Page 57 of What the Wife Knew

Seven months. I repeated the steps in my mind, worked through every piece of my grand design and tinkered when the mental walk-through failed. The plan demanded a very public ending. If the police came to our house and found my parents’ bodies I could have been implicated, and there was a strong possibility Cooper would have folded under pressure and confessed.

No, the police had to find Cooper away from home and see him as being on the run and panicking. He had to die. That meant tricking him and putting him in front of witnesses with the murder weapons in his hands while I rushed to dispose of my bloody clothes... but not his. I left his back on the floor nearmy mother’s bloody head as further evidence of his culpability. In the post-killing frenzy Cooper didn’t notice. He trusted me. Just as I suspected he would.

The timing had been perfect. Adding the school as the final location was the masterstroke. That Zach kid’s death was unfortunate, sure, but the move put a target on Cooper as the aggressor and sole shooter and made me an avenging angel. I rushed in just in time. I begged Cooper to stop while everyone watched in horror. I killed him because I had no other choice. Thanks to my selflessness, I became a national hero, deserving a lifetime of admiration.

“The thing I regret not seeing sooner was how hopeless Cooper felt. He and Dad were fighting. Cooper snapped and shot... both of them... my parents...” The practiced sucking in of air at just the right time in the made-up retelling. The perfect crack of my voice. I’d mastered it all. “Then Cooper headed to the school, probably to kill more innocent people. We’ll never know.”

“You’ve told that story so many times I wonder if you believe it.”

Her amused tone sealed her fate. “You think I want to relive that day?”

“Why not? The scheme is your greatest achievement.” She kept her voice at an almost soundless whisper. “You and your brother killed your parents but you were in the clear. All the evidence implicated Cooper.”

Cooper thought we were going to school to establish an alibi. That we’d be away from the house and seen by witnesses in the hallways and on security video before and after the killings. The school wouldn’t be a crime scene. Once I had him wound up and ready to act, convincing him of the brilliance of my plan wasn’t difficult. He believed I was protecting both of us, but I wasn’t.

I’d read about a criminal case where the husband played with the house’s thermostat to throw off the estimated time of death. An artificially hot environment could change a corpse’s core temperature and skew calculations. I needed that buffer in case the police figured out I had time to return home, kill my parents, and get back to school.

So, I had Cooper change the thermostat. His fingerprints on it, not mine. His attempt to mess with the temperature, not mine. Either way I had cover, and his actions were in the spotlight.

But how the hell did she know any of the particulars? There was no way she spun a tale around that damn map that shouldn’t exist and got this close to the truth.

“I have to hand it to you because this is where your devious nature really paid off. Pulling the fire alarm while your brother was on his way to dump the weapons left him alone and in full view as students and teachers ran out of their classrooms. Tackling him, making a huge scene where you begged him to stop and turn himself in, created an audience.” She seemed to relish regurgitating the timeline. “But you didn’t count on Zach being there.”

I didn’t. He walked in on the scene. Not my fault.

“Everyone watched, thinking you’d saved the school when what you were doing was eliminating a witness and the need to share your parents’ money. You also got close enough to Cooper that no one would ever question the blood or gunpowder on you from your parents’ murders.”

Guesses. Had to be... but no one else had guessed. Who the fuck was she? “Why do you care about this? Take the cash I offered and go.”

“A hundred grand is tempting but too easy for you.” Her soul-crushing smile returned. “You need to feel a fraction of the suffocating terror your family felt as you picked them off one by one, you sick bastard.”

I grabbed her wrist and dragged it onto my lap. Let her feel my strength as I clamped down on the fragile bones of her wrist. Medical school taught me how to heal, which inadvertently also taught me how to break. “If I’m a cold-blooded killer, why risk pissing me off?”

She didn’t even wince as I tightened my hold. “Are you still trying to prove you’re innocent?”

I matched her nerve with a load of my own. “I don’t lose, Addison.”

“You’re going to lose everything you care about, leaving you a cracked and empty shell without a family or the pathetic string of mistresses you can no longer afford. Just another sad wannabe guy who led with his dick, cheated on his wife, and was forced to move into a small apartment to financially recover. Because you will be paying Kathryn and the kids. I’ll leave you with enough money for that and only that.”

“You think I’ll let you take this life away from me?” She might know some things about me, but she underestimated my will. “I’ll put you in the ground first.”

“Do it and everything I have goes public, including... have I mentioned this? The tape.”

The constant string of noise playing in my head cut off. “There’s no tape.”

“The one Cooper made of a conversation with you where you talk about disposing of the weapons. Touch me and everyone hears it.”

“That tape doesn’t exist.” It couldn’t. Not possible.

“It’s almost as if your brother knew you were going to screw him and made a contingency plan. Guess he was smarter than you thought.”

I dropped her hand. “You’re a gold-digging whore.”

“Every time you piss me off I add another zero to the amount you’re going to lose.” She flexed her wrist. The only sign the grab hurt her.

She should get used to my anger. “You can only push a man so far before he shoves back. Enjoy your win. It’s temporary.”

“But ruining you will be forever.”

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