How to Kill a Man in Thirty Seconds

Chapter 74: A Christmas Miracle

FOUR YEARS AGO, DECEMBER 25TH, 09.32 PM, WRIGHTWOOD

The skies had broken open that night, rain pattering with unforgiving strength. The sky was an empty moonless black, only lit up by the occasional angry streak of lightning that tore through it. The streets were empty; even the stray cat by the roadside had burrowed itself into some shelter.

Susan Green barely saw the rain as she sat in her car across from the Red Hills Motel. She had just watched her husband of nearly fifteen years step out of his car and adjust his hair by the side view mirror before he scurried into the motel. It had confirmed her worst fears.

Her brain lacked coherent thought as she stared ahead, not really seeing anything. She felt pain; that much she registered. Tears were building in her eyes like water in a well. It had been a long drought but now the well was overflowing, overwhelmed by the start of unforgiving rainfall that had returned with a vengeance.

She had never known what it felt like to have your heart ripped out, layer by layer by relentless layer, but she knew now. Susan saw fifteen years of memories flit through her mind in one moment. She saw their two kids and for one terrifying second, wondered what would happen to them now.

Her phone was buzzing; Morgan was calling, but she barely heard the distant vibration. The world had slowed down around her.

It hurt. She wanted to scream.

It hurt too much.

The woman had had her suspicions for months but they'd only been fleeting moments of nonsensical paranoia. It was only last week that she had dared to hire an investigator. The pictures he had produced had shattered the lies she'd been blinded by for years. No matter the times Susan had wept, she could not forget the woman's face.

Not the laughing smile, or the crinkle of her eyes. Not the wild black hair or the emerald green eyes.

Susan felt anger surge up inside her at the recollection. She didn't have it in her to sob; she'd done that for days.The venomous stab of betrayal had struck harder than she had ever thought possible. Perhaps it was just karma biting back, she thought as silent tears slipped out.

The woman stepped out into the torrential downpour, hoodie pulled up over her head. Before she knew it, she was mindlessly scurrying towards the motel after her husband.

Susan Green stood outside the door of the motel room, overwhelmed by a sense of foreboding. She was terrified of confronting him, of accepting the heartbreaking reality of what it meant for their future and the future of their children. But most of all, she dreaded confronting the pain- the complete fucking agony- of knowing that the man she had loved wholeheartedly for fifteen whole years did not remotely feel the same.

She turned away for a moment to stare over the railing. She was on the seventh floor and the houses looked like little dollhouses from up here. Streaks of rain shot past her. She placed her hand gently on her stomach and felt her heart sink in her chest; how could she tell him now, of what she carried inside of her?

Susan lost track of passing time. The deafening sound of the thunderstorm filled her ears, blocking out all else, and for a moment- a single blissful second- she felt at peace.

She wondered for a moment if she should turn and walk away, continue living her happy, comfortable life the way she had all these years. Little did she know that she would look back on this moment decades from then, and wish she had chosen differently.

Susan opened the motel door.

Her husband's weathered body lying motionless on the floor, was the first thing she saw. She halted in shock, the air rushing out of her as her gaze flickered in panic over the trail of blood that smothered the floor.