Chapter 1 - The Blood on the Wallpaper
Lily, pressing her warm hands against my belly every time her baby brother kicked. By three in the afternoon, my mother’s house looked like something lifted from the pages of a luxury home catalog. White roses sat in low crystal bowls on the dining table. Baby-blue ribbons fluttered from the mahogany dining chairs. On the entryway credenza, gift envelopes stuffed with checks and cash were stacked in an antique glass bowl beside the leather-bound guest book.
I was thirty-four weeks pregnant, swollen, exhausted, and desperately determined to believe, just for one afternoon, that my family could behave like civilized human beings.
Then my sister-in-law, Vanessa, arrived forty minutes late. She wore a crimson cocktail dress entirely too tight for a midday celebration and oversized designer sunglasses she refused to remove indoors. She kissed the empty air beside my cheek, smelling of expensive gin and heavy tuberose.
“You look huge, Claire,” she purred, looking me up and down with narrowed eyes. “Positively spherical. But glowing, I suppose.”
That was Vanessa. Beautiful, venomous, and always smiling with all thirty-two of her teeth.
She had married my younger brother, Mark, two years ago. Ever since that wedding, small, irreplaceable things had vanished whenever she stayed over. My mother’s vintage pearl earrings disappeared from the jewelry box. A crisp hundred-dollar bill vanished from my father’s coat. My grandmother’s heirloom gold bracelet went missing from a bathroom counter while Vanessa was supposedly touching up her lip gloss.
Every single time I brought it up, Mark accused me of being jealous of his wife’s beauty. My mother, Evelyn, wrung her hands and begged me not to fracture the family peace.
So, I kept my mouth shut. I swallowed the bile and played the dutiful daughter.
Until Lily didn't.
I was in the kitchen helping my best friend, Rachel, slice the lemon-raspberry cake when Lily’s voice cut through the soft jazz playing in the hallway. Her voice was clear as a silver bell.
“Aunt Vanessa, why are you putting Mommy’s baby money in your purse?”
The kitchen went dead silent. The low murmur of thirty guests died instantly.
I froze, knife suspended over the white frosting. Rachel caught my arm, her eyes wide. We stepped into the archway leading to the foyer.
Vanessa stood frozen beside the gift table. Her designer tote bag hung open over her shoulder, gaping wide. Inside, nestled beneath her wallet, I could clearly see a thick wad of blue and white pastel envelopes, their decorative seals torn open. In her right hand, she still held a pink card with a fifty-dollar bill half-pulled from its sleeve.
For a split second, Vanessa’s polished mask slipped. Her eyes went flat and wild, like a cornered animal caught in headlights.
Then, her face twisted into pure, hysterical rage.
“How dare you accuse me, you little brat?” Vanessa shrieked, her voice bouncing violently off the tall ceilings.
Lily flinched, taking a small step backward. Her tiny hands bunched the fabric of her yellow sundress. “I saw you,” she whispered, trembling. “You tore the cards.”
“Shut your mouth!” Vanessa lunged forward.
“Vanessa, stop!” I screamed, moving as fast as my swollen body would allow, my hands instinctively flying to protect my belly.
It happened so fast my mind couldn't process it. Vanessa didn’t just yell. Her hand darted out and seized the heavy, solid-brass table lamp resting on the entryway console. She ripped the cord from the wall in one violent jerk. With a low, feral grunt, she swung the lamp like a baseball bat.
The solid brass base struck the left side of Lily’s skull with a sickening, hollow *crack*.
The sound echoed through the house like dry timber snapping in winter.
Lily was lifted off her feet. Her tiny, thirty-eight-pound body flew backward through the air and slammed into the drywall. She slid down to the hardwood floor, leaving a thick, jagged smear of crimson on the pristine white paint.
The room erupted into screams.
I dropped hard to my knees, the impact jarring through my spine, completely forgetting my pregnancy. I scrambled to Lily’s limp body, my hands shaking so violently I could barely cup her cheeks. Bright red blood was pulsing out from beneath her golden curls, pouring across her pale temple, soaking the collar of her yellow dress.
“Lily! Lily, look at Mommy! Baby, wake up!” I wailed, the sound ripping raw from my chest.
“Call 911! Somebody call an ambulance right now!” Rachel screamed, already dialing her phone.
Vanessa stood over us, chest heaving, the dented brass lamp still clutched in her white-knuckled grip. Her eyes were glazed with manic shock.
Mark shoved his way through the stunned guests, but he didn't run to my bleeding child. He ran straight to Vanessa, throwing his arms around her shoulders. “Vanessa! Baby, what happened? What did you do?”
“She attacked me!” Vanessa shrieked, tears instantly flooding her mascara-stained eyes. “She lunged at me! She tried to push me! It was an accident, Mark, I swear, she fell into the lamp!”
Lily’s eyelids fluttered weakly. Her small chest hitched.
I pressed my trembling palm against the wound on her head, blood burning hot against my skin. “Don't speak, my sweet girl. Mommy’s here. Help is coming, I promise.”
Lily’s pale, blood-smeared lips parted. She didn't cry. Her voice was a fragile, papery wheeze against my ear.
“Basement,” she breathed.
My heart seized.
My parents' house didn't have an accessible basement anymore. My father, Arthur, had padlocked the heavy steel door at the back of his home office over a year ago, claiming the foundation had dangerous structural rot after the flood. He had forbidden anyone from ever going down there.
Lily’s tiny, blood-slicked fingers weakly gripped the cuff of my sleeve.
“The money,” she whispered, her eyes rolling upward as unconsciousness dragged her down. “And Grandpa.”
Behind me, in the crowded hallway, a glass shattered against the floor.
I looked up through my tears. My father was standing there, staring at my bleeding daughter. His skin wasn't just pale—it was the color of curdled milk. His hands were shaking violently, and his eyes held pure, unadulterated terror.
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And in that split second, as sirens wailed in the distance, I realized Vanessa stealing gift envelopes was only the surface of a rot that went all the way to the core of this house.
***
