Confess to Me E-Book

Sharon Doering

• Herausgeber: Titan Books
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

A wickedly gripping thriller about family secrets, infatuation and the lies we bury to protect ourselves from the author of She Lies Close."Somewhere between Ozark and Sharp Objects, there is Sharon Doering's Confess to Me… you won't put this one down" – Samantha Downing"Wow! Doering delivers spellbinding plot twists… I loved every moment spent with this story!" – Wendy Walker"A truly menacing tale delivered one elegant twist at a time. You don't devour this book – it devours you." – P. J. VernonHeather Hornne is going home.Haunted by a childhood tragedy and estranged from her family, Heather finds herself back in Hunther, Wisconsin after twenty years running from it.She returns to finally put the past to rest, but uncovers another tragedy and finds herself in the beguiling grip of a young woman who knows more of her family secrets than Heather does.To survive this homecoming, Heather must piece together a toxic history that she long tried to forget.

Leseprobe

Contents

Cover

Also by Sharon Doering

Title Page

Leave us a Review

Copyright

Dedication

Prologue

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Author’s Note

Acknowledgements

About the Author

“A tense, irresistible story.Get settled in for a long night of reading,because you won’t put this one down.”

SAMANTHA DOWNING

“Doering has done it again! Raw, dark, and explosive,Confess to Me is an alluring and engrossing taleof revenge and redemption.”

JENEVA ROSE

“Every word is woven with sinister foreboding.Genius twists and winding paths lead to a shockingending you won’t see coming. A chilling read!”

SAMANTHA M. BAILEY

“Doering writes with exceptional authenticityand imagination, delivering spellbinding plot twists.I loved every moment spent with this story!”

WENDY WALKER

“Brilliant, vicious, and wildly compulsive.A masterpiece of a thriller. Doering delivers a trulymenacing tale one elegant twist at a time.You don't devour this book—it devours you.”

P.J. VERNON

“A thriller with the sharp andsmart voice you expect from Doering…I am still reeling from the incredible twistsand shocking turns—do not miss Confess to Me.”

VANESSA LILLIE

Praise for She Lies Close

“An explosive, darkly comedic thrillerthat belongs on every to-read list.Scrupulously plotted… a live wire of a debut.”

MARY KUBICA

“I am gasping for breath–what a terrific book. A masterclassin voice, a psychological tour de force,and one of the most originalstories I’ve ever read.”

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN

“Grabbed me from the first page andwouldn’t let go. A fast-paced, taut,psychological mind-bender thathits all the right notes.”

D.J. PALMER

“The perfect blend of dark writing,gripping characters and gasping twiststhat will keep you reading late into the night.Doering has knocked it out of the park.”

SHERRI SMITH

“A psychological thriller unlike anyyou’ve read before. A perfect mixture ofchilling suspense and twisting family secrets.”

JAMIE FREVELETTI

“Doering’s wordsmithing is theabsolute gold standardand leads readers to a stunnerof an ending.”

New York Journal of Books

Also by Sharon Doering

She Lies Close

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Confess to Me

Print edition ISBN: 9781789097191

E-book edition ISBN: 9781789097207

Published by Titan Books

A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd

144 Southwark Street, London SE1 0UP

www.titanbooks.com

First Titan edition: June 2021

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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

Copyright © 2021 Sharon Doering

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

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For my mom and mother-in-law,

Both kind and generous andnothing like the characters in my novels

PROLOGUE

Rage spills like gasoline inside my head. I am volatile and combustible, igniting from the inside out. My breath comes fast.

What have I done?

I wipe my eyes with my palms, but that only makes my vision oilier.

I blink tears and blood away and hold out my hands, studying them as if they don’t belong to me. My knuckles are raw and shiny with blood. Some of it mine.

Overhead lights are bright electric white. A faucet is leaking, and the drips plunk into a rust-stained basin. Each drip scratches at my brain. Air smells of iron and flesh.

The bathroom stall door is swinging, and the lock, hanging broken, clicks against the door. On the filthy linoleum floor, a body lies curled in a fetal position. A tangle of hair, blood-smeared skin and clothes, the faint rise and fall of a shoulder. A soft moan.

Rage lingers, clinging to my hot skin like beads of moisture after a shower.

My love. I did it for you.

“The people who say these cases aren’t real, they’re naïve. Oh, if they could be a fly on the wall in my office.”

Doctor Clifford Paulson, PhD PsychologyTranscripts from the Sixth Annual Conference onAdult Manifestations of Childhood Trauma

THE RADISSON PLAZA HOTEL, CINCINNATI, OHIO

1

HEATHER

I came back from the dead once in Hunther, Wisconsin.

Don’t prime your mind for rotting zombies or cottony, lavender-scented serenity. I didn’t watch the scene play out as I hovered, ghostly, above my dead body. And, strangely, there was no pain. Not that I remember anyway.

Because I died once, and it didn’t seem to be all that big of a deal, most of my life I’ve felt comfortable with death, maybe a little too comfortable.

If death were a woman, I’d welcome her into my house, tell her she could keep her shoes on, and share cheap Moscato over ice in plastic cups on my back porch. The best of friends.

My memory was screwy, sporadically deviant, but I’d pieced together the details of my brief death from my older siblings’ accounts—like taping together pieces of a letter that had been written and then torn.

We were an unlucky bunch, me and my siblings. Cursed, you might say. Only two out of five of us were alive now. Reaching adulthood for the Hornne kids was worse than a coin toss, a statistic that had fortified my intimacy with death.

Anyway, I was six, and it was an accident.

Six. That’s how old Emily is now.

*  *  *

We were driving there now, to Hunther. The four of us in the old Toyota RAV packed with luggage, boxes, too many snacks, and a fishing pole peeking up from the way back as if it were our strange pet. Trevor was driving. Emily in the back, bouncing her feet and talking to Trevor. He handed a Starburst back behind his seat, and she took it, neither of them mentioning the transaction. Across from Emily, Sawyer slouched against the window, earbuds in, hoodie pulled up, face hidden.

Hunther was going to be our new, temporary home.

Trevor’s mom was dying. Her oncologist had said, three months. Such a strange thing, a prognosis. An expiration date stamped on your forehead, everyone talking about you as if you were a tub of cottage cheese.

But that’s not exactly why we were all in the car. Trevor had wanted to care for his mother on his own, make trips back and forth between his mother’s house in Hunther, Wisconsin and our condo in Chicago. He hadn’t wanted to disrupt the kids’ school or my job at the clinic.

The reason we were all in the car was because I had insisted. “Let’s just rent a house near your mom. You’ll be close to her without all that driving back and forth.” It was true enough, but I had my own reasons I needed to be here.

We passed a green rectangular sign. Hunther, pop. 8,553.

No welcome sign, only the facts: where you were, and how many were there with you.

Trevor and I were both born in this outworn town, clunky with its scattering of uninspiring shops, wide open with allergen-spewing prairies and failing dairy farms, and stunning with its clear rock-bed river, edged by old forest, meandering through the town proper.

Trevor stayed in town until high school graduation. I was only six years old when my family moved to a neighboring state. And now, at thirty-seven, I was back.

“We’re getting close, guys,” Trevor said, excitement in his voice, as if this were a vacation.

“Take Me To The River” played at low volume on the radio—Al Green’s remastered version by Talking Heads, eerie and captivating. Trevor had magic radio fingers. Only good tunes when he drove.

We passed a strip of businesses. An auto shop called Doc Jerry’s, a stretch of pastel-painted, stand-alone motels in a gravel lot, a monster truck tire leaning against a wire fence, a resale furniture shop called Auntie’s Antiques, and a diner named Marjory’s Greasy Spoon and Donuts. All those personal names gave off a conspiratorial, fraternity feel. They were in the club, and you weren’t.

“I already put our sheets on the beds,” Trevor said. “There’s milk, coffee, and sandwich stuff in the fridge. Dishes in the cabinets. Your favorite mug too.”

He was looking for props. No harm in giving them. “Aw, that was nice of you,” I said, half sincere, half teasing. Which mug was he talking about? I didn’t have a favorite.

He glanced at me and smiled.

First thing anyone notices about Trevor: his wavy blond hair. The man had damn good hair. He kept it short enough, but his hair gave off a vibe—artsy musician or tough-guy hockey player, depending on the clothes he wore. His eye color was hard to pin down. They could look green, gray, or brown depending on the lighting. His eye color said, Hey, whatever you want, I can work with you, baby. His eye color matched his personality.

Emily and Sawyer both resembled their father. Both blond and breezy with chameleon eyes. His children, in every sense of the phrase. I was the oddball.

“I can’t wait to take you guys fishing,” Trevor said. “In the summer, when I was a kid, I’d wake up early to fish and I’d grill bluegill for breakfast.”

“Eww, Dad,” Emily said. “I am not eating a fish.”

“But you do eat fish,” he said, his tone cheerful. “We literally ate fish a few nights ago.”

“That’s different,” she said. “Wait, did you eat the eyeballs?”

With the sun warming the car, making me sleepy, I tuned out Emily’s questions and Trevor’s delightful answers.

Trevor was the high-voltage electric core of our family, the plasma ball with its brilliant neon light filaments, enchanting the kids, drawing them near, and rewarding their proximity with a pulsating, dancing light display.

He turned off Route 34 onto a hilly side road. I put my hand against my door and glanced back. Emily was wide-eyed and smiling out her window, still chatting about fish.

Sawyer didn’t look up. Probably sleeping. Poor Sawyer. He was not looking forward to high school here. He was supposed to be staying in Chicago with his birth mom, but plans had changed abruptly three days ago. He loved time with his dad and didn’t mind Emily and me, but still, as Sawyer had put it, “This was going to suck balls.”

This was also going to be an interesting experiment. The four of us had never lived together full-time. We usually got Sawyer on Wednesdays and every other weekend. The three of us were used to Sawyer moving in and out of our space like a ghost. Sometimes he was rattling chains and putting us on edge and sometimes he slipped our minds because he mostly wasn’t there and, when he was, he never left a mess. The kid was a minimalist. He didn’t have enough clothes to fill a dresser. Didn’t want them. All he needed was a toothbrush, deodorant, a pair of shoes, his phone, earbuds, and a charger.

“It’s hilly,” Emily said. “That’s so cool, Dad.” I hadn’t remembered hills. Maybe this pocket of Hunther was anomalous. Were we anywhere near my childhood home? I couldn’t recall the street name. It didn’t matter. I had no plans to visit that house.

“Yeah, Em,” Trevor said, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel. “We’re not far from Chicago, but it feels far away.”

“Like a different planet,” I said, my sarcasm thick.

Trevor laughed. He liked my grumpy humor.

“Here we are, guys. This is our street,” he said.

I read the street sign aloud. “Winding Way.”

“Now, remember guys, this is temporary,” he said, his voice rich and warm. “I didn’t rent this place for the house. I rented it for the yard.” He reached over and squeezed my knee. I laid my hand on his. “It backs up to the forest. We’re gonna see deer back there,” he said with the enthusiasm of a man who had “deer in the yard” on his bucket list. “There’s a path back there too, just beyond the trees.”

“Oh, no!” Emily’s high-pitched shriek broke the calm. “No. No. We have to go back,” she said, tears already swelling.

“What is it, Em?” I said.

“Quit it!” Sawyer screamed, yanking down his hood. “Don’t be such a baby.”

She cried harder, tears spilling fast.

“Sawyer, please,” I snapped, reaching back and touching her leg. “What is it, Emily?”

“I-I-I—” she cried.

Christ, spit it out, Em.

“I forgot Lucky!”

Her bear.

Oh, good God, what a relief. This was a problem I could solve. “No, Em. I packed her. We’ve got her.” I exhaled, my heart still hammering.

She calmed, still gulping air, her chest trembling and her cheeks shiny and wet.

“We are only a couple hours away from our condo,” I said. “If we forgot anything, Daddy can grab it on the way home from work.” Trevor worked an hour north of our condo in Chicago and an hour south of Hunther, Wisconsin.

“You can’t let her just scream like that.” Sawyer’s words ratcheted up the stress. His knee bounced frantically. Sometimes he barely talked, barely moved; other times he was like a coiled spring.

I cranked my head and tried to give Sawyer a pleading half-smile. “We’re all tired from the trip. Everyone needs to stretch their legs,” I said. “Please.”

He pulled his hood across his face, not interested in my bullshit. It was bullshit. We’d been in the car for two hours, not two days. Emily should be able to hold it together.

“There she blows, mateys. We’re here,” Trevor said, completely unfrazzled. He slowed and turned into the driveway, which was a long, asphalt incline up toward the house.

I gasped.

“You OK?” Trev said.

“Fine. I’m totally fine.”

It was one of those houses that had a face, and this one was mean. Over the garage-mouth were two windows with upside-down “V” awnings painted black and shaped like symmetrical arched eyebrows. Wood siding, painted tan. Not flesh-colored, but, Christ, close enough.

He parked, pulled the keys out of the ignition, and turned to me. “Should I show you the yard first?”

I laughed. “Is the inside that bad?”

He smiled and shrugged.

I stepped out, stretched, and walked across the driveway to the edge of the garage. Lifted my hand as a visor against the late August sun. The house was modest, but the yard was huge. It was probably five hundred feet to each house that planked ours. None of our neighbors were out. The backyard went on for a long walk, ending abruptly at a wall of forest.

Emily ran past me, toward the backyard. “Look at all this grass!” she shouted, delighted.

Trevor came up behind me and put his hands on my shoulders. “What do you think?”

I smiled and reached back to hold his hand. “I think she’s right. That’s a lot of grass to mow.” It was a good, wifely joke. Trevor gave my shoulders a loving squeeze. He liked it when I acted wifely. I peered over my shoulder. Sawyer leaned against the car, neck dropped, eyes on his phone.

My brow must have knitted because Trevor said, “Sixteen is a tricky age. He’ll be fine. This is only temporary.”

“If I had a quarter for every time you’ve said temporary,” I said, turning to him, smiling. “I already know it’s ugly in there, I don’t care. You know why?”

“Why?” His eyes lit. He liked games.

“Temporary.”

He smiled, but his eyes dimmed, no longer matching his smile. “You and the kids can go home at any time. Remember that. You guys don’t need to be here.”

I put my palm against his jaw and kissed him on the lips. He tasted like strawberry Starbursts. “Let’s go inside,” I said.

If I could go back, I would have gripped the backs of my arms tight enough to leave nail marks and warned myself, This place is poison.

If I could go back, I would have told myself, Get. Out. Leave the bedding and that favorite coffee mug, grab your people, and get out. Hunther is a diseased tree, its rotten seeds riding the wind to sprout plague in the dirt below your doorstep.

2

Trevor unlocked the door and we followed him in.

“Pew!” Emily laughed. “It smells funny in here.”

No humor in his voice, all sixteen-year-old irritability, Sawyer said, “Yeah, smells like old lady, wet dog, and a cigarette.” Was that old lady comment a dig about me? Sawyer could be sweet and cruel within the same conversation. He didn’t mean anything by it. Don’t paint yourself as the hated stepmother.

The foyer was tiny so we spilled into the parlor room. It was a vomit of warm colors. Three lemon-yellow walls. One hombre wall that faded from hot pink to orange to red. Ugly, disturbing, and brilliantly avant-garde. The couch was red, and the throw rug was orange and yellow with red bursting flowers. I felt energized and crazy and slightly nauseous. Maybe I would appreciate this room in the winter.

God help me, let us be back in Chicago by Christmas.

It was August, so that was likely.

A large vase sat on an end table. Em’s gonna break that by the week’s end. Where to put it? There were no high shelves or bookcases in here.

“So,” I said, trying to make a good, fun memory of this. “A smoking granny with wet hair?”

“Yep, that’s exactly what I was going for,” Trevor said, winking at me. “I said to myself, what we really need is a dirty, moist grandma.”

I smacked him playfully with the back of my hand.

“Let’s name her Moldy Mildred,” he said, scooping Emily up for a hug and a tickle. She beamed at him. Being swept into Trevor’s creative, energetic mind was like being picked as the audience member who got to join the circus for a show.

“Mildred?” she giggled. “That’s not even a name.”

“Sure, it is,” he said. “That’s what we were gonna name you.”

“Really?” she said, mind blown.

He touched her nose with his. “No.” He laughed, spun her, and plopped her down.

Sawyer said, “You could stab someone in this room, drag the body out, and no one would notice.”

“Mommy, did someone get killed in here?” Em asked, slipping her hand into mine.

“No, Emmy. Sawyer’s only joking. Sawyer, please be more careful with your words.”

Sawyer rolled his eyes and left the room.

“I’m going to grab some stuff from the car,” Trevor said. “Sawyer, come help me.” Trevor, bless his heart, was trying to redirect.

I moved through the first-floor rooms, Emily holding my hand. The house was dark. Lots of wood paneling. The family room had no windows. The windows in the living room and dining room were small, like they’d been put in as an afterthought. The kitchen wasn’t bad. The cabinets and décor were fifty years old, oak, but the kitchen lighting was cheery, and a quaint chandelier hung above a cozy table. You’re stretching. To borrow Sawyer’s phrase, this place “sucks balls.”

In Trevor’s defense, there was not an abundance of houses to rent. People didn’t pass through Hunther; they were born here and died here.

During our drive, Trevor had explained Hunther’s layout. There was an apartment building on the south side of town, a screw factory and a trailer park to the east, a brushstroke of old mansions on the northern tip, a handful of dairy farms to the west, and sprinkles of businesses and houses all over town. Hunther had two cemeteries, two churches, and two high schools—Hunther North and South. Trevor went to North and played third base on their varsity baseball team. Go Bobcats.

I remembered so little about this place. When you’re six years old, you have minimal interest in anything beyond the layout of your house and yard.

We’d visited Trevor’s parents over the years, but our visits lasted no more than a few hours and we took the same door-to-door route. We never strayed from our route, never stopped at a grocery store to pick up a forgotten ingredient, never stopped for ice-cream cones at the general store before we drove back to Chicago, never stopped at a park or scenic lookout. Trevor knew I wasn’t a fan of this place.

I opened the back door, and warm air seeped in. A faint low rumble simmered in the distance. Sounded like a train.

Trevor hustled into the room, carrying two boxes and holding the top one steady with his chin. As he set them down in the middle of the kitchen, Emily’s hand slipped from mine, and she wandered away.

“Are there train tracks nearby?” I said.

“I don’t think so,” he said, gazing at the backyard, blissful. “Hey, you want to pick up pizza for dinner?”

“Pizza sounds good.” My phone buzzed with a text. I pulled it out of my pocket, read the message, then deleted it.

“Who’s that?”

“Just a friend from work,” I lied.

“They miss you already?” he said, smiling. Damn handsome.

I smiled back. “I’ll probably—”

Something crashed in the parlor room. I rushed toward the sound of Emily crying, already knowing. The vase.

Broken shards on the floor. Emily stood in the middle of the mess, crying. It hadn’t taken her a week. Only fifteen minutes.

My reflex was to yell, but I squashed it. Trevor moved in and scooped her up. “It’s OK, kiddo. Anything hurt?” She shook her head, no longer crying.

He kissed her on the forehead and looked at me. “Hey, I’ve got an idea. Remember that pool I was telling you about? It’s supposed to be really nice. Why don’t you two go dig up your suits and check it out. Sawyer and I can unpack.”

I gave him a sincere smile. He was good to me. “Great idea. What do you think, Em?” I said, thinking our pool expedition might be an opportunity to hunt for information.

“At the first International meeting in Chicago, I listened to other doctors describe these cases. I remember thinking the cases were idiosyncratic and incredibly rare. It wasn’t too long after that I found my own patient.”

Doctor Clifford Paulson, PhD PsychologyTranscripts from the Sixth Annual Conference onAdult Manifestations of Childhood Trauma

THE RADISSON PLAZA HOTEL, CINCINNATI, OHIO

3

The concrete edge of the pool snagged the ass of my swimsuit. It was two or three wears away from the garbage anyway, thinning to see-through. In the dim dressing room minutes ago, I had aimed my ass at the mirror and strained my neck over my shoulder. Could I see my butt crack? Faintly, yes.

I sat on the edge, circling my feet through bath-warm water near where Emily happily played. There were movable underwater structures to make the water shallower for young swimmers, and Emily splashed and paddled from platform to platform. This was definitely better than unpacking. And it was a good thing we’d left when we did. It was Open Swim now, but lessons would begin in thirty minutes. If we had driven all the way here and not been able to swim, Em would have melted down. And when she melted down, I occasionally did too.

The pool was encapsulated by a clear glass structure to keep the air in here warm and moist, and there were two doors, one at each end. To my left was a long bench backing up to a wall of glass. Behind that, eight showers in a row with low buttons, perfect for little kids. Guppy Swim was geared toward ages one to ten. A dozen kids splashed in the pool, most of them shouting joyfully, a couple of them whining. Parents were in the water or sitting along the edge like me.

I breathed in heavy, chlorine-saturated air, thinking about that text I deleted and what I should do about it.

The door opened, and a woman walked in wearing a red one-piece suit, holding a Pepsi bottle and looking at her phone. She was young, slender, and stunning. Dark hair tied in a loose bun on top of her head, her wrists covered in bangles. Eyeliner heavy. Obnoxiously heavy. Lips syrupy with gloss. Who wears a red one-piece? I felt like I was watching a Pepsi commercial. Her eyes still on her phone, she sat on the bench.

Chills ran up my thighs.

Becky. She looks like Becky.

Did she?

My oldest sister, Becky, died when she was fifteen, so who knew what Becky would look like if she lived to see her twenties?

This girl. She would look exactly like this girl right here.

No. It’s just the loose brown hair, the beauty, the slender body. That’s all.

My gaze drifted back to Emily. She was standing on a platform, belly-deep in water, talking to a rubber duck, teaching it how to jump through a ring. This place, Guppy Swim School, was going to be her favorite.

“Hey, you’re new,” the woman said, her voice scratchy.

I smiled. “Literally. We just moved in an hour ago.”

She laughed, raspy and brazen, baring high, sharp canines. Her gravelly voice and the imperfection of those snaggleteeth made her more beautiful. She grabbed her soda and phone, brought them over, and sat on the concrete edge catty-corner to me. Her eyes were striking: an ultra-light fairy blue, rimmed with smudged black eyeliner. Becky had light blue eyes too, but I don’t remember them this magical.

“I’m Desiree Moss. Welcome.” She held out her hand, and a dozen bracelets jingled on her wrist. She wore rings on five fingers. Her hand was moist and warm when I took it.

“I’m Heather.”

“You just arrived in town and came to the pool? That’s kinda fucked up.” Her rude words didn’t match her warm smile.

“My husband let us off the hook with unpacking the car.” Quieter, I added, “My daughter broke a vase within minutes of us being inside the house.”

“Ha! It’s hard for some of us to sit still. I get it, believe me.” She spoke like an off-year Camaro. Crude, dated, yet flashy and packed with horsepower. “So, where you from and why the hell move to this dark armpit?”

“Chicago. My husband is taking care of his mother. She’s got cancer in a bunch of places. She’s got a few months left. So, it’s temporary.” Look at that. Now I was using the word temporary. Trevor would be so proud.

“I got ya. Hopefully she kicks the bucket soon, and you’re home by Christmas.”

I laughed because it was so inappropriate and it had been exactly what I was thinking. “This pool is really nice. It, well…” I hesitated.

“Does not fit with the rest of the town? I know. It’s the newest building we got. One of our wealthy families built it. This couple, they have eighteen grandkids. Instead of building each of their five kids a pool, they built this.” She pulled one bare leg up out from the water and wrapped her arms around it. As she moved, her breasts jiggled under thin nylon.

I relished the idea of having breasts like hers. Mine had always been small—perky was the kind, yet patronizing adjective—but since breastfeeding Emily, they’d lost the meager volume they’d had. Now they were tuberous, barely filled water balloons hanging onto my ribcage. Emily had drained my sexual appeal, literally sucked it right out through the nipple.

“The saltwater aquarium by the changing cabanas is the only aquarium in town,” Desiree said. “This is literally the fanciest joint in Hunther. Maybe that’s why I work here. I can fantasize that I’ve escaped.”

“You can’t?”

She shrugged. “My dad lives here. My boyfriend. This is what I know. These are my people. They may be scum of the earth, but they’re mine.” She smiled.

She had to know she could run a good hustle in the city. That she could have her pick of men and jobs. I bet she liked being the queen of this town—big fish in a small pond. Or maybe she truly couldn’t see beyond the horizon.

Emily’s fingers squeezed my big toe, then her face broke the water like a baby seal, her smile so wide, her eyes so bright. “I got your toe!” She laughed hard, and coughed a little.

“Hey, gorgeous,” Desiree said to Emily. “Can you back-float?”

Emily stared at Desiree’s eyes, mesmerized, and shook her head.

“Let me teach you. That way you can float with the mermaids at Mermaid Lagoon.” Desiree slipped into the pool without hesitating. The water hit her below her breasts. Her nipples were hard. “I’m Dezzy. What’s your name?”

“Were you born with your eyes like that or did you color your eyes?”

Desiree smiled wide and her snaggleteeth slipped out. “You are such a doll. I painted it on. Doesn’t your momma wear makeup?”

“No.”

I did, but not like Desiree. Her smokey eye was obscene. On anyone else, it would look grotesque. On her, it was captivating. Me, I didn’t like to draw attention. Same reason I never got a boob job. Once you have boobs, you are noticed. I would have liked to have boobs, but I liked being invisible more.

“It’s pretty. I’m Emily.”

“Emily, sweet pea, I’m gonna hold you like your momma held you when you were a baby, OK, hon? Fall backward into my arms.” Desiree was fun, but bossy. Like a kid. Like a kid who’d like to drive a red, off-year Camaro.

Emmy did as she was told and Desiree held her, instructing, “Push your belly button up and tip your chin back.” Desiree pushed Emily’s chin up, and pulled her forehead back. Roughly, like she was positioning a mannequin. If she got any rougher, you’d step in, right?

“Good,” she said. “Now make your hands and feet relaxed. Pretend they are Jell-o. Perfect. You’re doing it. Let’s sing our ABCs.” Desiree sang while stealthily letting go of Emily. When Emily started sinking, Desiree caught her under the armpits and lifted her up in the air. “You made it all the way to G. Wow, are you sure you’re not part mermaid?”

Emily liked that.

Desiree put her back on the platform and hopped out of the pool.

“She’s amazing,” she said to me. “I have a spot open in my next class if you want to wiggle her in. She could try today for free.”

“I’ll ask her. I’m sure she’ll want to.”

“So, where you guys renting?”

“Off Route 34. Near Marjory’s restaurant. Our house is on Winding Way.”

“Winding Way?” She slapped her thigh, thrilled. “You’re neighbors with the lions?”

“Who?”

“There’s a bunch of cages in your neighbor’s backyard. They have mountain lions. I mean, cougars. They’re the same thing, right?”

The skin on my thighs pricked and itched, suddenly irritated by the chlorine-charged air.

Pet cougars? She had to be messing with me.

I was opening my mouth to protest, Come on, Desiree, that’s against the law, when she said, “Listen to this. I’m such a dope. Until I was, like, fourteen, I thought lions were boys and tigers were girls. I swear to God. How was I so stupid?”

My heart bloated. I couldn’t hold back my smile. Shared idiocy is the best kind of connection between souls. “Me too,” I said, my words actually coming out in a shiver.

“What’s our problem?” she said, playful.

I laughed, then said, deadpan, “You’re joking about the cougars.”

“You’ll see.” Her smile was seductive, one snaggletooth slipping free. “So, your husband is from here? What’s his last name?”

“Bishop, but you wouldn’t know him. He’s forty-seven. Twice your age, I’m sure.”

“Yep. I’m twenty-four”

Here’s an opportunity to dig. “I was actually born here too,” I said. “But we moved away in 1991. I was little.”

“1991, damn,” she mused. “That year is famous around here. Carved into this town’s memory. Dawn Young was murdered in ’91. You remember that?”

“No. I mean, I was six when we moved away; I barely remember anything from back then.” Most people couldn’t recollect much of their early childhood, and my autobiographical memories were especially absent.

If a brainful of memories were a forest, trauma went in there with an axe and chopped memories down. For me, it cleared out most of the happy and mundane memories of my childhood, and it spared the most shocking ones. In the barren forest of my mind, these lonely trees were honey locusts, their branches spiked with long thorns, their trunks wrapped in treacherous barbs like shark teeth, warning: keep away.

“So, your hubby is,” she said, tipping her chin up and closing her eyes, “ten years older than you. Damn, he made out well.”

“Impressive math skills,” I said. Seriously. “So, what happened to her? The girl who was murdered in ’91?”

Desiree shrugged. “I wasn’t even born then, but it’s a juicy story. One of our only gruesome stories. My dad’s a cop, and I was a bit of a true crime fanatic when I was in high school. The story goes, a couple of kids found the girl under the grate of a storm drain, her dress blood-stained down the middle.”

I scanned for Emily. She was jumping from one platform to the next.

Even being this close, it was unlikely that Emily overheard Desiree. This pool-in-a-glass-box-room trapped the splashing noises, and the warm air venting in from big silver ducts overhead softened the shouts of kids and created the ultimate whooshing, white-noise machine.

“They said Dawn Young’s body traveled from Crooked River to the pond through retention pipes and got stuck in that storm drain.” I imagined a young girl’s pond-bloated face under a storm grate. Eyes puffy and piscine. Hair splayed in the water. Blood soaked into her dress and diluted a pinkish brown.

“It was a woman who’d gutted the girl,” she said. “But they could never pin it on her. The case went unsolved. Days before she killed Dawn, she’d killed her neighbor’s pet opossums. Creepy, huh?”

A memory flickered, sharp and abrupt like a gun’s safety clicked off. An image of a dead opossum in the grass, on its side, its fur matted, flies hovering in the heat. Under its back leg, something squirming. Oh God.

My stomach wrung itself.

“Lessons are going to start,” she said, glancing at her watch. “Would you like me to tell the front desk that Em is going to try a free lesson?” That she called Emily “Em” caught me off guard. It was too familiar.

“Emmy,” I said. “You want to try a lesson now with Miss Desiree?”

“Today?” Her whole face lit up.

“Yeah.”

“Yes. Yes. Yes.” She twirled on the platform, holding her arms out and splashing water.

I smiled at Desiree. “I guess it’s a yes.”

“You can sign the waiver when class starts. Should I sign her up as Emily Bishop?”

“Yes, we all use Bishop as our last name. Thanks.”

“Got it. Hey, you were born here too. What’s your maiden name?” Her eyes twinkling, her tone demanding—the Camaro’s brake and gas pedals held down simultaneously, revving the engine.

I’d cut contact with my family when I was seventeen. Changed my last name because I hadn’t wanted them to find me. I was used to keeping my birth name secret, but there was no point to it now. I was here to dig up the past.

This is why you insisted on coming.

“Hornne.”

“Hornne?” she said, her lips parted, her jaw dropping. “Like a goat has horns? Extra N, silent E?” Her gorgeous moonstone eyes widened.

“Yes,” I said, feeling like a spool of kite string unraveling quickly, the kite attached at the end taken by a sudden gust of wind. This is why you came.

The door opened, and a young guy shouted, “Hey, Dez. Kids are lining up.” As the door whooshed closed, a gust of cool air hit my chest. I held my breath.

Desiree rubbed her nose. “Melinda Hornne was your mom?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s wild,” she said.