Page 98 of The Replacement Wife

She wanted to grab Rachel and drag her back inside, but she was on the porch now. Getting too close to that car. Elisa’s panic spiked.

Josh tapped his key fob on the roof of the car. “Rachel?”

Shut up. Shut up. Shut up. Elisa wanted to scream the words. Make it clear that she didn’t want to hear one more thing from Josh.

“I have all of this under control,” Rachel said, getting Elisa’s attention again.

“But how?”

Rachel let out a sigh. “I’m concerned.”

“What?” What kind of response was that? The words had no bearing on the conversation, on Elisa’s trembling fear. “You’re what?”

“You heard me. Think it through.” Rachel jogged down the steps and reached for Josh’s outstretched hand. She turned to wave right before she got in the car. “See you in a few days.”

Harris waved back. Elisa couldn’t move. Rachel’s response had her reeling. She spoke nonsense there at the end. Like some kind of cry for help, except that she seemed fine. Happy, even.

I’m concerned.

Then it hit Elisa.Concerned.

Rachel was Concerned.

Chapter Fifty

Elisa spent the rest of the weekend trying to figure out if she’d manufactured the scene with Rachel in her head or if it really happened. The line between what was real and what was part of some anxiety-fueled haze blurred. Things she knew to be true—where she put her meds, the closeness she and Abby shared, snippets of conversations—didn’t hold up to facts thrown in her face. She blamed Josh for undermining her, for taking away her stability, but holding on to that belief was getting harder and harder.

As soon as Josh and Rachel drove away a thick blanket of darkness settled over Elisa. She tried to punch through, but her muscles felt weighted down. She wanted to curl up in bed and not think. Thinking invited doubts and second-guesses and guilt. And, yes, paranoia.

She tried to block all of it. Just drift off to sleep and remember a time a year ago before all of this happened. Abby would be there. Maxine would be alive. Her life would be on track. She wouldn’t be lost in this thick fog that filled her until she choked. Her marriage wouldn’t feel so shaky and uncertain.

She’d be stable. Josh would be decent.

She wanted to stop worrying about Rachel and Abby and everything else. She wanted to be able to travel outside of a twenty-mile radius without being overtaken by this desperate clawing sensation inside of her.

But that wasn’t her world now. Her life had become one she no longer recognized, centered around hiding things and telling half-truths. Investigating people she supposedly cared about. Not being one inch closer to finding Abby.

And now this... Concerned.

Elisa tried to make all the pieces fit and only got more confused. Rachel in secret, anonymous talks with Abby. Rachel issuing warnings to Abby about Josh... then getting engaged to him.

Elisa couldn’t make sense of it. She’d run through the possibilities, some so ridiculous they couldn’t possibly be true. Rachel as Josh’s willing partner. Rachel as someone with a connection to the women in Josh’s life. Rachel as some sociopath, a stalker who targeted the family.

Harris played with Nathan all weekend and sulked. Harris insisted he wasn’t, but even as her life crumbled around her, she did still know him. He seemed to take the news of Josh getting quietly engaged as a personal attack. Harris hated being cut off from information. He’d played the pseudo father role for so long—despite Josh’s marriages and engagements in the interim—that he had trouble letting go of the assigned role.

In an effort to pull back some control, she spent the weekend looking through the saved messages between Abby and Concerned. Shelby had Abby’s laptop at her office, but Elisa kepta copy of those messages. She hadn’t studied them for days, but now she couldn’t stop. By the time Monday morning rolled around, she almost had the entire back-and-forth memorized.

With Nathan at school and Harris at work, she needed to call the doctor, but she took another deep dive in the messages, hoping to uncover something the first hundred read-throughs hadn’t shown her.

ABBY:Do I know you?

CONCERNED:what matters is that I know josh and you’re not safe

ABBY:Convenient. How am I supposed to doublecheck what you say? To trust you?

CONCERNED:i don’t care if you trust me just don’t trust him

ABBY:How do you know these things about him?

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