The Liar Next Door by Nicola Marsh
Sixty-Three
Saylor
The situation next door is dire.
Three police cars pull up, sirens blaring and lights flashing, then uniformed officers and plain-clothed detectives go into Andre’s place. They don’t stay long, before he gets into one of the cars with several officers and they drive away. The other officers and detectives force their way into Celeste’s.
That’s when I know this is serious.
Police don’t break down doors unless there’s real danger and from what I saw earlier, it looks like Celeste has kidnapped Luna.
Disbelief makes me tremble and I clutch at the windowsill for support. Why would Celeste have taken Luna? What would propel a perfectly nice woman to do something so despicable as rob another mother of her child?
One of the officers catches me peering out the window and I ease the curtain back. I know they’ll want to question me, but I need some time to pull myself together. I glance across the park but Ruston’s house is in darkness. Not that he’s a man to depend on in a crisis but with Lloyd not due back home until tomorrow, I need someone to comfort me.
Before I’m tempted to barge across the park in search of Ruston, I force myself to relax. I tidy up the living room, check online pregnancy sites and try to watch some mindless reality TV for an hour or two, but I’m still worried about what’s going on next door. I’m making a cup of chamomile tea when I hear a blood-curdling scream. It sounds like Frankie and my heart breaks for her. It’s the anguished cry of a mother whose child has been taken.
I’m torn between wanting to go next door and comfort her and staying away because I’m the last person she’ll want to see if Andre follows through on his threat to tell her everything.
A few minutes later there’s a pounding on my door. I expect it’s the police but when I open the door, a disheveled, wild-eyed Frankie is staring at me like she’s seen a ghost.
“Andre told me,” she says, and bursts into tears.
I’m stunned and at a complete loss, filled with guilt and regret. What a complete and utter bastard Andre is to tell her the truth about us at a time like this. I wish I could deny it but she’s distraught and the least I can do is apologize.
“I’m so sorry, Frankie. I never meant to hurt you.” I focus on my shoes, unable to look her in the eye. “It was a one-off thing, something stupid I did to make Ruston jealous.” I give a self-deprecating laugh. “I’ve always been a tad obsessed with Ruston, him being my first love and all, and I used Andre, but I never expected this.”
My hand splays protectively over my belly. “I know Andre is wealthy, and with him being the father I need the money desperately…”
I still can’t meet her eyes and the enormity of the situation sinks in. If Frankie knows, then I have no leverage against Andre, and he has no reason to give me the fifty grand I need so desperately to pay off the blackmailer. It’s over. The blackmailer will go public with what I did and my folks will lose everything.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
I look up to find Frankie’s tears have dried and she’s staring at my belly in absolute horror.
Shit. Shit, shit, shit.
She’d said, “Andre told me” and I thought he’d followed through on what he’d said on the phone earlier, about telling his wife everything. But now I realize that isn’t what she’s referring to and probably has to do with what I saw earlier when Celeste left with the girls.
Her eyes are bulging as her gaze swings from my face to my belly and back again. “Are you saying Andre is the father of your baby?”
It’s too late to lie.
This is a mess of my own making. And I seem to be digging myself into a deeper hole with every passing day.
While I’m not certain, I bite my bottom lip and nod.
Frankie crumples. There’s no other word for it as her face collapses into a mess of lines, her shoulders slump and her knees buckle. She leans against the doorjamb, gasping for air, and intense remorse stabs me, like someone has plunged a knife between my shoulder blades.
“Do you want to come in—”
“I want nothing from you,” she hisses through gritted teeth, her glare feral. “Just tell me what you saw when Celeste took Luna.”