Behind Closed Lies

DN'T SAY wh

ring her white, lacy wedding gown stood b

seball bat leaning against her nightstand. Then her vision adjust

y her wedding dress, ensconced in plastic, hanging on the back of her closet d

shape. Nellie collapsed back onto her pillow. When her breathing steadied, s

turn off the alarm before it could blare, the diamond engagement r

didn't have the patience for drawn-out bedtime rituals, but her father would

s the message. Other times he'd trace patterns, circles, stars, and triang

r pink-and-purple-striped comforter and stare

od seven or eight hours-so deeply and dreamlessly that her

ht in her senior year of col

d abrupt awakenings. Once, she came downstairs to breakfast in her sorority hous

"Just stressed about finals. The Psych

he table to get an

man's gentle coaxing, Nellie couldn't talk about the warm early-fall night that had

t twice, but canceled her third

voice whispering in her ear, "I've got you, baby. You're safe with me." Entwined with him, she felt a security she realized she'd yearned for h

eady ground beneath he

Chicago on business, and her best friend and roommate, Samantha, had slept over at her latest boyfriend

indows, and three locks reinforced the door, including the thick one Nellie had installed after sh

n her terry-cloth robe, then looked at her dress again, wondering if she should

ntly simple, like a chignon amidst bouffants. But next to the tangle of clothes and flimsy IKEA bo

st and every detail was in place, down to the cake topper-a b

d said when Nellie showed her a picture of the v

etrieved it from the storage room in his apartment buildin

he's too goo

successful hedge fund manager. He had a runner's wiry buil

dies with the sommelier. For their second, on a snowy Saturday, he'd told her to dress warmly and ha

nd had looked just as good in the

n she replied to Sam's questi

kitchen, the linoleum cold under her bare feet. She flicked on the overhead lig

r pool. Even after years of living in Manhattan, the sight still made her queasy. Ne

n checking email-a coupon from the Gap; her mother, who'd apparently become a vegetarian, asking Nellie to ma