I get it. Out here, it’s rough, animalistic, needy. Not what I want with her. Never with her.
“Come, then.”
I step across the front of the boat to the stairs. Brie dances around me, and I pull her close from behind. My lips on her neck. She lets out a soft moan and pushes against me so that I feel it. Yes. Soon. I pull at her dress. She tries to keep it on, but I don’t give up, and it rips open and falls to her feet.
I remove my shirt and follow her down into the bowels of the boat. She’s inside the cabin, waiting. I never thought it could be like this again. Just her. Us. Later, I’ll see if the fire extinguishes.
And if it does, then I’ll plan the end, my last duchess.
But when I turn the corner and enter the cabin, I see she’s not alone.
Lying on the bed, stiff and white like Ophelia floating in the stream, is the corpse of Grace.
And then, the corpse rises.
“Hello, Bradley.”
That voice. No. It isn’t possible. I stumble backwards, like I’ve been hit by a car. This can’t be. She was gone. Washed out to sea. Is she real? Or a ghost? Grace, my love!
I turn, and then I scream. I scramble for the door, but Brie kicks it shut. I slam against it and then turn, because maybe it isn’t real. It can’t be real.
It’s Grace, risen again.
She’s holding a gun, and it’s pointed directly at my chest.
“It’s time for us to have a little chat, husband.”
PART 5
CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE
BRIE
One week earlier
“I’m thinking it will be a suicide.” Grace stands—how is she standing? How is she here? She’s holding a gun loosely at her side. “How hard is that to stage?”
“Not hard,” Jesse says.
“Or just a murder? I’m dead, after all. The dead can’t be prosecuted. That would simplify matters.”
I freeze in terror, and she laughs.
“Put the gun away, would you? You’re scaring her.”
“You’re a busy man, Neil. I get that. You like efficiency. But this woman participated in my murder.”
“There’s only one man responsible.” Neil touches my arm, but I push him away and step back towards the door. Jesse is there before I have a chance of escape. “I had a conversation with Mr. Youngman after the incident outside your motel. I wanted to warn him off. He wasn’t really in New York, you see. But then, he told me an incredible story, and I thought maybe we could all work together. Pursue our mutual interests.”
I’m not hearing anything Neil says. I can’t look away.
Grace in the dim light. Is it really her?
“I’m not a ghost,” Grace says. “I’d offer to let you touch me, but I’m afraid I still haven’t quite forgiven you for killing me.
“How—?”
“That is the question. How am I still alive? Very easily, as it turns out. Our man Bradley is very sloppy. He underestimated the strength of the human skull.” She angles her head into the torchlight, revealing a bald spot on the back of her head. “I had a concussion, but I wasn’t even unconscious.”
