The House Next Door Read online

  McGrath. He’s the only one who might even begin to understand what she’s going through. He’s the only one who’d listen if she called him. Ellen crawls toward her kitchen, toward her cell phone, resting on the counter. All she has to do is pick it up and dial to hear a friendly voice, to see a friendly face, to—

  No. She can’t. She won’t.

  At least not yet.

  Chapter 21

  Nightfall in the hills of San Luis Obispo is a quiet, peaceful time. It’s one of the things Ellen has always loved most about living here.

  But tonight, she finds the silence outside her home deafening.

  She’s been tossing and turning for hours. The two tall tumblers of Scotch she had made her fuzzy but not sleepy. The old sitcom reruns she tried watching were agitating, not distracting. And now, a few minutes before 3:00 a.m., Ellen feels the walls of her little home closing in on her. She can’t breathe. She needs to get out. Get some oxygen. This instant.

  Those damn reporters camped outside can go to hell.

  Ellen bolts out of bed. She throws on a pair of jeans and a black sweater. She ties her wild mane of hair in a sloppy bun. Then she grabs her car keys and, before she has time to change her mind, bursts out her front door toward her Camry.

  This unexpected development clearly catches the sleepy press off guard. Which was exactly Ellen’s intent. “Hey, she’s going somewhere!” one of them shouts as Ellen starts her engine and peels out, the squeal of her tires piercing the quiet night.

  Free at last!

  Ellen tears down her street, blowing past the homes of all her dozing neighbors, who have long since shunned her. She rolls down all her car’s windows and lets the cool air hit her face from every side. It’s exactly the kind of refreshment she needs.

  Ellen applies the brakes as she approaches a yellow light at the intersection of Andrews Street and Monterey. She flips on her turn signal to make a left, even though she doesn’t know exactly where she’s going. For now, she just wants to drive and enjoy the freedom of the open road.

  After a few seconds stopped at the red light, however, that freedom disappears.

  In her rearview mirror, Ellen spots a small caravan of cars and news vans speeding toward her. Those goddamn reporters are following her!

  Ellen furiously pounds her steering wheel. Come on!

  But no. This time, she is not going to give in to them. Not a chance.

  Making sure the intersection is clear, Ellen blows right through the stoplight, crossing Monterey Street and heading onto Grand Avenue. Most of the press is still stopped at the red, but damn it—a few run the light, too, and keep following!

  Gotta get away, Ellen thinks as she barrels along this four-lane thoroughfare. Gotta shake them! But how?

  Up ahead, Ellen sees signs for on-ramps to the 101. Which gives her an idea.

  She knows it’s crazy…but she also knows that at 3:00 a.m. on a weeknight, the freeway should be practically empty. And if she happens to get pulled over, well, she’s been growing chummy lately with a certain SLOPD detective who could probably help her get off with just a warning.

  Ellen takes another look behind her and sees two local news vans and three other cars on Grand Avenue, coming up fast. So she decides it’s worth a shot.

  Making a wildly sharp left to head southbound—via the off-ramp—Ellen is soon racing down the freeway…in the wrong direction!

  Honk-honk-hoooooonk!

  Horns blare and tires screech as the few cars that are on the freeway at this hour brake and swerve like crazy to avoid plowing into her.

  Ellen quickly gets over to the shoulder. She flashes her brights and honks her own horn as a warning to other oncoming vehicles, but she doesn’t slow down one bit.

  Soon she’s pushing forty-five miles per hour, which is about as fast as she feels safe driving in this insane condition. But she knows it will be only a matter of minutes before one of the stunned drivers she passes calls 911. So she’ll have to get off the freeway as soon as possible.

  The hard part, though, is over. She checks her rearview mirror. Not a single news van or reporter’s car is following her! None of them had the balls, which fills Ellen with a burst of pride.

  She keeps driving, the wind roaring through her Camry, the cacophony of horn-honking never stopping.

  Up ahead, finally, Ellen sees an exit. The sign is facing the other direction, of course, but she knows it’s for California Boulevard. The off-ramp gets closer…closer…

  But Ellen steers clear of it. It would spit her out too close to the Grand Avenue off-ramp she used. And the press might be expecting her to do that. They might very well be there waiting for her. Definitely not worth the risk.

  So Ellen continues speeding along. Her sweaty hands stay glued to the wheel. Her steely gaze stays fixed straight ahead. Her icy resolve stays as strong as ever.

  She passes another exit, Santa Rosa Street. Then a third, Osos Street. Ellen considers driving even farther this way, possibly out of town—

  But then she hears a distant police siren.

  Shit!

  Okay. No more time to mess around. The next exit is for Broad Street, and Ellen decides she has no choice but to take it.

  Pumping the brakes as she nears it, she pulls a wide, insanely dangerous U-turn across the two right lanes. Scraping the side of her Camry against the guardrail, she accelerates down the off-ramp and onto this sleepy residential street.

  Ellen heads a few blocks down, then finally pulls over, stopping under the cover of a giant oak tree. She shuts off her engine. She leans her head back.

  And she lets out a long, guttural scream.

  Adrenaline is surging through her body. Tears are leaking from her eyes.

  How the hell did this happen to her life?

  But for right now…what the hell does she do next?

  Chapter 22

  Sleep. Blessed sleep. That’s what Ellen needs most right now.

  As if she weren’t exhausted enough from the stressful hell of the past few weeks, her pulse-pounding drive the wrong way down the 101 has left her drained, both physically and emotionally.

  And now, the sound of that faraway police siren seems to be drawing closer.

  Ellen holds her breath. She clenches her fists. She says a silent prayer.

  Finally, the siren passes, fading into the quiet night.

  Ellen exhales in relief, then starts to consider her next move. She could get back on the freeway—heading in the right direction this time—and keep going, out of SLO. But where? And what would that accomplish? If anything, it would look like she was running away, and that would give the press even more reason to hound her.

  “Those bloodsucking creeps!” Ellen screams out loud inside her car.

  A small army of them are certainly still camped outside her house, waiting to pounce. If she dared go home now, especially at this ungodly hour, after leading them on that high-speed chase? The scene would be sheer chaos. Not very conducive to a good night’s sleep.

  So if Ellen can’t skip town but can’t go home yet, either, what now?

  She gets an idea and shifts her Camry back into drive.

  A few turns later, she’s cruising in the direction of the freeway again, more or less retracing her path, but on surface streets. Eventually she starts driving through a residential neighborhood, nestled in the foothills, where there isn’t another car or person on the road at all. The solitude is calming but also eerie. Unsettling.

  Ellen glances down at her dashboard clock: 3:51 a.m. With a shake of her head, she tries to remember the last time she was out and about this late. Even when she and Michael used to celebrate New Year’s Eve together at the old Moonbeam Lounge downtown, their one big night a year to let loose and drink and dance and act like kids again, they were always back home and in bed by one o’clock at the very latest.

  Tonight, Ellen has been run out of her home. And Michael’s bed is a cot in the county jail. How quickly life can change.


  After passing a block of modest adobe-style houses, Ellen pulls into the driveway of an old-fashioned motor inn, the El Toro Motel, the building small and quaint and painted a light cantaloupe. Seeing a flickering neon sign out front advertising VACANCY, Ellen parks her car in one of the many open spaces and heaves her tired body out.

  She pushes open the lobby door. As it swings shut, a set of old sleigh bells attached to the knob jangles. Inside, the air is air-conditioned cool, but smells faintly of marijuana. Ellen immediately spots the likely source: a young man slouching behind the front desk, his nose buried in his smartphone, his eyes at half-mast and bloodshot.

  Ellen has a hunch this twenty-something stoner—CARSON C., according to his name tag—isn’t about to give her a world-class customer-service experience. But that’s just fine by her. Better than fine, actually. Between his youth, his slovenliness, and his likely altered state, the chances of him recognizing her are slim to none. Which is something Ellen definitely doesn’t want right now.

  “Excuse me, Carson?” she asks, after standing there unseen by the man for nearly thirty whole seconds.

  “Oh, sorry…can I, uh, help you?” he finally mumbles.

  Ellen requests a room for the night. Carson tells her that checkout is at 10:00 a.m., meaning she’d have it for only about five and a half hours. Ellen thinks about that and changes her request.

  “Two nights, then, please. Under the name Judith Hayes.”

  Using an alias gives Ellen a quick shiver of excitement, as if she were a spy or undercover agent. But that was the name of her maternal grandmother, a woman she loved dearly, and using it now also provides her a tiny bit of comfort.

  “Sure thing, ma’am. I just, like, need a credit card?”

  Ellen opens her purse and removes a thick wad of bills instead.

  “How about cash?”

  Key in hand, Ellen shuffles down the walkway to room 4.

  Four—oh, great, Ellen thinks. That’s the number of girls who have gone missing. The number her husband stands accused of kidnapping and murdering.

  Ellen hesitates before unlocking her room. She debates whether to go back and ask Carson for a different one, one that won’t remind her of—

  No. Forget it. She’s just seconds away from passing out anyway, so Ellen opens the door, locks the bolt behind her, and without even turning on the lights, literally collapses face-first onto the queen-size bed.

  In her final few moments awake, an image of Detective McGrath flashes through Ellen’s mind. He’ll probably be waking up soon for work, she thinks. He’ll be told about her daring late-night “escape” from her own home, and her reckless driving down the freeway, too. He might even guess her alias and figure out what motel she’s staying at.

  McGrath might then pay her private room a visit.

  And maybe a part of Ellen wants him to.

  Chapter 23

  Ellen wakes up in the exact same position: facedown on the bed, arms slightly akimbo, feet and calves dangling off the edge. Only now, her sparse little motel room is flooded with morning sunlight.

  Ellen peels herself off the itchy maroon bedspread and looks around, squinting, and fighting off the faintest feeling of nausea. Just like the outside of the motel, the walls are painted a pale orange. The color of vomit, Ellen can’t help but think. And although San Luis Obispo is landlocked, the room is decorated with a maritime theme. A bland watercolor of an anonymous beach is over the bed. A cheap print of a nineteenth-century whaling vessel hangs next to the dusty TV, slightly askew.

  Ellen stumbles into the bathroom and splashes her face with cool water. She gargles some, hoping to flush the sour taste from her mouth. In the process, she gets the briefest glimpse of her ghostly appearance in the mirror—and quickly looks away.

  Debating what to do next, Ellen gives her motel room a once-over. Other than a few creases in the bedcovers, it looks completely untouched, as if she’d never been there at all. As if all the pain and stress and anger she felt last night never even existed. As if it were all right to head back home—which is what Ellen decides to do.

  Next to a decorative glass starfish paperweight on the nightstand sits an ancient clock radio. The time is 10:05 a.m. Which makes Ellen grimly chuckle. She paid for this room for a whole extra night and has ended up needing it for only an extra three hundred seconds.

  Maybe I’ll keep it anyway, she thinks. Just in case.

  Ellen locks the door behind her, then gets into her Camry and pulls out of the El Toro’s parking lot. Some twenty minutes later, she’s rounding the corner onto her block. And the scene is an absolute zoo, the street and sidewalk in front of her home crammed with more reporters and news vans than ever before.

  Just as Ellen starts considering making a U-turn and heading back to the motel, she sees a familiar white Impala parked in her driveway. And there’s good old Detective McGrath again, leaning against the hood, talking on his cell phone. When he spots Ellen’s approaching car, he quickly hangs up. Ellen knows she can’t turn around now. And part of her doesn’t want to anymore.

  “Mrs. Pierson, where did you go last night?”

  “Were you thinking about running away because you’re guilty?”

  The reporters’ questions again come flying at her fast and hard the moment Ellen steps out of her vehicle. But just as fast, McGrath is next to her. He lays a comforting hand on her shoulder and draws her close to him, shielding Ellen from the verbal assault and speaking softly into her ear.

  “Hey…you doing okay?” he asks.

  “Yes, I suppose. I’ve been running errands all morning, just trying to—”

  “Because I was having some trouble sleeping last night, not an uncommon problem for me, either, when I heard a call come over the radio. A car was spotted driving wildly down the 101, the wrong way. Female driver. The descriptions of both sounded familiar. But she somehow slipped away. Crazy, huh?”

  Ellen nods solemnly, realizing now why McGrath is there. She braces herself for what will be coming next: handcuffs and further humiliation in front of the rabid press.

  “If you’re here to arrest me, Detective, just go ahead and—”

  “Arrest you?” McGrath asks, the faintest twinkle in his deep-set eyes. “For what? I just swung by to make sure you are okay.”

  Ellen flushes with relief—and decides to extricate herself as quickly as possible.

  “I’m fine, Detective. Thank you. No need to worry. Now, if you’ll excuse me…”

  Ellen shrugs off McGrath’s touch and starts to hurry inside, averting her gaze.

  She doesn’t want the detective to know how she really feels.

  Chapter 24

  “Wait,” I call out to Ellen as she rushes past me toward her front door. “Just promise me you won’t ever do anything that stupid again.”

  Ellen stops and spins around to face me but still won’t look me in the eye.

  “Why? Are you afraid I might die, and you’ll lose all that precious evidence in here?” She taps the side of her head, a little tauntingly.

  Despite the crowd of reporters at the end of the driveway, their cameras watching our every move, I feel the sudden urge to grab Ellen’s shoulders and give them a violent shake. Of course that’s what I’m afraid of! I want to shout. What the hell are you hiding from me?

  But instead, I say gently, “I want you safe, Mrs. Pierson. For a lot of reasons. Is that so hard to understand?”

  Ellen nods and finally looks me in the eye.

  “I do understand,” she says. “I’m just not sure if I believe you. Or if I trust you.” She pauses, then asks, “I want to trust you, Detective McGrath, but should I?”

  I’ve had similar doubts about Ellen’s honesty since the moment we met. I’m usually damn good at reading people, too. But these past few weeks, the more I’ve gotten to know the intriguing, alluring Ellen Pierson—the low-key wife of one of the most despicable killers I’ve ever put away—the more mysterious she’s become.

  “For
someone with those kinds of doubts,” I say, “you seem pretty willing to keep talking to me.”

  Even though you never actually say a damn thing, I think.

  Ellen smiles and tucks a few errant strands of hair behind her left ear.

  “Maybe…maybe that’s because I like talking to you.”

  I look back at all the reporters crowded up and down the sidewalk, jostling to get the best position, their cameras and microphones pointed at us like weapons.

  “There’s another pretrial hearing today in your husband’s case. Starts in less than an hour, actually. I guess you’re not going?”

  Ellen bites her lip. And shakes her head.

  “Just take care of yourself, Mrs. Pierson. Okay? No more late-night joyrides on the freeway. No more disappearing on me. I need you to be—”

  Ellen takes a sudden step toward me, getting right up in my face.

  I flinch, caught off guard—and reach for my sidearm. But Ellen is too fast.

  She leans in and plants a kiss on my cheek.

  I’m too startled to pull away. But I hear the reporters going wild, hurling questions at us, their cameras click-click-clicking like a swarm of angry cicadas.

  “I—I’m sorry, Detective,” Ellen says, backing away now. “I don’t know what came over me.”

  I’m feeling equally flustered. Maybe more so.

  “Bye, Mrs. Pierson,” I mutter, and get back in my car as quick as I can.

  Chapter 25

  This time, I really stepped in it.

  After leaving’s Ellen’s place, I decided to skip the hearing, drive around town for a little while, then head back to the station. I was feeling so…thrown by the whole episode. So confused. Pierson wasn’t going to be in court today anyway—just his public defender, Kirkpatrick, and the state prosecutor squabbling over some pretrial motions. I could use that extra time to catch up with my partner, get ahead on some paperwork, and think.

  But as soon as I step into the bullpen, I realize I’ve made a big mistake.