Diane had insisted on handling all the paperwork related to the marriage. “Oh, let me do it, darling,” she’d cooed, taking the envelope from my hands weeks ago. “I know the clerks at the county office; I can speed things up for you kids.” She’d intended to intercept the background check, falsify the approvals, and ensure the state was never caught in the act of bigamy. She’d made a mistake. Or perhaps the automated system had simply detected a fingerprint she couldn’t erase.
My phone rang again on the desk.
Another text. But not by Ryan.
Diane: Dear daughter-in-law, what’s taking so long? Come back soon, Ryan and I are waiting for you so we can all go to the airport together. I brought mimosas!
I looked at the message. The sparkling and affectionate tone, which I had found endearing just yesterday, now reads like the mockery of a psychopath.
I was standing on a trapdoor, and the rope had just been cut. If I had boarded that plane to Bali—a trip Ryan had insisted on planning entirely himself, booking us a secluded villa on a cliff overlooking the ocean—I would never have returned. An “accidental” fall during a photo shoot. A tragic drowning. The grieving widower goes home, raises two million dollars, and returns to his “mother.”
“I have to run,” I said, panicking, as pure adrenaline surged through my veins. I jumped up so fast my chair scraped loudly against the linoleum. “I have to leave the state. I have to call the police.”
“You should definitely call the police,” Ms. Delaney agreed, standing up. “But Maya, do you have your passport? Your ID? Your credit cards?”
I froze. My hand went to my small handbag. I opened it.
Empty.
My wallet, my passport, my social security card—they were all in my large tote bag. The tote bag that was lying on the bed in the master bedroom. Right next to Ryan.
“They have everything,” I breathed, terror rising within me. “If I run now, I have no ID, no access to my accounts. They could empty my bank accounts by the end of the day. They have my social security number. They could ruin me or track me everywhere I go.”
I looked at Diane’s text message again.
Come back soon.
If I didn’t come back, they would know something was wrong. They would disappear, taking my money, my identity, and leaving me a ghost, always looking over my shoulder for a killer I once called my husband.
I looked at Mrs. Delaney. My tears stopped. The cold, sub-zero clarity of survival washed over me. The woman who had left her house an hour ago was dead. She had been murdered by a piece of paper. The woman standing in that office was someone else entirely.
“I have to go back,” I said.
“Maya, no! This is incredibly dangerous,” Ms. Delaney protested, reaching out to grab my arm.
“I’m not coming back to stay,” I said in an unusually calm voice. “I’m going back to get my life back. And I’m going to make sure they never get the chance to do this to anyone else.”
Chapter 4: Facing the Den
I sat in my car in the alley for five minutes, forcing my breathing to slow. Inhale for a count of four, hold for a count of four, exhale for a count of four. I needed to be a better actor than them. I needed to walk into the lion’s den, smile at the lions, and steal the meat from their jaws.
I picked up my phone and dialed a number. It was Detective Harris. He was the father of one of my best friends, a grizzled veteran of the local police station who had known me since I was a teenager.
“Maya? Shouldn’t you be on a beach drinking from a coconut right now?” his gruff, warm voice replied.
“Harris, listen to me very carefully,” I said, keeping my voice low and steady. “I’m in extreme danger. My husband is a fraud. He and his mother are legally married, and they have a two-million-dollar life insurance policy on me. I’m going back to my home at 412 Elm Street to get my passport and ID. I need you and a police car parked two blocks away. Don’t use any sirens. If I don’t text you the word ‘Safe’ in exactly ten minutes, you break down my front door. If you hear screams, you put them down.”
The playful tone vanished instantly from his voice. He was all cop now. “Maya, don’t go into that house. We’ll go in for you.”
