The Man Who Looks Like Him

Chapter 3

Bare feet slapped against hardwood. She slipped on the hallway runner and grabbed the wall to keep herself upright. Behind her, she heard the knife hit the edge of the counter with a metallic clang before Andrew yanked it free again.

“Taylor.”

Her name came out calm, almost amused. That terrified her more than if he’d screamed it.

She rounded the corner too fast, slamming into the hallway table with her hip. A framed wedding photo crashes to the floor. Glass bursts across the wood in glittering shards. In the picture, Andrew had been smiling down at her like she was the only thing in the world worth looking at.

Taylor nearly lost her footing.

Behind her, Andrew laughed once. “Look at you,” he said. “You can’t even run right.”

Her lungs burned. Panic made the hallway feel too narrow. The walls felt too close, the air too thick to breathe as tries to pick where to run.

The bedroom? No, it’s too obvious. The front door is too far. The bathroom has a lock, but he can easily kick in the door.

She turned toward the small room at the back of the house. Andrew barely ever entered because he called it her “junk room.” It’s a cramped, half-finished office with old storage boxes stacked along one wall and a battered filing cabinet in the corner.

There, her gun was hidden and he was none-the-wiser.

Taylor hit the door so hard it banged inward against the wall. The room was dark, except for the spill of the kitchen light reaching in behind her. Her pulse pounded so violently in her ears it drowned out everything else.

Move. Move. Move. She repeated it in her head like a mantra.

Her hands shook so badly she could barely get the bottom drawer of the filing cabinet open. Paper folders snagged and bent beneath her fingers as she dug beneath old tax forms and expired warrants. She passed by the sealed envelope of photographs she hadn’t looked at in years.

From the hallway, Andrew’s footsteps slowed, becoming measured. He knew she was trapped, but he didn’t know what was hiding here.

“Baby,” he said. His voice had softened again, slipping into that low, coaxing tone he used when he wanted to sound reasonable. “Open the door.”

Taylor’s breathing hitched. The gun was cold when her fingers finally closed around it. A small revolver that had once belonged to her father. It’s unregistered and was hidden away years ago when Andrew “joked” she was too emotional to carry it.

Her hand clamped around the grip so tightly her knuckles ached. She turned just as his shadow appeared under the door, and it swings in a moment later.

Andrew leaned one shoulder against the doorframe, the knife hanging loose in his hand like this was normal. Acting like he hadn’t just chased his wife through the house with murder in his eyes over a splash of red wine.

Only wine. For now.

He looked at the gun, then at her. A slow smile sprawled itself across his face. She could tell it wasn’t because he was afraid. It’s because he thought she wouldn’t use it.

“Taylor,” he said softly, “put that down. I don’t want you to hurt yourself, now.”

She lifted the revolver with body hands, but the barrel waver violently. Tears blurred her vision. Her whole body had become one raw nerve.

“Don’t come any closer,” she commands, her voice shaking.

Andrew tilted his head. “Or what?”

Her breath broke in her chest. “I mean it, Andrew.”

He took one step into the room to test her. The kind of test he’d been giving her for ten years.

How far can I go?

How much will you take?

Will you stop me this time?

“Taylor,” he chastises, like he’s talking to a child, “now you’re just being dramatic.”

Another step.

The room shrank. The filing cabinet dug into the back of her leg. There was nowhere left to go, nowhere to back up, and nowhere to run.

Andrew looked from he gun to her face and gave a quiet, disbelieving shake of his head. “You won’t do it.”

And maybe, if he’d stopped there, he would have been right. If he stayed in the doorway and dropped the knife, if he’d even looked a little uncertain.

Instead, he lunged.

And Taylor fired.