Page 1 of The Atonement
CHAPTER ONE
AINSLEY
My husband was alive.
He was alive and he shouldn’t be.
That was my fault.
I checked the rearview, both for signs of being followed and to make sure my children were still there. Still asleep. Still safe. But for how long?
How long did we have until he found us?
Maybe he already had.
I’d read over his text message what felt like a thousand times, until my eyes blurred with tears, fear, and fury.
Then, I’d loaded up my kids, sand still drying on their damp legs, and we’d rushed back to the hotel. I couldn’t tell them what was happening—could never tell them what I’d done, so instead, I said very little. They understood something was very wrong—I never let them see me so distraught—and I was grateful when they moved withme, packing their things quickly and loading them into the rental car without too many questions.
We were coming home from our vacation days early, but the stress I wore like a blinding hazard sign seemed to keep them from complaining.
“Is everything okay?” Maisy had asked once more, after her brothers had both fallen asleep. I wanted to be honest with her, truly I did, but what could I say?
What could I ever tell her in order to make her understand how we got here?
As I stared into the headlights approaching our car on the quiet highway, I had to wonder how exactly wehadgotten here.
Ten years ago—hell, two years ago even, if someone had told me this was what would become of us, I would’ve laughed at them. Because it was ridiculous.
We were normal people.
A normal family.
Two loving parents.
Three perfect children.
How, then, had we managed to fall this far so fast?
I knew the answer without having to think about it, really.
Peter.
The answer was always Peter.
He was the reason I’d had to make the choices I did. He was the reason for all my mistakes. No matter what I did, nothing seemed to faze him, nothing seemed to make him want to change…not for me, not for his kids, not for anything.
And now, he was refusing to die.
The easiest thing he could’ve done, yet he refused.
While I could predict almost everything about him, I had no idea what would be running through my husband’s mind at that moment, and that scared me maybe more than anything else.
Being unable to stay one step ahead of him simply because he wasn’t meant to have any steps left, had caused me to stumble.
And I’d always prided myself on my ability toneverstumble.
As the car behind us gained speed, the bright headlights blinding me in the rearview, my stomach lurched.
