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It was always my father who said for anyone to take you seriously, you must dress the part. When I met Dominic, he wandered around in plain T-shirts, jeans, and sneakers. Once he was mine, I invested in his style. I started slowly, with button-down shirts and jeans. I allowed him to keep the sneakers but only to show him that the people we surrounded ourselves with do not wear sneakers every single day, and if there’s one thing I know about my husband, he does not like to be the outcast. Together, we’ve progressed to full suits and designer dress shoes.
I almost sigh. Look at him. So handsome. Sometimes I miss the old us. His hair is cut army short and wavy at the top, his tie neat, as if he’s recently adjusted it. His skin is golden-brown and satiny smooth. In the light of the kitchen, his skin glows and the sun reflects off his light-brown eyes.
There was a time when he’d greet me in the kitchen with that full, perfect smile. He doesn’t smile anymore. Instead, he steps toward the counter to pick up one of the glasses of juice along with three sausage links.
“Rally is today. Will you be there?” he asks after guzzling down some of the juice.
“Of course I will,” I say. “Appearances are everything to you, right?”
He gives me a look, one mixed with confusion and aggravation. He gulps down the remainder of juice then collects his keys from the hook attached to the wall, as well as the folder he’d left on the counter last night containing his speech. I’d written the speech for him several weeks ago. Does he thank me? No.
“Don’t be late, Jo,” he says, leaving the kitchen. When he’s out the front door, I watch him through the kitchen window above the sink. If things are going well today, I know that state troopers are parked at the curb of our house, waiting for the governor’s departure. In the driveway is a running black Tahoe. Dominic climbs in the backseat of the Tahoe and it pulls out of the driveway. Our driveway is built at an arch, so from the kitchen, I can’t see the main road. At the end of the driveway, the land is lined with a knee-height brick wall, green hedges, and a gate that closes us in.
When I can no longer see the truck, I rush out of the kitchen and into Dominic’s office. My husband is hiding something. I don’t know what it is, but it has to be here.
I check the desk for anything new, but it’s all the same. Printed speeches and loose papers. Paperclips, pens, a stapler. I grip the handle of the top right drawer, and nothing is inside but loose stationary. On the top left drawer, it’s crammed with chewing gum and sunflower seeds, his vice when he wants to avoid drinking. When he has events, he aims not to drink liquor the night before.
I check the bottom drawers and it’s no surprise they’re locked. Ever since we moved into this house, he’s kept them locked. I thought nothing of it at first. After all, we all need our privacy. I have a secret treat stash that I keep in a chest on my side of the closet. I keep the chest locked too, so Dominic can never see exactly what I’m stashing there. I sit for a moment, trying to think of where he’d have the key.
Normally, I don’t pry in my husband’s things, but ever since his campaign has started, he’s been more on edge, more secretive. He leaves early and comes home late. He’s not the Dominic Baker I married all those years ago. He’s someone else—a stranger residing in his body. Or perhaps this is the real him, tried and true.
A chiming noise blares in the room, causing me to gasp. I relax when I realize it’s my phone ringing in my pants pocket. I snatch it out to see the reminder alarm: Coffee @ Daphne’s.
I can’t be late, and as badly as I want to find the keys to those drawers, I let it be for now and tuck the chair beneath the desk.
I hurry to the kitchen to drink some of the juice, collect my purse and keys, and leave the house. On the way to my best friend’s house, I find my mind sinking deeper into a bad place and all I can think are the same words: He’s hiding something. He’s lying. Figure it out.
THREE
BRYNN
Four years ago—New Orleans
I hated everything about New Orleans. Of course, it wasn’t always like that. I’d moved to New Orleans when I started college, but that was nearly ten years ago. After being cheer captain in high school and being the most popular girl, might I add, I was offered only one scholarship to college, at Loyola University of New Orleans.
At first, I was ecstatic because I’d never been outside of North Carolina, and it was better that I had some interest from a college than none at all. I’d seen many girls in my cheer squad graduate high school with nothing in their back pockets. In a way, my scholarship was owed to me. I kept the team in tip-top shape. I made sure practice ran as scheduled, and it gave me escape from the awful reality I faced at home. Growing up poor with a verbally abusive father and a spineless mother was for the birds.
When I’d taken a bus to get to New Orleans with two suitcases and one duffel bag full of my belongings, I was pleased to see the live oak trees swarming the land and eccentric people on the streets. We passed marshes and bayous with trees that hung with Spanish moss, colorful houses, and restaurants on the water. It was all so new, so refreshing. It was a fresh start, a new beginning, and I was ready to tackle the opportunity headfirst.
I wish I could go back and slap that happy, naïve version of myself. In the movies, you get a glimpse of New Orleans and the nightlife, the Mardi Gras parades, a bachelorette party celebrating a bride-to-be, or a collection of men looking for a good time at bars or strip clubs. But the low-down dirty truth is New Orleans was filthy and chaotic. I didn’t mind chaos, so long as it was the controlled sort, but New Orleans wasn’t controlled by any means. People ran rampant, women with their breasts out and some men even slinging their dicks around, just to get a reaction. Vomit on every corner of the street, homeless people demanding money, and tourists crowding the areas, making it hard for cars to pass.
I was a victim of the latter, sitting behind the wheel of my car, groaning as a line of elderly people walked along the crosswalk in matching neon pink shirts. Summertime in NOLA was ground zero for tourists, and I couldn’t stand it. As soon as I’d saved up enough money, I would leave this place and find somewhere quieter, a suburban area where I could hear more crickets chirping than car horns beeping.
I glanced at the clock on the dashboard of my dingy silver Volkswagen Beetle, tapping my fingers on the wheel. I had six minutes to get to work and my job was twelve minutes away. Once the elderly people moved, I floored it and was glad there weren’t any more red lights or pedestrians to stop me.
When I pulled up to Franco’s Italian Restaurant, I collected my purse and hurried through the back door of the building, apologizing to my manager Trent for being late for the third time this week.
“One mo’ strike, Brynn! I mean ‘nat!” Trent boomed in his Creole accent. I ignored him, throwing on my apron and rushing through the double doors that led out of the kitchen.
It was hard being on time when I worked part time at Nulli’s Mini Mart. As soon as my shift was over at Nulli’s, I would rush to the bathrooms, change, and hustle to Franco’s.
Franco’s was an upscale lakefront restaurant, a hidden gem according to online reviews. It was also the only other job I could get until I found one more suitable. Truth is, I hated my life. What was the point of spending all those years in college learning and studying, just to come out of it with a mountain of debt and still having to work a bare minimum job to pay the bills? I’d majored in Business, yet I didn’t have the time or resources to start my own. I’d dreamed of opening my own restaurant one day, or perhaps something quieter and quainter, like a bed and breakfast. I had dreams of this bed and breakfast existing in New Hampshire, where people would come during the spring and summer, sleep in, then wake up to delicious food from my kitchen. Because that was another thing I was good at, cooking.
The last time I was late on my rent, my roommate fussed for a bit, then told me things would get better, but I couldn’t trust Shavonne’s advice because she was up to her neck in debt too. Both of us struggled monthly to pay our $1250 rent, and I was almost positive Shavonne was selling ass or something on the side because she never came up short.
I let the idea and internal rant go, collecting a notepad from the hostess stand as said hostess informed me which tables I’d be serving. There weren’t many people in yet, but within a few hours, once the sun dipped and the golden light spread over the tables, it would be packed. That’s what the couples loved about Franco’s. It allowed a romantic night by the water as they drowned themselves in hot Italian food, wine, and love.
I stopped at my first table where a middle-aged woman was scanning the menu with rectangular glasses low on the bridge of her nose. She requested a water with lemon to start and after I prepared it and set it down on her table, I gave her a few more minutes to peruse the menu. I made my way to the next table. Two men sat there, one of whom had his back to me.
