White Lies by Jeremy Bates Page A

her neck in bubbles, reading a book, her head resting on the lip opposite the faucets. Naked as Eve. Zach stared. He didn’t know for how long. Only that at some point he began to have an unsettling feeling, a shifting in his gut that sent breezy shockwaves up the back of his neck. Something was wrong. It took him another few moments to realize what it was. He was actually staring into the bathroom mirror. That meant the tub—and Katrina—were right on the other side of the wall, less than two feet away.
    Katrina reached over the side of the tub and exchanged the book for a glass of red wine. The water frothed, momentarily revealing her right breast. It was round and full. The nipple was a light shade of pink. Zach felt himself getting aroused. He pressed closer to the wall, his eyes widening. He could hear his breathing; it had become a little quicker, a little dryer. Katrina finished what wine was left and dangled the empty glass in front of her by the stem, as if she was contemplating something. Then, with a suddenness Zach wasn’t at all prepared for, she stood up, a cascade of water running down her upper back. He was so surprised he stumbled backward a step.
    Something cracked under his foot. It sounded as loud as a gunshot in a funeral home.
    Katrina’s face appeared in the window. A curious expression.
    When she saw him, her eyebrows shot up. Her eyes became saucers. Her mouth dropped open and she screamed.
    Zach fled. Maybe he’d screamed too, but he didn’t think so. He bolted along the back of the house, around the corner, toward the street. Blood was thumping so hard behind his temples he wasn’t aware of any other sound, only a constant drone, as if he’d been slammed by a large wave and pinned beneath the ocean.
    What the hell had he stepped on? How had she seen him through the glare?
    Candles, he realized. There
wasn’t
any glare.
    Had she recognized him
?
    He was halfway across the lawn when he heard a dog bark. He didn’t break stride but glanced in the direction from which the bark had come. On the sidewalk, near where the mouth of Katrina’s driveway met the road, a man walking a black-and-white dog was standing perfectly still, staring at him. Zach couldn’t imagine what he must be thinking as he watched someone dressed like a shadow running from a house as if a legion of demons was licking at his heels.
    The dog snapped the leash taut. Started barking more furiously.
    â€œStop!” the man shouted.
    Zach didn’t. If anything, he ran faster. He snatched his bike from where he’d left it leaning against one of the big trees in the front yard, hopped on, and pedaled furiously. He heard footsteps giving chase. More barking, closer. He pedaled faster, half expecting the dog to attach itself to his leg at any moment. That didn’t happen. The footsteps and barking diminished. He’d left his pursuers far behind. He tore off the skullcap and stuffed it in his pocket. Wind rushed past his face, turning the tiny beads of sweat on his brow icy cool. He sped down Birch Street and shortly thereafter reached his place, a stucco-and-timber two-story Victorian with a pointed roof and an overhanging roofline. He went to the side door, carried his bike down the stairs, and dumped it in the corner—all the while his vivid imagination was glibly exploringthe ways in which forensic guys in crime scene suits could prove what he’d done tonight. Hair, fabric, blood. The skullcap would have kept his hair on his head, and he didn’t cut himself. His clothes? He stripped off his shirt, pants, and shoes, and dumped them all in a green plastic garbage bag, which he shoved into the cupboard beneath the kitchen sink. First thing tomorrow he would dispose of the evidence in a proper fashion. Next he took a shower, not so much to wash away any dirt he might have acquired as to mark a return to normalcy. By the time he’d toweled off and dressed again,