Page 89 of Rich Little Liars

So completely out of reach.

I had seconds to decide. The ring or my life.

I chose my life. I could work around a missing ring.

Then I turned and rushed towards the door.

Kelly was still standing in the doorway when I passed her. Still frozen and watching, still wearing that strange expression that said she knew exactly what was happening and had chosen not to stop it. Our eyes met for just a second, and something passed between us.

Understanding.

Or recognition.

One mad woman acknowledging another.

Then I was through the door and out into the night air. Behind me the house was screaming as it died. I walked until I couldn’t hear it any more. Until the smoke cleared from my lungs and my heart stopped racing and I could think clearly again.

I had my story. I had knowledge of bank accounts, insurance policies, the location of every document Kelly would need to access her husband’s money. And I had a face that looked enough like hers to fool anyone who wasn’t paying close attention.

The rest was just details.

I looked around for Kelly, and it wasn’t hard to find her.

She’d crawled out of the house eventually – smoke-damaged, traumatised, barely coherent. She made it as far as the tree line before collapsing. I watched from the shadows as she lay there, coughing and crying and calling Daniel’s name like he might still answer.

Soft until the very end.

I won’t describe what happened next. Some things don’t need elaboration. Suffice it to say that Kelly Reynolds stopped breathing in those woods, and her body found its way to a place where no one would ever think to look for it. A place where she could rot in peace, forgotten, while I stepped into the life she’d been too weak to hold on to.

The beauty of it was the resemblance.

We’d joked about it, back when she still thought we were friends. ‘We could be twins,’ she’d said once, laughing over coffee. ‘Same colouring, same build. People must mix us up all the time.’ She meant it as a compliment.

She didn’t realise she was handing me the keys to her entire existence.

Later, I cut my hair to match hers. Recalled her speech patterns, the way she held herself when she was nervous. I practised her signature until I could forge it in my sleep. And then, when the time was right, I became her.

Kelly Reynolds, tragic widow.

Survivor of a devastating fire.

Woman seeking a fresh start in a quiet town where no one knew her face and questions couldn’t be asked.

The insurance money came through without a hitch. The solicitors accepted my signature, my identification, my tear-stained story about needing to move somewhere new. East Hampton welcomed me with open arms and curious glances and the promise of exactly the kind of anonymous wealth I’d been chasing my whole life.

I bought the house. I played the part.

I became the fragile, haunted widow everyone expected to see.

And when Joseph Harvey came knocking with his questions and suspicions and his desperate need to avenge a brother he’d never bothered to know… well. That was just another problem to be solved. Another obstacle between me and the life I’d stolen fair and square.

I almost felt bad about Richard. He was genuinely kind, in a way I hadn’t encountered often. But kindness was just another form of weakness, and weakness was something I’d learned long ago to exploit rather than admire.

He loves me now. Or thinks he does. Loves the woman he believes I am – the traumatised survivor, the gentle soul trying to rebuild, the damsel he got to rescue from a villain who conveniently died before anyone could ask too many questions.

He’ll never know the truth.

None of them will.