The Arrangement by Kiersten Modglin

Author:Kiersten Modglin [Modglin, Kiersten]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kiersten Modglin
Published: 2021-01-27T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Sixteen

PETER

It was my worst nightmare, living with what we’d done. I tossed and turned the entire night, replaying the evening’s events over and over in my head.

The day had started out so normal; how had things gone so wrong? How would I ever sleep again knowing the evidence that I was a murderer was buried just outside? That anyone could find it at any time? Every night for the rest of my life, every single day, I’d be reminded that I was a killer. That I’d killed a man. That I’d killed a cop. That I’d killed a cop in front of my wife.

She’d never forget it. She’d never unsee what I’d done. She must’ve hated me. How had I let us get here? Why had I ever let her go out with that monster? How would I ever be able to breathe again? How would we survive this?

There was a time when I was sure my secret about the other women would destroy me, but this was so much worse. That was an eyelash stuck in the corner of my eye, mildly painful and obtrusive, annoying as all hell, but I could live with it. And I had. This…the fact that Ainsley had watched me become a monster before her very eyes, the fact that there was a dead body buried just outside our front door…it was a scalding hot poker to my insides, the scraping and pulling of all my muscles in opposite directions. It burned and stung and made it impossible to breathe, impossible to think of anything else.

How would I continue living? The idea of going to work on Monday, of facing coworkers, facing my children, while I had no control over who might come snooping around, what wild animal might catch the scent on the wind and dig up the body… It was too much to bear. I couldn’t go to prison. I needed to be here for my kids. I needed to be here for my wife.

I rolled over for the eightieth time, pulling the covers out from under my side. When I looked to Ainsley’s side of the bed, I jumped, sucking in a breath. She was lying there, awake, eyes open and staring straight at me. She had a determined look in her eyes I knew well.

“You need to calm down,” she said softly, her tone firm.

“How am I supposed to be calm right now?” I asked. “How are you calm?”

“I’m not calm,” she said, “but I know that if we don’t at least seem calm, we’re going to get caught.”

“What did you do with the…er, the bat?”

“I bleached it. Tomorrow, I’ll take it with me on my way to work and drop it in a dumpster downtown.”

“Do you think it’s okay to leave…him…where he is? Will he start to…stink or—”

“We don’t have a choice right now,” she cut me off. “He’s there, and for all we know, that’s okay. You think he’s down deep enough, right? To hide the smell?”

“How should I know?” I asked, my hands shaking again.

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