Killing Katie (An Affair With Murder) (Volume 1) (8 page)

Just let him show you,
I told myself.
After all, who was breaking a law? A conversation is just a conversation.
I could be writing a paper, doing research.

It wasn’t as if I was about to bring Nerd along or let him in on the details of my plans.

I turned onto our street. A pretty cul-de-sac with a collection of houses and manicured lawns that was impossibly suburban, impossibly familiar, and everything that Steve disliked because it wasn’t the city. The bricks and lath-and-plaster, which we grew up with, had been replaced by paper shells covered in vinyl siding.

“Must’ve all come from the same factory,” Steve had joked when our realtor brought us to the For Sale sign. “Any flavors available other than plain?” The realtor politely ignored his joking, but I remember giving him a smirk, pleading with him to behave. Our lives had been firmly rooted in the city, and we would have stayed there forever, but the city we’d once known wasn’t the city that it had become. Steve still spent some of his days there, working across jurisdictions to put away the worst of the worst. After all, criminals know no boundaries. For me, home was wherever my family was. And at the time, pregnant with Michael, the best place for home meant a move out of the city.

I turned into our driveway and tried to peer through the front window to see if Steve’s silhouette was there, waiting for me.

Is it too soon to say that I was shopping for the holidays?
I wondered.

I could tell him that I’d lost track of time browsing in one of the newly opened boutique stores off Main Street. He knew that I wasn’t much for browsing in stores, but it was the next best excuse that I could come up with. And I could also tell him how lunch with Katie had gone over on account of her news that Jerry was having an affair. I shook my head. I was never late. I never lost track of time. Some of this was my fault. On the other hand, it could be a good first step toward my other plan. I suppose that I had set a precedent and was now obligated to be on time.

That’s just going to have to change
, I considered.
Not that it will help me right now.

The round handle to our front door felt as cold as the night air—it sent a chill into me. My stomach felt sour, twisting from the nerves that came with lying. I dreaded the idea of not being truthful with Steve. I held the door handle another moment but didn’t turn it. During my entire drive home, I’d missed something important.

An epiphany
.

Soon, there was going to come a time that I was going to
have
to lie. With murder, I was going to have to start lying to
everyone
to cover up my work.

This is practice
, I told myself as I turned the knob.

As I walked through our front door, the familiar smells of home hit me. Someone had been cooking too, and with the pang of hunger, I realized that I was famished. Steve’s mother was an excellent cook; the smell of tomato sauce and pasta filled our kitchen. Any minute, I was sure to see Snacks racing up to greet me, red sauce covering her front and a tangle of hair bouncing with each step. I’d laugh, loving every second of it.

Steve said nothing as he hurried around the kitchen cleaning up. A heavy blanket of silence sat between us, raising the tension to a nearly unbearable level. I put my things down, plopping them on the table loud enough to be heard, but he ignored me. Normally, I’d try to turn this around, act mad about something unrelated, but I needed the practice. I had to learn how to lie to my husband.

“I’m sorry that I’m late,” I started, having rehearsed my apology multiple times now. “Katie and I had a few drinks with lunch and I needed to walk off the buzz. I just lost track of time.” Not sure where that came from, but I thought it sounded good.

Steve slowed his movements over the sink, then turned the water off and faced me. He didn’t look mad—that is, he didn’t look at all like I imagined he would. During our marriage, I’ve seen Steve get angry, and the memory of those times scared me. He looked concerned instead.

“You didn’t think to text and let my mom know?” Anxious guilt took a hard bite at my gut. I shrugged a shoulder and slowly shook my head. “My mom called me. You’re never late. She wanted to call the hospitals. Where were you all that time?”

“The library,” I answered. His expression went blank. The words were out of my mouth before I could catch them.

Did I not understand how lying even worked?

Steve said nothing. I feared that even the truth was hard for him to believe.

“The library is down the street from the café, and I just needed a place to sit until I felt okay to drive. I picked up a book and got lost in it.”

“A text message?”

“The roof,” I answered, adding some truth to my story. “Phone didn’t work inside the library.”

“I had to leave work early to come home and help,” he said. The words stung like a bee. This was a slip, a bad slip, bringing up something that he knew I was already sensitive about. “My mom couldn’t stay, so I came home to take care of the kids.”

“Oh . . . and is that such a bad thing?” I exclaimed, raising my voice. He did work a lot of hours, and I understood the type of career he had as a police detective.

Steve stopped what he was doing, “What is that supposed to mean?”

“Would it kill you to be more involved?”

“I
am
involved,” he answered, clapping a ladle against the rim of the pot. We’d had this argument before, and we both knew it wouldn’t go very far. “Now tell me what’s really bothering you.”

My mouth had gone dry and I could taste regret. I wished I had something else to add. He stared at me until I couldn’t take it. “I want to go back to work,” I finally blurted. He rolled his eyes and turned back to the sink.

“How?” he asked, sounding frustrated. “I know you want me to go back to school and I appreciate that you want to help, but how can we manage the time? Please tell me that.”

“First you said the problem with school was about the money,” I began. “And now that I want to work for the extra money, you’re saying it is about the time. So which is it?” While the argument was valid, the intent was to distract him from asking more about where I’d been. It worked, but started an argument I wasn't up to having.

Steve raised his hands, pyramiding his fingers. “You’re right,” he acknowledged. “Money is one thing we don’t have; and time is something we have less of.”

“Katie and Jerry manage to do it,” was all I could think to say. I knew before I finished that I’d picked a horrible comparison. Steve knew it too and threw out a snarky laugh. I hated it when he did that.

“Oh, well, there it is. We’ll follow Katie and Jerry’s lead,” he said. He shook his head and laughed sarcastically. “Parents of the year!”

But I did want to make time for planning. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that I needed a
lot
more time. I sensed that Steve didn’t want to fight any more than I did. I stepped up to the sink to lend a hand with the dishes. A thought came into my mind; I realized how to turn this around and maybe end it.

“Are you laughing at me because I want to do more than just take care of the kids and . . . and you?” His snarky expression disappeared immediately.

“Babe . . .” he began to say, turning the water off and facing me. He took my hands into his—soapy bubbles erupted between our fingers. “I just don’t know how we’d make it work with my schedule.”

Now I did feel true resentment coming on. I felt the pang of jealousy toward Katie and her busy career.

“I know this is my job now, but I’ve got to do something else, even if it is only part time, a couple of hours a day.” Steve leaned in and peppered my cheek with kisses. I could see in his eyes that he was trying to figure out how to make something work.

“We could always get one of them young foreign
au pairs
. You know, the super-model hot ones, let them live here with us and help out with Snacks,” he offered, and raised his brow playfully.

“Sure,” I answered. “As long as he is tall, dark, and handsome and, you know . . . very well-endowed, like I’m accustomed to!” I laughed, thumping his chest and patting his crotch.

“Or . . .” he began. “How about I ask my mother if she’d be up for the job?”

“Really?” I answered, excited by the prospect. Steve’s mother would be perfect.

“Yes, really,” he answered. “Dad mentioned that Mom was looking to volunteer her free time.”

I hugged Steve, holding him tight. I felt his heart beating against my chest as he cradled the small of my back with his hands. “I love you.”

“Love you too.” He pulled back and looked at me. “So, what book were you reading at the library?”

P
RACTICE WENT ON
for another twenty minutes as Steve asked a half dozen of the same questions—albeit with a bit of trickery so that the questions sounded different each time. When at home, he was a husband and a father. He was my lover and my best friend. But he was also a cop. He was always a cop. Being a cop was in his blood, just like being a killer was in mine.

I watched as my husband spoke to me, and for a moment I didn’t see a cop. I saw the man I fell in love with. I watched as his brow creased and then rose, pushing worry lines across his forehead. I watched as his mouth pursed and then relaxed. I watched as his lips parted to reveal perfectly straight teeth. I watched as his gorgeous sky-blue eyes stayed fixed on me, following me. I felt a sudden weakness and a flutter in my stomach that only came when he looked at me like that. No other man has ever made me feel the way Steve does.

As I listened to Steve’s questions, keeping my answers short and never forfeiting information, some of what Nerd showed me came to mind. The idea of making real money seemed to be moving into the realm of possibility. With Nerd helping me, I could do this. I wanted to do this. From the Deep Web, I would connect with the people who wanted what I had to offer and were willing to pay for it. And they were going to pay a lot. There’d be a time when Steve wouldn’t be a cop anymore . . . one could hope, anyway.

“Amy?” I heard my name and swam up through the dreamy daze of what could be if we had the money and the time, as Steve had reminded me. “Amy?”

“Sorry, are you done being a cop? I want to talk to my husband.”

“Just one more.”

Of course I tensed, but let him ask his last question. Steve wore his cop senses like a coat, putting them on whenever the truth seemed cold. I must have said something wrong in my short answers while thinking about how to pay for law school. It could be that he was trying to find out if I really had been shopping for the holidays—he always figured out what I got for him.

Should have used that excuse instead.

At one point, a nervous laugh found its way to the back of my throat and the fear of it spilling out became so powerful that I began to sweat.

Did he notice? Would he notice?

“And the book?” he asked, wording the question differently. “What was the book you were reading at the library?”

“A Hundred-and-One Sexual Positions for Dummies,” I answered jokingly, and then motioned with my hands, pantomiming sexual intercourse until Steve began to laugh: the finger in the hole motion did the trick. “Are we done now?”

“Yeah, we’re done,” he said, still laughing. I’d made it through my first round of questioning and thought I should feel giddy, or feel relief, or feel something. This was a milestone for me. But instead, I felt conflicted.

Could I get used to lying to Steve?

“If you’re going to be around the library, be careful. A young girl, pretty too, was attacked earlier this week.”

I remembered hearing the story on the radio. It never occurred to me that Steve might be working the case. “How is she doing?” I asked, thinking what happened to her was far from what I wanted to achieve. The distinction was simple: the world would miss
her
. “Radio said that she was in critical condition?”

“She’s stable. Lost a lot of blood,” he answered as he motioned his hand across his neckline. Watching Steve reenact the attack put a lump in my throat, catching me off guard. I felt bad for the young woman. “The kids are downstairs. Snacks is fine, busy tearing through her toys. But Michael was worried when you didn’t come home.”

The kids. I got a knot in my stomach and bit down on my lip. My lies weren’t just going to be to Steve. Not now. And certainly not later. It was easier when Michael was younger. Steve and I could do and say a lot more around him without his knowing the context.

A child’s innocence,
I thought. It was like a shield, guarding them against knowing what the adult talk was about. But Michael had become more grown-up and more curious, and we’d begun to filter what was said around him.

“Playing video games?” I asked. Steve nodded, and I leaned in to kiss him. I wrapped my arms around his middle and put my head against his chest. I stayed there like that, listening to his heart and waiting for him to put his arms around me. “I
am
sorry. I’ll go talk to him.” Steve cupped his hand on the lower part of my back and led me to the door.

“Love you, babe.”

Snacks was on me as soon as I pressed my feet into the plush carpet of our children’s playroom. I called it a playroom, preferring the warmer, cozier, more joyful name over the usual, stationary names—basement or cellar. With a heated floor and all the finishes of the rest of the house, playroom seemed more fitting. Snacks folded her arms and legs around my calf, clutching the back of my jeans while squatting on my foot and preparing for a ride. It was a good thing I’d changed into something that was more mommy than business. Heels just wouldn’t have worked in this situation.

“Ride ride ride,” she yelled, wanting me to walk. A smile peered at me from her upturned face. I shook my head when seeing her dark blonde hair laying tangled and out of control, strands of it pasted to her cheek with dried spaghetti sauce.

“Didn’t you let Daddy clean you up?”

“Come on, Momma!”

“Hold on now,” I told her as I took long sweeps of my feet across the room. I grunted as I walked and tried to sound like a monstrous machine moving an impossibly heavy load. “Time to exit.”