killer into the house, to kill him with your own hands—none of them have been acts of self-preservation. In fact, the last healthy thing you did was hide in the hollow of the tree. Part of me wonders if you wanted to confess, if you wanted to answer for your crime. It’s not unusual, so attached are we to the story of good rewarded, and evil punished.

  “It was almost as if there were two of me,” you say. “The one who almost died that day, the one who did what we did. And the one who emerged after—Rain Winter, journalist, wife, mother. That other girl was locked inside, buried deep. And once I let her free—”

  You pause, not sure how to go on.

  “You integrated,” I offer. “The frightened girl with the woman you’ve become.”

  You consider it a moment. Then give an affirming nod. “Yes.”

  “There are only three of us who know the whole truth,” I say. Agent Brower has her suspicions about me, but no proof. And I suspect she’s running an agenda of her own. It’s her who I think has taken the kill bag. What she’ll do with it, I have no idea. Maybe it’s a way to keep me in line, a warning not to continue. Or maybe it’s something else. I keep this fact to myself.

  “And none of us will ever tell,” you say. “Not I, not you, not Harper. We’ll take our secret to the grave.”

  “So, you weren’t looking for answers, or punishment.”

  “No,” you whisper. “I already had more answers than I wanted. I was looking to control the telling of what happened to us, I think. To control, to own it, to choose where our story ends.”

  “I understand.”

  You reach across the table and I take your hand in mine, a joining, a pact sealed.

  “That part of it, who we were then, what happened to us—” You pause, pull your hand away to dig something from your pocket. Then you place the crystal heart on the table between us, where it picks up the sun and casts red flecks on the ceiling.

  “Our story ends right here, Hank.”

  Tess stands by the window and watches, smiling sadly. She is as she would have been, like Sandy, willowy and blonde with kind, smiley eyes. Then, as I watch her, she fades into the sunshine.

  FORTY-SIX

  She rose before 5 a.m., the sun not yet lighting the sky, kissed Greg on the cheek.

  “Mmm,” he said, reaching for her.

  She slipped from his grasp, causing him to moan and roll over. She checked on Lily, who was still sound asleep—thank goodness for small favors—then laced up her sneakers at the door, slipped out into the near-morning coolness. She jogged down her drive, up the middle of the road through her sleeping neighborhood, then through the gate to the park.

  She did not look for hulking shadows or strange cars. She did not imagine fires and earthquakes turning her pretty neighborhood to ash. Or at least, when the thoughts came, she let them pass into the cool morning air.

  The day stretched ahead of her as she picked up her pace, footfalls on concrete, the sound of her breath. Another runner passed in the opposite direction with a wave, yet another overtook her from behind and disappeared. She was slow, steady; speed was not an option. That was okay. Mommy-and-Me Yoga (which basically meant no one got to do any yoga) this morning. Picnic lunch with the park mommies, a bitch and kvetch session that was nonetheless kind of fun now that it wasn’t the only thing she had on the schedule. Final edits on their story “The Nightjar” in the studio tonight, Mitzi to come in the afternoon, Greg to take over in the evening. Another full day, one after which she would collapse into an exhausted pile of herself.

  Don’t let this slow you down, kid.

  “Are you happy?” Dad wanted to know when he came for dinner on Sunday. “Are you well?”

  “I’m not sure I have time to think about it,” she’d laughed.

  “Good answer,” he said.

  “Is it?” Greg looked a little miffed. “Is it a good answer?”

  But, yes, more or less. She was happy.

  “It is a good answer,” said her father. “You can figure it out when the rush is over. Trust me, time to think about whether you’re happy or not is not all it’s cracked up to be.”

  Five miles later, she was back in the kitchen, making breakfast, when Lily’s voice sounded over the monitor.

  “Mommy. Hungy.”

  “Coming, bunny,” she called.

  “I got her.” Greg from upstairs.

  The bustle of morning—coffee brewing, Lily laughing, Greg running around looking for the keys that were in his pocket the whole time. Her phone pinging from somewhere—where was it? Once, twice, three times. She’d find it in a minute.

  “Don’t be late,” she reminded him. “Mitzi has to go by six.”

  “I won’t be late.”

  And then at the door, a kiss. A real kiss, where she snaked her arms around his neck and he held her tight. Because—she was a wife, too. A mother. A journalist. A runner. Herself. A wife who made promises to her husband, and kept them.

  Don’t let this slow you down, kid.

  Greg left, and Rain turned on the live radio feed on her phone, Gillian’s voice low and soothing.

  “Brian Tome, the man who was tried and acquitted for killing his ex-wife and two sons in their home, was found murdered today on his isolated property in Ocala, Florida. FBI officials say that they are investigating this in connection with other recent murders in which the victims were accused of crimes for which they were found innocent, or unfit to stand trial. This investigation, and the others, are ongoing.

  “Special Agent Brower, in charge of the case, had this to say—‘We are treating this like we would treat any serial murder case. No one has the right to kill in cold blood.’

  “Gillian Murray, reporting for National News Radio.”

  The world seemed to stop, a hush falling. What did this mean?

  Outside, Rain strapped Lily into her car seat.

  “Time for Mommy-and-Me Yoga!” she said brightly. Lily bounced in excited anticipation.

  It wasn’t Hank, she thought. He hadn’t murdered that man in Ocala. He had promised her that he would never do anything like that again; that he had that other side of himself managed. She’d believed him; he was done. He had Beth now, a calming influence in his life. Someone who understood his complexities, who loved him anyway. Maybe that’s what he needed all along. Someone who didn’t need him to be one man or the other.

  So then, what? Another vigilante? A copycat? One inspired by the other vigilante killings?

  What evidence?

  A postscript to their story?

  A sizzle of fear. Had she lost control of the narrative?

  As she drove, Henry called.

  “You heard, I guess,” he said over the speakerphone.

  “I did.”

  “Any theories?”

  “No,” she said. “Not one.”

  She’d spent a lot of time talking with Henry in recent weeks—trying to understand the dark web, murderabilia and the people who collect it, Kreskey’s online fan club, and the one that had sprung up around the man people were calling the Nightjar.

  “A journalist without a theory,” he said. “I’ve never met one.”

  “Journalists don’t have theories,” she reminded him. “They follow the facts. The facts—that’s the story. That and only that.”

 
“Well,” said Henry, cagey. “I do have one bit of info.”

  “Oh?”

  “I heard that they found the kill bag at the scene.”

  Something tightened in her middle. Hank’s missing bag. It had disappeared that night. Just gone. A big pack filled with tools, weapons, rope, tarps, duct tape. They’d both wondered when it might turn up.

  She glanced in the rearview mirror at Lily, who was thumbing through a board book.

  “And?”

  “Supposedly they found something that connects it to the Markham murder. A knife that’s similar to the weapon they suspect was used on Markham.”

  The jangle of alarm rattled her.

  “Interesting.” She kept her voice level, pulled into the parking lot.

  Emmy was in front of the studio with Sage, waiting. She sent up a wave to Rain. Her other life, her other self. Mommy. Friend. Wife. It was waiting for her.

  “Keep me in the loop?” said Rain. She lifted a hand to Emmy, held up a finger. Just a second. I’ll be right there.

  “Will do,” said Henry and ended the call.

  She dialed Hank, who picked up on the first ring.

  “Don’t worry about it,” he said by way of greeting.

  She didn’t want to say anything else on the phone. After all, they were always watching. “You heard.”

  “Agent Brower called me,” he said. She waited a beat. “For my help, my insights on this new development.”

  “Oh.”

  “It’s fine,” he said, his voice low and steady. “Really.”

  “How can you be sure?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “It wasn’t—” She knew she didn’t have to finish the sentence.

  “No,” he said quickly. “God no. That’s all done.”

  She’d have to take his word for it. What else could she do?

  Her mind was on spin cycle. How did this fit into their story?

  “Who, then, Hank?”

  “I have some theories, one I’ve been working on with Agent Brower.”

  She waited.

  “My guess is that we’re dealing with a person in law enforcement or the military,” he said, voice low. “I suspect that our perpetrator has been wronged or has lost a loved one. Our vigilante has lost faith in the system, even though he might be working within it.”

  She let the words settle.

  The missing kill bag. There was only one person who could have taken it. The pieces fell into place. But why leave the bag? Was it a warning to her and to Hank? If they suspected Agent Brower had continued where Hank had stopped, they’d need to keep it to themselves and out of the story. Mutually assured destruction.

  “How does Agent Brower feel about this profile?” she asked.

  There was a heavy silence. “She’s taking it under consideration.

  “The bag they found was clean,” he went on, intuiting her concern. “No DNA evidence. Just the knife that may or may not be the Markham murder weapon. It potentially links the crimes, but it doesn’t bring them any closer to the perpetrator.”

  Rain watched Lily in the rearview mirror. She wasn’t sure how to feel, how to weave this into their story—their story, hers and Hank’s. Someone else was out there, delivering a certain brand of justice. That stranger inside her took a kind of dark pleasure in the thought.

  She sat suspended—between her life in the light and her life in the dark, the past, the future. Emmy waved again, beckoning her.

  “Hey, I was going to call you,” he said into the silence.

  “Oh?”

  “I asked Beth to marry me.”

  Another impossibly complicated swell of emotion. Happy. Sad. A twist of regret. She still thought about what they shared that week. Sometimes. Sometimes she woke from dreams that shamed her.

  “Congratulations, Hank,” she said, putting a smile in her voice. “I’m so happy for you both.”

  “You assume she said yes.”

  “Didn’t she?”

  “She did,” he said. “I don’t know why. But she did.”

  She could hear how happy he was, and she felt the squeeze on her heart release.

  Rain went around to the back seat, unstrapped Lily from her seat and lifted her, gathered up her things. Hank was still on speakerphone.

  “Do you ever think about how things might have been different?” he asked. “If we’d made different choices.”

  She laughed, lightly, a little sad.

  “I don’t have time to think about things like that,” she said, which was, of course, a lie. “When you and Beth have kids, you won’t either. No more navel-gazing, Doctor. Just move forward, for you, but mostly for them. I gotta go. Mommy-and-Me Yoga.”

  He had a funny laugh, warm, smart, knowing. He sounded far away.

  “Goodbye, Lara.”

  Rain ended the call.

  She jogged to Emmy, Lily in her arms, and together they walked through the door, setting off chimes. It was dim and peaceful inside, soft flute music, light incense.

  They all spread out their mats, sporting their brightly colored yoga wear. All shapes and ages, mommies with time and money enough to be here.

  “Welcome,” said the lithe yoga teacher. She was a little too young, a little too hot to be teaching a mommy-and-me class, wasn’t she?

  The toddlers immediately descended into chaos, trying out their voices, greeting each other with laughter, waddling around. Which was fine—it was a safe space with everything soft, no hard corners, nothing sharp or unstable, everyone present, gentle and patient.

  “I invite you to leave everything you brought with you—any stress, any worries, your list of things you have to do right after this—outside this room,” said the teacher with a lovely smile. “Just be here, now—for yourself, for your little ones. And take the biggest breath you’ve taken all day.”

  Yes, thought Rain—she’d leave behind the world with all its brutal edges, and hard consequences, all its confounding shades of gray, the chaos of the past, the uncertainty of the future. Just for a while. Lily ran back to Rain and tumbled into her folded lap.

  And for just a little while, Rain would indeed let it all slow her down.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Writers are hobbits. We settle into our space and spend the majority of our days dream weaving—if we’re lucky. But we don’t work alone. No novel makes it out into the world without a team.

  My husband, Jeffrey, and our daughter, Ocean Rae, supply endless love, patience, kindness, and a life filled with light and laughter. I wouldn’t be the person that I am or the writer that I am without them.

  My agent Amy Berkower and her assistant Abigail Barce of Writers House keep the business of being a writer well in hand. I am grateful to them for their intelligence and guidance.

  The sterling team at Park Row Books—my smart-as-a-whip editor Erika Imranyi, my partner-in-crime publicist Meredith Barnes, the elegant, in-charge Shara Alexander and powerhouse Margaret Marbury—well, a writer couldn’t ask for more or better. My heartfelt gratitude goes to each of them, and to everyone from the brilliant art department, to eagle-eyed copy editor Jennifer Stimson, to the intrepid sales force.

  I am blessed by a vast network of family and friends. My parents, Joe and Virginia Miscione, and my brother, Joey, are tireless floggers—spreading the word and facing books out in stores around the country. Erin Mitchell is early reader, voice of reason and champion. Susana Weymouth, Lorna Taylor and the board members of Tampa Bay Businesses for Culture and the Arts offer endless support in my local community, and bolster our burgeoning arts scene with all their efforts. And for all those faces I see again and again at my events locally and around the country, who buy books, who spread the word—family, friends, faithful readers—thank you. You probably don’t know how much it means to a writer to have that kind of l
ove and support. I’ll tell you—a LOT!

  I’ve cited this book before and it continues to be a touchstone for me in my writing; Donald Kalsched’s The Inner World of Trauma: Archetypal Defenses of the Personal Spirit changed the way I thought about mental illness and the way I write about it. And Essentials of Abnormal Psychology by V. Mark Durand and David H. Barlow is a resource I refer to again and again.

  Read on for an extract from UNDER MY SKIN by Lisa Unger.

  If you loved The Stranger Inside, turn the page for an extract from Under My Skin by Lisa Unger…

  Under My Skin

  by Lisa Unger

  PROLOGUE

  I like him. I do.

  But.

  There’s always a but, isn’t there?

  He’s talking and I should be listening. I’m not. Does he see it, that I’m scattered, distracted? Doubtful. He doesn’t seem especially observant, has that way about him that people do now. As if they are putting on a show of themselves, as if the moment is being watched rather than lived. He glances about as he talks. Up at the television screens over the bar, all on mute, all tuned in to different sporting events. Down at the phone that sits dark beside him. Back to me, off again to the rowdy table across from us—a postwork gathering I’m guessing from the rumpled suits and tired eyes.

  I soak in the details of him: his shock of ink black hair, thick—any girl would kill for it; dark stubble on his jaw, just enough—sexy, not unkempt, style, not neglect; his gym-toned body. Beneath the folds of his lavender oxford, the dip of cut abs, the round of a well-worked shoulder.

  If I had a camera in my hand—not a smartphone but a real camera—say a mirrorless Hasselblad X1D, ergonomic, light—old-school style with high-tech innards—I’d watch him through the lens and try to find the moment when he revealed himself, when the muscles in his face relaxed and the mask dropped, even for just a millisecond. Then I’d see him. The man he really is when he steps off the stage he imagines himself on.