She sounds desperate.

Long rolls of carpet in the back of Christian’s SUV.

Beth does not come out of the carriage house.

Beth’s earring, broken, on the floor.

It’s not easy to kill someone, Jewelann.

It’s always the boyfriend.

I drain my glass of wine and get up to look out through the sliding glass doors. His car isn’t in the driveway, but I saw lights on over there last night when I got up to use the bathroom, so I know he was there. But had he been alone? “Why would Christian have any reason to hurt Beth?”

Do I think he hurt Beth?

“Why does any man need a reason to hurt a woman?” Lisa asks darkly, each word jagged and icy.

More silence. It stands out to me that neither one of us has dared to say the word “kill” aloud. “Nobody’s saying she’s dead, Lisa.”

“Maybe she and C.C. ran off together—” Lisa begins.

“No.” I cut her off, razor-sharp. “He … no.”

Not after what happened between us, after I let him back in. It’s one thing to know he was with me after being with Beth, but I can’t bear to imagine him being with her after being with me. What about murdering her, though? Can I bear to think he’s capable of doing that? I did, after all, ask him to help me kick a ladder out from underneath my husband.

Still, we can’t go down this bumpy, winding road simply out of hysteria. I don’t like Beth, and I don’t trust Christian, but something about all of this feels off. I remember Beth slurring, weaving, stoned. He didn’t have to kill her to be involved in her going missing. Accidents happen. And if he was responsible, he’d have hidden that, wouldn’t he?

He would.

Anyone would.

“Oh, God.” Lisa rocks back and forth, squeaking the chair. “This is really messed up. Should we go to the police?”

“If Steve thought Christian was involved, he’d have told the police that. We don’t need to complicate anything.” And I don’t want the police to have any reason to come around, not until I can be sure Eli won’t get caught up in this.

Lisa nods but looks skeptical.

“People have fights, they need time to cool off. I mean, look at me.” I hold up my bare-fingered hand. “Ken and I had a fight a few days ago. He told me wanted out. He left. I haven’t heard from him since then.”

“So he’s missing, too?”

“I don’t think he’s missing,” I say, after a pause. Lisa stares with the concentrated focus of someone trying very hard to see only one of me. “He’s just gone.”

Lisa helps herself to another healthy glug of vodka, thinning the orange juice to a pale gold. She swirls it and sips with a grimace. Another heavy sigh. I sip wine while she drinks my vodka, and soon she’s heading toward being smashed.

She takes a long drink and sets the glass down with a heavy sigh. “So … maybe Beth is just gone for a while, and she’ll come back?”