Page 62 of The Perfect Poise

The woman looked up, startled to see Jessie there, along with Ryan, who had drawn his gun the second his wife made her presence known.

“Don’t take another step!” Paulina shouted.

“I just want to talk,” Jessie said evenly. “You’re still in control here. I’m just trying to understand what you’re after.”

Paulina shook her head forcefully.

“Didn’t you hear the charges I laid out?” she demanded. “Didn’t you hear me render a verdict?”

“I did,” Jessie said, slowly moving forward, “but we both know that’s not what this is really about.”

“You don’t know anything about me!”

“I know more than you think, Paulina,” Jessie said, using her real name for the first time.

The woman briefly froze before regrouping.

“That doesn’t mean anything,” she spat. “So, you know who I am. That’s just a cheap parlor trick.”

“But that’s not all I know,” Jessie told her, inching closer. They had been fifty feet away. Now they were thirty. “I think I understand what really has you so upset, and it’s not just the fact that these women you killed didn’t appreciate the money they have.”

“I’m not upset,” Paulina said. “I’m full of righteous outrage for everyone who suffers at their hands.”

“You weren’t upset at Chloe Baptiste’s effort to blackmail you?” she asked, knowing that she was taking a risk by making that assumption. “You didn’t resent the way she tried to use your past against you? Isn’t that what really set you off, Paulina, and with good reason?”

As she spoke, she continued to take small steps toward the two women, until, when she finished speaking, she was only fifteen feet away.

“Stop moving,” Paulina said, pressing the blade of the knife right up against Lila’s throat. “You are killing her.”

Jessie stopped and held up her hands with her palms facing Paulina in a sign of submission.

“I’m stopping,” she assured her, glancing over her shoulder and seeing that Ryan had stopped too, a good ten feet behind her. Even though she had stopped moving, she kept talking.

“I get it,” she said quietly, now that they were close enough to each other that she could be heard without yelling, “I really do.”

“You don’t get anything,” Paulina snarled. “You have no idea what I’ve been through.”

“It’s true—there’s no way that I can comprehend the depth of your pain,” Jessie conceded, before deciding to take a leap that was based more on feeling than fact, “And I don’t know what Chloe was holding over you that made you so angry, so desperate. But I do know what it’s like to have a father whose intentions can’t be trusted.”

Paulina stood up slightly. She seemed legitimately surprised by that one, as if this was the first time that someone else had ever suggested that such a highly regarded man might not be exactly what he seemed.

“He was my stepfather,” she said with unvarnished derision.

"Okay," Jessie said, "but all the same, he raised you, right? He was supposed to take care of you. But I'm guessing he failed in some unfathomable ways. Am I right, Paulina?"

The woman's eyes went wide, but she said nothing. Jessie continued.

"My father murdered my mother right in front of me when I was six years old," she said softly. "He used a knife a lot like that one. And then he left me, tied to a chair, in an isolated, snow-covered cabin. That was my childhood, Paulina. I'm guessing that your pain was different, but that it lasted a lot longer than mine. Because, while my mother died and all I have left of her is memories, yours was there the whole time, letting it happen, wasn't she? Is that what you see when you use that knife on these women?"

“How could you possibly know any of this?” Paulina whispered, loosening the grip the knife slightly.

“Why would you leave a life that seemed so perfect?” Jessie asked. “Why change your identity and start over unless the perfect façade hid a nightmare? There are only a few reasons someone would do something as desperate as that. That’s how I know, Paulina. And also—because I can see it in your eyes. I can see years of pain.”

Paulina just stared her, unblinking, as if stunned by the first person to ever understand her. Jessie kept going.

"But I can tell you that the pain doesn't have to last forever," she said, "not if you're willing to face it head-on head-on. There are people who can help. I can help. But to get that help, and to get real freedom from the trauma of your past, you have to stop this. You have to let Lila go. If you do that, we can start down the path to healing. All you have to do is hand over the knife. Will you do that, Paulina?”

For an endless, wordless eternity, Paulina just stood there, knife in her hand, tears welling up in her eyes. Then, finally, she nodded.

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