The End of Her

by Shari Lapena

  She goes back to the front page of the newspaper. She has a few minutes, the babies happy in the living room before she gets them ready to go out. They will walk to the grocery store this morning, pick up a few things. She hopes she doesn’t run into anybody she knows, although she probably will. She always does.

  An article on the second page catches her attention. It’s a lurid story about a man in Albany who has killed his two children, his wife, and then himself. She tells herself not to read it, but of course she does. She can’t help herself. There are always stories like this, and she always reads them. The man smothered the two young children before his estranged wife returned home from work. When the mother arrived home, he stabbed her several times in the chest. And then he calmly got into his car and drove off a bridge.

  She sits back, her head swimming at the horror of it.

  These sorts of things happen all the time. And no one ever seems to see it coming.

  The phone rings in the kitchen, making her jump. She glances at it, reluctant to pick it up. Whoever it is, it can only be bad news. She can’t imagine anything else these days.

  She picks it up. “Yes?”

  “Hello, Stephanie, it’s Robert Lange.”

  Her heart sinks. What now? “What is it?” she asks.

  “I wanted to let you know that Patrick will be going before a judge this morning for the arraignment.”

  She can’t think of anything to say.

  “If they do go ahead with this—and I still don’t see how they can, realistically—we’d be probably looking at a trial date sometime next spring or early summer.”

  She closes her eyes, and leans against the counter. “Okay.”

  “I’ll need a retainer.”

  * * *

  • • •

  SOMEHOW, THE DAYS crawl by. Even when everything is falling apart, the sun still rises and sets, Stephanie still needs to eat and sleep. The babies need to be taken care of—fed and dressed and changed. She has to answer the phone when Patrick calls from jail.

  Their conversations are false, stilted, unnatural. How could they be otherwise? The time apart is quickly making them grow more distant, as they share less and less of the day to day. It’s always that way when couples are apart, Stephanie thinks; it’s much worse when one of them is in jail on a murder charge, and the other one isn’t entirely convinced he didn’t do it.

  “Stephanie,” Patrick always says, “you must believe me. I didn’t do it.”

  “I know,” she says automatically. She knows she doesn’t sound especially convinced. She sounds detached, dismissive.

  “They’ll have to drop the charges. I’m going to get out of here and come home,” he says.

  “I know,” she repeats tonelessly, staring blankly out the window. She doesn’t feel anything when she talks to him.

  “Lange says that if they can’t find any other evidence, it won’t be enough to go to trial—it will be her word against mine about the affair, and an affair isn’t sufficient proof that I killed my wife. Neither is the insurance. They have no direct evidence that I meant to kill Lindsey.”

  She isn’t really listening.

  Suddenly Stephanie remembers something Erica said to her, that day on the porch. That her neighbors might have seen him coming and going from her apartment, might have heard them in bed, through the wall. If they find just one neighbor who saw him there, she thinks, on more than two occasions—that would prove he was lying. Patrick said he’d only gone to her apartment twice.

  “Stephanie, you have to be strong for me, okay? For me and for the twins.”

  She can hear a note of desperation in his voice now; his mask has slipped a bit. He’s scared. Of course he is. “Lange wanted a retainer,” she says.

  “Yeah, he told me he called you.”

  “It’s a lot of money.”

  “I know. And I’m sorry.” He sounds contrite. “When this is all over and I’m back on my feet, it won’t matter, Stephanie. It’s just money. I’ll start my own firm, earn it all back. People have short memories. A few years from now this will all just seem like a bad dream.”

  * * *

  • • •

  AS SHERIFF BASTEDO drives his truck down Creemore’s main street, he reflects that they haven’t gotten a damn thing out of Kilgour—his smart lawyer has seen to that. And if Kilgour doesn’t talk, they aren’t going to have enough to proceed to trial.

  Even so, Sheriff Bastedo parks his truck in front of the K & R Pharmacy. This is the place where Erica Voss worked back then. It’s a family-run business. He makes his way to the back of the store, where he finds an older man behind the counter. The man looks up and he flashes his badge. “Are you the owner?”

  The man nods and says, “What can I do for you, sheriff?”

  “I’d like to ask you a few questions about a former employee of yours, Erica Voss. Remember her?”

  The man gives him a knowing look. “I was wondering when you were going to show up.”

  Bastedo nods. The story is all over the news; he’d be interested to know what this man thinks of it all. There’s no one else within earshot. “What can you tell me about her?”

  “She was an excellent employee,” the pharmacist says. Then adds, “As far as I know.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She was very smart, reliable, good with customers. Picked things up fast. Ambitious.”

  “I’m sensing a ‘but,’” Bastedo says.

  The pharmacist gives him an appreciative look. “We had a couple of break-ins back then. Drugs taken. Oxycodone mostly. Stuff you can sell on the street. You guys never caught who did it.”

  “And?”

  “And I can’t prove anything. But I always thought it was her, or that she was involved somehow. I mentioned it to the sheriff at the time as a possibility, but they didn’t find anything. Like I said, she was smart.”

  “Did you let her go?”

  “No. How could I? I couldn’t fire her without some proof, and I didn’t have any. But I did ask her, point-blank. She denied it. She was either telling the truth or she’s a very good liar.”

  “So what happened?”

  “She left town—not long after that terrible thing with the Kilgour family.” He adds, “My wife and I were glad she was moving on. We didn’t have any more thefts after that.” He raises his eyebrows at the sheriff. “You know what I think?”

  “What?”

  “I wouldn’t believe a word she said.”

  “Thanks for your time.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Sheriff Bastedo drives back to the station, his mind turning over what he’s just heard. He’d better check it out.

  * * *

  • • •

  THAT EVENING, ERICA CALLS. Gary feels sweat collecting in his armpits and down the center of his back. Cheryl is watching him anxiously from across the room. They knew she would call again; they’ve been waiting. They’ve gone downstairs to the basement so that Devin can’t overhear them, just in case he isn’t asleep.

  “Hi, Gary,” Erica says. “I assume you know I spoke to your wife the other day.”

  “I’m having trouble coming up with that much money,” Gary blurts out.

  “Right,” she says, as if she doesn’t believe him.

  “It’s true.” It is true, which is why he’s sweating so profusely. They’ve taken a hit on a couple of commercial properties over the last two quarters. “I’m overextended at the moment.”

  “Bullshit. I don’t believe you.”

  “Why don’t you believe me? This is America. Everyone’s overextended!” He takes a deep breath. “Look, you’ll get the money. I just need more time. We don’t want you talking to Devin, ruining his life. Ruining our lives. You know that.” He waits a long moment while she seems to consider.

&
nbsp; “Fine. You can have more time. I’ll call back in a few days.”

  45

  The sun finally comes out again after days of relentless rain. Patrick has been in jail for the better part of a week. It’s Tuesday morning, and Stephanie has arranged to meet Hanna and Teddy later in the morning, and go to the park together, and then to a coffee shop afterward. She feels safer going out and about with Hanna by her side, now that the news is generally known that Patrick has been arrested. Hanna has become her protector of sorts—her buffer against the world. Stephanie has been bothered by the press, but at least they aren’t camping outside her door.

  The twins are in their high chairs, and Stephanie is spooning pureed peas into their mouths, her thoughts going round and round, the way they have ever since Patrick failed the lie detector test.

  If he really did it, if he killed his first wife in cold blood . . . she has to face that her husband might be a murderer. How profoundly her thoughts have changed since this all began. At first she’d thought he’d been briefly unfaithful, and that Erica was simply trying to shake them down for money. Stephanie had lost weeks of her life in a blur of paranoid panic about her husband being wrongly accused. But now . . .

  What does she hope for? Does she want them to let him go? Does she want him to be convicted? What if he comes home?

  She stares at the wall and thinks, Even if he gets away with it, it doesn’t mean he didn’t do it.

  There are too many things that make her doubt him. The fall down the stairs. The polygraph. She can’t keep deluding herself—if he is a murderer, she can’t endanger herself and the twins. She decides, He can’t come back here.

  She’s finally admitted it to herself. She doesn’t believe her husband is innocent.

  * * *

  • • •

  PATRICK IS ESCORTED into the room that prisoners use to consult with their attorneys. He feels like he’s aged years in the days he’s been inside. How do people do this for twenty years? For life? Whenever he thinks of it his stomach lurches, and he sweats with fear. He and his prison clothes stink. He’s not coping as well as he thought he would. But how does anybody know how they’ll cope with prison, with a murder charge, until they’ve tried it? It’s a foreign country. One he doesn’t belong in. He’s not like the other men in here, mostly hardened criminals, uneducated toughs. He stands out. He still wrestles with disbelief every day. He wonders if it will ever really sink in.

  “Patrick,” Lange says, standing up.

  Patrick shuffles over and sits down heavily as the guard retreats and closes the door behind him. His attorney is looking at him with concern, which Patrick appreciates. Patrick gets the sense that his own wife doesn’t care that much, that she’s going to bail on him. He wouldn’t really blame her, given how things look.

  “How are you doing?” Lange asks, worry evident in his face.

  “How do you think?” Patrick says. Then he relents and says, “I’m scared shitless, if you want to know. I hate it in here. You have to get me out.” He knows he sounds desperate.

  The attorney nods, tries to reassure him. “That’s what we’re going to do, Patrick. You just have to hang on. Are they treating you all right?”

  He nods wearily. “I guess.”

  “In case they proceed with this—we have to go over everything, anything that could be harmful to you. If there’s anyone, anyone at all, who can harm you, I need to know about it now. We can discredit witnesses if we know what to expect, but I can’t have surprises. Do you understand?”

  Patrick looks back at him, feeling aggrieved. Lange thinks he did it.

  “What about your friend Greg Miller?” the attorney presses.

  “What about him?”

  The attorney leans toward him over the table. “Look, a murder trial is a very different thing from a coroner’s inquest. The gloves come off, you understand me? He knew you then. Is there anything he knows that can hurt you? Did you ever say to him, even as a joke, that you’d like to get rid of your wife?”

  Patrick is taken aback. “No, of course not.”

  “Nobody lurking in the shadows who’s going to pop up and say you tried to hire them to bump her off? Because shit like that happens.”

  Patrick sits, the sweat oozing out of him. He’s drowning in his own stench. He’s not worried about anything like that. But the truth is, although it wasn’t the grand love affair Erica claims it was, he had minimized the number of times he slept with her to Stephanie, and then he’d had to do it again at the inquest. He’s a liar. And Erica knows it.

  He shakes his head. “No. I swear. Nothing like that.”

  * * *

  • • •

  “SO, KEVIN,” SHERIFF BASTEDO says to the wiry man in unwashed jeans in the interview room. They’ve been interviewing every drug dealer and former dealer in the area known to them.

  “How about you tell me why I’m here? I haven’t done anything wrong in years.”

  “You’re not in trouble with us. We just want to talk to you.”

  “About what?” the man says nervously.

  “You were active in the drug scene around here ten years ago.”

  “Yeah, and I done my time. I’m working now. Clean. Ask anybody.”

  “We did, and we know. You’re not in any trouble. We just want to talk to you about Erica Voss.”

  The man goes still. Thinks about it. Swallows. “Okay.”

  “You know who we’re talking about.”

  “Yeah, sure. She’s in all the news about that man who killed his wife in the car.”

  “What we’re interested in,” Bastedo says, leaning toward the man over the table, “is what she was up to back then. Tell us about the drugs.”

  Kevin swallows again. “I already done my time. Nothing I say here is going to get me into trouble, right?”

  “That’s right. You’re free and clear. You’re just here helping us out.”

  “Okay, yeah, she was involved, in a small way. Just for a short time.”

  “Dealing?”

  He nods. “She was dealing oxy. I got some from her.”

  “Where did she get the drugs?”

  “She stole it. She worked at a pharmacy. That’s where she got it.”

  46

  The DA slaps the manila folder down on her desk the next morning in disgust.

  “We’re going to have to let Patrick Kilgour go,” Dominguez says. “We were never going to win this one, not unless he broke down and confessed.”

  Bastedo nods. “Yeah. And his bloody lawyer won’t let him talk. Haven’t been able to get a peep out of him.”

  “And our only witness has been accused of stealing and dealing opioids.” She thinks for a moment and then says, “Too bad the statute of limitations means we can’t go after her for the drugs.”

  “Look on the bright side,” Bastedo says after a moment, with a world-weary expression. “Think of all the money it will save the state not to have a trial, not to have to pay for him to serve a life sentence.”

  She snorts derisively. “Yeah, but I have a feeling the bastard did it.”

  “Me too.” He gets up to go. “I’ll have them drop the charges and release him.”

  * * *

  • • •

  ROBERT LANGE GETS a call on his cell phone. They’re dropping the charges against Patrick, letting him go. About time. Lange heads to the jail to tell his client the good news.

  When Lange gets there, Sheriff Bastedo meets him in the front area. Together they go to an interview room, where Patrick is brought in. He seems wary, frightened, when he sees his attorney there with the sheriff. It’s unexpected; he looks like he’s assuming the worst.

  Lange hastens to reassure him, smiling at him. “Patrick—good news. They’re dropping the charges. You’re free to go. You’re going home.”

  * *
*

  • • •

  PATRICK HEARS THE WORDS, but he doesn’t really take them in. His attorney steps forward and embraces him. Then it hits him, and the relief is overwhelming. For a moment he sags against Lange. He thought he would die in here. Despite the reassurances of his attorney, he was terrified that he’d go to trial, that he’d be convicted, that he’d never see the light of day again.

  “We’re really leaving? Now?” Patrick manages to say.

  “Yes. I can get you back home tonight. There’s room on an afternoon flight—I already checked.”

  It’s starting to sink in. The shock is subsiding, replaced by elation. He can’t wait to tear off his smelly prison clothes, to scrub the prison stink off his skin, to sleep in his own bed again.

  “Let’s get you processed.”

  Patrick wonders how Stephanie will react to him coming home so unexpectedly.

  As if reading his mind, the attorney says, “We’ll call your wife with the good news.”

  * * *

  • • •

  STEPHANIE SITS ON the living-room sofa, stunned. She’s just spoken to Patrick on the phone. He’s on his way home. She can’t believe it. She thought he was in jail, that he was facing a murder trial. Now they’ve let him go, dropped the charges. He’ll be home later tonight.

  She thought she’d have more time to figure things out. She doesn’t know what to think, what to do.

  Erica is a liar. Stephanie knows for certain that she lied at the inquest about the blackmail.

  Her husband is a liar. That’s what the lie detector said.

  Who is she supposed to believe? She wants to be rid of both of them. She thinks uneasily about Patrick. She hasn’t seen him since he failed the polygraph. When trust goes, how quickly love disappears and self-preservation takes over.