The Life She Stole

by S W Vaughn

  “Hey, take it easy.” I try to smile as I dig around in my purse and find the pack of travel tissues I keep for emergencies. This qualifies. “Do you want to sit down?” I say, handing them to her.

  She nods, fumbles a tissue loose and blows her nose, a big, honking blast. “Ugh. That’s so disgusting,” she says as she walks unsteadily toward a rich, cream-colored Chesterfield sofa with walnut trim. She practically collapses at one end and drops the used tissue into an oval vanity wastebasket tucked discreetly beside the back leg. “I’m sorry, Celine.”

  “No, I’m sorry.” I take a few steps in her direction and gesture at the couch. “Mind if I sit with you?”

  She shakes her head as she wiggles another tissue free. “Please. Have a seat.”

  I take the other end, leaving a bit of space between us so it’s not too weird. “I shouldn’t have said all that to you yesterday,” I tell her. “I was just …”

  “Yes, you should have. I deserved it.” She wipes her cheeks, blows her nose again, and tosses the tissue, immediately taking a fresh one out. “I’m awful,” she says, staring at her lap. “I’m the worst kind of person — a fake everything with a lot of money. Fake mom, fake friend, fake real estate agent.” She lifts her head slowly with a terrible, watery smile. “Fake app developer. I lied to you about that,” she says.

  For some reason, that surprises me more than anything else she’s said so far. “You pretended that you made an app?”

  “Yeah. Stupid, right?” She looks down again. “I read somewhere about how easy it was supposed to be. And I did watch some tutorials, and I tried. But I couldn’t make anything work,” she says, laughing bitterly. “So I downloaded this dumb, obscure app that hardly anyone knew about and started saying that I developed it. I guess … I wanted people to think I was smart, or cool, or something.”

  I can sympathize with that.

  “Anyway, now you know the truth. I’m sad and worthless,” she sighs. “Alice — I mean, Izzy — I can see why you thought I was lying about having a daughter. It must’ve been weird seeing me hang around the school by myself, right?”

  “Yes, it was pretty weird,” I say.

  “Julie does everything for her. Takes her to school, makes her meals, tucks her in at night. I just go to watch sometimes, that’s all.” Hannah closes her eyes. “Everything you said about me was right. I was at Seton-Frischer before I came here, and I … don’t have a daughter. Not really.” She shudders.

  I bite my lip. “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “I think I should explain it, at least,” she says, and looks at me. “She is my daughter. I was pregnant when I got committed, but I couldn’t keep her. You know, mental hospital and all.” She flashes a dark smile. “I didn’t want to give her up, either. So I found Julie and hired her to work for me. To take care of my daughter until I was released. I figured that once I had my shit together, I’d take her back and we’d be a happy little family. But … Julie’s the only mother she’s ever known,” she finishes in a whisper. “I keep trying, but it’s so hard to get through to her.”

  “Well, I can see that you love her,” I say. “You’re doing a great job, being very patient in difficult circumstances. I think she’ll come around eventually.”

  “Really?” A tentative smile lifts her lips. “Thank you, Celine. That means a lot to me,” she says. “And I’m so glad that our daughters are friends.”

  “Maybe we can be, too,” I say.

  “I’d like that.” She sniffles and looks away again. “By the way … about Brad.”

  My breath catches. “What about him?”

  “I can’t tell you how sorry I am for the way I treated him,” she says in a paper-thin voice. “I was a terrible, spoiled child who never had to grow up, so I didn’t. I acted out in high school, a lot. And poor Brad was right in the middle of my shitstorm.” Her shoulders tense as she hunches away. “I lost my shit when his family moved away, and my parents sent me to a ‘teen retreat’ for my senior year,” she says, making air quotes around the words. “That place actually helped me a lot. I was so much better … at least, until the fire. Then I lost it even harder.”

  I’m starting to feel really awful for her, and guilty for thinking of her as a crazy rich bitch. She obviously has reasons to act the way she does. “Every kid makes mistakes,” I say. “Sometimes they make really bad ones.”

  “Yeah. But my mistakes were the worst.” She unclenches and looks at me tentatively. “How is he doing? Brad, I mean.”

  “Surprisingly well.”

  “That’s good,” she says. “He hates me, doesn’t he?”

  I decide not to answer that.

  She takes my silence as assent. “Of course he does. Why wouldn’t he?” she rasps. “Ever since I heard he woke up, I’ve thought about going up there. To apologize for being so horrible. But I don’t think he’ll listen to a word I say … and I don’t blame him.”

  I can’t bring myself to contradict her, because she’s probably right. Instead I say, “The most important thing is for you to forgive yourself.”

  “That’s what my therapist says.” She laughs weakly. “Oh, well. I guess I’d better get back to the party, if I can manage to make myself presentable,” she says. “Thank you for talking to me, Celine. I don’t … really have any friends.”

  “Well, now you do,” I tell her.

  She smiles. “Do you think you can stay? Just for a little while. If you can’t, I understand.”

  “Sure,” I say. “I’ll stay.”

  I’m convinced that Hannah isn’t behind the texts or the murders. But even though I’m relieved that the police haven’t let the real culprit go, I’ve got a whole new layer of worries to replace that relief.

  Because if it’s not Hannah, then who is it?

  24

  Sunday

  Alyssa is watching cartoons, and I’m in the kitchen making pancakes for a lazy Sunday brunch, when my phone rings. I almost don’t bother looking at it since my hands are covered with flour. But I wipe them on my jeans and pick up the phone from the counter, and see Detective Chambers’ number.

  I figure I’d better answer.

  “Ms. Bauman, I’m actually calling with good news,” he says after I greet him. He sounds exhausted, but satisfied. “We’ve made an arrest for the murder of Teryn Holmes.”

  “You have?” My mind races as I try to guess which of Brad’s ex-girlfriends has flipped her shit. But I can’t come up with any likely suspects. “Who?”

  “Kate Engle. She’s a nurse at Hayhurst, a co-worker of Teryn’s,” he says. “Apparently they’ve had some kind of rivalry for years, and Teryn attempted to file a restraining order against Engle. We found Nembutol and chloroform hidden in Engle’s work locker. The poisons that were in Teryn’s system.”

  I didn’t recognize the name at all. “So she’s not Brad’s ex?”

  “No. This was completely personal,” Chambers says. “Nothing to do with Mr. Dowling.”

  Something about this seems wrong. I have no idea who Kate Engle is, but it seems convenient for the detectives to find a murder weapon, or whatever they considered poison, in a locker five days after the murder was committed. But if I mention that to Chambers, he’ll probably remind me that I’m not a detective.

  Instead I ask, “What about Rosalie?”

  “We’re revisiting that case, but we’re considering the possibility that it may have been a suicide after all,” he says. “Handwriting matches are rarely conclusive. And to be honest, it was only a hunch.”

  “What was a hunch?”

  Chambers clears his throat. “The suicide, thinking it was murder,” he says. “It was my hunch, actually. After we interviewed the family and friends, the suicide note didn’t make sense — the idea that she killed herself over a man she hadn’t been involved with in years. That’s why I had the handwriting analyzed.” He sounds awkward and embarrassed as he explains. “Things seemed to fit when there wasn’t a match. And then Teryn Holmes
was apparently murdered, and there was a connection between the two victims. A thin one.” He blows out a breath. “I was following my instincts. But it must’ve been a coincidence.”

  “Maybe you should trust your instincts.”

  “I did,” he says, startling me a bit. I hadn’t realized I’d said that out loud. “Unfortunately, the chief trusts evidence, not instincts. We found evidence. So the case is closed.”

  Suddenly I hear the bitter note behind his words, and I realize he doesn’t buy the convenient poison-in-the-locker theory either. They’ve arrested the wrong person — again. But this time it’s not Detective Chambers’ fault. “What if the chief is wrong?” I say.

  “The chief is never wrong. Just ask him,” Chambers says with a rueful laugh. But then he grows serious. “As a police officer, I’m officially telling you that the case is closed. But as a guy who’s interviewed a woman clearly terrified for her life, a guy who trusts his instincts … I’m telling you to be careful.”

  I close my eyes as a chill prickles my skin. “I will be,” I say. “Thank you, Detective Chambers.”

  “Oliver. Ollie, if you like that better,” he says. “I’m just a concerned guy now.”

  “All right. Ollie.” Something close to despair wells inside me. If he’s just a guy, and the killer is still out there, I have no one to protect me. “And I’m Celine,” I say. “Just a woman terrified for her life.”

  My voice cracks on the last few words, and Ollie says, “I’m so sorry, Celine. If there was anything I could do …” He trails off, and I hear him curse in the background. “Look, you have my number. You can still call me if you need anything.”

  “Maybe I’ll do that.” I manage a smile. “I’d better go before my pancakes burn.”

  “Mmm, pancakes. The perfect breakfast,” he says. “Celine, I hope you’ll keep in touch.”

  “I will,” I tell him.

  We say goodbye, and I tuck the phone in my pocket as I turn back to breakfast-in-progress. At least I have my pancakes. But I don’t have what I need the most — a clue about who’s been killing my friends and threatening me with vague promises to ruin my life.

  I freeze with the spatula in my hand. The texts. If a woman I’ve never met killed Teryn, and no one killed Rosalie … then who’s been texting me?

  It’s too late to point that out to Ollie. Even if I had, he wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. The police have closed the case. But there’s still someone out there, with me in their sights, and I don’t think this false arrest is going to stop them.

  In fact, it’ll probably encourage them.

  I finish making the pancakes and bring two plates to the living room. Sundays are quiet days for me and Alyssa, and we almost always have a late, casual TV breakfast, and then hang around the house or go to the park for a while, with no big plans.

  But today I think we might do something different. I told Brad that if I didn’t visit him yesterday, I would today. And I could leave Alyssa with a sitter, but I always feel guilty doing that.

  So maybe it’s time for my daughter to meet her father.

  Alyssa is her usual bubbly self as we walk down the fifth-floor corridor to room 548. She doesn’t fear hospitals yet, because she’s never had to be in one. All she knows is that we’re going to visit Mommy’s friend, who was sick but is getting better. I want her to meet him, but I’m not ready to explain who he is yet.

  I’ve called ahead to make sure Willa won’t be there for a while, and Brad assured me that she’d only come in for a brief time that morning and wouldn’t return until after dinner. I also told him that I was bringing Alyssa but didn’t want to break the news to her, at least not this time. He seemed okay with that.

  We stop in front of the door to the room, and I take a minute to compose myself. There are so many butterflies in my stomach that I’m sure they’ll start flying from my ears. This moment is bigger than I expected — she may not know it, but my daughter is about to meet someone who’s part of her, forever. It’s daunting.

  When I don’t go in right away, Alyssa looks up at me. “Should we ring the doorbell, Mommy?”

  Her innocent question relaxes me, and I laugh and reach for the handle. “They don’t have doorbells here, munchkin,” I say. “We can just go in.”

  “Oh, okay. I like doorbells, though.”

  “Me too,” I say with a smile.

  I take a breath and push the door open. And my first thought is that something’s gone wrong, because the bed and the chair beside it are empty, and the wheelchair is nowhere in evidence. No wheelchair … and no Brad.

  Then I hear a muted flush from behind the closed bathroom door, and my heart starts to beat again.

  “Come on, sweetheart. My friend will be here in a minute,” I say as I lead my daughter into the room. “We’ll just sit down and wait.”

  Alyssa looks around at everything with thoughtful consideration as we approach the chair next to the bed. I sit down and lift her onto my lap, and she says, “Mommy, is your friend a magician?”

  I look at her. “Why would you think that?”

  “Because magicians pop out from nowhere,” she says. “Like this.” She covers her face with her small hands, and then throws both arms out. “Ta-dah!”

  I hug her and laugh. “I guess you know a lot about magicians,” I say. “But no, my friend isn’t one of them. He’s just in the bathroom, see?” I point to the closed door across the room.”

  She follows my gesture and nods. “Okay. But it would be cool if he was a magician.”

  In a way, Brad is a magician, and he’s pulled off the greatest trick of all: coming back from the dead. But I’m not sure that’s an appropriate conversation to have with my four-year-old daughter.

  The handle on the bathroom door clicks down, and I hold my breath as the door swings open. It seems to move by itself. Then I realize that there must be one of those handicapped buttons to open the door, because Brad is standing there behind an aluminum-frame walker, smiling out at me.

  “I thought I heard voices,” he says as he walks slowly into the room, pushing the walker before him. “I wasn’t sure if I had visitors, or I was going crazy.”

  Alyssa giggles. “Your friend is funny, Mommy,” she whispers. “I like him.”

  My heart soars. She likes him. It’s a definite step in the right direction.

  “Let’s go say hello,” I tell her quietly, and she nods and slides to the floor.

  Alyssa is fast, and she reaches Brad almost before I’m fully standing. He stops and stares down at her over the walker, smiling hesitantly.

  “Hello,” she says, her face turned up in solemn greeting as she lifts a tiny hand toward him. “My name is Alyssa Dawn Bauman.”

  Brad’s features work briefly, and he takes her hand with infinite gentleness. “Hi, Alyssa. I’m Brad,” he says with a catch in his voice. “I’m very happy to meet you.”

  She beams at him. “Hi, Brad. There’s a boy in my class named Brad too, only Mrs. Jocasta calls him Brad-ley because he always throws the blocks. But I never throw blocks. I think it’s mean.”

  “I think you’re right,” Brad says hoarsely as he grips the walker again. His hands are shaking, and his eyes are wide and startled. “It is mean to throw blocks. You’re a very smart girl, Alyssa.”

  “Thank you,” she says. “I like being smart.”

  I can tell that Brad is nearly overcome with emotion. If he doesn’t sit down soon, he might collapse. I close the distance to my daughter and reach down to rub her back. “Hey, munchkin, can you go sit in that chair for a minute?” I say. “If it’s okay with Brad, maybe you can turn the television on and see if there’s anything interesting.”

  “She can sit on the bed.” Brad flashes a wan smile and nods toward it. “The remote is right there by the pillow. And … I think I’m going to need the chair.”

  “Okay. Thanks, Brad!” Alyssa calls as she runs off and scrambles up the side of the bed. Soon she’s working the remote li
ke a pro.

  “Celine. Oh, God …”

  Brad whispers the words, and I turn just as he shoves the walker aside and throws his arms around me. His embrace is firm and trembling. “She’s so tiny,” he rasps, his breath feathering my ear. “Tiny, and perfect.”

  I hug him back, until he finally stops shaking, and then smile at him. “Do you want me to grab the walker for you?”

  “No.” He turns his head away and wipes a few stray tears. “Maybe you could help me over there, though? My legs don’t seem interested in cooperating.”

  “Of course I will.”

  I keep an arm around his waist, and he leans on my shoulders as we move toward the chair. When we reach it, he grabs one of the arms and lowers himself in with a long breath. “Phew. Made it,” he says. “Thank you.”

  From his tone, I know he’s thanking me for more than helping him walk. I glance at Alyssa and smile. “You’re welcome.”

  This visit won’t be so bad, after all.

  25

  Jill comes over that night. She looks much better than she sounded yesterday, like she’s completely gotten over the cold, and she’s happy about her date with Hunter.

  What she’s not so thrilled about is to hear that I’ve brought Alyssa to meet Brad.

  After I tuck my daughter into bed at eight, since she has school tomorrow, Jill hangs around to talk. She’s sitting at the island counter in the kitchen while I make coffee — we’ve decided to skip the wine because we both have an early day tomorrow. “I’m not sure you should have told him, Celine,” she says, toying with her phone on the counter. “Did you forget what a jerk he was before?”

  I shake my head as I get two mugs out of the cupboard and set them by the coffee machine while it burbles away. “No, I didn’t forget,” I say, heading to the fridge for the creamer. “Like I said, though, we were both young. I just … if there’s a chance that Alyssa can have her father in her life, I want to take it.”

  Jill rolls her eyes good-naturedly. “You still love him, don’t you?”