Chương 6
“My friend Nora has a guest room.”
“Great.”
Rachel looked at her.
“You don’t need to come.”
Sophie shoved her phone into her pocket.
“I know.”
“You should probably go home.”
Sophie’s face changed.
“Which home?”
Rachel regretted the sentence immediately.
Margaret’s house had been Sophie’s home since Thomas died. She attended community college and worked part-time at a veterinary clinic. She could not afford rent alone.
Rachel said, “I’m sorry.”
Sophie stared across the parking lot.
“I don’t want to be there tonight.”
“Okay.”
“I don’t want to look at her.”
“Okay.”
“I also don’t want to make this about me.”
Rachel pressed two fingers to the bridge of her nose.
“You’re doing a bad job.”
Sophie laughed unexpectedly.
Then covered her face.
“I’m sorry.”
“No. That was funny.”
Nora Chen answered on the first ring.
Rachel did not explain everything.
She said, “I need somewhere to sleep.”
Nora said, “Come over.”
Rachel added, “Sophie’s with me.”
A pause.
Then, “Bring her.”
Nora lived twenty minutes away in a small brick house with two cats and a kitchen that always smelled faintly of toasted sesame oil.
She opened the door wearing scrub pants and a University of Michigan sweatshirt.
Nora was a physical therapist at the clinic where Rachel worked. They had met seven years earlier when Rachel was hired to manage scheduling and billing. Their friendship developed through canceled lunches, insurance fights, bad coffee, and an annual tradition of lying to coworkers about joining a gym in January.
Nora looked at Rachel’s bruises.
Then at Sophie.
Then back at Rachel.
“Shoes off,” she said.
Rachel blinked.
“What?”
“I just cleaned the floor.”
It was exactly the right thing to say.
Rachel took off her shoes.
At midnight, she woke on Nora’s guest bed unable to breathe.
There was no dirt.
No weight.
No shovel.
Still her lungs refused to understand.
She sat up.
The room was dark except for light from the hallway.
Someone was there.
Rachel reached for the lamp.
“It’s me,” Sophie whispered.
Rachel turned it on.
Sophie stood in the doorway wrapped in Nora’s spare blanket.
“What?”
“Sorry. I heard you.”
Rachel looked down.
Her hands were clenched in the sheets.
“I’m fine.”
Sophie leaned against the frame.
“Do you want water?”
“No.”
“Okay.”
She didn’t leave.
Rachel said, “Sophie.”
“Yeah.”
“Why are you standing there?”
“I don’t know.”
Rachel almost told her to go back to bed.
Instead she moved over.
Sophie sat at the foot of the mattress.
After a minute she said, “Evan called me.”
Rachel’s stomach tightened.
“When?”
“About an hour ago.”
“From jail?”
“He got released.”
Rachel looked at her sharply.
Sophie raised a hand.
“I didn’t tell him where we are.”
“What did he say?”
“He asked if you were okay.”
Rachel laughed once.
Sophie winced.
“Yeah.”
“What else?”
“He said he didn’t mean for it to go that far.”
Rachel stared at the wall.
There it was.
The phrase.
Not that far.
As if violence had a reasonable destination and Evan had simply overshot.
Sophie continued.
“He said Grandma told him you were blackmailing her. He said she told him you’d threatened to sell company records to a competitor.”
“Did he believe that?”
“He says he did.”
Rachel looked at Sophie.
“And you?”
“I don’t know what I believe about anything.”
“Good.”
Sophie frowned.
“That sounded mean.”
“It wasn’t.”
Rachel pulled the blanket higher.
“You shouldn’t decide tonight who everyone is.”
Sophie stared at the rug.
“Did you?”
“No.”
That was the worst part.
Rachel had decided slowly.
Over years.
Evan was not violent when she married him.
He was not cruel.
He was funny, patient, and embarrassed by compliments. He cooked eggs too long because he hated runny yolks. He called every dog “buddy.” He once drove ninety minutes in a snowstorm because Rachel left her work laptop at his parents’ house.
He was also a man who became twelve years old around his mother.
Margaret did not need to command him.
She disappointed him.
That was enough.
When Evan and Rachel bought their house, Margaret offered the down payment. Rachel refused.
Evan accepted anyway.
When Rachel wanted to paint the dining room green, Margaret said dark colors reduced resale value.
Evan brought home beige.
When Thomas became ill, Margaret decided Rachel should coordinate meals because “you’re good at those support tasks.”
Rachel did it.
Not because Margaret asked.
Because Thomas was dying.
Afterward, everyone confused compliance with agreement.
Rachel had too.
Sophie rubbed her eyes.
“Do you think he’s a bad person?”
Rachel took a long breath.
“I think he buried me.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only one I have tonight.”
The next morning Detective Vega called at 7:18.
The original will was gone.
Rachel sat upright in Nora’s bed.
“What?”
“Officers went to Margaret’s property last night with consent from Ms. Hayes.”
“She consented?”
“She consented to a limited search. The paint can was there. The document wasn’t.”
Rachel closed her eyes.
Of course.
“Did you find anything?”
“Old paint.”
Rachel nearly laughed.
Vega continued.
“We need to talk about the digital copies.”
“I have photos.”
“We’ll collect those. But photographs of a document are not the same as locating the original.”
“I know.”
“Do you know Daniel Cho’s address?”
“No.”
“We’re trying to locate him.”
“Why can’t you?”
A pause.
“His wife reported him missing yesterday.”
Rachel swung her feet to the floor.
“What?”
“He left home Sunday evening. Didn’t show up to work Monday.”
“Is he okay?”
“We don’t know.”
Rachel’s skin prickled.
The room suddenly felt cold.
“Do you think Margaret—”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
“Rachel.”
“I’m listening.”
“Don’t contact anyone connected to this on your own.”
Rachel looked at the sleeping shape on the air mattress across the room. Sophie had refused the couch because one of Nora’s cats kept walking across her stomach.
“Okay.”
“Especially Margaret.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“Or your husband.”
Rachel’s mouth tightened.
May you like
“Fine.”
When the call ended, Rachel stayed on the bed.
