Chapter no 6 – ‌‌‌‌‌BEFORE‌

The House Across the Lake PDF

hen she leaves, Wilma Anson takes the piece of broken wineglass with her. The way she carries it to her car, holding the baggie at arm’s length

like there’s a moldy sandwich inside, tells me she already thinks it won’t lead to anything. I’d be annoyed if I weren’t so caught off guard by what we’ve just been told.

She thinks Tom Royce is a serial killer. She thinks Katherine thought that, too.

And that now Katherine is dead or in hiding because of

it.

Wilma was right. This is a lot bigger than Katherine’s

disappearance. And I have no idea what to do now. I know what Marnie and my mother would say. They’d tell me to protect myself, stay out of the way, not make myself a target. I agree, in theory. But the reality is that I’m already a part of this, whether I want to be or not.

And I’m scared.

That’s the brutal truth of it.

After watching Wilma drive away, I return to the dining room, looking for Boone. I find him on the porch instead, gripping the binoculars and staring at the Royce house on the other side of the lake.

“The bird-watching is amazing this time of year,” I say. “All that plumage.”

“So I hear,” Boone says, indulging me and my weak attempt at a joke.

I settle into the rocking chair beside him. “Any sign of Tom?”

“None. But his car is still outside, so I know he’s there.” Boone pauses. “You think Wilma’s right? About Tom being a serial killer?”

I shrug, even though Boone can’t see me because he’s still looking through the binoculars. Watching him observe the Royce house so intently gives me an idea of how I’ve looked the past few days. Parked on this porch. Binoculars pressed to my face. Focused on nothing else. It isn’t a great look, even on someone as absurdly handsome as Boone.

“I think she could be onto something,” he says. “Tom’s been in the area a lot, something I never understood. He’s rich. His wife’s a supermodel. They could go anywhere. Hell, they could probably buy their own private island. Yet they always chose here, the backwoods of Vermont, where it’s quiet and he’s less likely to be disturbed. Then there’s the fact that I always got a weird vibe from him. He seems so . . .”

“Intense?” I say, echoing Marnie’s description of Tom Royce.

“Yeah. But it’s a quiet intensity. Like there’s something simmering just below the surface. Those are the kind of people you need to watch out for. Thank God you were doing just that, Casey. If you hadn’t been watching, no one might have noticed any of this. Which means we can’t let up now. We need to keep watching him.”

I turn toward the lake, focused not on the Royce house but the water itself. Now streaked with afternoon sunlight, it looks peaceful, even inviting. You’d never guess how deep it is or how dark the water can get. So dark you can’t tell what’s down there.

Maybe Megan Keene.

And Toni Burnett.

And Sue Ellen Stryker.

Maybe even Katherine Royce.

Thinking about multiple women resting among the silt and seaweed makes me so woozy I grip the rocking chair’s armrests and look away from the water.

“I don’t think Wilma would like that,” I say. “You heard what she said. She wants us to stay out of the way and let the police handle it.”

“You’re forgetting she also said they wouldn’t have made the connection between Katherine and that postcard without us. Maybe we can find something else that will be of use to them.”

“What if we do? Will they actually be able to use it?”

I think about everything I saw in the Royce house. Katherine’s phone and clothes and the treasure trove of information on that laptop. It’s maddening that none of it can be used against Tom, even though all of it points to him being guilty of something.

“This is different than you breaking into their house.

That was illegal. What I’m talking about isn’t.”

Boone lowers the binoculars and gives me a look bright with restless excitement. The opposite of how I’m feeling. Even though I have no idea what he’s planning, I don’t think I’m going to like it. Especially because it sounds like Boone has more in mind than just watching Tom’s house.

“Or we could do what Wilma told us to do,” I say. “Which is nothing.”

That suggestion does little to douse the fire in Boone’s eyes. In fact, he looks even more determined as he says, “Or we could stop by the store Megan Keene’s parents own. Maybe look around, ask a few innocent questions. I’m not saying we’ll crack this case wide open. Hell, most likely

it’ll lead to nothing. But it’s better than sitting here, waiting and watching.”

He jerks his head toward the other side of the lake. There’s frustration in the gesture, telling me this isn’t just about Tom Royce. I suspect it’s really about Boone, having once been a cop, now longing to be part of the action again. I understand the feeling. I get fidgety every time I watch a really good movie or see a great performance on TV, my body longing to again get onstage or be in front of the camera.

But that part of my life is over now. Just as being a cop is for Boone. And playing detective isn’t going to change that.

“It could be exciting,” he says, nudging my arm with one of his formidable elbows. “And it’ll be good to get out of the house for a bit. When was the last time you left this place?”

“This morning.” Now it’s my turn to gesture to the Royce house. “Being in there was enough excitement for one day.”

“Suit yourself,” Boone says. “But I’m going with you or without you.”

I almost tell him it’ll be without me. I have no desire to get wrapped up in this more than I already am. But when I consider the alternative—being alone here, waiting for something to happen, trying not to watch when I know I will—I realize it’s best to stick with the hot former cop.

Besides, he’s right. It will do me some good to get away, and not just from the house. I need a break from Lake Greene itself. I’ve spent too much time gazing at the water and the home on the opposite shore. Which is exactly what I’ll be doing if Boone leaves alone. The idea of me sitting here, staring at the sun-speckled water, thinking about all

the people who might be resting at the bottom, is so depressing I have no choice but to agree.

“Fine,” I say. “But you’re buying me an ice cream on the way home.”

A grin spreads across Boone’s face, one so big you’d think I just agreed to a game of Monopoly.

“Deal,” he says. “I’ll even spring for extra sprinkles.”

The store Megan Keene’s family runs is part supermarket, part tourist trap. Outside, facing the road in an attempt to lure passing motorists, is a

chainsaw sculpture of a moose. Draped over the front door is a banner telling everyone they sell maple syrup, as if that’s a rarity in syrup-drenched Vermont.

It’s the same inside. A mix of blandly functional and effusively homey. The aforementioned maple syrup sits in an antique bookcase right by the door, lined up in sizes ranging from shot glass to gallon jug. Next to it is a bourbon barrel filled with plush moose and bears, and a wire rack of postcards. I give it a rickety spin and spot the same card Wilma Anson showed us. I recoil at the sight of it, nearly bumping into yet another wood-carved moose, this one with knit hats placed on its antlers.

The store becomes more utilitarian the farther back we go. There are several aisles bearing canned goods, boxed pasta, toothpaste, and toilet paper, most of it cleared out in anticipation of the approaching storm. There’s a deli counter, a frozen food section, and a checkout area bursting with the convenience store staples of lottery tickets and cigarettes.

When I see the girl manning the cash register, my heart skips two beats.

It’s Megan Keene.

Even though her face is in profile as she stares out the window at the front of the store, I recognize that fresh-

scrubbed prettiness from the photo I’d seen an hour ago. For a moment, shock holds me in its grip.

Megan isn’t dead.

Which means maybe none of them are.

This was all some big, horrible misunderstanding.

I’m about to grab Boone and tell him all of this when the girl behind the cash register turns to face me and I realize I’m wrong.

She’s not Megan.

But she is definitely related to her. She has the same blue eyes and picture-perfect smile. My guess is a younger sister who blossomed into the girl-next-door sweetheart Megan seemed to be.

“Can I help you?” she says.

I don’t know how to respond, partly because the shock of seeing who I’d thought was Megan is slow to leave me and partly because Boone and I never discussed what to do or say when we reached the store. Luckily, he answers for me.

“We’re just browsing,” he says as he approaches her. “Saw the moose outside and decided to stop in. It’s a nice store.”

The girl looks around, clearly unimpressed by the shelves and souvenirs she sees every day.

“I guess,” she says. “My parents try their best.”

So she is Megan’s sister. I’m proud of myself for guessing that, even though the resemblance is so uncanny that most people would.

“You get a lot of business on the weekends, I bet,” Boone says.

“Sometimes. It’s been a good fall. Lots of people have come up to see the leaves.”

I notice something interesting as the girl talks. She isn’t looking at Boone, which is where I’d be looking if I were her. Instead, she keeps glancing my way.

“Are you on Mixer?” Boone asks as he takes out his phone.

“I don’t think so. What’s that?”

“An app. People link to their favorite businesses so their friends can see.” He taps his phone and shows it to the girl. “You should be on it. Might be a way to bring in some extra business.”

The girl looks at Boone’s phone for only a second before glancing at me again. It’s clear she recognizes me but isn’t sure from where. I get that a lot. I only hope it’s from my film and television work and not one of the tabloids filling the magazine rack within eyeshot of the register.

“I’ll ask my parents,” the girl says as she turns back to Boone’s phone.

“It’s a great app. The guy who invented it lives nearby.

He’s got a house on Lake Greene.”

Until now, I’d been wondering why Boone was steering the conversation toward Mixer. But when he taps his phone again and brings up Tom Royce’s profile, I understand exactly what he’s doing.

“His name is Tom,” Boone says as he shows off Tom’s picture. “You ever see him come into the store?”

The girl studies Boone’s phone. “I’m not sure. Maybe?” “He’s very memorable,” Boone says, prodding. “I mean,

it’s not every day a tech millionaire comes to your store.”

“I’m only here after school and on weekends,” the girl says.

“You should ask your parents then.”

She gives a nervous nod before looking at me again, only this time I think she’s seeking someone to rescue her

from the conversation. She seems so vulnerable—so goddamn young and in need of protection—that I’m overcome with the urge to hop the counter, pull her into a tight hug, and whisper how sorry I am for her loss. Instead, I approach the register and nudge Boone aside.

“You’ll have to excuse my boyfriend,” I say, the word slipping out before I can think of a better alternative. “He’s trying to distract you from the reason we really came inside.”

“What’s that?” the girl says.

Boone drops his phone back into his pocket. “I’m curious about that myself.”

A second ticks by while I come up with a good excuse for entering the store. “I wanted to know if there are any good ice cream places in the area.”

“Hillier’s,” the girl says. “It’s the best.”

She’s not wrong. Len and I went to Hillier’s, a quaint little dairy farm a mile down the road, several times last summer. We’d get our favorites and eat them on the wooden bench out front. Pistachio in a waﬄe cone for me. A cup of rum raisin for him. I can’t remember the last time we were there, which seems like a thing someone would want to remember. The last ice cream cone with your husband before he died.

I look at Megan’s sister and wonder if she has a similar problem. Unable to remember so many last moments because she was blithely unaware of their finality. Last sisterly chat. Last sibling spat. Last ice cream cone and family dinner and wave goodbye.

Thinking about it makes my heart ache. As does wondering if Toni Burnett and Sue Ellen Stryker also have sisters who miss them and mourn them and wish, deep down in dark parts of their hearts they don’t tell anyone

about, that someone would just find their bodies and put them out of their misery.

“Thanks,” I say, giving her a smile that in all likelihood looks more sad than grateful.

“I’m not sure they’re open right now, though. It’s the off-season.”

“Do you sell ice cream?”

Megan’s sister points to the frozen food section. “We have gallon containers, quarts, and a couple of individual novelty cones.”

“That’ll do just fine.”

I grab Boone by the elbow and pull him to the ice cream case. As we look at our options, he leans in and whispers, “Boyfriend, huh?”

Warmth spreads across my cheeks. I pull open one of the freezer doors, hoping a blast of frigid air will cool them down, and snag a red, white, and blue Bomb Pop. “Sorry. It’s all I could come up with on short notice.”

“Interesting,” Boone says as he picks out a chocolate- covered Drumstick. “And just so you know, there’s no need to be sorry. But I do think we’re going to have to keep up the ruse until we’re out of the store.”

With a wink, he takes my hand, his palm hot against mine. It feels strange to have something so cold in one hand and so warmly alive in the other. As we return to the cash register, my body doesn’t know if it should sweat or shiver.

Megan’s sister rings up our order, and Boone releases my hand just long enough to pull out his wallet and pay. As soon as the wallet’s back in his pocket, he reaches for my hand again. I grasp it and let myself be led out of the store.

“Thanks for your help,” Boone says over his shoulder to Megan’s sister.

“Anytime,” she says. “Have a nice day.”

Before stepping outside, I take one last look at the girl at the register. She’s got her elbow on the counter and her head resting dreamily in a cupped hand. She watches as we go out the door, looking past us to the road and the trees and the mountains in the distance. Even though she might be focused on any of those things, I can’t help but think that she’s really gazing beyond them, eyes on some distant, unseen place where her sister might have run off to and is still, waiting for the right moment to come home.

We eat the ice cream in the back of Boone’s pickup truck, our legs dangling from the lowered tailgate. I regret choosing the Bomb Pop the

moment it touches my lips. It’s far too sweet and artificial tasting, and it colors my tongue a garish red. I lower the popsicle and say, “So this was all for nothing.”

Boone chomps down on his Drumstick, the chocolate shell on top breaking with a loud crunch. “I don’t see it that way.”

“You heard what she said. Tom Royce never came to the store.”

“That she knows of. Which doesn’t surprise me. If we’re right about this, Tom came to the store while Megan was working. Not her sister. It probably happened several times. He came in, chatted with her, flirted, maybe asked her out on a date. Then he killed her.”

“You sound pretty certain.”

“That’s because I am. I’ve still got a cop’s instinct.” “Then why did you quit?”

Boone gives me a sidelong glance. “Who said I quit?” “You did,” I say. “You told me that you used to be a cop,

which I took to mean you quit.”

“Or it meant I was suspended without pay for six months and never returned when my punishment was up.”

“Oh, shit.”

“That about sums it up,” Boone says before taking another bite.

I look at my popsicle. It’s starting to melt a little. Rainbow-colored drips spatter the ground like blood in a horror movie.

“What happened?” I say.

“A few months after my wife died, I was drunk on duty,” Boone says. “Not the worst thing a cop’s done, obviously. But bad. Especially when I responded to a call. Suspected burglary. Turns out it was just a neighbor using the spare key to borrow the owner’s lawn mower. But I didn’t know that until after I discharged my weapon, barely missing the guy and getting my drunk ass put on leave.”

“Is that why you decided to get sober?”

Boone looks up from his ice cream. “Isn’t that enough of a reason?”

It is, which I should have realized before asking.

“Now that you’re sober, why don’t you go back to being a cop?”

“It’s just no longer a good fit,” Boone says. “You know that saying, ‘Old habits die hard’? It’s true. Especially when everyone you know still has those habits. Being a cop is a stressful job. It takes a lot to unwind after a shift. Beers after work. Drinks during weekend barbecues. I just needed to get away from all of that. Otherwise I would have had one of those cartoon devils always sitting on my shoulder, whispering in my ear that it’s fine, it’s just one drink, nothing bad will happen. I knew I couldn’t live like that, so I got away. Now I scrape by doing odd jobs, and I’m happier now, believe it or not. I wasn’t happy for a very long time. It just took hitting rock bottom for me to realize it.”

I give the popsicle a halfhearted lick and wonder if I’ve already reached rock bottom or if I still have some distance left to fall. Worse, I consider the possibility that getting

fired from Shred of Doubt was the bottom, and now I’m somewhere below that, burrowing down to a sublevel from which I’ll never emerge.

“Maybe things would have been different if we’d had kids,” Boone says. “I probably wouldn’t have hit the bottle so hard after my wife died. Having someone else to take care of forces you to be less selfish. I mean, we wanted kids. And we certainly tried. It just never happened.”

“Len and I never talked about it,” I say, which is true. But I suspect he wanted kids, and that it was part of his plan to live at the lake house full-time. I also suspect he knew I didn’t want them, mostly because I didn’t want to inflict the same kind of psychological damage my mother had caused me.

It ended up being for the best. While I’d like to think I would have kept my shit together after Len was gone if a child had been in the picture, I doubt it. I might not have fallen apart so quickly and so spectacularly. A long, slow unraveling instead of my very public implosion. Either way, I have a feeling I would have ended up exactly where I am now.

“Do you miss it?” I say.

Boone takes a bite of his ice cream, stalling. He knows I’m no longer talking about being a cop.

“Not anymore,” he eventually says. “At first I did. A lot. Those first few months, man. They’re hard. Like, it’s the only thing you can think about. But then a day passes, and then a week, and then a month, and you start to miss it less and less. Soon you don’t even think about it because you’re too distracted by the life you could have been living all this time but weren’t.”

“I don’t think it’s that easy.”

Boone lowers his Drumstick and shoots me a look. “Really? You’re doing it right now. When was the last time you had a drink?”

I’m shocked I need to think about it—and not because I’ve been drinking so much that I’ve forgotten. At first, I’m certain I had something to drink today. But then it hits me that my most recent drink was a double dose of bourbon last night before Googling Tom and Katherine Royce on my laptop.

“Last night,” I say, suddenly and furiously craving a drink. I suck on my Bomb Pop, hoping it will quench my thirst. It doesn’t. It’s too cloying and missing that much- needed kick. The ice pop version of a Shirley Temple.

Boone notices my obvious distaste. Holding out his half- eaten Drumstick, he says, “You don’t seem to like yours. Want to try some of mine?”

I shake my head. “I’m good.”

“I don’t mind. I’m pretty sure you don’t have cooties.”

I lean in and take a small bite from the side, getting half ice cream, half cone.

“I loved those as a kid,” I say.

“Me, too.” Boone looks at me again. “You have some ice cream on your face.”

I touch my lips, feeling for it. “Where? Here?” “Other side,” he says with sigh. “Here, let me get it.”

Boone touches an index finger to the corner of my mouth and slowly runs it over the curve of my bottom lip.

“Got it,” he says.

At least, I think that’s what he says. My heart’s beating too fast and too loudly in my ears to know for sure. Even as everything gets fluttery, I know this was all a move on Boone’s part. A smooth one. But a move all the same. So

much more calculated than Len’s shy honesty that day at the airport.

Can I get a kiss first?

I was willing to go there then. Not so much now. Not yet.

“Thanks,” I say, scooting to the side to put a few more inches between us. “And thank you for earlier today. For distracting Tom long enough to let me slip out of the house.”

“It was nothing.”

“And thank you for not telling Wilma about that. I imagine you wanted to. The two of you seem close.”

“We are, yeah.”

“Did you work together?”

“We did, but I knew Wilma long before that,” Boone says. “We went to school together, both high school and the police academy. She’s helped me out a lot over the years. She was one of the people who convinced me to quit drinking. She made me realize I was hurting others and not just myself. And now that I’m sober, she still keeps an eye out for me. She’s the one who introduced me to the Mitchells. She knew they needed work done on their house and that I needed a place to crash for a few months. So you can blame her for saddling you with me as a neighbor.”

He pops the last nub of ice cream cone into his mouth before glancing at my popsicle, which is too much of a melted mess to resume eating.

“You done with that?” he says. “I guess so.”

I hop down from the tailgate to let Boone slam it back into place. After throwing my half-eaten popsicle into a nearby trash can, I get back into the truck. As I strap the seat belt across my chest, a thought hits me: Boone and I

aren’t the only people at the lake with Tom. He also has a neighbor, who to my knowledge has no idea about any of this.

“Do you think we should tell Eli?” I say. “About Tom?”

“He lives right next door. He deserves to know what’s going on.”

“I don’t think you should worry,” Boone says. “Eli can take care of himself. Besides, it’s not like Tom is preying on seventy-year-old men. The less Eli knows, the better.”

He starts the truck and pulls out of the parking lot. In the side mirror, I get a glimpse of a battered Toyota Camry parked in a gravel area behind the store. Seeing it makes me wonder if it’s Megan Keene’s car, now being driven by her sister.

And if her sister is walloped with grief every time she gets behind the wheel.

And how long the car was parked there before Megan’s parents realized something was wrong.

And if, when they see it parked there now, they think for a brief, cruel moment that their long-lost daughter has returned.

Those thoughts continue to churn through my mind long after the car and the store it’s parked behind recede in the side mirror, leaving me to wish I was like Eli and didn’t know anything about what’s going on.

But it’s too late for that.

Now I’m afraid I know far too much.

Instead of taking the spur of the road leading to our respective houses, Boone drives a little bit farther to the one that accesses the other side of the lake. He

doesn’t explain why, nor does he need to. I know that circling the entire lake will bring us past the Royce house so we can see if Tom’s still there.

It turns out that he is. And he’s not alone.

When the Royce driveway comes into view, we see Wilma Anson’s car parked close to the portico on the side of the house, effectively blocking Tom’s Bentley. The two of them are outside, having what appears to be a friendly conversation.

Well, as friendly as Detective Anson can get. She doesn’t smile as she talks, but she also doesn’t look too concerned to be conversing with a man she suspects is a serial killer.

Tom, on the other hand, is all charm. Standing at ease in the front yard, he chuckles at something Wilma just said. His eyes sparkle and his teeth shine a bright white behind parted lips.

It’s all an act.

I know because when Boone and I drive by in the truck, Tom gives me a look so cold it could refreeze the popsicle I’d only recently dropped into a parking lot trash can. I try to look away—to Boone, to the road ahead, to the slice of lake glimpsed through the trees—but can’t. Pinned down by

Tom’s stare, I can only endure it as it follows me in the passing truck.

His head slowly turning. His eyes locked on mine.

The smile that had been there only seconds before now completely gone.

When Boone drops me off at the lake house, there’s an awkward few seconds of silence as he waits for me to invite him in and I debate

whether that’s something I want. Every conversation or bit of contact brings us slightly closer, like two shy teenagers sitting on the same bench, sliding inexorably together. And right now, that might not be the best thing for either of us.

I experienced no such hesitation with Morris, the drinking-buddy-turned-fuck-buddy stagehand from Shred of Doubt. He and I had the same idea: get drunk and screw.

But Boone isn’t Morris. He’s sober, for one thing. And just as damaged as I am. As for what he wants, I assume— and hope—it involves his naked body entwined with mine. But to what end? That’s the question that sticks in my head like a Taylor Swift song. Not knowing his end game makes me unwilling to play at all.

Also, I really need a drink.

That thirst I immediately got when reminded I haven’t had one all day hasn’t left me. Sure, it faded a bit when Boone swiped a finger across my bottom lip and when Tom stared at me as we passed his house. Now, though, it’s an itch that needs to be scratched.

One I can’t touch while Boone is around.

“Good night,” I say, talking louder than usual to be heard over the truck’s idling engine. “Thanks for the ice cream.”

Boone responds with a meme-worthy blink, as if he’s surprised to be rejected. Looking the way he does, I suspect it doesn’t happen often.

“No problem,” he says. “Have a good night, I guess.”

I get out of the truck and go inside. Dusk has descended over the valley, turning the interior of the lake house gloomy and gray. I go from room to room, switching on lights and chasing away the shadows. When I reach the dining room, I head straight for the liquor cabinet and grab the closest bottle within reach.

Bourbon.

But after opening the bottle, something Boone said earlier stops me from bringing it to my lips.

I was hurting others and not just myself.

Am I hurting others with my drinking?

Yes. There’s no doubt about that. I’m hurting Marnie. I’m hurting my friends and colleagues. I cringe thinking about how fucking rude I was toward the cast and crew of Shred of Doubt. Showing up drunk was the ultimate sign of disrespect for their hard work and preparation. Not a single one of them came to my defense after I was fired, and I can’t blame them.

As for my mother, I am absolutely drinking to hurt her, even though she’d insist I’m only punishing myself. Not true. If I truly wanted to be punished, I’d deny myself one of the few things that bring me pleasure.

And I like drinking. A lot.

I like the way I feel after three or four or five drinks. Limp and floating. A jellyfish drifting in a calm sea. Even though I know it won’t last—that at some point hours in the future I might be dry-mouthed and headachy and heaving it all back up—that temporary weightlessness is worth it.

But none of those things are the reason why I haven’t been sober for a single day in the past nine months.

I don’t drink to hurt or punish or feel good. I drink to forget.

Which is why I tilt the bottle and bring it to my parched, parted lips. When the bourbon hits my tongue and the back of my throat, all the tension in my mind and muscles suddenly eases. I unclench, like a flower bud spreading open into full bloom.

That’s much, much better.

I take another two gulps from the bottle before filling a rocks glass—minus the rocks—and carrying it out to the porch. Twilight has turned the lake quicksilver gray, and a light breeze blowing across the water wrinkles the surface. On the other side of the lake, the Royce house sits in darkness. Its glass walls reflect the moving water, making it look like the house itself is undulating.

The optical illusion hurts my eyes.

I close them and take a few more blind sips.

I stay that way for God knows how long. Minutes? A half hour? I don’t keep track because I don’t really care. I’m content to simply sit in the rocking chair, eyes shut tight as the warmth of the bourbon counteracts the chill of the evening breeze.

The wind has picked up enough to whip the lake into unruliness. Trish, announcing her impending arrival. The water rolls toward the shoreline, slapping the stone retaining wall just beyond the porch. It sounds unnervingly like someone stomping through the water, and I can’t help but imagine the fish-pecked bodies of Megan Keene, Toni Burnett, and Sue Ellen Stryker rising from the depths and stepping onto shore.

Even worse is when I picture Katherine doing the same thing.

And worse still is imagining Len there as well, a mental image so potent I swear I can feel his presence. It doesn’t matter that, unlike the others, his body was found and cremated, the ashes sprinkled into this very lake. I still think he’s there, a few yards from shore, standing in the darkness as water laps past his knees.

You know the lake is haunted, right?

No, Marnie, it isn’t.

Memories, though, are a different matter. They’re filled with ghosts.

I drink more to chase them away.

Two—or three—glasses of bourbon later, the ghosts are gone but I’m still here, beyond buzzed and sliding inexorably into utter drunkenness. Tom’s still here, too, safe in his house that’s now bright as a bonfire.

Apparently Wilma didn’t want to haul him in for further questioning, or Tom somehow told enough lies to avoid it for now. Either way, it’s not a good sign. Katherine’s still missing, and Tom’s still walking free as if nothing is wrong.

Holding the binoculars with hands that are numb and unsteady from too much bourbon, I watch him through the kitchen window. He stands at the stove with a dish towel thrown over his shoulder like he’s a professional chef and not just a coddled millionaire struggling to reheat soup. Another bottle of five-thousand-dollar wine sits on the counter. He pours himself a glass and takes a lip-smacking sip. Seeing Tom so carefree while his wife remains unaccounted for makes me reach for the rocks glass and empty it.

When I stand to go inside and pour another, the porch, the lake, and the Royce house start listing like the Titanic.

Under my feet, it feels like the earth is shifting, as if I’ve stumbled into some stupid disaster movie Len would have written. Instead of walking back to the kitchen, I stagger.

Okay, so I’m not nearing drunkenness. I’ve already arrived.

Which means another drink won’t hurt, right? Right.

I splash more bourbon into the glass and take it back outside, moving with caution. One foot slowly in front of the other like a tightrope walker. Soon I’m in the rocking chair, plopping into it with a giggle. After another sip of bourbon, I trade my glass for the binoculars and peer at the Royce house again, focusing on the kitchen.

Tom’s no longer there, although the soup remains. The pot sits on the counter next to the wine, wisps of steam still coiling in the air.

My gaze slides to the dining room, also empty, and then the large living room. Tom’s not there, either.

I tilt the binoculars slightly upward, tracing with my vision the same path I took in person earlier.

Exercise room. Empty.

Master bedroom. Empty.

Office.

Empty.

A worrisome thought pokes through my inebriation: What if Tom suddenly took off? Maybe he got spooked by his conversation with Wilma Anson. Or maybe she called him right as he was about to eat his soup, saying she wanted him to come in for formal questioning, which sent him running for his keys. It’s entirely possible he’s driving away this very second, speeding for the Canadian border.

I swing the binoculars away from the second floor toward the side of the house, looking for his Bentley. It’s still there, parked beneath the portico.

As I bring my gaze back toward the house, sliding it past the back patio strewn with dead leaves and the bare trees on the lakeshore that they’ve fallen from, I notice something on the Royces’ dock.

A person.

But not just any person. Tom.

He stands at the end of the dock, spine as straight as a steel beam. In his hands are a pair of binoculars, aimed at this side of the lake.

And at me.

I duck, trying to hide behind the porch railing, which even in my drunken state I understand to be ridiculous on so many levels. First, it’s a railing, not a brick wall. I’m still visible between the whitewashed slats. Second, Tom saw me. He knows, like Katherine did, that I’ve been watching them.

Now he’s watching me back. Even though I’ve lowered the binoculars, I can still see him, a night-shrouded figure on the edge of the dock. He stays that way another minute before turning suddenly and walking up the dock.

It’s only after Tom crosses the patio and heads back into the house that I risk bringing the binoculars to my eyes again. Inside, I see him pass through the dining room into the kitchen, where he pauses to snatch something from the counter. Then he’s on the move again, pushing back outside through the side door off the kitchen.

He slides into his Bentley. Two seconds later, the headlights spring to life—twin beams that shoot straight across the lake.

As Tom backs the car out from under the portico, I at first think he’s finally running away. He knows I’m onto him and has decided to flee, maybe for good. I yank my phone from my pocket, ready to call Wilma Anson and alert her. The phone springs like a leaping frog from my bourbon- dulled fingers. I lunge for it, miss, and watch helplessly as it hits the porch, slips under the railing, and drops to the weedy ground below.

Across the water, the Bentley has reached the end of the driveway. It turns right, onto the road that circles the lake. Seeing it brings another sobering thought. If Tom were running away, he would have turned left, toward the main road.

Instead, he’s driving in the opposite direction. Around the lake.

Right toward me.

Still kneeling on the porch, I watch the Bentley’s headlights carve a path through the darkness, marking its progress past Eli’s house, then out of sight as it reaches the lake’s northern curve.

Finally, I start to move.

Stumbling into the house.

Slamming the French doors behind me.

Fumbling with the lock because I’m drunk and scared and I’ve never had to use it before. Most nights, there’s no reason to lock any of the doors.

Tonight, I have one.

Inside the house, I veer from room to room, switching off all the lights I’d turned on earlier.

Dining room and kitchen. Living room and den. Library and foyer.

Soon the whole house has been returned to the darkness I’d walked into when I arrived. I push aside the

curtain at the small window beside the front door and peek outside. Tom has reached this side of the lake and is coming my way. I see the headlights first, plowing through the darkness, clearing a path for the Bentley itself, which slows as it draws closer to the house.

My foolish hope is that, even though he knows I’m here, Tom will see the place in utter darkness and keep driving.

He doesn’t.

Despite the dark house, Tom steers the car into the driveway. The headlights shine through the beveled panes of the front door’s window, casting a rectangular glow on the foyer wall. I duck out of its reach, crawl to the door, and engage the lock.

Then I wait.

Hunched on the floor. Back against the door.

Listening as Tom gets out of the car, crunches up the driveway toward the house, steps onto the front porch.

When he pounds on the door, it shimmies beneath my back. I clamp both hands over my nose and mouth, praying he can’t hear me breathing.

“I know you’re in there, Casey!” Tom’s voice is like cannon fire. Booming. Angry. “Just like I know you were inside my house. You forgot to lock the front door when you left.”

I cringe at my stupidity. Even though I had to leave in a hurry, I should have known to lock the door behind me. Little details like that can trip you up when you’ve got something to hide.

“Maybe I should have told your detective friend about that instead of answering all her questions. What have I been doing? Have I heard from my wife? Where have I

stayed every summer for the past two years? I know you sent her, Casey. I know you’ve been spying on me.”

He pauses, maybe expecting I’ll respond in some way, even if it’s to deny what’s clearly the truth. I remain silent, taking short, frantic breaths through interlaced fingers, worrying about what Tom will do next. The glow of the headlights through the door’s window are an unwelcome reminder of the house’s many vulnerabilities. Tom could break in easily if he wanted to. A smashed window or a powerful push on one of the doors is all it would take.

Instead, he pounds the door again, hitting it so hard I really do think he’s about to break it down. A startled yelp squeaks out from beneath my cupped hands. I press them tighter against my mouth, but it doesn’t matter. The noise escaped. Tom heard it.

When he resumes talking, his mouth is at the keyhole, his voice a whisper in my ear.

“You should learn to mind your own business, Casey. And you should learn to keep your mouth shut. Because whatever you think is happening, you’ve got it all wrong. You have no idea what’s going on. Just leave us the fuck alone.”

I remain slumped against the door as Tom leaves. I listen to his footsteps moving away from the house, the car door opening and closing. I watch the headlights fade on the foyer wall and hear the hum of the car growing distant in the October night.

Yet I stay where I am, weighed down with worry. That Tom will return at any second.

That, if he does, I’ll suddenly vanish like Katherine.

Too scared and spent—and, let’s be honest, too drunk— to move, I close my eyes and listen to the grandfather clock in the living room tick off the seconds in my head. The

sound soon fades. As do my thoughts. As does consciousness.

When there’s another knock on the door, I’m only vaguely aware of it. It sounds distant and not quite real. Like a noise in a daydream or a TV left on while you sleep.

A voice accompanies it. Maybe.

“Casey?” A pause. “Are you there?”

I mumble something. I think it’s “No.”

The voice on the other side of the door says, “I saw Tom drive by and got worried he was coming to see you. Are you okay?”

I say “No” again, although this time I’m unsure if the word is spoken and not simply thought. My consciousness is fading again. Beyond my closed eyelids, the foyer spins like a Tilt-A-Whirl, and I move with it, spiraling toward a dark pit of nothingness.

Before I reach it, I’m aware of two things. The first is a sound coming from below, in the basement I refuse to enter. The second is the chilling feeling that I’m no longer alone, that someone else is inside the house with me.

I sense a door opening. Footsteps coming toward me. Another person in the foyer.

Startled out of my shit-faced state for just a second, my eyes fly open and I see Boone standing over me, his head cocked in what’s either curiosity or pity.

My eyes fall shut again as he scoops me up and I finally pass out.

I wake with a pounding head and a roiling stomach in a bed I have no memory of getting into. When I open my eyes, the light coming through the tall windows makes

me squint, even though the morning sky is slate gray. Through that heavy-lidded gaze, I see the time—quarter past nine—and a mostly full glass of water on the nightstand. I take several greedy gulps before collapsing back onto the bed. Splayed across the mattress, the sheets tangled around my legs, I struggle to recall the night before.

I remember drinking on the porch.

And ducking stupidly behind the railing when I realized Tom was watching me.

And Tom at the door, yelling and knocking, although most of what he said is lost in a bourbon haze. So is everything that happened after that, which is why I’m startled when I notice the scent of something cooking rising from downstairs.

Someone else is here.

I spring out of bed, accidentally kicking a trash can that’s been left beside it, and hobble out of the bedroom, my body stiff and sore. In the hallway, the cooking smells are stronger, more recognizable. Coffee and bacon. At the top of the stairs, I call down to whoever’s in the kitchen.

“Hello?” I say, my voice ragged from both uncertainty and a killer hangover.

“Good morning, sleepyhead. I thought you’d never wake up.”

Hearing Boone’s voice brings another flash of memory. Him coming to the door not long after Tom left, me trying to answer but uncertain if I actually did, then him being inside, even though I’m pretty sure I never opened the door.

“Have you been here all night?” “I sure have,” Boone says.

His answer only prompts more questions. How? Why? What did we do all night? Although the realization that I’m still in the same jeans and sweatshirt I wore yesterday suggests we didn’t do anything.

“I’ll, uh, be right down,” I say before hurrying back to the bedroom. There, I check the mirror over the dresser. The reflection staring back at me is alarming. Red-eyed and wild-haired, I look like a woman still reeling from drinking too much the night before, which is exactly what I am.

The next five minutes are spent stumbling and fumbling in the bathroom. I set what has to be a record for the world’s fastest shower, followed by the necessary brushing of teeth and hair. One gargle with mouthwash and a change into a different, less smelly pair of jeans and sweatshirt later, I look presentable.

Mostly.

The upside to that flurry of activity is that it made me forget just how hungover I really am. The downside is that it all comes roaring back as soon as I try to descend the steps. Looking down the steep slope of the stairwell makes me so dizzy I think I might be sick. I suck in air until the feeling passes and take the stairs slowly, one hand on the banister, the other flat-palmed against the wall, both feet touching each step.

At the bottom, I take a few more deep breaths before heading into the kitchen. Boone is at the stove, making pancakes and looking like a s*xy celebrity chef in tight jeans, a tighter T-shirt, and an apron that literally says Kiss the Cook. I catch him in the middle of flipping a pancake. With a flick of his wrist, it leaps from the pan like a gymnast before somersaulting back into place.

“Take a seat,” he says. “Breakfast is almost ready.”

He turns away from the stove long enough to hand me a steaming mug of coffee. I take a grateful sip and sit at the kitchen counter. Despite my clanging headache and not knowing any details about the previous night, there’s a coziness to the situation that prompts both comfort and no small amount of guilt. This is exactly how Len and I spent our weekend mornings here, with me savoring coffee while he made breakfast in the same apron Boone now wears. Doing it with someone else feels like cheating, which surprises me. I felt no such guilt when having s*x with a stagehand from Shred of Doubt. I guess because, in that instance, I knew the score. What this is, I have no idea.

Boone slides a plate piled with pancakes and bacon on the side, and my stomach gives off a painful twinge.

“Truth be told, I’m not very hungry,” I say.

Boone joins me with his own plate heaped with food. “Eating will do you some good. Feed a hangover, starve a fever. Isn’t that how the saying goes?”

“No.”

“Close enough,” he says as he tops his pancakes with two pats of butter. “Now eat.”

I nibble a piece of bacon, nervous it might send me running to the bathroom with nausea. To my surprise, it makes me feel better. As does a bite of pancake. Soon I’m

shoveling the food into my mouth, washing it down with more coffee.

“We should have picked up some maple syrup at the store yesterday,” Boone says casually, as if we have breakfast together all the time.

I lower my fork. “Can we talk about last night?” “Sure. If you can remember it.”

Boone immediately takes a sip of coffee, as if that will somehow soften the judgment in his voice. I pretend to ignore it.

“I was hoping you could fill in the blanks a bit.”

“I was just about to go up to bed when I saw Tom’s Bentley drive by the house,” Boone says. “Since there’s no reason for him to be driving on this side of the lake, I assumed he was coming to see one of us. And since he didn’t stop at my place, I figured he had to be going to see you. And I didn’t think that was a good thing.”

“He caught me watching the house,” I say. “Apparently he picked up his own pair of binoculars while at the hardware store.”

“Was he mad?”

“That’s putting it mildly.”

“What happened while he was here?”

I eat two more bites of pancake, take a long sip of coffee, and try to bring my blurry memories of Tom’s visit into focus. A few do, snapping into clarity right when I need them to.

“I turned off all the lights and hid by the door,” I say, remembering the feel of the door against my back as it rattled under Tom’s knocking. “But he knew I was here, so he yelled some stuff.”

Boone looks up from his plate. “What kind of stuff?”

“This is where it starts to get foggy. I think I remember the gist of what he said, but not his exact words.”

“Then paraphrase.”

“He said he knew that I’ve been spying on him and that it was me who told Wilma about Katherine. Oh, and that he knew I’d broken into his house.”

“Did he threaten you?” Boone says.

“Not exactly. I mean, it was scary. But no, there were no threats. He just told me to leave him alone and left. Then you came to the door.”

I pause, signaling that I can’t remember anything else and that I’m hoping Boone can tell me the rest. He does, although he looks slightly annoyed at having to remind me of something I should have been sober enough to recall on my own.

“I heard you inside after I knocked,” he says. “You were mumbling and sounded dazed. I thought you were hurt and not—”

Boone stops talking, as if the word drunk is contagious and he’ll become one again if he dares to utter it.

“You came inside to check on me,” I say, hit with the image of him looming over me, swathed in shadow.

“I did.”

“How?”

“The ground floor.”

Boone’s referring to the door to the basement. The one with faded blue paint and a persistent squeak that leads directly to the backyard beneath the porch. I didn’t know it was unlocked because I haven’t been down there since the morning I woke up and Len was gone.

“I found your phone out there, by the way,” he says, gesturing to the dining room table, where the phone now sits.

“Then what happened?”

“I picked you up and carried you to bed.” “And?”

“I made you drink some water, put a garbage can by the bed in case you got sick, and left you alone to sleep it off.”

“Where’d you sleep?”

“Bedroom down the hall,” Boone says. “The one with the twin beds and slanted ceiling.”

My childhood bedroom, shared with Marnie, who I imagine would be both amused and mortified by my completely unromantic night with the hot ex-cop next door.

“Thank you,” I say. “You didn’t need to go to all that trouble.”

“Considering the state you were in, I kind of think I did.”

I say nothing after that, knowing it’s pointless to make excuses for getting so blitzed in such a short amount of time. I focus on finishing my breakfast, surprised when the plate is empty. When the mug of coffee is also drained, I get up and pour myself another.

“Maybe we should call Wilma and let her know what happened,” Boone says.

“Nothing happened,” I say. “Besides, it’ll require too much explanation.”

If we tell Wilma Anson about Tom coming to my door, we’ll also have to reveal why. And I’m not too keen on admitting to a member of the state police that I’ve illegally entered a person’s home. Tom’s the one I want in jail. Not me.

“Fine,” Boone says. “But don’t think for a second I’m leaving you here by yourself while he’s still around.”

“Is he still around?”

“His car is there,” Boone says with a nod toward the French doors and its view of the opposite shore. “Which I take to mean he’s still there, too.”

I look out the door and across the lake, curious as to why Tom still hasn’t made a break for it. When I mention this to Boone, he says, “Because it’ll make him look guilty. And right now, he’s betting that the cops won’t be able to pin anything on him.”

“But he can’t keep up this charade forever,” I say. “Someone else is going to realize Katherine is missing.”

I move to the dining room and grab my phone, which shows damage from its fall from the porch. The bottom right corner has caved in, and a crack as jagged as a lightning bolt slices from one side to the other. But it still works, which is all that matters.

I go straight to Katherine’s Instagram, which has remained unchanged since the morning she disappeared. I can’t be the only one to realize the photo of that pristine kitchen wasn’t posted by Katherine. Surely others, especially people who know her better than I do, will notice the wrong month on the calendar and Tom’s reflection in the teakettle.

In fact, it’s possible one of them already has.

I close Instagram and go to the photos stored on my phone. Boone watches me from the kitchen counter, his mug of coffee paused mid-sip.

“What are you doing?”

“When I was searching Tom and Katherine’s house, I found her phone.”

“I know,” Boone says. “Which would be amazing evidence if not for that whole, you know, being-obtained- illegally thing.”

I note his sarcasm but am too busy swiping through photos to care. I pass the picture of the article about Harvey Brewer, looking grainy on the laptop’s screen, and photos of Katherine’s financial records and Mixer’s quarterly data.

“While I was there, someone called Katherine,” I say as I reach the photos taken inside the master bedroom. “I took a picture of the number that popped up on the screen.”

“Which will help how?”

“If we call them and it’s someone worried about Katherine—especially a family member—maybe it will be enough for Wilma and the state police to declare her missing and officially question Tom.”

I scan the photos on my phone. Katherine’s rings.

Katherine’s clothes.

And, finally, Katherine’s phone, both blank and lit up with an incoming call.

I stare at the screen inside my screen. A strange feeling.

Like looking at a photograph of a photograph.

There’s no name. Just a number, leading me to think it’s probably someone Katherine didn’t know well. If she even knew them at all. There’s the very real possibility it was a telemarketer or a vague acquaintance or simply a wrong number. I remember my own number appearing on the screen when I called to confirm the phone belonged to Katherine. Although those ten digits made it clear Katherine hadn’t added me to her contacts, it doesn’t make me less concerned about where she could be or what might have happened to her. It might be the same for this other caller. They could be just as worried as I am.

I call them without a second thought, toggling between the photo and my phone’s keypad until the number is typed

in completely.

I hold my breath.

I hit the call button.

At the kitchen counter, Boone’s phone begins to ring.