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But now Lily and I can do whatever we want.
And a rundown, drippy kitchen was better than any sort of kitchen we might share with Martin.
A scarred wooden table with four chairs was set in the kitchen. There were other modest furnishings, too—a chair in the living room, beds and dressers in both bedrooms—which was one reason I chose this place. It was the perfect getaway spot, out in the middle of nowhere, and we didn’t need to bring much to get started.
The refrigerator and cabinets were still empty and in need of a good scrubbing. We’d grabbed some fast food on the way to West Virginia, but I hadn’t wanted to stop at the grocery store yet.
All I wanted to do was get us here.
But now that we were, I’d have to spend the weekend making it as homey and comfortable as possible for Lily.
We’re doing this. We’re starting over. This is our home now.
For months, years, I’d imagined this moment. But then, it had just been a fantasy, a twisted version of hyper-reality. I never really thought I would leave. Even the night before we left, I’d expected myself to back out. To freeze. To panic and collapse in the middle of the street after loading our cases. But I didn’t. And it wasn’t until we were almost a hundred miles outside of Granton that I knew it was really happening…that we were leaving Martin for good.
My duffel bag lay sprawled open on the floor beside the table, from where I’d taken out my pajamas last night. We were so tired when we got here, to the point of delirium. It had taken nearly ten hours to reach Northfolk, the rising hills and winding curves of West Virginia making me skittery and afraid. I couldn’t stop checking the rearview mirror and my heart was thrumming in my ears the entire drive. During the daytime, it hadn’t been so bad. But at night, I’d imagined every pair of headlights were the angry, glowing orbs of Martin’s truck, chasing us up the wild, mountain roads…
Lily had handled the move so well, believing me when I told her that we were going on an adventure. With her mousy brown hair and cornflower blue eyes, she looked just like Martin. But, luckily, she hadn’t inherited his meanness, or his wild mood swings.
Lily was, by all accounts, a normal four-year-old girl. But that wouldn’t have lasted long, not while living with Martin. Eventually, his violence would have moved onto her, seeping into her pores and saturating her life with his poison.
She was innocent, so seemingly unaware, yet she’d already learned to fear her father and his unpredictable ways. And the way Martin looked at her…his eyes searching, evaluating her every move, it made me uneasy.
I’m taking her away from her dad. What kind of mother does that?
Emotions played tug-of-war inside me—I felt guilty for stripping her of her fatherly influence, but I was relieved—exuberant, even—to give her a fresh, safe start in life. During the drive to Northfolk, I’d been so focused on getting away, that the guilt hadn’t had time to settle in yet. And last night, I’d been too tired to stay up worrying. But now…now all those worries came rushing back at once.
What will I tell her when she’s older? Surely, she will remember Martin. Will I tell her why we left? How much memory can a four-year-old retain?
“I m-made the right decision,” I told myself, firmly, for the hundredth time this morning.
Pressing my face against the window pane, my eyes scanned the backyard. From behind a layer of murky glass, the branches no longer seemed murderous or threatening. Even the clouds were wimpy, less dark. It was ironic, really. After years of feeling claustrophobic, shut inside the house with Martin, now it was the outdoors that overwhelmed me.
Everything overwhelms me.
Again, my thought from earlier came crawling back: how can I raise my daughter to be a stronger, better version of me when I’m so scared of the world and the men that live in it?
Clutching the necklace at my throat, my fingers curled around the dainty silver cross that Martin had given me on our anniversary. The holy symbol should have brought me comfort, but all I could think about were his hands pressed against my throat, the crossbars digging sharply into my flesh as I struggled for a tiny bit of air…
Tenderly, I reached back and unclasped it. It seemed wrong to throw it away, but then again, I couldn’t keep it. It hadn’t protected me when I’d needed it to, and expelling Martin’s memory from our lives was my top priority now. Before I could change my mind, I carried the lightweight pendant over to the waste basket and tossed it inside.
I didn’t put on makeup this morning. There was no rushing around to make Martin’s breakfast, or to see him off to work.
No slamming doors or missing shoes or screaming.
No angry fists pummeling my body.
Most mornings, the air felt suffocating and dense. I’d wake up panting, a surge of panic hammering through my bloodstream and lifting me from bed. I was always afraid I’d oversleep, and sometimes I did. If Martin was late for work or didn’t have the things he needed in the mornings, he blamed it on me. And worst of all, he seemed to enjoy punishing me for my mistakes.
He must have been so angry when he realized we were gone. We didn’t take much when we left, just Lily’s suitcase and my bag. But he must have known immediately.
The first thing he probably did was call my cell phone, and from there, it wouldn’t have taken him long to find where I’d left it—on the nightstand next to our bed.
He can’t reach us here.
There was no note. No paper trails. I’d saved up small amounts of cash over the past year, so there wouldn’t be any need for ATM withdrawals. I had enough money to last us for a while, until I could figure out how to get some more.
Pinching my eyes closed, I couldn’t shake the image of his seething blue eyes, the angry caterpillar brows furrowing in anger.
He’s probably mad enough to kill me right now. To kill us both.
I could almost taste his rage from six hundred miles away. It tickled the back of my throat and burned the edges of my tongue.
Fear. I can taste that, too.
The fear I’d felt earlier was rushing back. My old friend Panic seized my chest, like a boulder pressing down on my belly, making every breath tight and controlled.
He might find us. What will I do if he does?
As I passed through the hallway, fingertips grazing the unfamiliar walls of the cabin, I thought I heard a muffled grunt coming from behind Lily’s closed bedroom door.
Nonono. He’s not in there. I’m only imagining he is.
I’d imagined his voice last night, too, before I fell asleep. The angry, breathy snores that he made while he slept. My body so accustomed to sleeping next to his, I’d lain against the edge of the mattress, curled into a tight little ball, despite all the extra space.
“One, t-two, th-three…” I counted out loud.
I read somewhere that counting helps alleviate anxiety. My lips silently formed the words, but the clenching in my chest remained. Suddenly, I was hurtling back to our house in Tennessee. Fear slithered in through the logs. Martin’s anger dissolving and sinking down through the rafters…
“F-four, f-five, six…” My skin tickled and crawled, my stutter rearing its head again, becoming worse, the way it always did when I sensed a confrontation coming. As I moved through the hallway, I fought the urge to look back over my shoulder.
Martin is not standing behind me. He’s not! I chastised myself.
The hallway tilted and swayed, then slowly, the buttery yellow paint dissolved. I wasn’t back home in Tennessee; I was in our new house, faraway from Martin.
Safe.
“A-are you a-awake yet, Bunny?” My stumbled words a mere whisper through the heavy door.
Bunny. It was a nickname given to her by Martin, and I’d have to remember to stop using it. It would only serve as a reminder of him, and Lily wouldn’t need any of those, now that he was out of our lives for good.
Closing my eyes and taking a deep breath, I nudged the bedroom door open. Soft sunlight streamed in through motheaten curtains above the bed. There was no Martin.
See? Nothing to be afraid of.
Lily, so tiny, was curled up beneath the blankets in a ball, unmoving. Like me, she was always trying to make herself smaller and unseen…
Lily had never been a good sleeper. She was prone to nightmares, but last night, she’d slept all the way through. Reaching across the bed, I slid the curtains back, welcoming more light into the room. The bright white heat was soothing, like a warm cloth across my face. I released a long stream of breath, relieved.
“Rise and shine, B—” I stopped myself from using the nickname again, squeezing my lips together. There were so many bad habits to break, and this was only just one of them…
I prodded the soft little lump in the middle of the bed. But Lily didn’t move a muscle.
Finally, I rolled the covers back, imagining her sweet morning smile and sleepy doe-like eyes.
I know they say you should always love your children no matter what, and I do, but for some reason, my heart just soars when I see her doughy cheeks every morning. She is always at her sweetest when she first wakes up.
“Lily?”
A strange wisp of gray-white hair poked out from beneath the blanket. I stared at it, my mind not comprehending the strange bit of fur.
Tentatively, I rolled the covers down. Button-eyes stared back at me, black and menacing.
It was a toy rabbit, but not like the ones Lily used to keep on her bed in Tennessee. This bunny looked ugly and old, its limp arms and legs adorned with black, plastic claws.
I poked at the strange stuffed toy, shaken.
“B-bunny? Where are you?” I grasped the corner of the blanket in one hand, then yanked it the rest of the way off.
Lily wasn’t in her bed.
A deep guttural scream pierced the morning air.
CHAPTER TWO (#u1a357202-3b9e-5d54-a5c7-2e64ba3b0826)
The Cop
ELLIE
It started with a phone call, buzzing on the bathroom sink as I painted my eyes with charcoal liner.
“Makeup? Is that wise?” My mother was leaning on the doorframe, watching me get ready for work. Even though she retired from teaching five years ago, she still got dressed up like she was going to work each morning. Today she was wearing a creamy, salmon-colored pantsuit with brown pumps and a string of pearls.
“Just stop, mom.” I rolled my eyes, dusted off my right palm, then took the call. It was Sergeant DelGrande, so loud and brash my mom could probably hear his words clear as day, even if she hadn’t been standing right by my side.
I mumbled ‘yes’ a few times, adjusting my thick brown ponytail in the mirror as I balanced the phone between my shoulder and cheek. I hung up and tucked the phone in my back pocket.
“What was that about?” my mother clucked, pretending she hadn’t heard.
“Nothing to worry over. See you at dinner.” I kissed her on the cheek then hurried out the front door.
“Be safe,” she added as I left, almost too quiet for me to hear.
As I climbed in my cruiser and buckled my seatbelt, she was perched like an eagle behind the curtains, keeping watch as I reversed down the driveway.
Most parents would be proud of their twenty-eight-year-old daughter who was just starting out in the police force, but Barbara James wasn’t your usual mother. She was Catholic and came from a strict family, and she had tried to raise me much the same way.
When I told her I was taking the law enforcement entrance exam, she had laughed. But when I passed the test and entered the police academy, that laughter had turned to tears.
Not only was she worried because the job was dangerous, but she was also concerned about my reputation. What will people in the parish think when they find out you want to be a cop? she’d asked.
First off, I didn’t give a damn about my mother’s parish. Part of me relished the thought of their gaping faces when they learned about my new job.
Secondly, I’d reminded her that I didn’t want to be a cop. I am a cop now, I’d told her. And there was nothing Barbara James, or anyone else in Northfolk, including the parish, could do about it.
I’d always been fascinated by people. I wanted to help them. Understand them. And as corny as it sounds, I wanted to make a difference in the world. At first, I’d considered psychology or social work. But what better way to make a difference than to help the one group of people that no one gives a damn about? The incarcerated.
But Eddyville Penitentiary was hours away, and it paid more to be a cop than a corrections officer. It started out as a small dream, but once I’d entered the academy, it became an obsession. An obsession that, once upon a time, stretched beyond being a small-town cop in my tiny town of Northfolk…
But my views on helping and understanding criminals were looked down upon by my peers, and I was reminded at the academy, more than once, that it was my job to help the community, not the criminals who muck it up. I understood their point of view, but I was idealistic—couldn’t I help the community and try to make a difference in people’s lives? Was it really impossible to do both?
Northfolk was a close-knit mountain town, comprised of less than five thousand people. Nevertheless, it was riddled with poverty and with that came heavy drug problems, specifically heroin and meth. Besides drug crimes, sometimes I had to cite people for shooting off unregistered guns or riding ATVs on private property. Domestic disturbances and petty thefts occurred occasionally, too, but they were the exception, not the norm.
I’d only had one serious incident since joining the force, but it was enough to change all those well-thought-out plans I’d previously made. Four weeks into my new job, I’d been called to the scene of a domestic disturbance. I didn’t recognize the red-faced, frazzled woman who opened the door, but I did recognize her husband. A well-known cop, Ezra Clark, was accused of assaulting his wife. I had no choice but to call it in…and to arrest him. But what happened next…well, let’s just say that Ezra didn’t take too kindly to a new, young, female cop trying to take him into custody. He was angry and drunk, and although the scuffle between us only lasted a few seconds, the results had caused long-term effects. Possibly, lifetime effects. Memories of that day came floating back…the pounding pop when I fired my own gun, the burning smell of gunpowder in my nose. On my lips…
Would I ever be able to forget that day? And most importantly, would my colleagues and the residents of Northfolk…?
Sergeant DelGrande’s instructions circled back through my mind. He’d asked me to go directly to 8418 Sycamore Street, where a woman had called in, claiming that her ex-husband had stolen her child right out of bed. It sounded like a domestic disturbance, but I wasn’t familiar with the address. It was near the old Appleton farm, but no one lived out there besides the Appletons, as far as I knew.
As I pulled down the gravel drive to the property, I was instantly met by a running woman. Thick black hair swept across her face, a silky pink robe blowing back like a cape in the wind. I closed my eyes, fighting back images of Mandy Clark opening the door that day…if I let myself think about it long enough, I could still remember the smoky smell of Officer Clark’s flesh as I pulled the trigger…
The events of that day were still such a blur. One minute, I was sliding the cuffs on his wrists, and the next, it was me being slammed against the hood of my cruiser. You think you’re tough, don’t you? You don’t know shit, rookie. He let me go, but then he did the unthinkable: he reached for my gun. Afterwards, my fellow officers would claim that Ezra was probably just teasing, trying to show me I was ill-prepared as a new cop…but he was wrong about that. When he reached so did I…and moments later, one of us was lying dead on the ground…
Cautiously, I parked and emerged from my patrol car. While most of my male colleagues would have itched their fingers over their guns at the sight of a hysterical person, my instinct was to go to her, to calm her down. She was clearly distraught, her cheeks streaked with tears, her skin blotchy. I couldn’t shake off images of Mandy Clark’s distraught face, her battered skin stretched over her face like a ghoulish mask…
“Sh-she’s gone,” the robed woman choked out the words, all the while fighting with the hair around her face. “M-my Lily’s gone.”
The wind howled, blistery cold for September, causing me to stumble a bit with the heavy belt weighing down my mid-section. I shook off my whirling thoughts about that day with Ezra Clark and tried to focus. “Ma’am, let’s go inside and talk. Would that be okay?”
She hesitated, giving me the once over as though I were a stranger asking to use her phone. Her eyes were wild, shell-shocked. Maybe she knows who I am. Maybe she knows I shot a colleague, I thought. But that’s ridiculous, I chastised myself, immediately. This woman was new to Northfolk; she couldn’t possibly know about the Clark incident.
“I’m here to help. You called us,” I gently reminded her.
Shakily, she led the way inside. The cabin was sparsely furnished, a small arm chair and rug in the center of the living room. Everything looked worn but clean, and not recently used.
There was no TV, no pictures or personal effects.
“How long have you lived here?” Awkwardly, I tried to adjust my belt, then took out a notebook and pen from my back pocket. The pages were blank, which for some reason, made me feel embarrassed.
“I just moved in yesterday. Me and my daughter, Lily. She’s f-four.”
“And your name?”
“Nova Nesbitt.” The words were like whispers, strained.
“And your ex-husband, how long have you two been divorced?”
Nova shifted from foot to foot, chewing on a stray piece of hair and looking around the room with those wide, wild eyes. “Well, we’re not. I mean, I-I only just left him y-yesterday.”
