Page 31 of Final Cost

Thank God he sent someone to protect me. I don’t know what would’ve happened otherwise.

“And now, here she is. In her own words,” Jeannie says from the studio, and that’s all the warning we have before the scene switches and fills the screen. I thought I was braced for this moment, but I’m still startled to see her alive again in all her vibrant natural beauty. She’s wearing jeans and a white linen shirt, her skin glowing and fresh even with her forehead bandage, brows dark, red lips plump and pouty and eyes luminous.

It’s wild how jarring it is to see her like this. I half expect her to step out from behind the screen and resume her place here at Ackerley. I don’t know how everyone else is taking this, but we all wait, riveted and frozen.

“Ravenna, welcome,” Jeannie says. “How are you feeling?”

Ravenna pauses to think it over. “Nervous,” she finally says with a tremulous smile.

“Why nervous?” Jeannie asks.

“I’ve never told my story before,” Ravenna says. “I’ve never felt brave enough.”

Sympathetic nod from Jeannie. “First things first. You’re wearing a bandage. What happened to your head?”

“It’s not that big a deal.” Ravenna touches the bandage with one of her delicate hands. “I slipped and fell on the rocks near Ackerley the other day when it was raining. Minor concussion. It’s fine.”

Daniel and Lucien exchange a look.

“It’s plausible,” Daniel says, shrugging. “The rockswereslippery that night.”

“So that much of her story could be true,” Lucien says thoughtfully.

“Let’s go back a few years,” Jeannie says. “You were in a boating accident.”

Ravenna looks grave now. “Yes.”

“Your sailboat capsized in Manhasset Bay off Ackerley,” Jeannie continues.

“Yes,” Ravenna says again.

“Ravenna, you disappeared. You were presumed dead. Foryears. What happened to you?”

Ravenna hesitates, her chin wobbling. A tear drops, and it’s the most beautiful tear I’ve ever seen in my life. Crystalline against her vivid green eyes, leaving a perfect trail down her exquisite cheek before she hastily swipes it away. “I hate that I caused so much trouble. And the expense of the search. I feel terrible about that. But I had to disappear. I had no other choice.”

“I don’t understand,” Jeannie says, her voice hushed now as she leans in. “What do you mean?”

Another beautiful tear falls. “I mean that I was afraid Lucien was going to kill me.” Ravenna takes a deep breath, the picture of a brave battered wife. “So I had to fake my own death.”

I cry out, pressing my hand to my chest. I’d run a million different scenarios in my head. Ways she might try to explain her lengthy disappearance. Kidnapping. Sex trafficking. Amnesia. Alien abduction. That this isn’t Ravenna at all but her long-lost identical twin sister.

Nothing likethat.

“What?”shouts Roman beside me. He looks like he’s ready to smash the TV. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Oh, my God,” Daniel says with a disbelieving look in Lucien’s direction.

And Lucien? No reaction. Not even a flicker of his eyes.

“Why would you fear that your husband would hurt you, Ravenna?” Jeannie asks in that dramatic stage whisper of a voice. “You had the perfect marriage. We’ve seen the photos and the videos. What on earth did you have to fear?”

“Nothing is perfect,” Ravenna says in a brave show of wiping her eyes a final time before drying her fingers on her jeans and hitching up her chin. “I know how it looked from the outside. But Lucien wears a mask. And the man that the world sees is not the man I dealt with behind closed doors.” She pauses. “I didn’t realize it until we were on our honeymoon in Monte Carlo. When it was too late. A server flirted with me at dinner. Lucien got jealous. When we got back to our hotel suite, he said thatIwas flirting. That was the first time he ever slapped me across the face.”

“What?”Roman shouts again, but all my attention is split between the screen and Lucien, who watches frozen and unblinking.

“Heslappedyou,” Jeannie repeats, aghast.

“Yes.”

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