“I understand,” I said gently. “I understand how difficult it was for you. I’m safe now. You don’t have to worry anymore. And… ” I swallowed thickly in the midst of my dissembling. “I forgive you.”
Part of me was stunned that I said it. But then I saw relief break over her thin, ravaged face, and I knew why I had.
Lorraine had known, deep down, what Noah Madaster was doing to their only child. She’d believed she’d been powerless to stop it. And so she’d consigned herself to waking up to a fresh hell every day of her life. I understood in that moment that Lorraine’s madness was an escape from Madaster. But it was an escape from the monumental guilt of a mother who could not—or would not—protect her child, as well. I cringed inwardly, recognizing the pit of pain and despair inside her.
Inside this house.
In the distance, I heard the sound of someone descending the stairs rapidly. I looked behind Lorraine, and peered for the first time into the South Twin.
It was darker here than in the North Twin. Heavy drapery covered every window that I could see. It was laid out differently, as well. The first thing that I saw was an impressive mahogany grand staircase almost immediately outside of the entry foyer. It wasn’t Y-shaped like the one in the North Twin.
This one went straight up.
Straight down.
The staircase was so steep, I couldn’t see the top of it. But surely that’s where the shout—Noah’s shout—had come from. I pictured him sitting impatiently at the top of the stairs in his wheelchair, the shadows clinging around him.
It was Noah’s nurse who currently descended the steep steps. She stopped around halfway down the stairs, a frown plastered on her face. She beckoned to me. I gave Lorraine another stroke of reassurance and started to move past her. Lorraine grabbed my wrist, her grip surprisingly strong.
“Be careful on the stairs. They’re more dangerous than a knife,” Lorraine whispered heatedly. And then I saw it: a knowing, malicious gleam in her rheumy eyes. I started. Seeing the blank surprise on my face, Lorraine gave a small nod, affirming the flash of truth I’d seen.
Lorraine Madaster wasn’t the helpless pawn I’d imagined. It played out in my mind’s eye like a film clip: the frail, forgotten woman with a lifetime of regret, loss, and hatred boiling inside her. She creeps up behind Noah Madaster.
(Not so weak in that moment, was I?)
I started. It’d been like Lorraine had said the words, but her mouth hadn’t moved.
Madaster had been talking on the phone in that loud, firm, superior tone, oblivious to everything but whatever he was demanding of the person on the other end of the connection.
She hated the sound of his smug, authoritative voice. Years of suppressed rage exploded to the surface.
A mighty push.
And the all-powerful Noah Madaster was falling and falling, his body breaking before her gleeful gaze.
I blinked, cutting off the imagined film clip.
Only it wasn’t my imagination. I knew that, somehow, as I stared down at Lorraine’s flushed face. Noah’s fall had been no accident. Lorraine had been the one responsible for Noah Madaster’s spinal cord injury.
Just like Evan, she’d wanted revenge. And she’d gotten some measure of it. But he’d lived. Why hadn’t Madaster punished her for pushing him?
“He doesn’t know,” Lorraine whispered as though she’d read my mind. She pointed to her temple, her face full of madness. “His head got broken a little on those stairs, too. Not as much as his back. But enough to make him forget.”
“Miss. If you just walk away from her, she’ll leave you alone.”
I threw a frown over my shoulder, fuming. That Nurse-Bitch had made Lorraine sound like an annoying dog.
I gave Lorraine another shoulder-squeeze. “I’ll be okay,” I said softly.
I felt her grip fall off my wrist. Steeling myself, I walked toward the stairs.
I passed the nurse, not even sparing her a glance. All my attention was focused like an arrow on the presence I sensed at the top of the stairs. As I neared him, nausea flared in my stomach. It was very dark, and I couldn’t quite make him out in the shadows.
Keep back, I ordered that encroaching panic angrily. I won’t let him see me afraid.
I stopped ten feet from the top of the stairs.
“Turn on I light, or I’m not coming up any farther,” I said.