Читать книгу It’s Always the Husband: the Sunday Times bestselling thriller for fans of THE MARRIAGE PACT - Michele Campbell, Michele Campbell - Страница 17

8

Two Months Later

At 9 A.M. on Labor Day, Aubrey was doing yoga in the studio off her kitchen, desperately trying to quiet her mind. She had three hours till Jenny’s big barbecue, and Ethan still hadn’t come home from wherever he’d spent the night before. Goddamn him, he’d promised. Aubrey could hear the kids moving around upstairs. It was past time to get their breakfast, but she couldn’t face them yet. Not again, not like this. Viv was still too young to understand, but Lilly was starting to see through the lies. And Logan had known for a while now. Sorry pal, the story’s not working, she told Ethan in her mind. He could have the latest girlfriend buzz his pager and claim there was an emergency at the hospital, as had happened last night. But nobody believed him anymore, not even Aubrey, the stupidest fool in town.

Aubrey went into a deep backbend. Hot tears rolled down her temples and plopped softly on the mat. Why was she the one crying? She wanted to make Ethan cry, Ethan and whatever tramp he was with this time. She had this studio built ten years ago, after the first time she caught him. She’d done it to punish him, really. It replaced his home office, and cost a mint, with big windows and bamboo floors. He deserved to pay, after what he put her through. Ethan Saxman, MD, had seemed like the answer to Aubrey’s prayers once, back when she was a starving grad student and he was resident at Carlisle General with a bright future ahead of him. She hadn’t asked a lot of questions; she’d grabbed him and held on tight. The old adage was true in her case: marry in haste, repent at leisure. In retrospect, it was clear that Ethan had always been a cheater, but Aubrey hadn’t wanted to see it. She’d been happy at the beginning, for years really, when they were newlyweds, and after the kids were born. Aubrey stayed home and enjoyed her children, and didn’t complain when Ethan was gone a lot. She closed her eyes. Well, she’d paid the price for that.

Aubrey had admitted to herself that Ethan was cheating only when she had caught him in the act. That was about ten years ago now. Ethan had claimed he was going to a conference in Philadelphia. The weather had turned hot, and she decided to take the kids to the lake, even though they hadn’t officially opened the cabin yet. When Aubrey pulled into the driveway, Ethan’s car was there – his, and another. She told Logan to stay put and watch his sisters, then walked up to the front door, breathing as hard as if she’d just run through the woods. She was terrified. She’d suspected for a long time, but to find out for sure would change things forever, and she knew it. Of what happened next, Aubrey recalled only fragments. A wineglass tipped over, clothing strewn across the floor in the harsh morning light. In the bedroom, Ethan with a shocked look on his face, and the redheaded nurse with her pale white breasts. Then the noise, the screaming – which turned out to be Aubrey herself, and then Logan, after he rushed in to help her. Poor, poor child, to bear witness to something like that. She tried to protect them. And that was the problem. Aubrey longed to walk away from her marriage, but she had her children to think of, and no way to support them. She knew how it felt to grow up with no father and no money. She refused to do that to them, so she stayed, and chose to believe Ethan’s promises that he wouldn’t betray her again.

But he did. The second time Ethan got caught (though she realized now that there must have been other times in between) was about five years later, and it wasn’t by Aubrey. The young resident resigned when Ethan dumped her and sued the hospital for sexual harassment. Ethan had to pay money to hush it up. He needed wifey by his side to ride out the scandal, so she had leverage this time. She also had the good sense to go to Jenny for advice. Mayor Jenny and her husband Tim were knee-deep in real estate deals in Riverside, the old industrial part of Belle River, which was gentrifying rapidly. Oh, there were whispers about the legality, but Aubrey didn’t judge. With Jenny’s help, she took their nest egg and bought a majority stake in a renovated loft building – in her name, not Ethan’s. She’d been practicing yoga seriously for over twenty years at that point, and teaching it for almost as long. (She’d discovered yoga at Carlisle in her Eastern Religions class, and fallen in love with it because of its ancient roots. Besides, it was the one physical activity she was ever naturally good at.) She’d always taught part-time, just to get out of the house, and make a little money of her own. Now that she owned a building, Aubrey decided to open her own yoga studio. With the following she’d established over her years of teaching, Riverside Breathe was an instant success, and she had plenty of space left over to rent out to paying tenants. She was a businesswoman now, with a decent income. She had the means to walk away if she was willing to make some financial sacrifices, and here Ethan was, up to his old tricks. She’d promised herself she would leave him if she caught him a third time. But did she have the guts?

Aubrey did a round of sun salutations that failed to smooth her skittish heartbeat, then took child’s pose, seeking peace and consolation. The cat walked in and started meowing at her, but she ignored him. That damn cat. He liked Ethan best, and always seemed to know when his master was coming home. At that moment, with her forehead pressed to the mat, Aubrey heard the garage door go up. Ethan was home, and she would have to deal with him now. Aubrey rolled her mat into a tight coil and shoved it in the cubby under the window seat. She’d go meet him in the garage, where the kids wouldn’t hear them fight.

“Mom, Dad’s home!” Viv shouted, bouncing into the studio in her pajamas and bare feet. “Can I have a Pop-Tart?”

“No.”

Viv was seven, gap-toothed, adorable, and used to getting her own way. “I’ll ask Dad. He’ll say yes.”

“Vivian, I said no.”

Aubrey’s voice came out so tentatively that Viv ignored her and skipped off toward the garage. Aubrey stood there wringing her hands. She couldn’t confront Ethan with Viv watching. The reckoning would have to wait. She went downstairs and took up position at the kitchen island, facing the door that led to the garage, steeling herself. What would she say to him when he walked through that door? She wanted to scream, to throw something, wave the butcher knife. Every solution crossed her mind. To stay, to leave, to rush at him, screaming. But she wouldn’t do any of those things right now. She would control herself in front of her daughter.

Ethan stumbled into the kitchen, laughing, with Viv clinging to his leg. His dark hair was mussed, his dress shirt rumpled, his finely modeled chin shadowed with stubble. He looked like a man who’d just rolled out of the sack after a wild night. How dare he touch her daughter in that state? Aubrey couldn’t stand the sight of him. Her fingers twitched with the desire to slap him. She clenched her hands behind her back.

“Hey, babe. I got bagels,” he said, tossing the paper bag onto the island. Just like nothing was wrong, like he wasn’t the world’s biggest asshole.

“Ooh, yummy,” Viv said.

Ethan walked over to the desk by the window where they kept a basket for keys and such, and started emptying his pockets. She watched him throw his keys in there, then his sunglasses and wallet. He took out his phone, like he’d done a million times before. And she saw him hesitate. Normally, he would throw it in the basket, too, but he seemed not to want to, not today. He looked up and caught her watching. She smiled, but he must’ve seen something in her eyes, because she saw his Adam’s apple bob. Ha, ha, he was scared. She knew exactly what he was thinking: taking the phone with him would look suspicious, leaving it behind would risk Aubrey snooping.

He put it in the basket. Ethan hesitated by the desk for a minute, like he might say something. Then he glanced at Viv and seemed to think better of it. Aubrey’s eyes were on him the whole time, the atmosphere between them thick with suspicion.

“I’m gonna take a shower,” he said, “and maybe catch a nap before the barbecue.”

Aubrey’s smile didn’t reach her eyes. “Of course, babe. You must be tired after your long night.”

The uneasy look on his face as he exited the kitchen gave her a measure of satisfaction. As Viv bit into a cinnamon raisin bagel, Aubrey walked deliberately over to the basket and picked up Ethan’s phone. Ethan had the latest iPhone, in space gray. Though the phone was only a few weeks old, she doubted he’d changed his passcode from the old model. He was sloppy that way. But she hesitated. Right now she had a strong suspicion that he was cheating again, but no solid proof. Once she knew for sure, she would have to take action, or hate herself.

Aubrey was still trying to decide whether to search the phone when it buzzed in her hand. Its blank face lit up with the first few words of an incoming text. “Hot damn, boy, you did a number” . . . The sender’s name came up as “Kate.” What the—? For an instant Aubrey thought of her Kate, but why would her Kate text Ethan? Why would her Kate’s name be in Ethan’s contacts, so it showed up simply as “Kate” when he got a text?

She typed in his passcode, and viewed the message in its entirety.

Hot damn, boy, you did a number on me. I can still feel your hands on my body. I want more more more. Again, please. Just say when.

Rage blurred her vision. She wanted to smash this goddamn phone. But then an even more sickening feeling took over. Could the text actually be from Kate Eastman? Was that possible? No. No, it couldn’t. Ethan’s latest tramp had the same name, that’s all. And yet . . . Aubrey had been fighting her suspicions for weeks now, blocking them out like she always did, looking the other way, except even more deliberately than usual because she didn’t want to believe the worst of her friend. (Ethan, at this point, she could believe the worst of.) But now the doubts came rushing in. Glances exchanged between the two of them, stories that didn’t add up, times they both went missing simultaneously. Things Aubrey had done her best to explain away. Even now, she was making excuses for them, telling herself this had to be a different Kate, hesitating to look at Ethan’s contacts list when the truth was discoverable in an instant. She had to stop being such a freaking baby.

Aubrey stared at the phone in her hand, then looked over at Viv, who was absorbed in her bagel. She had to force herself to look at the truth – here, now, even with her daughter in the room. No more excuses.

Aubrey sank into the chair by the desk, and went to Ethan’s contacts list. Kate’s cell number (which Aubrey knew by heart) was right there, under “Kate.” Couldn’t he at least use a fake name, the piece of shit? Now Aubrey couldn’t deny that the text was from her Kate, the Kate, Kate Eastman. Ever since freshman year at Carlisle, Aubrey had thought of Kate as her best friend. Even though Kate left school after freshman year. Even though Aubrey had done all the work of maintaining their friendship. When they visited or talked on the phone, when they messaged or texted or Skyped – which wasn’t even that often – it was always Aubrey who initiated. Yet in her mind, Kate had always been a loyal friend who would never dream of hurting her. What did it say about Aubrey if not only her husband but her best friend would betray her like this? Was she not worthy of love? Did she have terrible judgment in friends? Or was she just a goddamn idiot, and people took advantage because that’s how shitty people were?

It was like discovering Ethan’s cheating for the first time, all over again. She felt so stupid. How long had she been denying the obvious? With shaking fingers, Aubrey went back through Ethan’s texts. There were only three damning ones, part of an exchange with Kate from last night in which they set up their meeting at a local motel. (He’d obviously gotten smarter about hiding the evidence and deleted earlier texts; it was clear from their intimate tone that this wasn’t the first time.) They agreed on the time and the place, and then Kate texted that she was at the motel waiting with nothing but her thigh-high boots on. Aubrey went cold and still. The evidence was undeniable. Ethan was cheating again. And he was cheating with Kate.

Aubrey carefully replaced Ethan’s phone in the basket, wiped bagel crumbs from the island, and put the kettle on for tea. With each movement, visions floated before her eyes. Things she could do to them, to give them a taste of the pain they were causing her. She imagined Ethan coming home to find her in the bathroom with her wrists slit, or hanging from the wooden beam in the garage. Hah, he’d have to clean up the mess, explain to the kids. But that would leave Kate in the clear. Aubrey could go to Kate’s house instead and shoot herself on the front porch, leaving a bloody mess spattered across the door sill. But why kill herself? Why should she be the one to suffer? She imagined Kate and Ethan in bed together, naked, in a passionate embrace. She would barge into the room, take the gun from her purse, pull the trigger – once, twice, a thousand times. She saw the scene in her mind’s eye. Their corpses riddled with bullets, covered with blood, their blank eyes staring at the ceiling. They deserved it, oh, how they deserved it.

But Aubrey would never do it. There were the children to think of.