Chapter 66

Chapter Sixty-Six

T he following day comes far too early, yet I feel like I’ve slept like Sleeping Beauty for a hundred years. As I stretch, I gasp painfully and suddenly remember everything terrible that happened yesterday. I left my husband… it flashes through my mind, and I sit upright in bed.

I don’t know how to feel or what to think. Everything in my head is just spinning, and my body aches. My eyes wander next to me, and my bed is empty. Where is Ezra? He slept next to me last night and held me protectively in his arms the whole time. Maybe that’s why I slept so well, even though all those bad things happened yesterday. Still, it makes me wonder all the more where Ezra is.

Then I discover a note on my bedside table. Next to it is another painkiller and a fresh glass of water. I take the pill before reaching for the note Ezra left for me.

Good morning, beautiful!

I’m afraid I have an appointment I can’t reschedule. I’ll be back with breakfast. Rest until then and take the meds.

See you later.

—Ezra

I can’t help the grin that steals across my face at his words. Everything feels right with Ezra. It’s nice to have him by my side, even or maybe because of all the surrounding chaos—my haven of peace. My anchor is someone who supports me and is there for me when I need him.

Even though it hurts to get up, my smile still doesn’t disappear. I feel downright weightless, and it’s only because of Ezra’s words and that I’m about to see him again.

I can no longer deny it—I have fallen head over heels in love with Ezra. I still don’t know how it will all work out between us. After all, I still have to get divorced, and it will not be easy for June. She will need time to digest it all.

But we’ll get through it somehow. However, one thing is certain: I will be with Ezra King, no matter how many hurdles stand in my way. I’ve resisted this attraction between us long enough, and after yesterday—after everything that’s already happened between us—I know we deserve to try at least.

It’s still early morning, but I don’t want to spend the day in bed. At least not alone. So I decided to shower and tend to my wounds again before calling June and then Kelly.

In the shower, while the soothing spray hits my hair, I try not to overthink the horrible images from yesterday. It’s over. I’ve left Thomas, and I hope he’ll leave me alone and give me a quick divorce. I’ll spare June the details in return for him accepting the break-up. I don’t want her to know the other side of her father. She’s still too young, and she loves her father. This would change everything. As long as he never gets violent with her, she doesn’t need to know about our marital problems.

The ringing of the doorbell snaps me out of my thoughts. But with the way I look, I’m certainly not going to open the door. I can’t face anyone like this, all green and blue in the face and with a split lip. I haven’t taken a look in the mirror yet because I at least wanted to take a shower in peace before facing the harsh reality, but there’s no way I’m opening the door in this state.

But the ringing won’t stop. I briefly worry that it might be Thomas, but he would use his key. So who could be ringing the doorbell so insistently? Even after a few more minutes, the ringing continues, and I realize that whoever is outside won’t leave until I answer the door. I quickly get out of the shower, wrap myself in my silk robe, and grab my largest pair of sunglasses. I don’t have time for makeup, so I just hope I can get rid of whoever it is quickly.

I open the door a crack and am surprised to see the young blonde woman from yesterday standing on my porch, the one Ezra spoke to alone for a moment.

“My God!” she gasps, stunned. “Was that him? Did Ezra do that to you?” she asks angrily, looking at me with wide eyes.

“No! What makes you think that? What are you doing here? How did you even find my address?” I rattle off all the questions swirling in my mind.

I’m completely confused. Why does she think Ezra is responsible for the injuries? Ezra could never hit or harm a woman.

“I memorized your license plate number because I knew Ezra would never get a car. I… just had to find you. To talk to you. Urgently ! Please let me in,” she begs, looking at me as if it were a matter of life and death.

She kneads her fingers nervously and steps from one foot to the other as if afraid of standing outside my house for too long.

“I don’t know exactly what happened between you and Ezra, and it’s none of my business, but he told me he apologized yesterday and that he’s very sorry for what happened. So please let bygones be bygones and accept it,” I dismiss her and am about to close the door when I give her another friendly nod to clarify that this conversation is over.

But she braces herself against the door and pushes it open again, looking at me in bewilderment and snorting angrily.

“You want me to leave it alone? What exactly? That he threatened to kill me yesterday if he saw me again? Especially if I come near you? Or should I just get over the fact that he killed my best friend and her boyfriend in cold blood?” she asks me angrily but continues to speak in a lowered voice as we are still on my porch.

I look at her in horror and shake my head stoically a little later. Bullshit!

“How dare you? Do you know what serious accusations these are? Ezra is the kindest man I’ve ever met. He would never hurt a woman! Please leave before I call the police!” This is how I end this bizarre encounter. She’s crazy!

She shakes her head regretfully as if I’m the younger one here who doesn’t have enough life experience to see the threat.

“He’s not who you think he is. I’m just trying to help you. He spent the last six years in prison for a double homicide. Then, he somehow got out. I just didn’t know about it until yesterday. I thought they would never let that psychopath out again! Please, believe me. Here…”

She pulls an old newspaper article out of her pocket and hands it to me. With a furrowed brow, I take it. When I see Ezra on the front page, my eyes widen in horror. This… this can’t possibly be true!

“Do you believe me now? Do you really want to know what happened? Because if you confront him, you’ll only hear his version, and it certainly won’t be true. Please, I just want to prevent another murder. I want to help you. Please!” she begs me and grabs my hand in panic.

Stunned and quick-witted, I nod and let her into the house so that she can tell me what happened.

My stomach clenches, and I feel sick. Ezra is a murderer? That… that simply can’t be! But here it is, in black and white. He’s never said a single syllable about being in prison for the last few years, and if what the authorities think is true and he really is innocent, why hasn’t he told me? I don’t know what to think anymore, and I’m dizzy from all the questions in my head.

When I get to my kitchen, I slump down on one of the stools. I don’t even have the strength to offer her a drink. I’m too stunned.

“Listen…”

“Cora. Call me Cora, and you’re Jenny?”

She nods.

“Cora, I know it’s a lot to take in at once. But please, believe me. Ezra is sick. He is sickly obsessed when he falls in love. I did some research while he was in prison and found out that all his ex-girlfriends had either mysteriously disappeared or committed suicide, even though there were no known mental health issues. All open or unsolved police cases. Sarah, my best friend, wasn’t the first, and she won’t be the last. Do you understand what I’m trying to tell you here?” she asks me and grabs my hand insistently.

I don’t know what to say or what to think. It all sounds completely absurd and far-fetched. But then why was he convicted, arrested, and then released? None of this makes any sense at all! My head is spinning. I close my eyes for a moment, trying to organize my thoughts before I can get to the bottom of everything and make sense of it all.

“What happened to your best friend and her boyfriend? And why has Ezra been released if he’s supposedly guilty?”

“Ezra was obsessed with Sarah. She was his best friend’s girlfriend. I don’t know where he got the idea that he and Sarah were ever a couple because they never were. Sarah loved Milo. She would never have been unfaithful to him or started something with his best friend. One day, Ezra completely lost it and claimed that he and Sarah had been together. He stalked her from then on. Everywhere she went, he went. Always . It was scary. He flooded her with messages and calls. But the crazy thing about the messages was that he pretended they had a normal relationship as if Milo didn’t even exist… And then… one night at a party, when he saw the two of them together, he freaked out and went off on Milo. He was thrown out, and Sarah thought it was finally over, but the next day, they were both dead. He bashed their heads in. They were almost unrecognizable. I… I found them,” she sobs at the end and collapses on the chair next to me.

I pat her shoulder because she is completely distraught. The whole thing still weighs so heavily on her, even though, as I can see from the newspaper article, it was over six years ago.

“I’m terribly sorry about your friend and her boyfriend… But who says it was Ezra?” I clutch at the last straw because I still don’t see a ruthless killer in Ezra, even though the story sends an icy shiver down my spine.

“I saw him that night. I was the key witness who put him in jail, and I was sure he was going to die in there. But now… Cora, he’ll kill me if he finds out I was here.”

Panicked, she glances around as if expecting Ezra to suddenly appear. Her fear of him is palpable, but it leaves me confused. How could I have encountered such a different side of him, while she seems to know another version entirely?

I reflect on every encounter and every conversation we’ve had to see if anything could match what she’s told me here.

“Cora, this guy is sick! You must see that, right? Has he ever done anything strange? Was suddenly there, appearing out of nowhere? In the right place at the right time? Anything? He’s a master at making you believe things that aren’t there. He had everyone wrapped around his finger back then, so no one believed Sarah that he was stalking her. And she couldn’t say anything to Milo because he would have gone through fire for Ezra. He probably never thought he’d die at his hands.”

I look at her with wide eyes before my gaze finds its way to the pool. It was… planned from the start?

I jump up from my stool and shake my head in horror.

“Cora, if he did this, go to the police! You mustn’t cover for him because next time he’ll kill you!” she implores me.

But I shake my head.

“No. It wasn’t Ezra. It was… my husband. Ezra intervened and saved me,” I explained to her.

“He split you up? And your husband is still alive? How long have you two been together?” she asks, and I can’t help but notice the insistent undertone.

I make a rough mental count of the weeks and months that Ezra and I have known each other.

“Maybe two or three months. Ezra did nothing to my husband. He threw him out and then took care of me. I never noticed him being violent or anything. The only thing… There were a few coincidences where he was suddenly just there. He… was always just there,” I whisper weakly at the end, and a shiver takes hold of me as I realize Jenny might be right.

But then these wonderful images flood my mind again. Moments when I felt so safe and secure with Ezra. It couldn’t possibly have been an act planned from the start. Or could it have been? Was every encounter, everything that happened between us, already planned by him so that he could seduce me and I would leave my husband for him? Is that why he was always so generous, patient, and loving toward me? Everything my husband wasn’t because Ezra knew that’s exactly how I would react. Was it like that? I have no idea what is real and what is not. My head spins faster and faster with all the thoughts until the dizziness that forms in it almost wrestles me down.

My heart contracts painfully, and feels like it’s about to jump out of my chest and shatter into thousands of pieces at my feet. It would never be repaired again, and in the future, anyone who tried to mend it would simply cut themselves on the sharp splinters, if what this stranger is telling me is true. Can I trust you? Is everything you’re telling me about Ezra—the man who has captured my broken and stunted heart in such a short time—true…?

My head spins incessantly, threatening to drown me in the swirling vortex of confusion within my mind. Suddenly, the sound of a motorcycle snaps me out of my stupor.