The Stranger Inside_A Novel by Lisa Unger

Author:Lisa Unger [Unger, Lisa]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Thrillers, Psychological, Crime, General
ISBN: 9781488050985
Google: bA11DwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2019-09-17T15:46:47+00:00

It was late when Hank’s call came in and she left her dorm room to go to his Lower East Side loft. Greg was studying that night. They’d had an early dinner together and she knew Greg wouldn’t call again that night; that he wouldn’t drop by.

She’d almost told Greg at dinner, almost broke up with him. Whatever was happening with Hank, it was getting more intense. Even when she was with Greg, she was thinking about Hank. It wasn’t right. Her feelings had swept her away, fast, downriver; she wasn’t sure she could get back. Wasn’t sure she wanted to. Hank connected her to a part of herself that she’d forgotten.

When she got to Hank’s building, he buzzed her in and she climbed the dingy stairwell, pushed through the open door to his place. He was standing by the window, his big, muscular body in silhouette against the blue-black night, the light coming in from the streetlamp.

“Hey,” she said.

He turned to face her. There was something hard about his expression. Something dead in the eyes. She felt a flutter in her chest, which was silly. Because she knew him. It was as if she’d always known him. Preschool through middle school. He picked her up after she fell off her bike and helped her home to her mom. She defended him against Max, the school bully, got a detention for swearing. She wrote his book reports; he helped with her math homework. Hank was in love with her, always had been. It was just something she’d always known, even before she knew what it meant to be in love with someone.

“What is it?” she asked, moving closer even though something inside told her to move away. The door closed behind her.

“We’ve never talked about it,” he said. “Not really.”

“About what?”

But she understood. It always lingered in the air between them. That summer afternoon when the world changed.

“About what happened to us. I never told you the details.”

“No,” she said. That complicated swell of feelings—a sick fear, shame, anger—it all rose up from her belly into her throat.

“What happened to Tess, to me,” he said. “At Kreskey’s house.”

“I read the transcripts,” she said, sitting at the rickety kitchen table where he studied. “Not then. But later.”

They’d each given their testimony in chambers, just the attorneys, their parents, the judge. They were spared the courtroom; the media largely left them alone. Hank’s family left town shortly after. Rain’s family stayed. When she returned to school she felt embraced, people were kind—teachers, even the other children.

Eventually, what had happened became a kind of folklore, a ghost story—for everyone else. She became a character in a story that might have happened, or maybe not. Unbelievably, as the years passed it faded for her, as well. That day in the woods took on the gauzy quality of a nightmare. There were the scars, the dreams from which she woke screaming, the anxiety she felt around strange men, her strong attachment to her mother—she never went to another sleepover after that.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.