Page 29 of The Amendment

Did they thinkIwas pulling away fromthem?

Was I?

Perhaps the guilt over all we’d done had driven me from them, but now that I knew the issue, I could fix it.

I was a fixer, after all.

CHAPTER TWELVE

PETER

There was a body in our garage.

A decaying body.

It wasn’t the first time and I was sure it wouldn’t be the last, but this time I had no control over it.

It wasn’t my doing.

I didn’t know what unfortunate misstep the person—I was assuming it was a woman, but I couldn’t be sure—had taken to end up wrapped in a tarp in my garage.

I couldn’t press Jim. Couldn’t ask too many questions.

After that first night, that had always been the rule between us.

But with the evidence on my property, I had everything to lose here and nothing to gain.

Nothing except his silence, and even that was uncertain.

I knew Jim. I knew that whatever I was doing to make him happy now would only keep him happy until the next favor he needed. I didn’t know why I’d fooled myself intobelieving it would be any different now that we were grown and out of college.

We weren’t kids anymore.

We had families, careers…

But neither of us had stopped doing the things that had bonded us back then, and he knew it. He’d used it to control me before and he could still control me with it to this day.

“Did you hear her, Peter?” Ainsley was saying, her voice shrill. When I looked up, I noticed every eye at the table was on me.

“Hm? Sorry, I zoned out. What’d you say?”

Maisy was picking at the food on her plate. “I quit dance.”

It took a moment for it to sink in. “Oh… Okay, then.” I glanced toward Ainsley, trying to gauge how I was supposed to be reacting. “When did you decide this?”

“Last year,” Maisy said. “I haven’t started back.”

Now I understood the pinched expression my wife was wearing.

“Oh. I didn’t realize.”

“Me either,” Ainsley said. “I found out today when I realized she didn’t go to her recital last night. I assumed you were paying for the classes.”

“I… Yeah, I assumed you were.” I turned to face my daughter. “You should’ve told us, Maise. Did something happen?”

“Not really.” She twisted her hand over her arm. “I just didn’t want to do it anymore. Jennessa and Bailey quit, too.”

Ainsley was still looking at me, watching my reaction,but I had no idea if I was acting appropriately. In truth, I never cared if Maisy took the dance lessons in the first place. That was Ainsley’s choice. And frankly, her quitting was saving us a ton of money.

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