A Fatal Affair

by A.R. Torre

You loved me, even if you didn’t remember it in that moment in time. I needed to get you back and knew how to do it. I knew how to put everything back together again.

On their way out, she caught up with Kevin. “You think Protect the Children brought the kid to Los Angeles?”

She was older than most of them. In her fifties, with salt-and-pepper hair and a pear-shaped body. He spun to the shredder and held the folder over the mouth of it, then hesitated, his gaze drifting to the drawer.

And just like that, Theresa Biggle’s life was spared.

Soared so its a collection of women he hasnt taken yet?

Stepping in, she let out an unexpected scream at the sight of a bald kid sitting cross-legged on the floor, who stared up at her in surprise.

“Miles, sweetie. How did you get here?” “I don’t know,” he sniffed. “I woke up here.”

A terrible thought occurred to her—that this child might have been put here before the murders and forgotten or lost in the events of last night. “Are you hungry, Miles? Thirsty?” He

Easing into the hall, she carefully pulled it shut behind her and double-checked that it was locked. Shit. Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit.

There was no way to sit on a child, and she was furious that he had allowed that little boy to sit down there, in the dark, without food or water, while they sat at the fucking dinner table and ate lobster risotto.

For God’s sake, she was pregnant. He was going to be a father. A father who apparently stuck kids off to one side and forgot about them.

Girl you better call the fuckibg cop!

“The little bald kid who is locked downstairs in the basement,” she said slowly, enunciating each word. “Right now? There’s a kid in our basement right now?” He was a great actor—the best in the world—but this act, this harsh tone, his bewildered eyes . . . it was throwing her off, confusing her fury. “Right now.” “Take me to him,” he demanded.

Bruh ehT?!

“I didn’t. I didn’t even know he was here!” His face grew hard, and she reminded herself to tread carefully, that this was a man with a very short fuse.

“So if you didn’t put him in there, who do you think did it?” She waited for him to connect the dots. “Maybe someone who looks identical to Captain Voil?”

“Well then, who did?” Nora spread her arms out. “Who else would have put him down here? Who else has fingerprint access? Brenda? And look at the timing. This is probably that dead woman’s kid.”

“You’re serious? There’s definitely a kid in there?”

Why wouldshe joke avoutthis?

His mouth twisted. “I don’t want them to go through the whole house. I’m going to be honest, I don’t even know what’s here. There might be incriminating items.”

Bruh pleasewhy do you not know whats in your house?

But now, there’s a kid here, inside the bowels of our house. It brings us into it. It makes us look like we were accomplices. Plus—what? He kills himself and leaves a kid behind, one no one knows about? Something’s off there, and the cops are going to pounce on it.”

This boy was a rook, a piece that should be sacrificial for the protection of the queen. She opened her eyes. “Okay. Then we need to get rid of him. Tonight.”

Oh my gawdwere gonna kull him?

This bathroom was the first remodel they had done, and was thanks to the Iverson money,

Nolan hadn’t found out about Monica Kitle’s death until three months after it happened,

And now she was dead and this blood was on his hands.

He would be branded a criminal. A deadly errand boy. A serial killer’s pawn.

He had even done one of hearts and flowers, even though he wasn’t into that stuff, just for her, to make her smile.

Bald head—I’d liked that. With a bald head, his scar showed, big and ugly, and a Nair cream application once a week kept the hair from growing back and immediately brought on the attention and sympathy I needed.

occasionally knocked his face into something or pushed him into a sharp edge to create injuries consistent with one.

I tried to fight the enjoyment, to remind myself of the good reasons why I was doing it, but it was hard because honestly? I loved the results. But then Andi died. Andi, then Blanche. They were the first two dominoes to fall.

Kerry’s Facebook friend’s voice was playing on repeat in his head. I don’t know anything. None of us do. Us? Who the hell was us?

When it came, between a red sedan and a FedEx truck, he took five steps forward and stopped in the middle of the lane, waiting for impact.

“So Nolan Price was the Black kid on the show. Who saw that coming?”

Gertie waved off the concern. “Protect the Children has put up a fifty-thousand-dollar reward and provided two dozen volunteers. We’ll use them

Before her death, Andi was kind of the ringleader of our group. Maybe that’s why she was killed first.

They were simple and written in a way that left no room for interpretation. The gist was that we were no longer “allowed”—and that was the terminology used—to do anything that might harm our family, spouses, or kids.

And apparently, if we broke those rules, we’d be killed. KILLED.

Blanche read Andi’s post, walked out on the balcony of her downtown high-rise, looked over the view of the Seattle harbor, then hoisted her flat stomach onto the railing, swung one LuLaRoe pumpkin legging–clad leg over the side, then the other, and pushed off.

Andi’s Facebook post took only a few minutes to kill her. That was the scary thing for me. That Blanche would rather die than stop what she was doing to her child.

Kept living, while I went crazy inside myself. I went crazy and you never even noticed a thing.

Was it any wonder that she had fallen in love with them both? A woman’s heart should never have to defend itself against twins, especially not when they came in such irresistible packaging.

“The cabin.” Nora paused, her blue eyes darting from Farah to Kevin and registering the blank looks on both. “It’s out in the desert, almost to Mojave.”

“Damn, this keeps getting worse,” Kevin remarked. He was right. Three dead bodies so far and the lines between them were one big tangled knot.

All that was what Kerry was for. If she were here, she would tell them.

mean, you wouldn’t trade Trish for a night with Nora, would you?” “I’m gonna plead the fifth on that one, and if you ever tell my wife I said that, I’ll piss in your coffee.”

Maybe Trent wasn’t obsessed with Kerry. Maybe he was obsessed with Miles. The thought was too dark to consider, but she flagged it for discussion with Kevin after they ended the call.

Maybe hasn’t been giving the kid his.” “Munchausen potential?”

I stopped everything. Stopped giving Miles bad meds. Stopped rubbing in the hair-loss cream. Stopped inventing incidents.

It wasn’t just me, making a change. We all tried our best, but it didn’t stop more members from dying.

“Damn, K. Twelve tapes, all with different names.” She looked at him. “Twelve women.”

“You realize this just blew up into something we won’t be able to control, right?” He was right. Hollywood—and all of America—was going to lose their minds over this.

If she was wrong, if this was a prank, he couldn’t . . . he wasn’t sure his heart could take another stab wound. He carefully lifted the receiver to his ear. “Hello?” “Hi, Daddy.” The voice was so strong, so pure, so confident.

But when’s the last time a serial killer was in a murder-suicide? What, it’s his thirteenth murder and he suddenly gets remorse?” Kevin shook his head. “I don’t like it.”

A horrible thought, followed by a worse one. “Could they all have Munchausen by proxy?”