I nod, look into his eyes. “I don’t know what I’ll do if . . .”

 . . . if I have to pretend to be in love with this self-worshipping jagoff for another second. But I let the words drift off.

“It’ll be fine,” he assures me. “Everything’s going to turn out fine.”

66

Christian

Saturday morning. I flip up the collar on my jacket. Out here in the heavily shaded woods, it feels like nighttime, not one hour past dawn. It can’t be more than forty degrees.

Gavin comes walking down the trail a few minutes later, wearing a green hunting jacket and a cap on his head. “You sleep much?” he asks me.

“Hardly at all.”

“You’re nervous.”

“Hell yes, I’m nervous. This would be much easier if you did this, not me. You’re the hunter. You’re the one who knows guns.”

“I’m not doing it, Nick. We’ve been over this. It’s your job. You’re doing it.”

I stretch my arms, roll my neck. I’ve never fired a gun in my life, and two days from now, I’m going to kill somebody at close range.

“You trust Vicky?” Gavin asks me.

Do I trust a woman who is willing to kill over money? Do I trust a woman who plans on stealing it all from her husband?

“What I trust,” I say, “is that she wants the money, she wants me to invest it, and she wants me, period. That much, I trust. And that’s all I need to trust.”

“Yeah.” Gavin works his jaw, which could use a razor. “Yeah. So . . . what happens afterward? After you kill Lauren?”

“Simon’s going to be pretty devastated,” I say. “There’ll be no reason for him to go through with the divorce so urgently. He’ll probably— He’ll be blown apart, I assume. And Vicky will be the doting wife who plays dumb.”

“What if Simon suspects Vicky was behind this? It’s not exactly a giant leap. He’s having an affair, planning on dumping his wife and cutting her out of the money, and suddenly the ‘other woman’ ends up shot dead?”

“Vicky says she can handle him. I trust that much, too.”

“Vicky can handle him.” Gavin thinks that over. “Vicky hasn’t been handling him so far, has she? Simon’s been stepping out on her and she didn’t have a clue.”

“That’s probably my fault,” I say. “I’ve done too good a job with her. She’s fallen for me. She’s so worried about him finding out about me that she didn’t notice what he was doing behind her back.”

Gavin starts walking down the trail to our site, the place I’m going to practice shooting.

“You don’t seem convinced,” I say to him.

“Okay, Nicky, let’s say Vicky handles Simon, like you say she will. She plays dumb and plays the doting wife. November third comes and goes, and now she has control of the money.”

“Right. That’s the key. She handles him for a couple of days after the murder, and then we’re home free on November third.”

“What about the cops?” Gavin turns to me.

“Well, if they’re halfway decent at their job, they’ll figure out Simon was having an affair with Lauren. And they’ll want to question him.”

“And Vicky.”

“Yeah, probably. Vicky can handle it. All she has to do is play dumb, right? There’s no connection between her and me.”

“Sounds like you’re counting on Vicky a lot.”

“Not as much as you think,” I say. “For one thing, we’re setting Simon up. I’m wearing the same exact boots he owns and the same Grim Reaper costume in his closet. If anyone sees me or the cops find my boot prints, it will lead to Simon. They’re not gonna think Vicky dressed up in that outfit. And anyway, we just have to get past a couple of days, right? The day after Halloween, November first—Simon hears the news. That’ll hit him like a freight train. Vicky plays dumb. Maybe Simon confesses his affair to her. Maybe he doesn’t. But then we just need another twenty-four-hour period to pass—November second—and then we’re at November third and their ten-year anniversary and we’re golden.”

“You mean Vicky’s golden.” Gavin stops along the trail. This must be the spot he had in mind for target practice.

“No, we’re golden.”

Gavin shows me one of his patented smirks. “How do you know that, once November third rolls around, Vicky won’t forget you ever existed?”

“She won’t,” I say. “Believe me, she won’t.”

“How do you know?”

“Fuck, G, where’s the trust? I know what I’m doing.”

Gavin pulls out an empty soda can and places it on a tree stump.

“You, I trust,” he says. “Vicky, I don’t. What if she just wants you to be the triggerman who kills Simon’s girlfriend? And once you’ve performed that task for her, thank you very much, she forgets that ‘Christian Newsome’ ever existed. What if the whole point of your existence is to be the guy who solves the ‘Lauren problem’ for her?”