Or would she?
Just the idea of her facing this sadistic fucker one-on-one made my blood run cold. She needed to know exactly who her husband was before it was too late.
Grabbing my phone, I dialed Gianna’s number. She had to know what she was up against. Maisie began to whine on my lap as I impatiently waited for Gianna to pick up. I rubbed the top of her head, not sure if I was trying to soothe her anxieties or my own.
The phone just rang and rang. And again, there was no answer.
42
Gianna
“Forty-seven, forty-eight, forty-nine—”
The sound of my cell phone vibrating interrupted my nightly regimen of two hundred crunches. In the shelter’s shared bunk room, other women always eyed me curiously when I did these, but nobody asked questions. If they did, it would break an unspoken code. We all had our story, and not one of us owed another an explanation.
Reaching over to the small table next to my bed, I looked at the vibrating screen of the phone. Derek was calling.
“Hey, you,” I greeted. “What’s up?”
“Gianna, finally! Are you all right?” The alarm in his tone was apparent.
“Yeah, why wouldn’t I be? Are you? What’s going on?” A worrying silence fell on the other end of the line. “Derek?”
“I’ve been trying to reach you all night. Why didn’t you answer any of my calls?”
I ignored the accusatory tone and focused on the underlying panic I heard in his voice.
“I left my phone in my room while I was…” I trailed off, unable to tell him that I was helping the other women in the shelter clean the common room. If I did, I’d reveal my location. “Does it matter? Derek, what’s wrong?”
“There was a break-in at the gym tonight, probably right after we closed. Whoever broke in managed to bypass the alarm system. Club Revolution has some high-profile DJ there tonight and there was a huge line to get in—one that extended to the front of the gym. They saw something was up and called the police.”
“Did they catch the person?”
“No. I’m here at The Mill with the police now. They’re just wrapping up. The FBI just left.”
“The FBI?”
“Jesus Christ, Gia… I don’t even know how to tell you this.”
Now, I was beginning to panic and gripped the phone tighter.
“Tell me what?”
“The gym was vandalized.”
“Well, that’s just stupid. I never understood why people feel the need to vandalize things. Breaking in and robbing the place is bad enough. Why wreck everything?”
“That’s just it—this wasn’t a robbery. Nothing appears to be taken. This was very deliberate.”
A sinking feeling settled in my stomach.
“What do you mean?”
“I think you’re right about Ethan being in New York. I think he did this. I just finished talking to the FBI about him.”
Shivers raced down my spine, and I wondered if the time to confront Ethan was near. I’d only been hard training with Xi for two weeks. While I felt more prepared, I wished I’d had more time. Now, with Derek talking to the police—and apparently the FBI—it was only a matter of time before I was flushed out of my hiding place.
“The FBI doesn’t get involved in local, petty crimes like vandalism. Why were you talking to them?” I asked.
“It had something to do with the Violent Crimes Division and criminal profiling. There are things… things you need to know. He’s not who you think he is. Yes, he’s a monster, but it’s so much worse than you thought.” He fell silent, and my heart began to beat rapidly in my chest. I’d never heard him sound like this before. He sounded genuinely terrified.
“What, Derek? Tell me.”
“Four women are dead, Gia. The FBI thinks he killed them. I saw pictures of things… terrible things. He had an apartment with a bunch of corkboards covered with photos of the women he’s stalking. There were pictures of you that looked like they were taken long before you ever met him. There was a weird shrine to the Virgin Mary and a fish tank with a snake. He uses a whip to punish himself, and—”
“Derek, stop.” He was rambling and not making any sense. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Who has an apartment with a snake? Ethan?”
“Yes!”
Derek continued at a more measured pace, recapping everything that happened from the moment a police officer had come to his door to tell him there’d been a break-in. The more he talked, the more I felt like I was living in an alternate reality.
Missing women.
Homicide.
Radicalized Catholic. The seven deadly sins. Shrines. Crosses.
Homicide.
Homicide.
Homicide.
Keywords replayed over and over again in my head as quick, shallow breaths chopped at my chest.
No, no, no!
While I heard what Derek was saying, it was as though he was speaking to someone else in another life. I knew Ethan to be among the most vile who walked the earth, but if what Derek said was true, what did that say about me? I’d been married to a serial killer and I didn’t even know it. I staggered under the cumulative weight of his words.
Flashes of my life with Ethan assaulted me—sunset walks when we were dating, his marriage proposal, our wedding vows, moments of intimacy. All of it had been with a stranger. I’d shared my bed with a murderer. How could I have been so blind—to not know about this other life my own husband lived?
A part of me wanted to curl into a ball and deny what I was hearing. They say ignorance is bliss. Would I have been better not knowing any of this—not knowing that my husband was secretly a religious zealot who stalked and murdered women? I thought back to the many instances of abuse I’d experienced at Ethan’s hand. I’d often wondered if he’d mentally kissed his knuckles before smashing them into my cheek. Now I knew he was reverently kissing a cross in the most twisted, hedonistic sort of way.
My stomach roiled, and I wanted to be sick. Oddly, I also felt a strong surge of guilt—guilty for surviving while so many others had died. If I’d had the courage to go to the police or the FBI like Cynthia had, could I have prevented any of those women from dying?
I tried not to contemplate the horrors they may have gone through and swallowed the bile welling in my throat. Sheer will was the only thing keeping the tremble out of my body as I finished listening to Derek.
“The FBI wants to talk to you. They want to offer you witness protection.”
“Not a chance in hell,” I immediately responded.
“Gianna, please,” Derek begged. “I know you don’t trust the police, but you have to take my word about this. Talk to Agent Gregory. She promised to keep you safe.”
I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose. A tension headache was beginning to spread across my forehead, either from keeping my jaw clenched for so long or from the surge of adrenaline that always came with fear.
“This isn’t about trusting them, Derek… at least now it isn’t. It’s about not wanting to hide anymore. After I told you everything, I finally felt there was hope—like I could have a real shot at life after Ethan. I don’t want to go backward. Witness protection would do exactly that. What happens to me if some hotshot lawyer manages to get him off on a technicality? I’d have to stay hidden indefinitely, and I don’t want to hide anymore.”