Chapter 49
Forty-Nine
Valencia finally looks up, her face wet with sweat and tears. Marcus’s eyes are wide and he shakes his head, but he looks
terrified. Like he got caught in a lie.
“Marcus?” It’s all Valencia can say.
“No,” Marcus says. “He’s lying, don’t believe him.”
“Oh, come on, Dad, we’re all being honest today. Tell your wife the truth.”
“You helped him?” I ask.
Despite thinking this myself, it still feels like a shock. I really hoped Easton might have done it himself. He’s so sure
and calculated, it felt obvious that he was the only one who could do all this. I didn’t want it to be true that one of his
parents knew. But Marcus helped him all along. And he’s been lying about it.
“Stop!” Marcus says. “Valencia, you know I would never hurt our children.”
“No, Dad, you didn’t hurt him. I did. You just sat there and cried and said I’d ruined my future and how could I be so stupid. Then you slapped me and said
you’d help me hide him so no one would ever find out.”
“Stop it!” Marcus screams.
But Easton’s voice remains calm and cool. “Then you helped me row him out to the island.”
“Shut up! Stop it! Stop it stop it stop it!”
“Oh, Marcus.” Valencia sounds heartbroken.
“And then I told JT the story you made up so the police would know I had an alibi. The one you coached me to tell—you were
a way better coach at that than you were at soccer, by the way.”
“You’re a fucking liar!” Marcus screams.
But I’m not sure who to believe. Easton isn’t the kind of person who would give credit to someone if he did it himself. He’d
relish how smart he is, and how capable.
Easton tsks and shakes his head. He stands over Marcus, looking down at him. “You know, Dad, I was really hoping this would
bring us all closer together. That the truth would set us free and all that bullshit. But I guess not.”
“You’re a liar! Don’t believe him, Valencia. It’s not true.” Marcus’s eyes are almost as red as his face, and he looks like
he’s about to cry.
“Do you believe him, Mom?” Easton turns his attention back to her.
Valencia looks at Marcus with fear and confusion, her face wet with tears and sweat.
“I would never,” he says quietly. A sob racks his body. “I would never hurt our boys. Please believe me,” he pleads. Tears
slide down his face. “I missed him, too. So, so much.” His face contorts in agony as he sobs.
“Marcus,” Valencia says.
Snot drips from his nose as he looks up at his wife.
“Well.” Easton sighs.
Then he jams the ice pick into Marcus’s left side. I cry out in shock. Valencia screams as Marcus gasps. Easton holds the
ice pick there.
“I was hoping to send you on to the next world with a clear conscience, but . . .” He pulls out the ice pick and blood trickles
down Marcus’s side.
Marcus coughs up more blood as he looks to Valencia. “I . . . never . . .” He shakes his head.
“No!” Valencia cries. “NO!”
Marcus mumbles something else, then slumps forward, more blood spilling from his mouth as he lets out one final shallow breath.
Valencia sobs, and my own eyes burn with tears. Marcus wasn’t my dad, but it still feels like Easton jammed the ice pick into
my own heart. Maybe that pain in my chest is for Valencia, because I shouldn’t feel heartbroken for Marcus if he helped Easton.
But I don’t even know if that’s true. And maybe that’s why this feels so awful.
“Shame.” Easton walks back to the workbench and wipes the blood from the ice pick with a kitchen towel. “How about you, Mom?
Do you at least feel a little better knowing the truth?”
Valencia is still staring at Marcus’s body. She shakes her head.
“Well, sorry about that,” Easton says. “But I thought you should know before you die that your husband has been lying to you
for years.”
She finally turns to him. Tears slide down her cheeks, but she’s calm. “No, he hasn’t.”
Easton’s eyebrows jump up in surprise. “What?”
“You’re lying. He didn’t help you.”
“You can’t be that delusional.”
“I’m not.” She turns to face me. And there’s something in that look. Like she’s telling me she hasn’t been delusional about
anything. Goose bumps rise across my sweaty arms.
“I missed Nate. Every day I missed my baby.” Across the room, Easton grumbles something under his breath. Valencia looks back
at Marcus. “He felt the same way I did. That’s how I know he’s telling the truth.”
“You believe him over me?” If my vision weren’t swimmy from the tears in my eyes, I’d think Easton actually looks surprised.
Valencia stares at her son with a look so frigid, it almost chills my burning skin. “He was my husband. I always put the two
of you before him, just like he put you both before me.
But I’ve known him way longer than I’ve known you.
I thought I knew you. I grew you inside me for nine months, and when you were born, I thought, This is my baby and I will always love him.
I knew I’d never feel a connection like that again.
And I was right. You and me, we have something special. ”
Easton seems as confused as I am. Is she . . . saying she knew he was a killer?
“When you tell me you killed Nate, I believe you. Because I know what you are capable of.” She doesn’t look away from him.
“Maybe it was denial, but I hoped I was wrong. I saw it when you were little. Those warning signs. How you didn’t seem to be afraid of anything, and how when one of us was upset you were bored or disconnected.
You didn’t seem to be able to love the way we all did.
I wanted so badly to believe you were okay, and then one day you were.
I thought it was a phase, and you had grown out of it.
And I held on to that hope, like I held on to the hope that my youngest boy wasn’t dead. ”
My eyes dart between Easton and Valencia. She’s so calm, while Easton looks genuinely scared for the first time. He’s also
distracted. I return to twisting my arms, trying hard to get my hands free, because with Marcus dead, it means the rest of
us are next.
I glance back at the red gasoline container. My guess is that’s the finale.
“You knew Marcus only as your father,” Valencia continues. “I knew him as a husband and a father, and my best friend.” Tears
spill down her cheeks. “I know what he’s capable of. And I know what you’re capable of.” She shakes her head. “He didn’t help you, did he, sweetie? You did it all by yourself.”
Easton stares at her for a few moments and I stop moving. Finally, he smiles that proud, terrifyingly toothy grin.
“I did,” he says.
“So why lie, honey?” Valencia asks. “If this is how it ends, why lie?”
He laughs. “I wanted him to die thinking you hated him. Thinking that you believed he lied to you, and you would never forgive
him.”
Valencia puts her head back, looking up at the ceiling. More tears fall. “What happened to you?”
“Nothing happened to me.” He takes several quick strides toward her.
He puts his hands down on her arms and looks into her eyes.
“You said it yourself, you could see me all along. Until you couldn’t.
That’s because I saw how you looked at me.
That fear in your eyes, even though you were supposed to love me. ”
“I do love you.”
“Bullshit. You were terrified of me.”
“Every parent is terrified of their kids. We’re scared every fucking second of every day that you’re going to get hurt or
sick or hate us or stop talking to us when you grow up.”
I can’t help but wonder if she also worried that he’d turn into a serial killer.
“It’s different with people like me,” Easton says. “Because I knew if I didn’t hide who I was, you’d know.”
She nods. “I would.”
My right hand is moving more. I glance down to see that the sweat dripping down my arm has caused the duct tape to slip. It’s
almost halfway down my hand.
“And then you showed up.”
I turn and Easton is looking at me. He points the ice pick in my direction and walks over. “You came in, and I genuinely thought,
Wow. Here’s someone who’s just as bad as me.”
“I’m nothing like you.” Maybe if I say it enough, I might actually believe it.
“No?” He snorts. “You told this poor woman you were her dead son. You lied, and I watched you do it. It was so fucking easy
for you. Like it was for me. Nate was a stupid little brat who could barely handle the slightest inconvenience, but you . . .
you were interesting.”
Easton gives me a genuine smile. But as quickly as it appears, it drops away again and his eyes cloud. He takes a step toward me, pointing at my chest with the ice pick.
“Then you had to go snooping around,” he says. He turns back to Valencia. “If it wasn’t for him trying so hard to find Nate’s
body with this nosy bitch”—he points to Miles, who still shows no sign of consciousness—“I would have killed him after making
him write a note admitting that he was a fraud, and everyone could have gone back to normal.” He’s lying again. Just minutes
ago he said he wanted my lies to continue for years to see how long they would play out for maximum devastation. Or was that
the lie? Maybe Valencia catching him out about Marcus has shaken the control he thought he had over this situation.
So I try to do my part as well.
“You didn’t get away with anything yet,” I say. “What’s your plan after you kill us? You stabbed Marcus. You think no one
is going to think you killed us all?”
“Yes.” He says it so confidently, it gives me chills. “Because I already planned it out.”
He shakes his head as he walks back to Marcus’s body. “It was always supposed to be him. I set it up so he was the suspect. Mom was asleep upstairs; Dad was at the store. I told the police I was at JT’s. And I told them I was scared
of Dad, so I stayed there. I don’t know what he said to them, but they didn’t even go out and check the island for a body.
Sure, they had divers search the bay, but I sat and watched them—they boated around it; divers went into the water. No one
thought to get off the boat and check the island.”