The Livestream That Exposed a Corpse

Tristan Crowley and Wendy Crowley rolled out of the city with a full livestream crew and a line of bodyguards.

The convoy stopped at a private villa tucked away in the foothills.

Nobody was permitted to enter that property. It had been built for one purpose. To hold me. The wife he had decided was a sinner.

The crew stepped out and saw the weeds running wild. The garden was a mess. The windows were soft with dust.

Tristan was in a tailored suit. The crisp line of him against the rotted hedge was meant to be a photograph.

He held a handkerchief over his nose like the air offended him.

"Since when has May been this lazy. Look at this place. It is disgusting.

"All she does is sulk over how much I love Wendy. Maybe if she made herself worth loving."

He turned toward the open door. His voice flattened.

"May. Stop hiding. Get out here!"

Nothing answered.

The grass moved in the wind. Somewhere in the trees, a crow called once and went silent.

His hand came down on the doorframe.

"Break it open." His voice was cold.

The bodyguards put their shoulders into the door.

One. Two. Three.

The frame splintered. The door opened wide. The bodyguards poured into the house like a tide.

Five minutes later they came back out empty-handed. Their faces were blank.

"Sir. There is no one inside."

Tristan's jaw flexed. His eyes went dark.

He pulled his phone out. He swiped to the dial pad and stopped.

He had locked me up only a month ago. But the number had become a stranger in his head.

His thumb hovered over a saved name he had not pressed in a long time. He had never deleted it.

[My Moon]

I watched his thumb shake on the screen. I watched his chest move too fast.

He used to call me that.

Before Wendy started crying.

Before the accusations.

Before he chose to believe her instead of the woman who had stayed up beside him through the night his father died, who had sat next to him through every fever, who had never had eyes for anyone else.

He had not called me that in a long time. His phone still remembered.

Inside the empty house, no phone rang. The handset he was holding gave him the long flat tone.

"The number you have dialed is not in service."

I let out a long breath he could not hear. Of course he could not reach me.

His face screwed up.

"May. You think you can dodge this. You think you can hide from me.

"Hide all you want. We'll see who breaks first."

A cough came from somewhere behind him.

He spun around.

In the corner, a man was leaning against a wall that was half-eaten with weeds. He was filthy. There was dirt on his face. There was a bottle in his hand.

"Stop yelling," the man said, slurring. "Whoever you came for. She is not here anymore."

Wendy heard him and shoved out from behind Tristan.

Her face was white. Old tears were drying in tracks down her cheeks. Her eyes were swollen to slits.

The livestream camera locked on her face.

"That's a lie." Her voice was a knife. "May Fairfax is in there. She is hiding. She saw my livestream and she ran into a corner. She's shaking somewhere in this house."

She shoved past a bodyguard and stumbled into the foyer.

"May, stop hiding! Come out here!"

Her voice ripped. She started flinging open every door she could reach.

"You think hiding is going to save you? Three days ago you killed my son! I was six months along. I was carrying a boy. Look at my stomach. You should be in hell!"

She lifted the hem of her shirt. There was an ugly red line across her belly. The seam was still raw.

The chat lit up.

[Oh my god, that's a knife wound. it isn't even healed yet!]

[Is this woman even human? Attacking a pregnant woman? A baby?]

[Wendy is so brave. She came straight out of the hospital to face the camera, and the killer is hiding from her!]

[Support wendy! Make May Fairfax pay!]