Page 80 of Circle of Strangers
I step into the house after work, and the instant silence strikes me like a cold, hard slap despite the fact that I knew I’d be coming home to this. Still, nothing could’ve prepared me for the deafening lack of laughter, cartoons, and little feet pattering across the floor. Nothing but a void and Camille’s meticulous order.
The kids’ shoes aren’t by the door. Georgiana’s favorite pink backpack—the one she drags everywhere—is absent. Jackson’s blue train, the one he takes everywhere lately, is nowhere to be found. Reality clicks into place faster than I’d like to admit, faster than I want to accept.
My phone is already in my hand. Her number. Dialed. Straight to voice mail. A muscle in my jaw tightens, but I keep my cool. I dial again, just to make sure. Nothing.
She hasn’t replied to any of my texts from earlier, so I don’t expect her to answer my calls, but it doesn’t stop me from trying.
My lips twitch into something that’s not quite a smile. I’d always had my suspicions about Camille, suspecting there was more to her than met the eye. No one isthatperfect. But my uncertainties weren’t confirmed until my mother let the cat out of the bag last year with Camille’s diagnosis.
Unbeknownst to my wife, we’re two sides of the same coin in many ways. Learning about her diagnosis only helped me understand her better so I could keep a tighter leash on her and maintain the control I spent our entire marriage letting her think she had.
But leaving me? Taking the kids? That wasn’t part of the game.
My hand clenches into a fist so tight it sends a shock of pain up my forearm. Eyeing the nearest wall, I fight the urge to punch it.
I want to.
But I don’t.
Because there’s power in control, and power is what I have in spades.
I call my wife again. Voice mail. A third time. Voice mail. My calm fractures. My thumb hovers, then swipes over another name in my contacts.
Sozi.
She answers on the second ring, her voice soft but wary. “Will?”
“She’s gone,” I say, my voice even, deliberate.
There’s a pause, and I know she’s calculating. Always thinking, always trying to anticipate me. She couldn’t if she tried. She’s not as intelligent, not nearly as cunning. That’s why I picked her as my affair partner. We met at a hotel bar years ago, when I was in Boston for a medical conference and she was in town visiting family for a reunion. She was distractingly gorgeous—which drew my eye. And after buying her a drink and talking to her, it didn’t take long for me to ascertain she was perfect for me ... for what I wanted, for what I needed.
She was weak. Unsure of herself. Mentally unstable enough to not cause problems but enough that she’d be easy to control. She lapped up my attention like a relapsing addict, and by the end of the night, when I took her back to my hotel room, she was putty in my hands.
The woman didn’t bat a lash when I told her I needed her to fake her death in my garage so I could get a better handle on Camille. She even did it all herself, followed my instructions to the letter. I didn’t have to leave work.
“What do you mean,gone?” Sozi asks.
“Exactly what I said. Camille left. Took the kids.” I pause, letting the words hang. “I just got home and the house is empty. She’s not answering her phone. The kids’ things are gone.”
“I told you she was unstable,” Sozi says after a moment, her tone edging toward smug. She’s been trying to convince me to leave my wife for a couple of years now. It was never going to happen, but letting Sozi think there’s a chance keeps her compliant and loyal. “You didn’t want to hear it.”
“Unstable?” I let out a soft laugh. “Sozi, if Camille is unstable, what does that make you?”
I shouldn’t have said that. My emotions are running too high for my own good. “Unstable” is a sharp word to use on people who don’t realize they’re unstable. It cuts them like a surgical blade. The last time I said that to Sozi, I was attempting to demonstrate how fucked up it was that she was befriending my wife—and the whole wine bottle and note from “M” was unnecessary. I told her she was above that despite knowing damn well she wasn’t. But I had to get her under control. She was getting carried away and that was my fault. I knew moving next door to her was going to be risky, but it was the challenge of it that excited me. Except in doing so, I got Sozi’s hopes up a little too high. It emboldened her in ways it shouldn’t have.
There’s a sharp intake of breath on the other end of the line, and for a second, I think Sozi might hang up. But she doesn’t. She never does.
“What do you want me to do?” she asks, her voice softer now, pliant. “Can I come back home?”
Sozi’s death was supposed to be my masterpiece, the move that put Camille exactly where I needed her. After finding that app on her phone, I thought she was going to leave me for that sad sack of shit next door—which would’ve been humiliating and financially ruinous. And when she found out about my contact with my mother, that presented an entirely new set of issues. Staging Sozi’s death gave me two things: a way to keep Camille silent about my mother’s no-contact violation, and a lock on her loyalty.
I lean against the kitchen counter, exhaling slowly as I pinch the bridge of my nose. Tension coils at my temples, pounding in time with each heavy thump of my heart.
“She’s going to regret this,” I say, more to myself than to Sozi.
“What’s the plan?” Sozi asks, her voice almost trembling with eagerness. It’s sickening how predictable she is, how desperate for my approval. But that’s what makes her useful. Minus the meddling she did when she felt threatened by Mara’s flirtations—the necklace, the letter, the constant planting of seeds in Camille’s mind about Mara—Sozi’s come in quite handy since we moved. After nipping some things in the bud, I was able to rein in Sozi’s crazy to a controllable level again, but it took a bit of finessing.
“Our plan?” I repeat, a smile curling at the corners of my lips as I emphasize the word “our.” I need her to believe she’s not the replaceable pawn she truly is. “Our plan is simple. I find my kids. I bring them home. And Camille learns what happens when you play games with someone who doesn’t lose.”
