Free The Last Secret by Mary Mcgarry Morris

hand on her stomach, beneath tightly grasped sheets of her dark, dark bedroom, needing time, that was all, time to take a deep breath, to relax, to dare feel anything, with even his breath at her flesh unbearable.
    “Close your eyes and make believe I'm somebody else,” he whispered once. Somebody exciting. Somebody who's crazy about you … Eddie's face she saw. And no matter how hard she tried to make it Ken's face, it was still Eddie, with every gasp, full of him, his voice, touch, smell, so heavy with yearning she could barely keep her eyes open, even in the hard light of day, nights later, cringing in the glare of the hot pink and green light flaring over the man's sagging back as he sank across her legs, pinning her against the seat, with Eddie, running around to her side, police coming, train coming. Coming. “Wake up, honey.” Ken was shaking her. “Wake up, you're having a bad dream, that's all.”
    In front of the small rectory, she turns off the engine, wets her finger, and rubs away smeared eyeliner. The minute she steps into the brisk night air, heels scraping the gritty brick walk, she can think clearly again. She rings the doorbell, takes deep breaths as she waits, noting the scroll of newspaper frozen into the front lawn, and she knows why she's come here so late at night to deliver three paltry checks she's already held for days and as easily could have mailed. She needs help.
    The door squeals open and the slight young priest with round, rimless glasses and thinning hair smiles out at her. “Mrs. Hammond! Nora. What a surprise.” He wears a baggy blue sweater over his black pants. And soft leather Indian moccasins, beaded like a child's.
    “I have these checks,” she says, fumbling them from her briefcase. One flutters to the floor and she and the priest almost bump heads as they bend to get it. “They came to the paper. Ken and I are leaving tomorrow.”
    “Oh. Thank you. But you didn't have to come out so late. I could have—”
    “No!” she interrupts. “I wanted to. Besides, I … I was out, I mean, out this way anyway.” With her faltering voice he peers over his glasses.
    “Well, come on in, then. Come inside.” He steps back. From the parlor doorway to the right comes the violet wash from a television screen and voices, then laughter. “Father Connelly and I were just watching a movie,” he explains.
    She sees the old priest's stocking feet draw back as if to stand up. “I can't, but thanks. I'm running late,” she calls as she starts back down the steps.
    “You have a good trip now,” Father Grewley calls, waving the checks.
    Thank God. Thank God, she thinks, shocked at how close she came again to losing it. Her face flushes at the thought of pouring out her misery to the wide-eyed young priest. He's heard more than his share of troubles in his ministry, but not from Nora Hammond. She is supposed to be strong. Control is the key. She has to take charge of her pain and confusion and wrestle it into manageable shape. No one else can do that for her. The first time she went to pieces at home, Ken suggested a counselor. He has the name and telephone number of a good one. But she can't. Not now. Not yet. It would be like trying to tweeze out dirt and grit from an oozing wound.
    “So, what do we do? What do you want? What're our choices?” he said, trying to hide his annoyance, when she refused. “Or do we just keep on like this?”
    It isn't the smooth passage that he expected. He doesn't know what he wants except for her to move step by step through some mad formula that begins with betrayal and debasement, and hopefully, logically, if the proper methods are utilized, will end with … with what? Happiness? Coexistence? He has no idea how many choices she has. So many, she can barely keep them straight. There is murder and suicide and slashing and nervous breakdowns and arson and anonymous letters, the gouging with her own ragged nails of Robin Gendron's flawless glowing cheeks