Despite what my manuscript stated, your love for our children is the thing I’ve always cherished most about you.
There have been moments throughout these past few months when I’ve wanted to tell you I’m here. That it’s me. That I’m okay. But it would be a waste of breath. We can’t get past two murder attempts, Jeremy. And I know if you find out I’m faking this before I’m able to leave, your third attempt at killing me will be successful.
I’m not going through all this effort in hopes that I’ll eventually change your mind and prove to you how wrong you were. You will never fully trust me again.
Everything I’m doing is for Crew. All I can think about is my little boy. Everything I’ve done from the day I woke up in that hospital has been for Crew. As much as I don’t want to take Crew away from you, I have no choice. He’s my child and he needs to be with me. He’s the only one who knows I’m still in here—that I still have thoughts and a voice and a plan. It feels safe, being myself with him, because he’s only five. I know if he told you I speak to him, you would pass it off as an active imagination, or even trauma from all he’s been through.
He’s the reason I searched so hard for that manuscript. I know, if you ever find us after I leave here, you’ll try to use it against me. You’ll want him to believe it as you believed it.
The first night after you brought me home, I snuck to the office to delete the manuscript from the laptop, but you had already deleted it. I tried to find the one I had printed, but I couldn’t remember where it was. There were blank spots in my memory after the wreck, and that was one of them. But I knew I needed to get rid of both of them so you couldn’t use it against me.
I searched everywhere, any chance I got for that manuscript, as quietly as I could. My office, the basement, the attic. I even searched around the bedroom a few times while you were asleep on your bed. I just knew I couldn’t leave with Crew until I had destroyed the proof you would use against me.
I also had to wait until I could get my hands on money but I wasn’t quite sure how to do that since I couldn’t very well drive to the bank.
When I overheard your conversation with Pantem Press about their brilliant idea of continuing the series with a new author, I knew that was my way out.
When you hired an overnight nurse and left for your meeting with them in Manhattan, I snuck into my office and opened a new checking account online.
Within days of that meeting, the new co-author was moving into the house to start on the series. Which means it will only be a matter of time before the money for the remaining three books will finally be in the account and I’ll be able to transfer the funds to my new account and get Crew out of here.
All I have to do is bide my time, but the new co-author has been making it difficult. She somehow got her hands on the printed manuscript I’ve been searching for. I’m sure you thought by deleting the file, you were ridding the house of it. But you didn’t. Now it’s two against one. I don’t even care about destroying the manuscript at this point. I only care about getting out of here.
I admit, it’s my fault she’s growing suspicious. I know it freaks her out when she catches me looking at her, but you can’t blame me. This woman has entered your life, is taking over my career, is falling in love with you. And from what I can tell, you’re falling in love with her, too.
I heard you fucking her in our bedroom a couple of hours ago. As much as I’m hurting, I’m equally as angry. However, you’re so occupied with her right now I feel it’s the safest time to write this letter. I locked the door to the master bedroom so I’ll be able to hear you trying to get out. It’ll provide me with enough time to hide this letter and get back in place before you can make it upstairs.
It’s been tough, Jeremy. Not gonna lie. All of it. Knowing you believed my words more than you believed my actions over the course of our marriage. Knowing I’ve had to resort to this level of deceit to save myself from being convicted of one of the most atrocious things a mother could do. Knowing you’re falling in love with another woman while I spend day after day pretending to be unaware of what our lives have turned into.
But I keep pushing through because I’m confident that I’ll get out of here as soon as that money comes, which is why I’m leaving you this note.
Maybe you’ll find it, maybe you won’t.
I hope you do. I really hope you do.
Because even after you tried to choke me to death and crash my car into a tree, I can’t find it in myself to hate you. You have always been fierce in your protection of our children, which is exactly how parents should be. Even if that means eliminating the parent who has become a threat to them. You truly believe in your heart that I am a threat to Crew, and even though it kills me to know you believe that, it also gives me life knowing how much you love him.
When Crew and I finally get out of here, I’ll call you someday and I’ll tell you where to find this letter. After you read it, I hope you’ll find it in you to forgive me. I hope you’ll find it in you to forgive yourself.
I don’t blame you for what you’ve done to me. You were a wonderful husband until you couldn’t be. And you were the best father in the world. Hands down.
I love you. Even still.
Verity
I drop the letter to the floor.
I grip my stomach as a pain seers through it.
She didn’t do it?
I don’t want to believe anything I just read. I want to believe Verity is cruel and deserves what we did to her, but I’m not sure she did.
Oh, God. What if it’s true? This woman lost her daughters and then her husband tried to kill her and then...we did kill her.
I sit back, staring at the letter as if it’s a weapon that harnesses the power to destroy the life I’ve recently built with Jeremy.
So many thoughts are running through my mind, I press against my temples because my head is pounding. Jeremy already knew about the manuscript?
Had he really already read it before I gave it to him? Did he lie to me?
No. He never denied knowing it existed. In fact, now that I think back on that moment, his exact words were, “Where did you find this?”
It’s too much to take in. I can’t process everything she said and everything that’s happened. I stare at the letter for so long, I forget where I am and that Jeremy and Crew are downstairs and that any minute, he’ll come looking for me.
I crawl forward and grab the pages. I shove the knife and picture back into the floor, then cover the hole with the wood. I take the pages to the bathroom and I lock the door behind me. I kneel in front of the toilet and I start ripping each page into tiny shreds. I flush some of the paper and eat as many pieces of the letter I can find with Jeremy’s name. I want to make sure no one ever reads a word of this.
Jeremy would never forgive himself. Never. If he found out the manuscript wasn’t real and that Verity never harmed Harper, he wouldn’t be able to survive that kind of truth. The truth that he murdered his innocent wife. That we murdered his innocent wife.
If it even is the truth.
“Lowen?”
I flush the rest of the pieces of paper in the toilet. I flush again for good measure, just as Jeremy knocks on the door.
“You okay?” he asks.
I turn on the water and try to calm my voice. “Yes.” I wash my hands, then take a sip of water to ease the dryness in my mouth. I look in the mirror and recognize the terror in my eyes. I close them, attempting to push it back. All of it. Every terrible thing I’ve witnessed in my thirty-two years.
The night I stood on the railing.
The day I saw the man being crushed beneath the tire.
The manuscript.
The night I saw Verity standing at the top of the stairs.
The night she died in her sleep.
I push it all back. I swallow it like I swallowed her letter.
I blow out a breath and then open the door and smile at Jeremy. He reaches up and runs a hand down the side of my head. “You okay?”
I swallow my fear, my guilt, my sadness. I cover it all up with a convincing nod. “I’m alright.”
Jeremy smiles. “Alright,” he says quietly, threading his fingers through mine. “Let’s get out of here and never come back.”
He holds my hand throughout the house and doesn’t let go until he opens my door and helps me into his Jeep. As we’re driving away, I watch the house grow smaller in the rearview mirror until, finally, it disappears.
Jeremy reaches across the seat and rubs my stomach. “Ten more weeks.”
There’s an excitement in his eyes. One I know I was able to put there, even after all he’s been through. I brought light into his darkness, and I will continue to be that light so he’ll never be lost in the shadows of his past.
He will never know what I know. I’ll make certain of that. I will take this secret to my grave with me so Jeremy doesn’t have to.
I have no idea what to believe, so why put him through more anguish? Verity could have written that letter as a way to try and cover her tracks. It could have been another ploy at manipulating the situation and everyone involved.
And even if Jeremy really was the reason for her wreck, I can’t blame him. He believed Verity maliciously murdered his child. I can’t even blame him for ultimately following through with her murder when he found out she had been deceiving him about her injuries. Any parent in his position would have done the same. Should have done the same. We both believed in our hearts that she was a threat to Crew. To us.