CHAPTER TWO

By the time her old college friend and current roommate Lacy Cartwright came out to the breakfast room, Jessie had been awake for over three hours. She had brewed a fresh pot of coffee and poured a cup for Lacy, who walked over and took it gratefully as she offered a sympathetic smile.

“Another bad dream?” she asked.

Jessie nodded. In the six weeks that Jessie had been living in Lacy’s apartment, trying to rebuild her life, her friend had gotten used to the semi-regular middle-of the-night screams and early morning wakeups. It had happened occasionally in college, so it wasn’t a total surprise. But the frequency had increased dramatically since her husband had tried to kill her.

“Was I loud?” Jessie asked apologetically.

“A little,” Lacy acknowledged. “But you stopped yelling after a couple of seconds. I went right back to sleep.”

“I’m really sorry, Lace. Maybe I should buy you better earplugs until I move out, or a louder noise-canceling machine. I swear it won’t be much longer.”

“Don’t worry about it. You’re handling things much better than I would be,” Lacy insisted as she tied her long hair in a ponytail.

“That’s nice of you to say.”

“I’m not just being polite, girl. Think about it. In the last two months, your husband murdered a woman, tried to frame you for it, and then attempted to kill you when you figured it out. That doesn’t include your miscarriage.”

Jessie nodded but didn’t say anything. Lacy’s list of horribles didn’t include her serial killer father because Lacy didn’t know about him; almost no one did. Jessie preferred it that way—for her own safety and for theirs. Lacy continued.

“If it was me, I’d still be curled up in the fetal position. The fact that you’re almost done with physical therapy and about to enter a special FBI training program makes me wonder if you’re some kind of cyborg.”

Jessie had to admit that when things were laid out like that, it was pretty impressive that she was so functional. Her hand involuntarily moved to the spot on the left side of her abdomen where Kyle had plunged the fireplace poker. The doctors had told her she was lucky it had missed her internal organs.

She had an ugly scar. It made for an unsightly addition to go with the one from childhood that cut across her collarbone. She still felt a sharp twinge in her gut every now and then. But mostly she felt okay. She’d been given permission to ditch the walking cane a week ago and her physical therapist had only scheduled one more rehab session, which was today. After that, she was supposed to do the required exercises on her own. As to the mental and emotional rehab required after learning her husband was a sociopathic murderer, she was far from getting an all-clear.

“I guess things aren’t that bad,” she finally replied unconvincingly as she watched her friend finish getting dressed.

Lacy slid on her three-inch heels, turning her from a tall woman into a full-on Amazon. All long legs and cheekbones, she looked more like a runway model than an aspiring fashion designer. Her hair was tied back in a high ponytail that revealed her neck. She was meticulously decked out in an outfit of her own design. She might be a buyer for a high-end boutique right now. But she had plans to have her own design firm before thirty and be the highest-profile lesbian African-American fashion designer in the country soon after that.

“I don’t get you, Jessie,” she said as she threw on her coat. “You get accepted into a prestigious FBI program at Quantico for promising criminal profilers and you seem to be lukewarm to the idea. I’d think you’d jump at the chance to change your surroundings for a bit. Besides, it’s only ten weeks. It’s not like you have to move there.”

“You’re right,” Jessie agreed as she downed the last of her third cup of coffee. “It’s just that there’s so much going on right now, I’m not sure the time is right. The divorce from Kyle isn’t final yet. I still have to lock down the sale of the house in Westport Beach. I’m not a hundred percent physically. And I wake up screaming most nights. I don’t know that I’m up for the rigors of the FBI’s behavior analysis training program just yet.”

“Well, you better decide quickly,” Lacy said as she moved to the front door. “Don’t you have to give them an answer by the end of the week?”

“I do.”

“Well, let me know what you decide. Also, can you open the window to your bedroom before you head out? No offense but it smells a bit like a gym in there.”

She was gone before Jessie could reply, though she wasn’t sure what to say to that. Lacy was a great friend who could always be counted on to give her honest opinion. But tact wasn’t her strong suit.

Jessie got up and headed to her room to change. She caught a glimpse of herself in the full-length mirror on the back of the door and didn’t immediately recognize herself. On the surface, she still looked the same, with her shoulder-length brown hair, her green eyes, her tall, five-foot-ten frame.

But the eyes were red-rimmed with exhaustion, and the hair was stringy and greasy, so much so that she decided to put it in a ponytail and wear a cap. And she felt permanently hunched, a result of the ever-present worry that her abdomen might unexpectedly pulse in pain.

Will I ever get back to who I was? Does that person even still exist?

She shook the thought away, forcing the self-pity to take a backseat, at least for a while. She was too busy to cater to it right now.

It was time to get ready for her physical therapy session, her meeting with the apartment broker, her appointment with her psychiatrist, and then one with her OB-GYN. It was going to be a full day of pretending to be a functional human being.

*

The apartment broker, a petite whirling dervish in a pantsuit named Bridget, was showing her the third apartment of the morning when Jessie started getting the urge to jump off a balcony.

Everything was fine at first. She was on a bit of a high from her final physical therapy session, which had ended with the pronouncement that she was “reasonably equipped for the tasks of daily living.” Bridget had kept things moving as they looked at the first two apartments, focusing on unit details, pricing, and amenities. It was only when they got to the third option, the only one Jessie was intrigued by so far, that the personal questions began.

“Are you sure you’re only interested in one-bedrooms?” Bridget asked. “I can tell you like this one. But there’s a two-bedroom one floor up with virtually the same floor plan. It’s only thirty thousand dollars more and it would have greater resale value. Plus, you never know what your situation might be a couple of years from now.”

“That’s true,” Jessie acknowledged, mentally noting that only two months ago she was married, pregnant, and living in a mansion in Orange County. Now she was separated from an admitted killer, she’d lost her unborn child, and she was bunking with a friend from school. “But I’m fine with a one-bedroom.”

“Of course,” Bridget said in a tone that suggested she wasn’t about to let it lie. “Do you mind if I ask what your circumstances are? It might better help me target your preferences. I can’t help but notice the skin on your finger is white where a wedding ring might recently have been. I could gear location choices based on whether you’re looking to aggressively move on or… hunker down.”

“We’re in the right area,” Jessie said, her voice tightening involuntarily. “I just want to see one-bedrooms around here. That’s the only information you need right now, Bridget.”

“Of course. I’m sorry,” Bridget said, chastened.

“I need to borrow the restroom for a moment,” Jessie said, the tightness in her throat now expanding to her chest. She wasn’t sure what was happening to her. “Is that okay?”

“No problem,” Bridget said. “You remember where it is, down the hall?”

Jessie nodded and walked there as quickly as she could without actually running. By the time she got in and locked the door, she feared she might pass out. It felt like a panic attack coming on.

What the hell is happening to me?

She splashed her face with cold water, then rested her palms on the counter as she ordered herself to take slow, deep breaths.

Images flashed through her head without rhyme or reason: cuddling on the couch with Kyle, shivering in an isolated cabin deep in the Ozark Mountains, looking at the ultrasound of her unborn and never-to-be-born child, reading a bedtime story in a rocking chair with her adoptive father, watching as her husband dumped a body from a yacht in the waters off the coast, the sound of her father whispering “Junebug” in her ear.

Why Bridget’s mostly innocuous question about her circumstances and references to hunkering down had set her off, Jessie didn’t know. But they had and now she was in a cold sweat, shaking involuntarily, staring back in the mirror at a person she barely recognized.

It was a good thing her next stop was to see her therapist. The thought calmed Jessie slightly and she took a few more deep breaths before leaving the bathroom and heading down the hall to the front door.

“I’ll be in touch,” she called out to Bridget as she closed the door behind her. But she wasn’t sure she would be. Right now she wasn’t sure of anything.