Little Secrets Read online

  Caroline’s voice was low and warm, like melting butter. Or maybe Ginny was melting, dissolving into the darkness and shadows. She put a hand between her legs and it came away wet, the smell of copper strong on her fingers. She was bleeding. A lot.

  “He took me to the mall and gave me money to buy a new suit. He saw all my friends wearing them. He wanted me to have one. To be like them. They fought about it, really loud. Brendan hid in his room with his music playing loud, but I could hear them in their bedroom. He won the fight. He always won the fights. And he brought the suit to me; he tossed it down on the bed, and told me to try it on. To show him how it fit. So I did.”

  Pause. A breath. Silence, but for the sound of water, trickling.

  “I figured out then that I could get whatever I wanted out of him. Out of boys, in general. With just a little show of T and A.”

  The phrase seemed oddly innocent, but fitting.

  “Do you know,” Caroline asked suddenly, “if she knew there was something going on? My mother, I mean. She had to have known. Didn’t she?”

  Ginny couldn’t tell if Caroline was desperate for affirmation or denial. “I don’t know.”

  “She knew,” Caroline whispered. Then, even softer, “Do you think she misses me? Will she be happy to see me again?”

  “Oh, Caroline. I’m so sorry. But your mom passed away.”

  More silence. The baby made a meeping grunt, but settled. Ginny’s thighs stuck together when she moved.

  “So…I’m an orphan.” Rusty, grating laughter became a sob. “Just as well. Just as well.”

  Ginny had lost track of time long ago. She listened for the sound of shouts or voices, but heard nothing. “These rooms…soundproofed?”

  “Yes. He built this house like this, you know. Back before he even met my mom. He built this house himself.”

  Ginny’s lips pulled back from her teeth. “Jesus Christ.”

  “He told me he was taking me to the beach for the weekend. As a special treat. We weren’t supposed to let Mom know. He said nobody could know, or they’d want to come along. That’s why he picked me up on the way home from school. I was walking. I was just scuffing my feet along in the leaves and thinking about going to the football game the next day. He pulled up in a van. I didn’t know it, and I would never ever have gone inside.” Caroline paused. Coughed. She coughed for a long time, and when she stopped, her voice had gone rough and thick with phlegm. “But I saw it was my daddy, so I got in.”

  “Someone reported it. The van. They saw you get into it.”

  “But they didn’t know it was him. Obviously. They thought a stranger took me.”

  “Yes,” Ginny said.

  Caroline snorted. “They were right.”

  A sound like distant thunder rumbled, then stopped. Ginny felt the vibration in the bed, or maybe just thought she did. She strained, listening. They all did. But nothing else happened.

  “When he showed me the bookcase, the hidden stairs, I thought it was amazing. So cool. And then when he showed me this little space, like a playroom, I thought it was so much fun. He told me this was our place, our special place, that nobody would ever know about it, and until he left me there and didn’t let me out, I thought it was going to be great.” Caroline sounded tired. “Also, he lied. Because it wasn’t just our special place. Not until later. Not until after.”

  “After what?”

  “After she died,” Caroline said wearily, casually. “I wasn’t the first one.”

  “Oh. Oh God.” There should’ve been more words than that, but Ginny had none.

  “Her name was Terry. She was jealous of me, right from the start, because I had long hair and pretty teeth. She didn’t have teeth. He’d pulled them so she couldn’t bite.”

  “Please. You don’t have to tell me this.”

  “I have to tell you this!” Caroline hissed. “I have been waiting for too long to tell someone this!”

  Ginny shut up after that. Caroline talked. Ginny listened.

  “He never touched me, not until she died.” That seemed to be an important fact. “He promised he’d let me out. But I saw what he did to Terry. I didn’t want to lose my teeth, or have him cut my hair. I thought someone would find me. I mean, I was in the house. In the goddamned house, right? How could they not know? How could they not hear me screaming? I did try to get away. So he put on the chain. And then…a baby.”

  At every pause, Ginny hoped Caroline wouldn’t say anything else. She prayed for someone to find them. But other than another rumble that sounded like distant thunder, there was only blackness and Caroline’s voice.

  “He took it away from me. It was a boy. He said I wasn’t old enough to take care of a baby. I was fifteen by then, or…I think I was. I lost track of time. I made marks, for a while, on the wall. But he saw them and erased them. So he took the baby. It was small anyway. I think it would’ve died. I think…it did die. Didn’t it, Ginny? Did my baby die?”

  Ginny thought of the bones in her backyard. “I think so, honey. Yes.”

  Caroline gave a shuddering sigh. “Then came Tate, and he let me keep him. Said I needed something to keep me occupied when he couldn’t visit me. Tell me something. When did my mother die?”

  “I’m not sure, Caroline. But I know that she and your brother moved out of this house about a year after you went missing.”

  “Oh. Oh. Oh,” Caroline said. “Oh. She didn’t stay? So she didn’t know. Really? She didn’t know I was here?”

  Mrs. Miller might have suspected something, but it couldn’t have been this. “I don’t think so, honey. I’m sure she didn’t know. I think she really thought you were…gone.”

  “She thought I was dead.”

  “Yes. I think so.”

  Caroline gave a barking sob. “Oh. Okay. That’s good. That’s good, you know? Because she just thought I was dead, she didn’t leave me here on purpose.”

  “No. I don’t think so.” Ginny reached blindly to find Caroline.

  Caroline turned and pressed herself to Ginny’s shoulder. Her tears were hot and wet on Ginny’s neck; the baby gave a startled cry. Ginny put her hand between Caroline and the baby, but didn’t push the other woman away. She cradled her as best she could.

  “No, Caroline. She didn’t leave you here on purpose. I’m sure of it.”

  They sat that way for another interminable amount of time. Ginny had never known kids to be so quiet for so long, but thought perhaps they’d all fallen asleep. Her muscles were stiff, and her back ached. Every movement sent another hot pulse between her legs, and her head spun.

  “I’m bleeding,” Ginny said. “Too much, I think.”

  “I thought once the children came, he’d leave me alone. He promised, after each one, he would take us all upstairs. After the ones that didn’t make it, he always said he would take me to the hospital. But he never did.”

  “How many times?”

  “I don’t know,” Caroline said, but Ginny knew that was a lie. No mother who lost a child could ever forget it, no matter how many times it happened.

  “Caroline, I feel really bad. I feel really sick. I’m losing too much blood.”

  “Wait.”

  The bed moved as Caroline got up and returned a few minutes later. She took away the material bunched between Ginny’s legs and replaced it with another. Ginny forced her mind from thinking of germs. Sepsis. Her breath shuddered. Oh God. Where was Sean? Where were the police?

  “Shh. Shhh, listen.” Ginny sounded drunk. She wished she were.

  Deke spoke up. “It’s Tate!”

  “Tate’s gone,” Linna snapped. “Don’t be a dumb-bum. Tate went up and he didn’t come back. He’s dead!”

  “Tate knew he was getting old. Tate said, what happened if he died? What would happen when he didn’t bring the food? So Tate tried to get the key, the spe