Page 1 of Rich Little Liars

PROLOGUE

The smoke came first. Thick and black, it poured through the house like water, filling my lungs before I could even think to hold my breath. I was coughing, bent double in the hallway, and the heat was everywhere – pressing against my skin, making the air shimmer and warp.

‘Daniel!’

My voice cracked. The walls were glowing orange now, paint bubbling into blisters that burst and wept. I couldn’t see. Couldn’t think. The floorboards groaned beneath me, a sound like something dying.

Then the ceiling screamed.

It wasn’t a sound I knew wood could make. A tearing, splintering roar that drowned out everything else. The beam came down between us, a wall of flame, and my husband was gone.

‘Daniel…’

I was on my knees. The smoke was so thick I might as well have been blind. I reached forwards, fingers stretching into darkness, but there was nothing. Just heat and the crackle of flames and wood splitting apart.

Somewhere above me, glass shattered.

The sound was almost pretty – like wind chimes in hell.

I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t see. Couldn’t tell which way was forwards and which way was out. There was just smoke and heat and the smell of something burning that shouldn’t have been. Something that made my stomach turn even as my lungs seized.

The house was eating itself alive.

And I barely made it out.

1

NOW

The moving truck pulls away at half past three, its rumble fading into silence. I stand on the gravel driveway of my new house – my house, though the words still sit wrong in my mouth – and watch it disappear round a bend lined with sycamore trees so symmetrical they look fake.

East Hampton.

Even the name sounds like money.

The house behind me is Georgian style, all lightly coloured stone and white pillars that gleam in the afternoon light. Three storeys of windows stare back at me like blank eyes. Inside, boxes are stacked in rooms I haven’t learned the shapes of yet. The realtor called it ‘a stunning property in an exclusive setting’. What she meant was: no one here will know you, and that’s exactly what you’re paying for.

The houses around the park are aggressively perfect. Identical hedges trimmed to identical heights. Matching window boxes spilling matching flowers. It’s the kind of wealth that doesn’t need to announce itself because every detail has already done the announcing. But there’s something unsettling about so much perfection. It’s like a movie set – all style and no substance. In my experience, the more perfect something looks from the outside, the more rot you’ll find if you scratch deep enough.

I heft the last box from the trunk of my car – kitchen items, the label says in my own handwriting, though I barely remember packing it. The past few weeks have that quality, like watching myself move through fog. Sign here. Initial there. Yes, I’ll take it. No, I don’t need time to think.

The gravel crunches under my feet as I carry the box towards the front door. It’s already unlocked – I left it open when I went back for this last load – and something about that openness makes my chest tight. In the old house, I locked everything. Checked twice. Sometimes three times before bed.

But that was different.

Everything was different.

I push through the door and set the box down in the entrance hall. The floors are pale oak, gleaming like they’ve never been walked on. The walls are the shade of cream interior magazines call ‘greige’ or ‘string’ or some other word that means beige but expensive. Fresh flowers sit in a vase on the console table – white roses, already arranged, left by the realtor as a ‘welcome gift’. Their scent is heavy, almost cloying.

I stand very still and listen to the house.

It sounds like nothing. No creaks. No settling. No heating unit clanking to life in the corner. Just a vast, cushioned, ridiculously expensive quiet that seems to muffle my breathing.

This is what I wanted. What I needed. A place where no one knows my name or what happened or why I wake up every morning with my heart trying to punch through my ribs.

I move through downstairs, opening and closing doors, trying to make the spaces feel smaller. Living room. Dining room. Kitchen with its marble island and faucets that probably need some special cleaning product I don’t own. Everything is clean. Everything is pale. Everything looks like the ‘after’ photos in a home renovation show, all traces of actual living scrubbed away.

Through the kitchen window, I can see the back yard – neat lawn, tidy borders, a stone patio with furniture I didn’t buy but that came with the house. Beyond the patio sits a rectangular swimming pool edged in pale stone, the water a clear, chemically perfect blue that looks almost artificial against the lawn. It’s the kind of feature real estate agents linger on in listings. Expensive and slightly excessive for one person. Another reminder that this place was designed for a life bigger than mine.