The Sister-in-Law: An absolutely gripping summer thriller for 2021

by Pamela Crane

  I picked up on the first ring, the urge to tell him everything bursting out of my seams. Had I promised not to say anything to Lane? Or was I bound to secrecy by an unspoken sisterly pact?

  When I answered, Lane sounded out of breath. ‘Hey, Harper. Do you know where Candace is?’ The tip of his question rose with hope that my answer would be yes.

  ‘What do you mean? Isn’t she home?’

  ‘No, and I haven’t seen her at all today. I was hoping she was with you.’

  ‘Sorry, she’s not with me. Why are you so concerned? And why are you out of breath?’

  ‘I, uh, just got back from a jog. But she was gone when I woke up, and I haven’t heard from her all day. That’s not like her.’

  And jogging was not like Lane. Certainly not in a downpour. And it didn’t sound like Candace to just disappear all day without a word.

  ‘I don’t know what to tell you. Maybe she’s just been out shopping all day. Or she’s out with friends?’

  ‘She doesn’t have any friends … that I know of.’

  There’s a lot you don’t know about your wife, I wanted to say. ‘Look, it’s still early in the day. She’ll probably turn up this evening. I’m sure she’s fine. She’s a grown woman, and grown women go out sometimes. It’s nothing to worry about.’

  ‘You’re probably right. I wouldn’t have given it a second thought if she’d just answer my calls or texts. She never takes off without touching base. And she left her purse with her wallet inside. How could she go shopping without it?’

  That information would have been helpful earlier in the conversation.

  ‘Are you sure she took her phone with her?’

  ‘One sec.’ The line rustled with the sound of Lane rummaging through her purse. ‘I don’t see her phone, and when I called it I didn’t hear it ring. I can only assume she has it on her. So she left with the car and presumably her phone, but no purse. Is that normal for women to do?’

  It was not something that I would ever do, but who was to say Candace wouldn’t? I gasped, hand to mouth, at the worry that crashed into my head. My dread hopscotched from Candace to Noah. A humiliated man was the most dangerous man. She had left him, crushed his ego, stole his unborn baby. If he had found out he was the father, it wouldn’t surprise me if he came after her. With Candace, nothing would surprise me.

  ‘Lane? I might know who Candace is with.’

  ‘Who?’ He sounded relieved, but he shouldn’t have been.

  ‘I’ll be home shortly. We need to talk. There’s something about Candace you need to know.’

  Chapter 20

  Lane

  It was almost eleven o’clock at night before headlights streaked across the steel-gray wall as Candace pulled up the driveway. Up until this moment I had been worried about my missing wife. Now I was pissed beyond words.

  ‘It looks like she finally decided to come home.’ Keeping me company with distressing conversation, Harper watched me while I watched the front door. ‘You ready for this?’ Harper asked.

  ‘As ready as I’ll ever be.’

  Harper knew better than to press. She pulled out a Better Homes & Gardens magazine from beneath a stack of mail, examining it. ‘They still haven’t updated my address.’ She glanced over at me. ‘Why did you pick up my mail from the Hendricks Way house? I stopped by today and the mailbox was empty.’

  Damn. I hadn’t thought she’d notice. ‘Oh, um, I was in the area.’

  ‘Doing what? That’s totally out of the way.’

  ‘Does it matter? I was trying to be nice.’

  She tossed the magazine down and glared at me. ‘Calm down, Lane. Why are you acting so defensive?’

  ‘You’re attacking me for getting your mail for you. I’m sorry for thinking of you.’

  ‘No, I’m sorry.’ She paused, as if she was caught in a mental fog. ‘I’m just on edge since Michelle Hudson made her statement. I thought maybe you had been over there to see her and I panicked. I just want that whole thing to go away.’

  Harper’s instinct was sharper than I expected. I had been over to see Michelle. But I couldn’t tell Harper – or anyone – about it.

  I sat forward at the sound of a car door slamming shut outside. I glanced at Harper and nodded in the direction of the stairs. Knowing what was coming, Harper excused herself from the sofa, her hand pausing on my shoulder as she passed.

  ‘Accept no more lies, Lane,’ Harper warned. ‘And remember, this is about her, not you. And do not tell her about what we’ve done, or she will bury you with it.’

  ‘I know, I know. We’ve gone over this a million times.’

  She leaned toward me, our faces this close. ‘You can love her more than you love yourself, but it’s going to cost you everything. I would know.’

  Then she left.

  I found it ironic that I was supposed to squeeze the truth out of Candace, yet I hid way worse secrets from her. Like tampering with evidence. Staging a murder. Or what I had been doing all afternoon. I hadn’t even told her about the black sedan I noticed sitting two doors down from our house with a man clearly watching us. Earlier today I had pretended to take a jog past his car, but he knew what I was up to and took off before I could get a look at his face.

  All evening I had expected the police to show up with two sets of handcuffs, one for me and one for Harper. Maybe it would be a relief. I was physically and emotionally exhausted from the perpetual state of panic I lived in. All the plotting, the preparing for worst-case scenarios … no matter how many times I talked myself in circles, I came back to the same conclusion: there was simply nothing we could do but wait.

  And not tell a soul.

  That was the deal I made with Harper.

  I had thought Michelle Hudson’s witness testimony about the night of Ben’s death was the worst of my problems, until Harper hit me with news of her own after she put the kids to bed. Apparently my wife was a liar. The worst kind, too. Candace had reeled me in with hopes and dreams, but they belonged to another man. A dangerous man. She had run from him into my arms. Was I merely an escape hatch? Or did she genuinely love me? I could never tell the truth from the lies with her.

  Did I really have room to judge her, though? I was a criminal in the making, after all. In the end, I was left with an unsettling feeling that I had betrayed Candace, not the other way around. As Harper’s feet padded across the upstairs landing, the front door creaked open.

  I was so relieved that my wife was alive that I could have killed her. The house was dark, except for a single lamp on the coffee table beside me. After quietly shutting the front door, Candace tiptoed toward the stairs, then paused when she saw me. My heart raced, as if something frightening or surprising was about to happen. It reminded me of the day I asked her to marry me. I had no idea if I was going to get a yes or a no, and it terrified me. Much like how I felt now, wondering what terrifying truth she’d reveal tonight.

  She marched into the living room, a shopping bag swinging from her arm. I barely recognized her, wrapped in pale, washed-out skin. The bronze glow had been replaced with dark scoops beneath her eyes.

  ‘Hey, babe.’ Her voice was tinged with an unspoken apology. ‘You’re still awake.’

  ‘I’ve been waiting for you. I called you a dozen times today. Where were you?’ No hey, babe this time. I was angry, and I wanted her to know it.

  ‘Out.’ She lifted her Nordstrom shopping bag up as proof. ‘Shopping.’

  I had caught her in lie number one. ‘Until almost midnight? And without your wallet?’

  ‘What? Are you stalking me?’

  ‘Answer the questions, Candace. No lies this time.’

  She huffed, and I knew stalling when I saw it. ‘First of all, I’m not lying. And second of all, I used Apple Pay on my phone, you asshole, to buy your sister a thank-you gift, then I got a pregnancy massage, and after that I was craving Korean so I grabbed dinner out. Would you like to see all my receipts? You can check my mileage, if you’d like.’ Thrust
ing her hand onto her hip and cocking her head, I recognized the sarcasm too late.

  Maybe I had overreacted. ‘I’m not trying to start a fight. I just didn’t know where you were all day and you wouldn’t take my calls. I was worried.’

  ‘I’m a big girl, Lane. I don’t need a babysitter.’

  ‘I know, but it was so out of character for you to just … disappear, without a note or text or anything.’ Especially when your deranged ex, whose baby you’re carrying, might be looking for you.

  She exhaled an exasperated sigh. ‘Sometimes I need a little space. The pregnancy hormones make me sick all the time, and angry when I’m not sick, and sad when I’m not angry. And with all the people in the house, it can feel overwhelming.’

  ‘I get it. But I did have something I wanted to talk to you about. Can you sit down for a minute?’

  She glanced away, then looked past me. ‘Um, do you mind if I grab something to eat first? I’m starving.’

  ‘I thought you already ate dinner.’

  ‘I did, but I felt too sick to finish. Now I’m hungry again.’

  Was it the pregnancy, or another lie because she hadn’t actually gone out to eat? I would never know. Everything that came out of her mouth was lies. I couldn’t trust the woman I married. I didn’t even know the woman I married.

  ‘Food can wait. This is important. We need to talk. Now. I’m not asking anymore, Candace. You owe me a conversation.’

  Her silence was so loud.

  ‘Excuse me?’ Her jaw clenched, and her words came out taut and angry.

  ‘I know you lied. You lied to me about everything – about the baby being mine, about where you’re from, even about your name, Candace Moriarty! How about you tell me your real identity, for starters.’

  ‘Lane,’ she said, owning my name. ‘Who told you all this stuff?’

  ‘Does it matter? Who are you really?’ The hope-filled boy in me wanted to cry, but the wiser man in me held it back.

  Candace dropped her bag on a chair and sat beside me, her knees angled toward mine. She scooted closer, generating heat between our legs, our arms. I was still in love with her, and I didn’t even know her. I choked on her silence. Finally, she had the courage to look me in the eyes.

  ‘I guess Harper told you everything?’

  ‘She’s my sister, and clearly the only one who cares about me. I want the truth, Candace. From your lips, not Harper’s.’

  ‘I had hoped to leave all the pain in my past. I just wanted to move forward with you into the future. Why is the past so important?’ She was pleading with me, her voice intense and wobbly.

  ‘You can’t just walk away from it, Candace. That’s not how it works; because it’s not the past if it’s still the present.’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘I know about Noah. About the baby not being mine. So it’s not the past, is it? He’s still looking for you, isn’t he?’

  She sighed, her gaze dropping. ‘I’m sorry for not being honest. I’ll tell you everything. But I need one thing from you first.’

  I wouldn’t give her a damn thing, but if it got the truth out of her, I could lie. ‘What’s that?’

  ‘I just need you to listen and not react until I’m done.’

  I could give her that. I nodded.

  ‘First, I want you to know I love you. More than anything. That’s why I lied, because I was afraid the truth would make you leave me. And I hope you’ll still want to be my husband after you hear it all.’

  I raised my hand to stop her. I was too angry to suffer through her emotional preamble. ‘Enough precursor. Get on with it.’

  ‘Sorry. Okay. Well, my name isn’t Candace Moriarty. It’s Candace Wilkes. Well, sort of.’ She lifted a finger to stop me from asking what that meant. ‘That’s my birth name. Born in Cleveland, Ohio. Eventually we fled Ohio after my dad’s arrest warrants piled up, and we ended up in Pennsylvania where my grandma lived. After my parents died when I was ten, I moved around a lot. That’s when I got close to a guy named Noah Gosling. His family took me in when I was living on the streets, and eventually we became high school sweethearts. We got married very young and I became Candace Gosling. Young and dumb, I thought we’d live happily ever after. Well, he ended up becoming an abusive jerk, but I stuck by him because I was afraid to leave … until one day I decided I couldn’t risk losing another baby. That’s when I left. Then I met you. I wanted to tell you, but I didn’t know how. Or if you’d be willing to accept another man’s baby.’

  Realization boiled slowly, but when it came, my anger was hot and spitting.

  ‘So he really is the father of your baby?’

  She didn’t answer at first. The stretchy minute gave enough time for the humiliation to claw into my flesh. I had been a fool for love.

  ‘Yes, unfortunately it’s his. But I had gotten pregnant several times with him and none of my other babies survived the stress or the abuse … until this one. I took the beatings for years, until I just couldn’t anymore. I had been so stupid and weak and foolish and hopeful that he would change. I preferred the devil I knew to the devil I didn’t know – homelessness and being alone, living on the streets and potentially ending up dead. All I wanted was a family, a man who would take care of me, not hurt me. Noah clearly wasn’t the answer. But you were.’

  I wanted to buy what she was selling: Hope. A future together. But I couldn’t, because it was all fake goods.

  ‘So you got pregnant with his baby and then ran off. Does he know?’

  ‘I don’t know. Does it matter? He never wanted to be a father. You did. That’s when I realized everything could work out okay.’

  ‘Only because it’s all based on lies.’ When she frowned, I instantly regretted the dig. ‘So who is Candace Moriarty?’

  Tears wet her eyes, and I almost felt sorry for her. I couldn’t imagine what she had gone through, but right now I was too fuming to care.

  ‘I created a new identity after I left. I knew a guy who could make me a fake ID. I was afraid Noah would find me, so I picked a name from the obituaries. At that point I never thought about the lie catching up to me. After I met you, it was too late to come clean. I didn’t want to lose you. Would you have stayed if you had known the truth?’

  I couldn’t answer that because she had never given me the chance to find out. I sat in stunned silence. I didn’t know what to say or what to feel. All I felt was betrayal and heartache.

  ‘We’ll never know, will we? You knew how much I loved you, and yet you kept this huge secret part of yourself from me. You just assumed I wouldn’t accept your past. Instead, you deceived me, lied to my face, told me I was a father … you never thought about anything other than yourself. How could you spin lie after lie about your whole life, our life? Is there anything that’s true?’

  Her gaze hung on her hands, stiffly clenched.

  ‘The way I feel about you, that’s true, Lane. I love you more than anything. I want a future with you – you, me, and our baby. That’s all true. Please forgive me. Please, I’m begging you. I can’t lose you. It’ll kill me.’ She dropped to her knees, kneeling before me, gripping my hands like her life depended on it. In a way, it did. ‘I knew if I told you the truth you’d never think I was good enough. All I want is to be good enough for you. Surviving without a mother broke me, but you helped build me back up more resilient than before. I want to be strong enough to forge a better future for us. For our children.’

  ‘You mean your children. Not mine.’

  ‘Please, Lane. I thought you, of all people, would be understanding.’

  ‘Oh, I understand plenty. I understand that you lie easier than you tell the truth. I understand that you’re selfish and will do anything to get what you want.’

  ‘Wow. So that’s what you think of me.’ She rose to her feet, glaring down at me. The passion sharpened her tongue into a knife. ‘Apparently you’re no different from any other man. I should have figured as much.’

 
; ‘Don’t blame me for what you’ve done to us!’ Slamming my fist on the coffee table, I stood to meet her, eye-to-eye. ‘You thought I was the kind of man who judges someone based on their past. Well, I have a past too, Candace, and I would have never held your mistakes against you. So, then, I guess neither of us knows each other. We’re two strangers, not two united souls. You’ve pushed me away with your secrets and broken me with your lies. There is no us. It’s just you. And me.’

  ‘No! You don’t get to split us with a word. It doesn’t work that way. You promised your future to me. You can’t just take it back!’ The air vibrated with her rage.

  ‘I married Candace Moriarty, not you.’

  ‘You can’t leave, Lane.’

  ‘Watch me!’

  I stormed across the room, unable to cork the tears that I didn’t want her to see. She didn’t deserve my anguish over her. Candace ran after me, reaching for me, but I shoved her back. Too hard. She fell to the floor, crying out as her rear slammed against the wood. I stopped, wanting to scoop her up and offer a million apologies, but I couldn’t. My rage held me hostage.

  I regretted every moment as I watched my wife splayed out on the floor, holding her belly, sobbing my name. I hated myself as I grabbed my car keys and headed for the front door. Everything in me screamed, but the voices were too loud. I needed to leave. As I reached for the doorknob, a movement drew my gaze upward, where I found Harper standing at the top of the stairwell, staring at me with eyes full of pity.

  You can love her more than you love yourself, Harper had said, but it’s going to cost everything.

  She was right. I could forgive a lot. My sister knew just how much. But the lies and deceit and entrapment … It was too much to be able to forgive. As I slammed the door shut behind me, it was the beginning of the end, when the girl breaks the boy and the boy seeks revenge.

  Chapter 21

  Candace

  Love is brutal. Love is bliss. Love is hard. Love is forgiveness.