Chapter 6: She Thought She Could Run
I told the dispatcher to stay on the line and handed the phone to Mrs.
Hallett.
Then I went after Rhea.
She was at the end of the front path, her car keys already in her hand.
She had a bag over her shoulder — small, packed.
She had planned for this too.
"Rhea."
She stopped but didn't turn around.
"You're not going to make it far," I said.
"They already have the address.
They have a description of you.
And Mrs.
Hallett's recordings are already on that phone."
She turned around then.
And for the first time that night, she looked like what she actually was — not composed, not in control, not three steps ahead.
Just a woman standing in the dark who had run out of moves.
"I loved you," she said.
"I want you to know that.
Whatever you think of me.
I loved you and I wanted a life with you and she was in the way."
"She was my son's mother."
"She was going to take him from you.
She told me.
She had a lawyer.
She was going to fight for full custody and she was going to win because she had money and you were always traveling and — "
"Stop."
"I was protecting you."
"You locked a woman in a basement and told her child she was d*ad." My voice stayed level only because I needed it to.
"There is no version of that word that fits what you did."
Her chin came up.
"She would have destroyed your family."
"She is my family.
Perrin is my family.
You were someone I trusted, and you used that to do something I cannot — " I stopped.
Started again.
"You told my son his mother was d*ad.
He was eight years old.
He cried for months.
I held him while he cried and I didn't know — "
I stopped again.
Rhea's eyes were wet.
"Joel — "
"The police are coming.
Don't get in the car."
She looked at the car.
Then back at me.
"If I stay," she said, "will you tell them I cooperated?"
"I'll tell them the truth.
That's all I can offer you."
A long silence.
The street was quiet.
Somewhere down the block, a dog was barking.
Then headlights appeared at the end of the road.
Rhea sat down on the low garden wall.
She set her bag on the ground beside her feet.
She put her keys on top of the bag.
And she waited.
I went back inside to Nora.
She was on the sofa now, wrapped in the blanket Mrs.
Hallett had brought from upstairs.
She looked smaller than I remembered.
But her eyes tracked me the moment I came through the door, sharp and present.
"Did she run?" Nora asked.
"She tried."
"Is she gone?"
"She's sitting on the garden wall."
Nora closed her eyes.
One long breath in.
One long breath out.
"Perrin," she said.
"I need to see Perrin."
"He's upstairs.
I'll get him in a minute.
I want the police here first."
She nodded.
Then she opened her eyes and looked at me with an expression I didn't have a name for — something between relief and grief and a question she hadn't asked yet.
"How much does he know?" she said.
"He knew you were alive before I did."
Her face broke.
Just for a second.
Then she pulled it back together.
"He heard me," she said quietly.
"Through the floor.
I used to knock on the pipes when I thought he was in the kitchen.
Just so he'd know I was there." She looked down at her hands.
"He knocked back."
May you like
The door opened behind me.
Two officers stepped into the hall.
