The Ruined Wife: Psychological Thriller Read online

  The Ruined Wife

  Marin Montgomery

  Contents

  Description

  Prologue

  I. Alastair

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  II. Steven

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  COVER DESIGN: LOUISA MAGGIO

  EDITING: BOOKTIQUE EDITING

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permission Coordinator” at the address below.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination, or if an actual place, are used fictitiously and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, or business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control and does not assume responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.

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  Description

  Alastair has found the perfect partner in husband, Steven. Together they’ve built a successful life, had a beautiful child, and still behave like newlyweds long since the day he carried her over the threshold.

  But all of that changes in an instant thanks to a thoughtless deed with lifelong repercussions.

  With secrets bubbling to the surface, the pair find their American dream life suddenly in jeopardy, and neither one of them are willing to let go at any cost.

  For my aunt Nancy, the most thoughtful, kind, God-fearing woman on this planet. For all you do, your kind words, your ability to intrinsically see the good in everyone. You’ve been such an inspiration in life. Thank you for your positivity, your spirit, and your genuine warmth to every person you meet, friend or stranger. You are one of a kind.

  Prologue

  My name’s Alastair Adams.

  I’m forty-two. My zodiac sign is a Leo. A tattoo of a miniature lion strategically is placed on my right ankle, a reminder of my years trying to be a badass, running wild, giving in to peer pressure, and wanting to press up against danger but not consume it.

  Yet, here I am now, sitting in a maximum-security prison headed to trial for killing a woman I trusted, a woman I let into my home. I’m charged with attempted murder of my husband, who is comatose and has been in a vegetative state for months.

  I’ve lost my husband and my daughter. I’ve lost my friends. I’ve lost my career and livelihood, the damn good life I had. People who used to be in my inner circle avoid me like the plague. It’s easy to do when you’re not in front of them. They reject your collect calls, ‘an inmate from Longview Prison is calling, do you accept the charges?’, ‘return to sender’ letters, and avoid any trace that you ever existed. I’m like a speck of dust that you scrub to disappear, once present, now a figment of your imagination.

  Two speeding tickets and a parking ticket. That was the rap sheet of this gal. Before I was accused of murder, my interactions with the police had taken place on the side of the road, my mind always elsewhere, the speed limit an afterthought until I saw their red and blue flashing lights in my rearview.

  Attorneys? I’d had one for my public relations agency on a retainer basis. A few I knew in a networking group. Always casual and fun, never stilted and serious like it is now.

  Now I have a criminal defense and a family law attorney, one defending me against the state and the other dissolving my parental rights to our daughter, my freedom taken away just like my place as a mother.

  Just like that, my life has been rewritten. Our dream house next to the mountain preserves is in foreclosure, my in-laws are unable to afford it with the hospital bills and my attorney fees, the debt the only upward trajectory. They’ve silently stood by me if only in terms of not draining my bank account. Livvie, our nine-year-old, moved in with my in-laws in a rental property on the opposite side of the valley escaping the sensationalism on the news, the taunts at school, and the jeers from colleagues and neighbors.

  No one knew I had it in me to cause the expiration date of another human. I use the word ‘expired’ because it’s less harsh than pre-meditated, first-degree murder. I understand you’re probably rolling your eyes thinking, you don’t get that choice, Alastair.

  Let me be straight. It wasn’t pre-meditated. At least not in the sense that someone considers ending the life of another. I didn’t sit around and dwell on it, on what she’d done to me, to us, to my nine-year-old.

  Until the moment I thought about her dead. But it’s not that simple. Life never is.

  My attorney has begged me to use self-defense as the motive.

  I refuse.

  It’s self-preservation, not self-defense.

  She ruined me. Everything I had spent the last seventeen years building, she took a wrecking ball and bashed the shit out of it. And in less than a year, I might add.

  I only did what I had to do. And if you were me, you’d have done it too.

  But before you judge me, keep in mind that nothing is ever as it seems …

  Part I

  Alastair

  1

  I have an Uber take me from the airport to a random house, one street over from my own, my car still in the airport parking lot. My hands are clasped tightly, my entire body is tense, and the feeling of electricity is shooting through every vein, head to toe. My body feels like an internal earthquake is going to shatter every bone, and even my knees shake.

  It’s Saturday, and I shouldn’t be home.

  Thanking the driver, I slam the car door shut and stand to survey my surroundings. The air is frigid, at least to me, the mid-fifties temp adding to my discomfort. I start walking, the sky pitch black, the outline of mountains welcoming me like an outstretched hand, motioning me up the hill. Typically, I find them serene, but tonight I find them ominous. It’s quiet, eerily quiet. Usually, I’m home at dinnertime, parked cars lining the street, hikers still making their way down from the mountain behind our house, a preserve that provides some of the best trails in the valley. Neighbors are pulling into their driveways, the sound of slamming doors and people walking their dogs the typical 5:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. sightings.

  I look at my Cartier—11:09 p.m.

  Shuddering, I wrap my jacket tight around my small frame.

  My husband should be at home. With her. I saw her enter the house to visit him. It was a bl
urry snippet, but nonetheless, her dark hair was enough to make my hands clench in frustration. She came over, just like I thought she would as soon as they had the opportunity to be alone.

  Unfortunately, my phone’s dead, my charger left back the hotel, my mind on other pressing matters, and the last five percent I used to get a ride home.

  No one knows we have a camera strategically placed near the front door.

  Not even him.

  I had it installed recently, yesterday morning to be exact when he was at work and before I flew out. The hard drive is hidden in the closet in our office, and the company that installed it is operating under the assumption of secrecy. Their main goal—to trap cheating spouses. It didn’t take long, I think dryly. The one in the front is aimed at the door hidden under an overhang where the roof slants.

  My feet are tired from a long day, aching in my Stuart Weitzman heels as I trudge up the hill and around the bend to our street, Cactus Lane. I’d come back a night early. I had to know.

  It wasn’t up for debate that something was going on, that I wasn’t crazy, and it wasn’t my imagination.

  His navy-blue Toyota pick-up is in the driveway, parked crooked, no reason to remain linear since my car is gone. He’s usually so straight and narrow, exactly like him… or exactly like the old him.

  My husband, Steven, and I realized early on that I was going to be the breadwinner. He’s a science nerd, fascinated by how endothermic reactions create boiling points and the way the laws of thermodynamics work. He used to tell me I was a coulomb attraction, and we were bodies of opposite charges. I thought that was sexy then, him running a hand through my long jet-black hair, staring intently at me, whispering it in my ear while he watched how my body reacted to his touch. It was true, he was the calm to my storm, the anchor, a permanent, reliable presence to my passionate sometimes heated outbursts, and the even-keel that was paramount to providing stability in our lives. He became a middle-school biology teacher, and I built a business from the ground up.

  Now his wheels are haphazard as if he’d been in a rush to park. To get inside with her.

  There’re no other vehicles in our driveway. It would be too risky to have unknown cars parked here. Our neighbors are close to us, not just in proximity but in confidences. We’ve been in this house for twelve years. We’ve built a life in front of this mountain. Only one neighbor borders us, but the residences on this street have been here for years, many longer than us, inheriting their homes from deceased parents. They could’ve sold over the years, but the answers have always been why give up these mountain views? Or leave this and go where precisely?

  Behind us is the vast expanse of desert landscaping and mountainous peaks. Our backyard backs straight up to the desert, only six feet of brick bordering our property, the only wall between us and cacti, javelinas, and the upward pinnacle to the top of the summit.

  Liv’s at a sleepover, her friend, Meredith, invited her over. Steven had told me that via text earlier today when we communicated, the breakdown in our marriage so bad we’ve resorted to texting instead of speaking, the strained voices and long pauses too much to bear.

  It hadn’t always been like this. In fact, it had been good, we had been good.

  Yanking my heels off, the blisters sore to the touch, I walk up the paved driveway. The driveway is like ice to the soles of my feet, my footsteps slow and calculated trying to be as quiet as possible.

  He’s home… but is he still with her?

  It would be dumb to have a woman at the house. But who would know? A few of our neighbors, women I know, are aware when I travel. This was a last-minute trip to Atlanta, filling in at a conference, speaking on social media channels, the extent of time-sensitive information, and reaching the correct audience for your business. I’d gone as a favor to a friend whose speaker had canceled last minute due to flight cancellations. It was hard to ignore the surprise when I told him I was going, the difficulty in hiding his excitement, a gleam in his eyes. His voice went up just an octave asking me a few questions, not bothering to feign his elation. All he did was squeeze my hand and say, “Sounds like a great opportunity. I know you’ll kill it.”

  I did.

  But those words ring out in my head, ‘I know you’ll kill it.” They weren’t supposed to mean her. The disease is threatening our marriage, viral and toxic, creeping in through the veins of it, coursing into action, wreaking havoc on everyone and everything it touched.

  Tiptoeing to our front door past the desert magnolia and scarlet flax, their colors brilliant even in the night, reds and yellows, a thing of beauty in this sordid world. Funny how I never stopped to notice how perfectly they line our walk. Our landscaper making sure our plants and trees remained the highlight of our yard, specially installed illuminated planters casting a glow.

  The porch light is on, the pomegranate tree standing tall next to the front, half-eaten ones scattered by squirrels and rodents, I test the metal screen door. It’s locked. The shades are drawn, our blinds a special fabric that’s centered in the middle of the windows, accordion-style, the ability to pull up or down, the least intrusive, our objective not to block the views. They’re better from the back, but the front still allows us to enjoy the precise reason we live here.

  I don’t want to give him a heads-up. A chance to lie his way out of this. The lies have been piling up like bodies in a furnace, heaved one on top of the other, all melding together into one putrid pile of shit.

  A wooden gate is located on the side of the house, the dark wood fusing with the sky. I hear a noise. Sucking the air in through my nose, I exhale and pause.

  There it is again. A giggle. I strain to hear if it’s our neighbors. Their house is dark, the small retaining wall between our yards giving me direct access to look into their patch of grass and tiny flowerbed. No lights are visible in their windows, the shades are drawn.

  The laugh intensifies, definitely a woman’s voice, laughter with a lilt.

  My mouth draws in a tight line. I clasp my leather key ring in my hand, my palms starting to sweat.

  Stepping toward the gate, the electricity once again intensifies shooting through my nerves, adrenaline rushing through every pore. I know I’m on the precipice of something far greater. I can turn and walk away, back down the driveway, ask a neighbor to call a cab to take me to the airport and pick up my car, call my husband, and have him pretend, pretend we’re all right. He’ll rush her out of the house, have a glass of wine poured or a bath run for me with just the right amount of hot water and bubbles, maybe even suggest our hot tub, making sure no traces of her exist. He will wipe the lipstick off the glass she used, throw her towel in the laundry basket, and search like a coon dog to sniff out if she left any articles of clothing—a thong, her bra, maybe a bikini top. He’ll act like the quintessential husband, internalizing her.

  Or I can walk through the gate and confront my worst fears, whispers I’ve heard, texts I’ve seen, emails, the culmination of the last couple months coming to a head. In some ways, I’m terrified. It’s one thing to imagine your husband with another woman, another thing entirely to walk in on them.

  I’m also in need of relief. Confirmation that I’m not losing my shit. That what I’ve seen, the strange happenings, the missing items, the paranoia he claims I’ve developed are tangible, and that I can reach out and touch it, see her.

  I need to see her face, if there are traces of guilt, what’s she done to his family, to us, his child, his wife. I want to wipe the smile off her face, the laughter to die down. She was supposed to be my friend. I trusted her.

  Except when I enter the gate, unhooking the latch, the wood slowly creaking as I open it, her arms are wrapped around his neck, face buried in his shoulder, his hands tangled in her messy bun, almost holding her at a distance, maybe to get a better view? Our backyard is a paradise, one we cultivated over the years, the rock and empty canvas now landscaped, pavers leading out to a hot tub, palm trees situated perfectly, string lights illuminat
ing the path to where they are embracing. Tiki torches add a romantic glow, a built-in BBQ complete with a fridge and sidebar. Wicker patio furniture is positioned with a fire pit and umbrellas on one side, a shed on the other.

  They have music streaming with a phone hooked up to our outdoor speaker, the sound of blues covering the churn of the bubbles and my timid steps. They don’t notice me, lips now in a full-fledged kiss, her hands grabbing at his hair and skin, wet and shiny in the glow from the lights.

  Pausing, I stare.

  Heaving, I clutch my stomach. I almost bang my shin on the gate, a cuss word on the cusp of my tongue. I turn back around, sneaking out the gate, leaving it ajar, so it doesn’t click shut. My hands shake, the key in my hand cold to the touch, my clammy hands ramming the metal into the lock.

  Our living room and dining room, open and spacious, are warm and inviting, the scent of vanilla and honeysuckle air fresheners wafting through the air, the aroma and dim light giving off a romantic vibe. He went all out for this one. Her purse is on the counter, an expensive Italian leather tote bag lying on the speckled granite.

  Fumbling through it, I pull out the contents. Her cell phone’s inside. Car keys. Makeup bag. Mints. Gum. Wallet. I feel the skinny metal object on the bottom before I see it. At first, I assume it’s another key ring, maybe house or office keys. It’s small and round. Pulling it up, it fits perfectly on my finger.