Chapter 37 Penelope
Penelope
The sound of arguing drew me toward consciousness.
Confusion muddled my brain. Why were my parents fighting again? I wished they’d stop doing that.
But no, it couldn’t be my parents. I wasn’t a child anymore. And they hadn’t been in the same room in years.
Who was arguing?
“This isn’t what we talked about,” a man’s voice said. It was vaguely familiar, although I couldn’t place him. He sounded concerned.
“Stop worrying so much,” a woman said. I knew her voice, too. I’d heard it before.
“What did you use on her?”
“Does it matter?”
“Yes, it matters. What if she doesn’t wake up?”
A strange thought came into my mind. They were talking about me.
“She’ll wake up,” the woman said, her tone filled with irritation.
“I still don’t see why you had to do that.”
“She’s not your concern. I’ll handle this. You need to go get rid of her car.”
“What are you going to do with her?”
“I just told you, she’s not your concern.”
“But—”
“Excuse me?” she snapped, cutting him off. “When did you develop a conscience?”
“You didn’t say anything about—”
“I’ll explain this one more time, since it appears I haven’t made myself clear.”
I forced my eyes open, but I wasn’t wearing my glasses. All I could see was the fuzzy outline of two people. It looked like the smaller one—was that Gina Morris?—was sticking her finger in the man’s face.
“All you need to worry about right now is getting rid of her car. That’s it.
That’s your job. When I’m finished here, I’ll pick you up, and you’ll help me with the rest. Or you can keep arguing with me.
Don’t forget, the feds would love to know about all the things you have hidden away on your computer.
But I’m sure you’d have nothing to worry about.
Prison is so kind to predators like you. ” She paused. “The choice is yours.”
The man made a gurgling sound in his throat and moved away from her.
“Fine.” He sounded defeated.
My stomach roiled with nausea, and I squeezed my eyes shut. I heard his footsteps walking away, and a moment later, a door opened and shut.
Where was I?
My mind struggled to catch up—to make sense of what was happening. I’d been at the gallery, talking to Gina. She must have put something in my tea. Had she moved me? I felt disconnected from my memories, but I had the fuzzy sense that I’d been in a car.
A cold sweat broke out on my forehead. It felt as if I was lying down—on a couch, maybe. Wishing my head would clear, I forced my eyes open. I was so confused.
“There you are,” Gina said.
Was it Gina? It seemed like it was.
I moved my mouth, trying to speak, but it was hard to get anything out. “What…?”
She stepped close enough that her features came into focus. It was definitely Gina Morris. She gazed at me with cold, dead eyes.
“What’s…what’s going on?”
“What’s going on, my dear, is you’re here to suffer the consequences of your actions.”
“Actions?”
She pulled a chair over and sat, leaning forward so her face was close to mine. “You don’t need to pretend, Penelope. I know the truth.”
“About what?”
“You and my husband.”
“What?”
She shook her head slowly. “I knew all along. He always thought he was so clever, as if I wouldn’t find out. But I always did. I tracked down each one of them and made sure they got what was coming to them. Now it’s your turn.”
I didn’t understand what she was talking about. The haze in my brain made it hard to think.
“I don’t…” I tried to lift my hand to rub my eyes, but my limbs wouldn’t cooperate.
Without saying anything else, she pinched my upper arm. I felt a prick and a slight stinging.
“What is that?” I asked. “What are you doing?”
She didn’t answer for a moment, then held up a syringe. “It’s insulin.”
“Did you just inject me?”
“That’s right, Penelope. I did. The upside is, it’s almost untraceable.
If they found you right away, they’d probably detect the GHB I put in your tea.
But I didn’t give you enough to kill you.
Cause of death would remain uncertain. Not that they’ll find you.
” She paused. “The downside is, it takes a bit of time to drop your blood sugar enough to kill you.”
“But…why?”
“Don’t play stupid with me. They always think the wife doesn’t know. What did he tell you? Did he say he’d leave me for you?”
“Edwin?”
“Of course, Edwin. He was lying, you know. He never would have left me for any of them. You were never special.”
Wait… My brain struggled with what she had said, trying to make sense of it through the haze. She thought I had an affair with her husband?
“No. I didn’t. I never.” I took a breath, trying to make the words come. “I didn’t have an affair. Amanda did.”
“Amanda? My son’s mistress? No, she’s always had her heart set on breaking up his marriage, not mine.”
“But I didn’t.”
“Why does every one of you deny it? These are your last moments on earth, Penelope. There’s no point in pretending anymore. I told you, I already know. I always knew.”
“No,” I insisted.
“Don’t lie to me,” she said through gritted teeth. “I hate it when people lie to me.”
“I’m not.”
“You don’t know what it’s like. To be married to a man people admire.
Especially women. They thought being an artist made him so interesting and sensitive.
They’d confide in him, tell him all their dirtiest, darkest secrets.
It wasn’t his fault when they started throwing themselves at him.
What man could resist that sort of attention?
He was sensitive, and it made him weak.”
“But I didn’t—”
“My mistake was thinking it would end when we got older. He got gray and fat and they still didn’t care. You didn’t care. Why would a woman who’s young and beautiful let a man like him sweat all over her? What did you think you were going to get from him?”
“Nothing.”
“That’s right. Nothing. That’s all I ever got from him.”
I stared at her as realization washed over me—as the fullness of what she was saying sank in.
“It was you,” I said. “You killed them.”
That seemed to surprise her. She pulled away slightly and her face went fuzzy again. “Did I?”
“The women they found. It was you.”
“I don’t suppose there’s any harm in admitting it to you. You’ll be dead soon. But do satisfy my curiosity. How did you know?”
“His paintings. He painted the places where you buried the bodies.”
She let out a slight laugh. “Indeed, he did. It seemed to help him cope with his guilt.”
“But he didn’t kill them. You did?”
“They died by my hand, but make no mistake, it was his fault. He should have resisted temptation. He should have stayed faithful to his wife. It was only fitting he help me get rid of them.”
The confusion began to recede, and things became surprisingly clear. She was trying to kill me, but it wasn’t because Theo and I had discovered the truth about Edwin’s paintings. She wasn’t trying to cover his tracks or silence me so the truth wouldn’t come out.
She thought I’d had an affair with her husband. She thought he’d had affairs with other students, too. She’d killed them because of it, and now she was going to kill me.
“Gina, I didn’t.” My chest felt heavy, like I couldn’t breathe, as panic rose. “I didn’t have an affair with him.”
“Here we go again.”
“I swear it. I didn’t.”
“He painted you! Your face. After he promised he’d never do it again. The dirty liar promised me. I couldn’t take it anymore. What wife could?”
“Painted me? He painted landscapes.”
“No, his favorites were the paintings of his women. His whores.” She practically spat the word. “I never let anyone see them. They were too humiliating. Once I found out who they were, I burned them. Just like I’ll burn yours when you’re gone.”
“Did you kill him, too?”
“Of course I did.” She sighed. “I almost regret that. I loved him. Even after everything he did to me, I loved that man. But I couldn’t go on living like that. You were his last. I made sure of it.”
“I swear,” I said, the words coming out in a sob. “Nothing ever happened. I was just a student.”
“You want me to show you?” She got up and stormed out of my line of sight.
I tried to reach out to feel what was around me, hoping my hands might fumble onto my glasses so I could see more clearly. But my body still wouldn’t cooperate. My limbs were so heavy it was hard to move.
Trying to get up, I turned, but I couldn’t get my legs beneath me. I rolled off the couch and onto the floor with a hard thump.
“Don’t be stupid,” Gina said. “You’re not going anywhere until I get rid of you.”
She crouched in front of me, holding a small canvas. I squinted, trying to bring it into focus, and she moved it closer to my face.
“See?” Her voice was low. “It’s you.”
It was the profile of a woman who did look remarkably like me. Maybe it was me. She had long brown hair and glasses, and her nose and chin were shaped like mine.
“That doesn’t mean I had an affair with him.”
“That’s what these always meant. He painted the students he took to bed.”
“No,” I sobbed. “No. I would never.”
She pushed me over so I was on my back, one shoulder wedged against the front of the couch. My head was starting to swim again and a strange sense of euphoria swept through me. I realized with an odd sense of detachment that I was smiling. I wanted to laugh. Why? What was so funny?
Gina seemed to leave again, her footsteps fading away. I laughed out loud, although the sound of it was feeble. I had no idea why I was laughing. It felt like my grip on reality was unraveling. She’d injected me with insulin, and it was probably dropping my blood sugar dangerously low.
I was going to die. And I couldn’t seem to stop giggling.