I re-taped the box from Amazon and pushed it into the corner of the family room with the rest of the moving boxes. That was the last of it. I had organized everything into two groups. Things that were my husband’s that I didn’t want, and the items that were mine that I did want.

I stared at the boxes filled with files. Ben hadn’t heard back from the forensic team yet. The files could still be important. I shoved them into the “keep” pile. It wasn’t much. I had really only wanted my clothes and a few other knickknacks. I would be starting a new life tomorrow. I didn’t want to be weighed down by anything from my past. Besides, my husband was extremely wealthy. And I was about to get half of everything in the divorce. Or will I get everything in the divorce since my husband’s a serial killer?

The doorbell rang. For the first time, I was excited to answer it. This would be the last time I ever had to see the gawkers. And there were only a few more hours before cops would swarm my house and arrest my husband. I couldn’t wipe the grin off my face.

“Hey, girls,” I said as I opened up the door.

Charlotte’s eyes wandered over me. She had a look of utter disapproval on her face. “Were you not expecting us, hon? I thought I said 3.”

“What? I was expecting you.” I stepped to the side, welcoming them in.

“Oh.” She laughed awkwardly. “Pretend I didn’t say anything. We brought wine and snacks.” She, Rosie, and Phoenix each walked in carrying a bottle of wine and covered dishes.

“You look fine,” Rosie said. “Ignore her. The last time I packed, it was 90 degrees out and our air conditioner was broken. I was a complete mess. You, on the other hand, look super cute.”

I looked down at my outfit. I was dressed in a pair of yoga pants and a tank top. Was that why Charlotte had said that? She thought I was inappropriately dressed? Give me a break. I pulled my hair out of its messy bun as they stared at me. Screw you, gawkers. I walked towards the kitchen and ran my fingers through my hair. “I left a few glasses out. They’re pretty much the only things I haven’t packed.”

“I can’t believe we’ve never been here,” Phoenix said as she eyed the boxes in the kitchen. “You’re moving and we never really even got to know you.”

And whose fault is that? She didn’t blame Phoenix and Rosie, though. If anything, they had been the nicest to her in the whole neighborhood. It was Charlotte who was the ringleader of evil looks and snarky comments. She had probably told them not to hang out with me. “It’s okay, I know you were all probably super busy.” I eyed the bottles they placed on the table. “Crap, I packed up the corkscrew. One second, I know it’s in one of these boxes.” I turned toward one of my husband’s piles.

“It’s okay, I came prepared.” Phoenix reached into her designer purse and pulled out a bottle opener.

Charlotte shot her a disapproving glance and grabbed it from her. “Ladies, I say we make a toast.” She opened up the bottle and started pouring the wine. “To new beginnings.” She raised her glass.

“Hear, hear!” Far away from you. I clinked my glass to hers, downed the whole thing, and put it back on the table a little harder than I meant to. I was lucky it didn’t crack. They all stared at me. It had only taken me 5 seconds with Charlotte to realize that I needed to be more than tipsy to get through the next couple of hours with her. They’d have to deal. I poured myself some more.

Charlotte cleared her throat and sat down at the table. “I still can’t believe we never even met your husband.”

Of course they wouldn’t remember seeing him at the neighborhood picnics. He always promised that he’d come. But then he’d only stay for a few minutes before leaving for an important business call. It was always the same lame excuse. “He travels a lot for work. He’s incredibly busy.” I sat down across from her. It felt like I was about to partake in the ultimate showdown. Snooty gawker versus tortured housewife. This was a game I could win.

“What does he do for work?” she asked.

He’s a serial killer. “He’s an insurance collector of sorts.”

“That sounds interesting,” Rosie said. “What exactly does that entail?”

Murder. “Honestly, I’m not really sure,” I said with a laugh. “What do your husbands do?”

“I’m actually very involved in my husband’s business,” Charlotte said. “We’re in real estate together. I handle staging the houses before showings. He always says I drive all the sales. God, I can’t imagine just sitting around all day doing nothing. How boring would that be?”

For just a second I wished I had booby-trapped the house. For her. She knew I didn’t work. I took another huge gulp of wine and pulled the aluminum foil off the closest dish. It was covered in chocolate chip cookies. “Oh, yum. These look great.” I stuffed one in my mouth.

“I made them from scratch,” Charlotte said.

I grabbed a napkin and spit it out. “I’m so sorry.” I wiped the corners of my mouth. “There was a hair in it,” I lied.

She gasped. “What?” She snatched the plate and stared down at the cookies. “I’m going to have to have a word with the bakery about that.” As soon as the words slipped out of her mouth she laughed awkwardly. “I mean I…” her voice trailed off. She sighed. “I ran out of time today. There was a showing this morning that took longer than expected.”

“That’s okay,” Phoenix said. “I just dumped a pile of Chex mix in a bowl.”

“I was too busy to cook anything too. Pretending to be a perfect housewife is exhausting.” Rosie laughed and revealed her dish. “I added some sour cream on top to make it look homemade. But I bought the dip from the grocery store.”

“You know, I have some mint chocolate chip ice cream in the fridge,” I said. “Does anyone want some?”

“That sounds amazing,” Rosie and Phoenix said at the same time.

“Is it dairy free?” Charlotte asked. “I don’t eat dairy products. I can’t believe how they treat the poor cows.”

“No. It’s the good stuff.” I rummaged through a few boxes and pulled out spoons and bowls. Charlotte glared at us as we stuffed ice cream in our faces. I honestly liked these girls, Charlotte excluded. We could have been friends. If my life had been different, maybe we would have been.

I felt so normal. For an hour, my problems evaporated. I laughed more than I had in years.

My phone ringing pulled me away from the conversation. It was Ben. We had only been apart for a few hours, but I missed him. I quickly answered his call.

“Hi!” I said. “What’s up, I’m a little busy hanging out with my girls.”

Rosie raised her glass to me and took another sip.

“Are you drunk?” he asked.

“No.” I laughed. “Maybe a little.”

"Do you want the good news or the bad news first?"

"Good news."

"Okay. So you know how the serial killer had been targeting men? And then the wives were going missing?"

"Yeah. My husband was probably selling the women into prostitution." As if he could be any more of a monster.

All three women looked up at me with shocked expressions.

I held my hand over the receiver as I shrugged and mouthed, "Telemarketer." That just made them even more shocked. I walked out of the kitchen to continue the conversation in private.

"Maybe," said Ben. "But that's not the important part. What's important is that we finally found a concrete link between all the murders. Up until now, we'd been looking at what the men had in common, since they were the primary victims. But when we went through your husband’s files, we realized that all the men's wives, the ones disappearing, were all patients of Dr. Nash."

For some reason I felt a tightening in my chest. I was Dr. Nash's patient too. I felt camaraderie with those women. No, I hadn’t disappeared. But it felt like a piece of my soul had disappeared the first time my husband ever put his hands on me.

“Yeah. It’s bigger than we originally thought. "We think he might have killed the women too. But now that you bring up the prostitution thing, I guess that's a possibility. We haven't been able to find the women's bodies. That might be why. I'll run it by some of our human trafficking guys. Either way, this link combined with all your statements should be enough to prevent your husband from getting bail while we piece the rest together."

"What about the prints on the files?" I asked. "Isn't that the final bit of evidence that we need?"

Ben cleared his throat. "That’s the bad news. His prints weren't on the files. Not a single one."

“Of course they were. He made the files. Have forensics look again.”

"We already double checked," said Ben. "Honestly, the lack of prints make your husband look even more guilty. It’s super weird. I mean, the files were in his house. He would have had to have been extremely careful to never get his prints on them."

"Right. I hadn't thought about that. What about Dr. Nash? Were her fingerprints on them?"

"No, but I didn't expect them to be. You said you thought you lost the original files when your last home burnt down two years ago. These were just copies. Dr. Nash has been dead for four years, so her fingerprints wouldn't have been on them. But, there is some good news here. There was one other set of prints besides yours. They belong to a Maria Gonzalez. We're still trying to locate her. She's originally from the Bronx, but her last known address is abandoned. Regardless, we think she must have been the woman impersonating Dr. Nash. The one that’s been subscribing you medicine you don’t need and helping your husband commit these murders.”

“No, she’s my…” The word got stuck in my throat. A word that made no sense at all. I immediately coughed. No. The side of my face twitched. No.

“Addy, do you know her?”

I thought about the box in the woods. The box that I had completely forgotten to tell Ben about. The picture of the other woman seemed to focus in my mind.

“Do you know her?” Ben repeated.

Maria Gonzales. I did know her. She was the woman in the picture. She was… I shook away the thought. My memory was playing tricks on me. “She’s an old friend,” I said. Lies had always come easier to me than the truth.

“You showed the files to her?”

“No…I…” my voice trailed off. “Yeah, that sounds right. I showed them to her.”

“Do you know where she is now?”

“No, I haven’t seen her ages.”

"How long has it been? Has she been to your current house?"

I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Um…yes, I think she's been here. It must have been a year ago or so.”

“Okay. Then she’s not the one impersonating Dr. Nash. I’m going to stop by and pick up a few of the other files to run for fingerprints. Maybe we can still figure out who the imposter is. Or find somewhere your husband slipped up and left his prints.”

I eyed the boxes of files in the corner. “Ben, I’ll bring them to you, okay? Give me a few minutes to finish up here.”

“I’ll see you soon…”

I hung up the phone while he was still trying to talk to me. My whole body felt numb. My vision was turning red. The gawkers had gathered in the doorway and were gawking at me in true gawker fashion. Stupid gawky gawkers. “I have to get going,” I said without even looking at them. “If you ladies don’t mind letting yourselves out.”

“Was that Ben Jones?” Charlotte asked. “You’ve been spending a lot of time with him.”

“Well, that’s because we’re having an affair.” Maybe that would make her leave.

Charlotte gasped.

“Now can you please leave?” My voice was calm, but my mind was zooming. I felt like I was going to faint. I needed to find the picture of Maria Gonzalez. I needed to make sure.

“What was that about fingerprints?” Rosie asked. “What’s going on? If you and your husband are having issues, Phoenix and I know a great couples’ therapist."

“You have to leave.” My voice came out in a whisper this time. They blurred in front of me. I walked past them back into the kitchen and grabbed my glass of wine.

Phoenix cleared her throat. “If you want to talk about it…”

“Please just go.” My memories were wrong. But the image was as clear as day. That picture was of Maria Gonzalez. I remembered something that didn’t make any sense. I downed the rest of the wine and grabbed one of the other glasses off the table.

“You need to go!” I screamed when they didn’t move. “Get out of my house.” I threw the wine glass against the wall.

Charlotte dove to the floor and covered her head. “I knew you were crazy!” she yelled as she scrambled towards the hall.

“Me? I’m the crazy one?” I threw another glass. It shattered right behind Charlotte’s feet. “You don’t even know me! You never bothered to try!” I threw another glass.

All the women ran for the front door. They didn’t know me. I placed my hand on the wall as I chased them out. The whole house was spinning. I didn’t even know me. “You don’t know what I’ve been through.” I was choking on sobs. I heard the slam of the front door and my knees buckled beneath me.

The image of Maria Gonzalez was all I could see. But the memories were wrong. They had to be. The years of pills had messed with my head. I dug my fingers into my scalp. The pain in my skull was unbearable. I screamed at the top of my lungs. “You’re messing with my head!” I yelled into the empty house. It was directed at my husband, but I knew he wasn’t there.

I was all alone with the thoughts tumbling around in my head. Mashing together in illogical ways. I wasn’t allowed to work. I wasn’t even supposed to leave the house. So how could Maria Gonzalez have worked for me?