One Sentence Made My Ex Kill the Groom

Chapter 3

In the end, the jury found Audrey not guilty by reason of insanity, and she was committed indefinitely to a secure state psychiatric hospital.

The Whitemores hired the best lawyers and doctors.

They denied every request I made to visit, yet arrived each week with flowers and reporters in tow. In front of the cameras, they insisted that Audrey had merely cracked under the stress of the wedding and was still their kind, perfect child.

I could see her only in public reports.

The first year, she cut off her waist-length hair. Vivian told an interviewer the hospital had neglected her. The second year, she gained 15 pounds, and Theodore immediately hired a nutritionist and demanded that the staff restrict her sweets. The third year, a reporter filmed her sitting alone on the lawn, eating a slice of chocolate cake.

She ate slowly, cream clinging to the corner of her mouth, and wore a smile more relaxed than any I had ever seen on her face.

The next day, the Whitmore Foundation had the footage removed for violating her privacy.

I printed the only surviving screenshot and tucked it into the deepest pocket of my wallet.

Most people considered the hospital a punishment. To Audrey, the ward door that required a key card to open was the first door in her life that could keep her parents out.

Six years later, the medical board approved her conditional release.

Her release came on the same day as the Whitmores' thirty-fifth wedding anniversary.

They celebrated with an extravagant charity gala at their estate, attended by politicians, celebrities, and members of the press. The theme was "Rebirth," and Audrey was set to take the stage as the night's celebrated success story.

And once again, I showed up in a black dress.

The color drained from Vivian's face the moment she saw me.

"How dare you show your face here?"

"I brought a gift."

I held out a long, narrow silver box. Instead of taking it, she knocked it to the floor. The lid flew open, and an old red pen rolled to her feet.

Audrey sat at the far end of the long table. At the sight of the pen, her face turned white as paper.

"Get her out of here!" Vivian shrieked.

The reporters immediately closed in.

"Mrs. Whitmore, has Audrey truly recovered?"

"If one sentence can provoke her into killing, why was she released?"

What Vivian cared about most was appearances. She quickly composed herself, bent to pick up the pen, and even linked her arm through mine.

"Of course she has recovered. Evelyn is an old friend of Audrey's. She is welcome here."

Still smiling, she seated me at the table farthest from her daughter and stationed two guards in the aisle.

Once dinner was underway, Theodore stepped onto the stage to speak.

He said he and his wife had never given up on their daughter. He credited their love with working a miracle. He promised Audrey would return to the foundation and begin a dazzling new life.

Thunderous applause filled the room.

Audrey clapped too.

She clapped again and again, her smile fixed in exactly the same curve, as though the 17 stab wounds six years earlier had never happened.

Then Vivian pushed her in front of the microphone.

"Tell everyone you're better now."

Audrey clutched the pages of her speech. Her lips moved, but no sound came out.

Vivian gave the small of her back a gentle shove.

That single push took me back to a night 20 years earlier.

I stood and walked toward the stage.