Janine appeared a moment later. She came to stand alongside me at the sink. I kept my eyes on the beans. Kept chopping.
“What do you think you’re doing, Kat?” she asked. “I mean, you’re a mother. You know as well as I do: I’m going to do whatever it takes to protect Annie.” Chopping, still chopping. I was hoping if I kept ignoring Janine, she would go. If she didn’t, things were going to escalate—I wasn’t giving her the phone, and Iwasangry about Aidan. It was an insulting, disrespectful betrayal. “Hello, Kat? I know you’re going to do the right thing. That you’re a good person, despite where you came from.”
I stopped chopping. Turned to look at Janine.
“Where I came from, huh?” I asked quietly. I’d never told Janine about Haven House. Aidan must have. “You need to leave, Janine. Right now. I am not giving you that phone. Not now. Not ever.”
“Kat!” she shouted, smacking a palm down on the counter. “If you don’t give it to me, I’ll go looking.” She gestured toward the stairs. “I bet it’s upstairs in your bedroom.”
My eyes flashed up in that direction before I could think better of it. “Leave, Janine. Now.”
She’d caught the tell—Janine was not stupid. “You know, if Iwere you, I’d probably put itinsomething. Like a pocket of some kind …” She started for the stairs.
I moved fast, heading her off, the knife still in my hand, gripped at my side. I raised it an inch. “Get out now, Janine.” She looked down at the knife for a long moment. Finally, she met my eyes again, and shook her head.
“Seriously?” But she’d taken a small step back, lifted her hands.
I crossed my arms so that the knife rested menacingly against my forearm. “Maybe you were right—what you texted to Aidan … Maybe what I need is a really good therapist. Until then, you should leave. While you still can.”
Cleo
SEVENTY-ONE HOURS GONE
As I wait for my father in the dimly lit, very quiet, impeccably clean kitchen, I picture Janine’s face when she swung open the door the night my mom disappeared. Eyes so wide, mouth in a big O. Was it all a bit too much? Her hand to her chest, a damsel in distress in her teenage clothes—the low-rise jeans, the white cap-sleeve T-shirt … I was wearing almost the same thing that night. And then it occurs to me: Maybe that’s why George said he saw me going into the house earlier. It was actually Janine. Mistresses kill wives all the time.
And yet, I’m still hoping somehow my dad and I won’t have to get into details about whatever has gone on between Janine and him. We all spent so much time together over the years—dinners and sleepovers and family vacations. Were they together the whole time? I look around, as if there might be an answer that has nothing to do with my dad floating in the air. Because even now, I’m holding out hope.
My dad is late, as usual. I check my phone. Nothing from him, but there are four texts from Wilson of increasing intensity. She wants to talk to menow. She wants toseeme. Whatever. Maybe that’s even fine. She can come out to Brooklyn and cross-examine me about my drug-dealing “boyfriend,” as she keeps insisting on calling him. It doesn’t seem like I’ve got much choice when Wilson’s last message is essentially an outright threat.Tell me where you are, Cleo. Or I’m issuing a warrant for your arrest.
At home in Park Slope,I finally write back.
I send the call that follows straight to voice mail.
Stay there. I’m up in Washington Heights but I’m on the way. An hour, hour ten. I’m not getting into it here in case you’re not alone, but don’t move, Cleo. I’m serious.
Ok, ok
Then I text my dad:Where r u?It’ll serve him right if Wilson shows up while he’s here. Maybe he’d like to explain Janine to both of us.
Almost there!comes his quick reply.
Maybe he’s at Janine’s right now. I feel like he might actually have the gall to do that.
I head over to the windows, careful to stay out of sight as I look across the street. I see Janine—I think it’s Janine—pass in front of her bedroom window. I swear she looks toward our house. But then I see my dad, rushing down the block on our side of the street.Thank God.I return to my spot at the island. A second later, I hear his keys in the lock.
“Hey.” He calls out, then comes from the vestibule into the kitchen, tossing his keys back and forth between his hands. He smiles stiffly. He’s nervous. He should be. “What’s the emergency?”
I want to stall, to delay the many terrible ways this conversation could go. All of which involve my dad adding to his pile of lies. But I know I need to get to the point and get this over with.
“It’s Janine you’ve been having an affair with, right?” I ask—before he’s even sat down.
“What?” My dad laughs awkwardly. He’s avoiding my eyes.
“Annie told me you guys were together, Dad,” I say. “Please don’t lie to me any more than you already have.”
I see the moment he reconsiders denying it. He sighs as hedrops himself onto the stool next to me. He rests his elbows on the counter, hands linked together. He presses his mouth to them as if he’s keeping the words inside, before finally reaching down to grip the edge of the counter.
“You know the craziest thing about being an adult?” he asks, though it’s not really a question. “You still manage to surprise yourself in all these ways. And some of those ways aren’t good. They are not good at all.” He smiles sadly. “I would have sworn I’d never cheat on your mom. Not because our marriage was so great—it wasn’t. And I’m sure your mom would agree. Maybe we’re too different. But I would have been sure that I was a better person than that.” He gestures across the street, toward Janine’s house.
