Empire of Lies

by Whitney G.

  Walking over to the small bookshelf near the window, I push up the bottom panel to see if my message has survived the test of time. Right underneath the crackling paint, are the words I wrote at my last session here.

  Fuck forgiveness. You will burn for this, and I’m going to watch you die.

  Old and ugly memories begin to play in my head, and I shake them away before I can succumb to their twisted horrors. I set a timer on my watch—twenty-six minutes, and vow to get this done in half that time.

  Making my way to the white French doors that lead to Dr. McAllister’s office, I knock as hard as I can.

  “My business hours don’t start until nine o’clock tomorrow!” he calls out. “Go home, Taylor. Whatever it is, you can wait to tell me about it in the morning.”

  “I’m not Taylor.” I step inside the room, shutting the door behind me. “I’m—”

  “Trespassing,” he says, looking up from a book. “You can come back at nine o’clock just like everyone else. However, please know that I’m not open to taking clients like you.”

  “What do you mean, clients like me?”

  “Adults,” he says. “Surely you see the words, World Renowned Child Specialist etched on all of my doors. It’s not there for decoration.”

  “I must have missed that.” I walk over to his desk and pick up one of the rare cigars from his Tinder box. “You still collect these?”

  I don’t wait for him to answer. Instead, I pull a lighter out of my pocket and place the cigar into my mouth. I take a long drag and debate whether I want to take a few of his cigars with me on the way out.

  You have very good taste, Dr. McAllister.

  “Did you not hear me say that you need to leave my office, sir?” He walks over to me and crosses his arms. “I believe I asked you very nicely.”

  “It’s amazing how easily you’ve been able to take your business to the next level after all these years.” I walk over to the far wall, pretend to admire all of his framed certificates and medals. “I bet you’re very proud of yourself.”

  “I am…” He stares at me, looking completely confused.

  “I bet you’d be even prouder of yourself if you didn’t wake up every morning with the guilt of what kept you in this business,” I say, putting out the cigar and tucking it into my jacket. “I bet your clients would scatter like roaches, if they knew who you really were and what you were doing twenty-five years ago.”

  “I have no idea what the hell you’re talking about.”

  “Denial isn’t helpful, Doctor. You used to tell me that all the time…” I walk over to a huge black case on the wall, where he keeps a custom diamond beretta pistol.

  “Please don’t touch that.” He holds up his hand. “It’s a classic beretta. It was handcrafted just for me.”

  “Is it loaded?”

  “Of course, it’s loaded.” He rolls his eyes. “Please, don’t—” He lets out a sigh as I take it out of the case, as I run my finger over its beautiful, diamond-studded trigger. “Look, whoever you are, I really don’t have time to play these games. I’ve honestly never seen you a day in my life, and I’d like to continue doing so.”

  “You were never a frequent visitor at 347 Holden Lane Avenue twenty-five years ago?” I say, and his face immediately pales. “Never spent significant time with two identical twin brothers named Michael and Trevor?”

  He gasps and takes a step back.

  “This is the part when you admit that you do know me,” I say. “That you knew me long before I ever became an unfortunate client of yours. You can also admit that you spent most of our sessions trying to convince me into believing what did and didn’t happen.”

  “I was a bad social service director then.” He swallows. “I would never treat you the same way now as I did then.”

  “Because you moved on to others.” I look around the room, making sure this scene will look exactly how I want. A random murder in the middle of the day. “You thought that if you just stopped and tried to become a World Renowned Child Specialist, that it would erase all of the things you did before. It fucking doesn’t.”

  He’s peeing his pants, shaking and attempting to grab his cell phone from his pocket.

  “I’m usually civil about these types of things,” I say, moving his picture frame a little to the left. “But for you, and because of all the damage you’ve gifted me, I’m going to make one hell of an exception.”

  “I’ve asked you to leave my office three times now,” he says, his voice wavering. “Don’t make me call the police.”

  “You know what?” I pull my burner phone out of my pocket. “I think that’s a great idea.” I dialed 9-1-1 and made sure to hit the speaker button so he could hear.

  “9-1-1, emergency response,” the operator’s soft voice fills the room. “What’s your emergency?”

  “I just heard a lot of gunshots in a building on Billionaire’s Row,” I say. “I think it came from one of those fancy therapy offices, so some officers may want to check that out.”

  “Can you tell me exactly where you—”

  I end the call and Dr. McAllister’s face is now ghost-white. He holds up his hands, looking like he’s about to beg for forgiveness.

  I don’t give him a chance to say another word. I aim the beretta at his chest and unload the clip faster than I’ve ever unloaded on anyone before.

  Eleven rounds. Eleven bullets.

  His body hits his desk, and then the floor with a sickening thud. Blood splatters all over the plain walls, coating pieces of the hardwood floor in a bright red.

  Walking over to him, I set the gun down on top of his chest. “You deserved more bullets than that,” I whisper. “I let you off far easier than you let me and Trevor…”

  Taking his cigar collection, I move through the back halls of the office and take a freight elevator down to the lobby. The guests are running and panicking at the sound of sirens, and the security guards are blocking the elevators.

  Dropping the burner phone down one of the city’s drains, I feel somewhat relieved that this chapter of my life is almost over, but I know there’s no way I can go “home” to the mansion right now. I know I’m bound to have one of those nights where I’m unable to escape the final nightmares that come, and I’ve never slept around Meredith for that reason.

  I’ll go home tomorrow.

  Or maybe the next day.

  Meredith

  Now

  My limbs burn as I slowly drag my body out of the heated pool. I’ve completed more than my required laps for the night, and I can’t take anymore. Dripping onto the tile with every step I take, I throw up my middle finger to the camera that’s tucked away in the corner, just in case he ever watches me when he’s away.

  Wrapping myself in a towel, I slide my feet into my flip flops and brace myself before heading upstairs to the kitchen. He’s been gone three whole days, so I know it’s only a matter of time before he walks through the door and resets the board for a new game of chess. Before he baits me with fake news about my own case.

  I look around and notice that the last chess game we played is still on display. The lights in the kitchen are still set how I like them, and there’s no new novel waiting for me on the counter. No phone charger with a “You can use this for one hour. PS—I’m still waiting on you to say thank you,” note.

  Confused, I grab my watch from a drawer and see that it’s nine thirty.

  He never comes home that late…

  I tap my fingers against the countertop, thinking this could finally be my chance. The perfect time for me to start getting to the bottom of who the hell I really married.

  I force myself to wait for another twenty minutes, and then I decide to go for it.

  Making my way up the grand staircase, I make a left and head to Michael’s bedroom. The keypad on the door handle gives me pause, but I’ve seen him type in the code before, seen him switch up the numbers every now and then whenever we happened to cross paths in the hallway.

/>   I typed in what I remember from last week, 1-17-4-16-5, and the lights flash green.

  Immediately pushing the door open, I step inside and let it shut behind me.

  He’s never let me see the inside of his bedroom before, and I’m shocked at how bare it is compared to the condo he showed me in New York.

  There’s a king-sized bed at the center of the room, draped in white sheets and flanked by two nightstands. There are six fans hanging from the ceiling, all positioned right over the mattress—all hanging at varying heights.

  Why the hell would he need more than one fan?

  I walk over to the nightstands and pull every drawer open, but there’s nothing inside. Undaunted, I look under the bed—hoping to find something, but there’s nothing more.

  Walking over to his closet, I type the same code into the keypad, but the lights flash red. I try it again, and an error message appears.

  Too many digits… Please enter the correct six digits.

  I try to think of what combination of numbers a psycho would pick—666-666, 123-456, 911-911, but none of them work. Just when I’m about to throw in the towel and leave, I enter the digits of the night we met—12-31-19, and the lights flicker yellow before turning green.

  The door slowly swings open, and the hairs on the back of my neck stand at full attention.

  What the hell is this?

  Stumbling forward, I struggle to make sense of what I’m seeing.

  In a room that’s the size of my bedroom several times over, is an immaculate and organized crime warehouse. On the right side, there’s an array of weapons locked behind a tinted wall of glass. Handguns, pistols, automatic rifles, a fucking buffet of artillery. On the left side, all of his trademark black and grey clothes are hanging at the exact same distance apart.

  His collection of designer shoes—shiny black loafers and copper-colored Oxfords, are sitting still on glass risers. His tennis shoes are all laced for an instant run, perfectly aligned with each other.

  Near the back of the room are perfectly pressed uniform tops for all types of businesses where he doesn’t work. A red and gold bellman jacket for The Four Seasons, a light brown top for the UPS delivery service, a green and black barista shirt for Starbucks. There are a few more that I don’t recognize, but none of the nametags on any of the uniform shirts sport his real name.

  Austin Greenwich. Tommy Porter. Jason Dean. Who the hell are these people?

  Something tells me that I should turn around and walk away at this very moment, but I can’t help but stay. I move to the far-right corner, where a beautiful white dresser stands next to a black file cabinet.

  Pulling open the top dresser drawer, I hope to find some hint of who Michael is, but it’s empty.

  I pull open the next one. Empty.

  Then the next, and the next. All empty.

  Moving on to the file cabinet, I tug on the top drawer, but it’s locked. The second one doesn’t budge a bit, but the third one slowly gives way.

  Inside are a few identical leather wallets and a ton of neatly organized manila folders and envelopes.

  Picking up the first wallet, I flip it open and see a Pennsylvania state license is for someone named Tyler Spears. The man in the picture is definitely Michael, though.

  The cards in the other slots aren’t credit cards. They’re other state licenses with varying names and fake addresses, but they all feature varying pictures of him in black and dark grey sweaters.

  As I look a little closer at the Arizona license that’s under the name Brock Daniels, I notice that his green eyes aren’t as dark in that picture. They’re still as stunning as ever, but they have a different tint to them. Not only that, but his lips aren’t as full, and the shirt he’s wearing for the camera exposes most of his neck.

  Why doesn’t he have any tattoos in this one?

  To the naked eye, this Arizona man looks exactly like Michael but not to me. The differences are subtle, but I know my husband. (Well, I thought I did.) This license is either a terribly bad photo-shop job, or this man has an identical twin brother who doesn’t share his appreciation for tattoos.

  It takes me all of five minutes to realize it’s the latter.

  One of the manila folders is full of pictures of the two of them. They’re faded pictures from the past—long before we’d ever met, long before he lied and said he didn’t have any family to invite to our wedding.

  My heart aches as I stare at a picture of his tattooed hand giving his brother a high five on what appears to be a college campus. I make it through about twenty of their brotherly pictures and decide I’ve had enough.

  He lied straight to my face…

  I continue opening folder after folder, finding myself face to face with even more confusion. There are passports for damn near a hundred countries, with the colored currency to match. There are birth certificates for at least twenty different people, and just as I’m committing a few of the names to memory, a blank passport booklet falls to the floor.

  This one doesn’t belong to him or his brother, though.

  It belongs to me.

  The photo has been edited to make my hair blonde instead of dark brown, and my name isn’t printed at all.

  I tuck it into my swim shorts, making a mental note to search for “passport fraud” on my limited YouTube app.

  My watch now reads midnight, and there’s plenty more manila folders and envelopes to rummage through, but I have to stop in thirty minutes. Not because I think I shouldn’t be in here in search of the truth, but because my heart can only take so much in a day.

  There are several sheets of paper with handwritten notes. Random dates and times, but it’s nothing concrete.

  7:10 arrives at work

  7:25 checks email; inbox empty

  7:35 calls Gchats for an hourHilton rendezvous planned for the evening

  8:52 calls H; sends flowers

  Sighing, I return everything to its place and push the drawer shut.

  The track rattles and the drawer refuses to go back into place. I try again, but it’s no use. Something is stuck at the back of the cabinet.

  Stooping down, I stick my hands inside and feel around—catching the snag of a crumpled sheet of paper. Slowly pulling it out, I unravel it, and see the words I heard on my wedding day. Words I’ve replayed in my mind every damn day.

  I love you, Meredith.

  I vow to cherish and protect you for the rest of our lives together—however long that may be.

  The words hit differently now, though. They’re lies. All lies.

  I flip the sheet over and see that there’s an entirely different draft of his words.

  Meredith,

  I wish we’d met under different circumstances.

  I wish I didn’t have to do this to you, but I have to.

  It’ll all make sense in the end.

  —M

  My mind spins and my chest aches so badly, that I feel like I’m on the verge of having a heart attack.

  Folding his vows, I tuck them into the pages of my fake, unfinished passport and slam the file cabinet shut.

  Taking one last look at the criminal warehouse, I hit the lights and walk away from the closet.

  When I open the door to his bedroom, I gasp at the sight of Michael standing right in front of me.

  “Did you find what you were looking for?” He glares at me.

  “I wasn’t looking for anything,” I say, “I was just browsing around.”

  “I don’t browse your room without permission.” He steps closer, his eyes on mine. “I could’ve sworn that we agreed that you would never go into mine.”

  “I never agreed to this.” I glare right back at him. “And I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but we’re not exactly on the best of terms.”

  “We could start to be on better ones, if you finally give me a thank you.”

  “Thank you for kidnapping me,” I say. “I’m not sure where in the world I would be, or the type of amazing life I could possibly
be living, if you hadn’t done that. Thank you so much.”

  He ignores my sarcasm and hands me a small black shopping bag. “You’re fucking welcome.”

  I peer inside and notice that there’s a new journal and a new John Grisham novel. I don’t say, ‘Thank you.’

  “You can get the hell out of my room now,” he says, in a tone that’s far harsher than anything he’s ever said to me.

  I nod and move past him, heading down the hallway to my room.

  “Oh, and Meredith?” His voice makes me look over my shoulder.

  “Yes?”

  “Stay the fuck out of my closet.”

  Meredith

  Now

  Later that night

  The last thing I want to do is lay in bed, thinking about everything I found in his closet today. I need time to process it all, time to calmly go over the facts and see if there’s anything I’m missing.

  Digging through the luggage from our honeymoon, I pull out my vibrator, even though it’s on its last leg. I’m not sure why I even brought it along on our honeymoon, but given the turn of events, I’m grateful that I tucked it into my luggage.

  It’s been my go-to whenever my own hands won’t get the job done, whenever old memories of Michael fucking me invade my brain, and I need to feel something more intense.

  Crawling into bed with it, I pick up my phone and open the kindle app. I open an erotic romance and swipe straight to the sex scenes. As I’m approaching the best part—the moment when the hero pounds into the heroine’s pussy relentlessly, a loud and tortured cry breaks out from right outside my window.

  Concerned, I set down the kindle and walk over to my bay window. I expect to see a deer caught in a trap below, but there’s nothing. The grass is as still as the trees, the estate’s lake waters are calm and motionless in the moonlight.

  I start to return to bed, but the tortured sound cuts through the air once more. It’s far more pained this time, so much so, that I can feel the hurt in my chest. It sounds like it’s coming from the left side of the house, where the only other bay windows are. Michael’s room.