Page 108 of The Accomplice
Danny screamed at me to leave her alone.
I was suddenly very frightened. I was unmoored. The world was spinning around me. My mind was disintegrating. What he had put me through just hit me all at once and I started crying. I ran out of the apartment. Otto said something to the woman, I couldn’t hear what, but I thought I heard a name. Then Otto chased after me. I got into my car and I just drove away. Otto called me seven times, but I didn’t answer. I needed time to think. To get myself together. I don’t know how long I drove around, but it was dark by the time I pulled in and parked by the side of the street and called him back.
I felt like such a fool.
He told me I had been betrayed, that it wasn’t my fault.
God, I felt so awful for hitting that woman. I’m not a violent person. I’d never hit anyone before in my life. The thought of it just made me feel worse.
Otto said he was sure she would understand. But that’s not exactly what he said. He kind of stumbled over his words and I got the impression he was about to say her name, then caught himself before he said too much. Then he went very quiet on the other end of the line.
He knew her. Or recognized her. I was sure of it.
This at least was one thing I could do to make myself feel better. I could go and apologize. Danny had made me hit that woman. Yeah, she was sleeping with my husband, but Danny was the one who had put me through this hell. It wasn’t her fault. Not really. I bet he was lying to her too.
I begged Otto to tell me who the woman was.
At first, he didn’t say anything. Then he admitted he did know her.
After a few minutes, he told me what I needed to know.
He gave me Stacy Nielsen’s address. It was fifteen minutes away. I drove onto her street, parked and stood outside her house. I wanted to talk to her. Tell her I was sorry, and I guess I wanted her to say sorry too. She had hurt me, deliberately. Neither of us deserved a man like Danny. I wanted to tell her we busted into that apartment to save her because we thought he was hurting her. It wasn’t to confront her.
I was standing on the street. Her house in front of me, when someone spoke. Someone asked me what the hell I was doing. I swung around to see Danny walk up beside me. He said he’d just dropped off Stacy, and he saw my car pull up.
I couldn’t quite believe it, but he started to bitch about me. He wanted to know what the hell I was doing here ? Was I really going to confront Stacy about her affair, in front of her family ? !
Her family.
I moved forward, slowly, Daniel kept in step beside me, and I gazed through their front window. Two young kids curled up on the couch beside her. A husband in the big armchair in the corner as they watched TV.
Stacy Nielsen looked like mother of the year, sitting in her living room with her family around her.
I turned, started walking back to the car.
Danny said he needed to talk to me. To explain all of this. I told myself I wasn’t going to be lied to again, and I told him no. I didn’t want to talk to him. I never wanted to see him again.
I didn’t want to have an argument on the street. I saw Daniel glance up at the lit windows. It distracted him enough to let me put some distance between us. I got to my car, got in and locked it as he approached the passenger window.
He looked different. Outside my window, his face had changed.
There was an anger inside of him.
I put my foot on the gas and drove straight home.
The house felt empty and cold. It was a hostile place – somewhere I couldn’t trust. It didn’t feel like home anymore. I stripped off in the bathroom, the shower running. I was about to put my clothes in the wash basket when I noticed blood on my sleeve.
Jesus, I must’ve split her lip when I lashed out in the apartment.
I showered, put on my night things and went to bed. I was hungry, but I couldn’t face eating. I couldn’t sleep either, but I lay in bed, willing myself to drift off into unconsciousness. I just needed that day to be over. Somehow, at some point that night, sleep took me.
The sound of my phone ringing woke me just after one a.m. I checked the display. Answered it.
It was Otto.
For a blissful second, in the moment of waking, I was not the foolish woman who had shamed herself, who had been betrayed, who opened the door and stepped into another life that was burning me up inside.
Then, I remembered.
