CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

 

Isabelle

 

We were both quiet as we made our way up the hill to the house. I felt unsettled as I pondered all Hank had said. I wanted to talk about it with Brant, to go over it all carefully, but I wanted to do so curled up in bed, his arms around me. Safe.

Still, with each step, my mind insisted on sifting through the information with what I now knew. Aaron had hired someone to kill Ethan? To kill all of us? Was it really possible? I couldn’t wrap my head around it. And why hadn’t he asked for the money back from me? Had the killings been planned purely out of rage because Ethan had betrayed him, never about money at all? Or had he turned down the money as a way to make himself appear the victim and nothing more? I felt sick.

There was no denying it, though. The number in the phone belonging to Zeke Harvey went back to Aaron’s office. Of course it had been Ethan’s office too, but I knew Ethan hadn’t planned his own murder. They were the only ones who worked there, well other than an administrative assistant, and Paige on occasion . . .

Brant opened the door to the house quietly, so as not to wake his father, I knew. He began turning in the direction of the bedroom, but I put my hand on his arm, “I need some water. Do you want some?” I whispered.

“Only the kind that comes from a showerhead.”

I gave him a smile as he turned away and I walked quietly to the kitchen. The familiar smell of the house was a healing balm to my soul and I already felt calmer, better. I filled a glass from the tap and stood at the sink drinking the cool, sweet water.

As I headed back to the room, I stopped near the hall closet, beginning to unbutton my jacket when I saw a flash of light through the French doors in the office. I paused, confused. What in the world? Was that burst of light something that had come in through the window? Headlights? I opened the door cautiously and stepped inside, walking to the window and peering through the open shutters. Nothing.

A cold shiver moved through me, the feeling that something was wrong, and I turned back toward the door.

Paige was standing to my left, half hidden in shadows, a gun in her hand.

Shock overwhelmed me, shooting iced water into my veins. A fuzzy gray cloud seemed to be weaving through my mind, obscuring my thoughts, my understanding. What was happening here? “Paige?” I managed.

She walked closer. “I never wanted it to happen this way, Isabelle. Just give me the money and I’ll be gone.”

“What money?”

She took in a deep, seemingly annoyed breath. “Ethan’s money.”

I shook my head. “It wasn’t Ethan’s money, Paige. I . . . it . . . I gave it to my parents.”

“All of it?”

“N-no. I donated the rest. It’s gone.” Rage, raw and hot flashed across her face. My mind rang as I desperately tried to figure out what to say. “How did you . . . how did you even know about it?”

“How did I know about it? That money was ours, Ethan’s and mine. We were in love. We were supposed to leave together, start a new life with all that cash. Ethan would make even more. We had a plan.”

I shook my head. What? “In love? You were having an affair with Ethan? You knew about that money?” My God, this couldn’t be real. It couldn’t. It hadn’t been Aaron after all. It had been his wife. My friend. “I trusted you,” I breathed. “You’re my friend.” My voice hitched on the final word, a disbelieving sob caught in my throat.

“And how do you think I felt? Having to comfort you when I was the one grieving? All this time, and it was all about you. I had to pretend as if everything was fine.”

Paige waved the gun around, her movement causing my heart rate to spike. My God. I stared at her, trying to comprehend, trying not to faint with panic.

“You took the key to the storage unit.”

“Of course. But all that was in there was that damn car Ethan loved so much. Little good that will do me.”

“If he loved you, why didn’t he just leave me then?” My God, if only he had. Maybe that day would have been different. Maybe we wouldn’t have been home. Maybe we wouldn’t have even lived there. Maybe . . . Maybemaybemaybe.

“He wanted to. It’s all he wanted. But he kept hesitating because of her. Said you’d never give her up willingly.”

Her? Elise? My heart constricted so tightly that for a moment I couldn’t breathe. Yes, for all Ethan’s faults, for all his sins and cruelties, he loved his daughter. She was the only reason he hadn’t left. As I stared at Paige, I recalled Hank’s words and the awful, horrific knowledge bloomed in my head, an idea so soul crushing that for a moment, I could do nothing but breathe as it took shape in my mind. “You. You were . . . responsible for that man breaking into our house,” I said and my voice sounded wooden, far away, because despite not understanding the reasons why, I somehow already knew it was true. “You had them killed.”

Her shoulders fell slightly and a shadow moved across her face. “I didn’t mean for them to die, only you.”

Sickness moved up my throat, my breath caught in my lungs, as I reached behind me, finding the solid wall and using it to steady myself, to keep from falling. “You hired him to . . . to break into our house, to—”

“No, no, no,” she said, sounding exasperated. “I hired him to kill you. He was just supposed to kill you. But he was crazy. He totally botched everything. He did nothing the way I told him to.”

I put my hand on my stomach and swallowed, trying to hold back the vomit that threatened to choke me. She had hired a crazy transient to kill me, and instead he’d broken in, tied us up, emotionally tortured us, and killed an innocent little girl. And Paige acted like she held no responsibility.

The person I’d thought was my friend was a sociopath.

I would have fainted, I think. I would have just given in and fallen to the floor. It would have been a relief, but then there was movement at the doorway and Brant appeared. I looked away from him, trying not to alert Paige, but she’d either seen something in my eyes, or heard the sound of his footsteps because she turned around, whipping the gun in his direction.