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My husband was a monster. It was something I’d come to accept over the years.
Why
He’d become my lapdog, dutifully doing whatever I needed or whatever I said.
I thought it was what I wanted. A quiet coexistence. But, truth be told, I missed the spark I used to see in his eyes. I missed who we used to be… Before.
Not yet. She was too busy feeling sorry for my husband. He was good at that.
homework—tell our partner how their actions make us feel at least once a day and tell our partner something we appreciate about them once a day—on it.
“So,” he said, obviously fighting against the joy he felt, “are we going to kill her?”
I knew he'd ask this bruh
“So, what are you saying? Are you going to turn me in?” My blood ran cold at the thought. She was manipulative, but she wasn’t evil…was she?
Boy ur the evil one
I should’ve known. Ainsley was always one step ahead of me. She always knew. Always.
“I’m not the same man I was.”
Bruh what... From 2 months ago. Pls
“You’re a killer, Peter.” She spat it out, finally laying the truth on the table. “A rapist. A liar. A monster. You hurt people. You’ve hurt me.”
You always mean to do it. The first time I caught you was when Maisy was a baby.”
Here I was, still recovering from childbirth, and you were out on a date. But, just before I started to confront you, I watched you slip something in her drink.” She sprinkled her fingers over her own drink, acting out my motions.
Disgusting Pig
“By the time I saw you for who you were, it was too late. I had three babies with you. We had a life. A home. Friends.
can. I haven’t hurt anyone in more than a year.”
Liar
Whatever you’ve got going on—however dark—as long as you’re honest with me, I promise you we can get through it.
This is not what in sickness and in health means
“Well, it started in college. When my parents got divorced. It’s not an excuse, but…I was in a dark place.
And then…then I met you.” Her head tilted to the side as if something had just occurred to her. “Wait, was I supposed to be one of your victims?”
Bro
The first time was this one night…after one of our biggest fights.”
“Are there any other secrets you need to tell me? Anything I should know?” My response was instant. A vow. A lie. “No. You know everything.”
Bruh
“Good,” she purred. “Because if you ever lie to me again, the next body in our freezer will be yours.”
I’d failed before. Not just with Peter. There had been others. One other, specifically. But that was the past. Peter wasn’t Ryan. This
It had been years since he’d called me on my personal phone, even longer since I’d answered. What could he possibly want now?
Potential partner in crime?
“It’s up to you and me, like always.” She clicked her tongue, dragging her sentences out longer and longer. “Always up to us…”
I thought back to the early days, when the news of my mother’s affair had gotten out.
The boy I thought would provide me with a means of escaping my family. The first boy I’d ever loved. I shook him from my head. Lately, I’d been thinking about him more and more, and I had no idea why.
Wis this about the Ryan character
“Who is it?” I asked. “Um, he says his name is Slater,” she said cautiously.
but wherever Jim Slater went, trouble usually followed. Whatever he wanted, I had a feeling it wouldn’t be good.
“Anyway, I heard on the news a few months later that they think he’s a rapist.” His brows shot up. “I guess you just never know about some people, hm?” His smile changed from playful and carefree to cruel and threatening in a matter of seconds.
Why had I ever trusted him? I’d known, even then, that it was a mistake. But I never thought he’d betray me. We held each other’s secrets, after all.
A favor was never just a favor with Jim.
Of course, that was before I knew who he was. Before I knew what he’d done. Before he brought me into his world and ruined my life. I’d met Jim the week I moved into my college dorm.
I did whatever he asked: wrote his essays, paid for his books, cleaned his side of the dorm. Anything.
When I walked into our dorm to see the two naked bodies on our floor—Jim on top of a girl I didn’t recognize—I panicked.
But when I reached it and opened the door, a joke ready on my lips, my smile fell away immediately. Jim was dressed and on the bed, but the girl was still on our floor, still not dressed. It didn’t take long for me to realize she was unconscious.
“I won’t snitch,” I swore. “You know me better than that.” “Then you know your other option, don’t ya?
It was then that I noticed the blood on his hands. It was dark, so I couldn’t be sure that was what it was, but somehow, I knew.
Maybe that was all he was ever trying to do—gather as much dirt on everyone around him as he could. To control them. To control everything.
When I opened the door to go back inside, Ainsley was standing in the hallway, her arms crossed in front of her chest. My body tensed as I tried to come up with a lie.
I knew she wasn't asleep fr
He was lying, again, but I didn’t know why.
“But you’re my monster. And as long as you’re completely honest with me, I’m not going anywhere.”
Before, the black plastic tarp had been used to cover the boxes in the back of his truck. This time, it was wrapped around a body.
She’d been out with Bailey yesterday.
No wonder she’d hardly spoken to me this morning…
Normal doesn’t exist and it never has. There are just these periods where things feel safe and calm, and then, long before we’re ready, everything’s torn apart and we call it change. We look back at our lives and wonder when it all changed, but the truth is…the better question is, when didn’t it? Because we’re always changing. Life is always changing. It’s the rarer moments where things are still.
“You’re dancing again?” Dylan asked, making it clear I was the only one out of the loop.
“You’re acting the way Bailey’s parents did before they got divorced. All quiet and…weird.”
Maisy shook her head. "It's nothing, I swear. I just don't want to do it anymore. Please don't make me."
uh oh
To my relief, without shaking his hand, she stepped back, offering a gentle wave. “Nice to meet you.” It seemed as though she sensed the danger, or my panic, and I was grateful to see her walking away from us quickly.
I’ll take care of the rest.” I saw him clock something over my shoulder, his whole demeanor filling with warmth again. When I followed his line of vision, I saw Ainsley’s silhouette in the porch light. She’d
“The problem is that she’s eleven years old and suddenly she doesn’t want to do the thing she’s loved doing since she was four.
