Chapter 45
I WAKE UP WITH THE SUN HITTING MY EYES FROM A SMALL WINDOW high on the wall. I’m looking at rafters. I push myself to sitting and nausea rolls through my stomach. Where the hell am I?
The attic. How did I get here? Then I remember.
Dinner with Alex, Ruth, and Sunny. Alex’s head bowed with the impending search of his house.
He being tipped off about a warrant. And earlier, the meeting with Detective Sanchez where I couldn’t do exactly as he asked.
I didn’t give him what he wanted—an airtight alibi.
Still, what happened to me and why am I in the attic in the old servants’ quarters?
The bed I lie on is lumpy, narrow. And dust is everywhere.
Nausea hits me again. Was there something in my meal or the tea Ruth handed me after dinner?
Duh, I think to myself. I shiver with the thought that my father could’ve done this.
Does Alex know that I was in the turret room? Has he figured out that I’m onto him?
Where is my phone? There’s nothing up here except for a rickety end table next to the bed, but it’s bare, no phone. I grasp at the pockets of my jeans, but they’re empty. I scramble across the creaky wooden floor to the door. Locked. Of course it is.
I think back to last night. We were in the kitchen, until I got sleepy. I bang on the door, but the house below me is deadly silent. I lean back against the door, woozy.
I gather my strength and drag the old bed across the floor, its metal legs screeching. I place it beneath the window and climb on top. I can just peep over the bottom of the frame. I see the lake, gray and choppy, and the docks. My car still sits at the end of the driveway. That’s a relief.
I jump back down and nearly fall. Vertigo turning my head, I clutch the side of the bed and fall to the floor on my backside.
How am I going to get out of here? Is this a test?
Will Alex let me out if I promise again to tell the detectives that I just remembered more details of the day Carol was here?
If I put on a convincing performance? Only if he doesn’t know that I’ve discovered his secrets.
I try to think through yesterday. Did I give myself away?
I draw my knees up to my chest. What if this isn’t a punishment?
Isn’t a test? What if my father has a more sinister plan for me?
Maybe he knows all about what Noah told the FBI.
And he thinks that Noah told me. Tears fall as I cover my head with my arms, crouching into the smallest form of myself.
How could this have happened? I see my mother’s face.
Oh, Mom, you were so right!
I listen for voices or cars. Anything to give me hope that someone who will help me is around.
Was Noah able to get on that earlier flight?
I hear nothing but the groans of the house in the wind.
Have Alex and Sunny left? Gone back to Boston?
But the cops are due here tomorrow with their warrant if Alex’s intel was correct.
So he and Sunny wouldn’t have gone anywhere.
What about Ruth? Would she help me? She was so kind when I first arrived at Cheshire Lake.
Surely, if I could talk to her, she’d help.
Maybe it’s all Alex’s doing. He put something in my tea when Ruth wasn’t looking.
Then, when I passed out, he told her he would carry me to my room, but instead he kept going up the narrow attic stairs.
I peep up at the window again. Maybe if I break it and scream, Ruth will hear. But if Alex is around and he hears, that will just piss him off even more.
When will Noah be back? Today? Tomorrow? What did he tell me? I can’t think straight. But he’ll be looking for me anyway. He’ll see my car in the driveway and know I never left.
I push myself to standing and try the door again, shaking it in its frame, but it’s locked tight.
I search for something to try to use as a key.
Maybe there’s a stray hairpin somewhere on the floor left behind by some long-forgotten maid.
I search and search, but there’s nothing.
The floor is clean except for the dust that stings my nose as I crawl on my hands and knees examining every crack.
There’s nothing here. And even if I did find a hairpin, would it even work like in the movies? I doubt it.
There’s nothing here besides the bed and the end table—and the dumbwaiter.
My gaze lands on it from across the room.
I know that it goes from the cellar to the kitchen to the second floor hallway and up here.
I wrench the little door up. It squeaks and I have to use force to get it open.
Cold, fetid air filters up from below. The tray where items would be placed isn’t up here, only the ropes that were used to raise and lower it hang inside the shaft.
The tray must be sitting on one of the lower floors.
But I do hear voices. I can’t tell who is speaking, but I think they are in the kitchen.
I think it’s Alex’s voice, definitely low and male.
And the other voice might be Sunny’s. I stick my head into the dark hole as far as I can, trying desperately to hear their words, but it’s no use.
I wonder if I should try to pull the ropes, make some noise, or even holler down.
But I step back. Alex put me here for a reason, do I really want to shout out to him?
I thought it was morning, but actually, the sun appears to be setting. The sunlight is slanted and dim across the floor. I’m thirsty and I have to pee. What am I going to do? Then I hear noise from downstairs. The heavy front door.
I creep back over to the dumbwaiter, listen.
“What do you want me to do with her car?” It’s Larry, his shrill voice coming through clearly. He must be standing by the wall in the kitchen near the dumbwaiter opening.
I can’t hear the reply distinctly, but I know it’s Alex. “… here’s the address …”
“Tonight?”
“Yes … later. I’ll tell you when. After Sunny’s asleep. …” Then Alex’s words peter out into a jumble of indecipherable sounds.
I collapse onto my knees. They’re going to get rid of my car, so …
I’ve got to figure out how to get out of here tonight, soon.
They want me gone before the cops show up with their search warrant in the morning.
Alex will probably tell Sunny that I left for Portland.
As much as she hates me, I don’t think Alex wants her to know what he’s done to me.
I lie on the bed, looking up at the darkening rafters as the sun disappears.
I try to formulate a plan. I’ll scream, break the window.
I won’t go without a fight. I’ll become the screaming woman.
It will be me instead of Carol. Thirty years later.
If my father kills me, he’ll never get away with it.
The detectives will figure it out. He’ll probably tell them that I left after I spoke with Detective Sanchez, but won’t they get suspicious? But who would report me missing?
Noah. If only he gets here in time.
I jump up from the bed. There’s only a little light left, so I search again for something—anything—that might help me get free. I stick my hand into the dumbwaiter shaft and lean in. It’s too narrow for me to fit inside. I pace the attic room, wiping my nose and tears from my cheeks.
Think, Emma.
Maybe I should just scream, bring Alex up here and force a confrontation. Maybe he’ll believe me if I promise to tell the detectives that I suddenly remembered what happened that day.
But that ship has sailed. There’s no way he’ll let me talk to the cops again. He suspects I know something, and he won’t take that chance. He’s done with me. I’m only a liability now.
I drop back down on the side of the bed.
My mind keeps flipping back to what I found in the turret room.
How could I have come from such a monster?
But then I think of Mary, and that somehow grounds me.
She was kind. She wasn’t the deranged person my father is.
But she knew that about him, or at least had an inkling of his true self.
Something about the photos in the albums. Her discomfort when they were posing together.
Her demeanor as Ruth described her as moody, quiet, and Ruth saying that she committed suicide.
To get away from her demented brother maybe?
Then a horrible thought sends me scrambling from the bed.
Maybe Mary didn’t kill herself. Maybe Alex got rid of her just as he plans to get rid of me.
Mary was there that day. Maybe she saw what happened to Carol.
My pulse races as I pace. I’ll fight him with everything I’ve got.
And I’ll leave enough DNA in this place that the cops will have no trouble figuring out what happened.
I’ll beat him at his own game. He’s been able to hide who he really is for decades, but modern forensics will get him in the end.
To that end, I push up my sleeve and bite down on my arm. Pain sears through my body, but I bite a second time until I feel warm, sticky blood start to drip. I wipe it on the door. Then at different spots around the room in case he sees it and cleans it up. He can’t find every trace, every droplet.
My arm is throbbing, but I hardly notice as anger drives me forward.
Finally, I pull my sleeve back down and put pressure on it like a bandage.
I perch on the side of the bed, my head in my hands.
What now? I look up at the window. Moonlight shines through and somehow makes me feel better.
I could break the glass. Hide a shard for when he comes for me.
He’s so much bigger than I am, but maybe I can surprise him.
He will come for me at some point tonight.
Right? He can’t leave me here when the cops come to search.
Dead or alive, he’ll have to move me someplace.