Stranger in the Lake by Kimberly Belle
On Sale Date: June 9, 2020
Fiction / Thrillers / Psychological
352 pages
Blurb:
When Charlotte married the wealthy widower Paul, it caused a ripple of
gossip in their small lakeside town. They have a charmed life together, despite
the cruel whispers about her humble past and his first marriage. But everything
starts to unravel when she discovers a young woman’s body floating in the exact
same spot where Paul’s first wife tragically drowned.
At first, it seems like a horrific coincidence, but the stranger in the lake is no stranger. Charlotte saw Paul talking to her the day before, even though Paul tells the police he’s never met the woman. His lie exposes cracks in their fragile new marriage, cracks Charlotte is determined to keep from breaking them in two.
As Charlotte uncovers dark mysteries about the man she married, she doesn’t know what to trust—her heart, which knows Paul to be a good man, or her growing suspicion that there’s something he’s hiding in the water.
At first, it seems like a horrific coincidence, but the stranger in the lake is no stranger. Charlotte saw Paul talking to her the day before, even though Paul tells the police he’s never met the woman. His lie exposes cracks in their fragile new marriage, cracks Charlotte is determined to keep from breaking them in two.
As Charlotte uncovers dark mysteries about the man she married, she doesn’t know what to trust—her heart, which knows Paul to be a good man, or her growing suspicion that there’s something he’s hiding in the water.
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EXCERPT:
The town of Lake Crosby
isn’t much, just three square blocks and some change, but it’s the only town in
the southern Appalachians perched at the edge of the water, which makes it a
popular tourist spot. Paul’s office is at the far end of the first block, tucked
between a fudge shop and Stuart’s Craft Cocktails, which, as far as I can tell,
is just another way to say “pretentious bar.” Most of the businesses here are
pretentious, farm-to-table restaurants and specialty boutiques selling all
things overpriced and unnecessary.
For people like Paul, town
is a place to socialize and make money—in his case, by selling custom house
designs for the million-dollar lots that sit high on the hills or line the
lakeshores. My old friends serve his drinks and wait his tables—but only the
lucky ones. There are ten times more locals than there are jobs.
The covered terrace for the
cocktail lounge is quiet, a result of the off-season and the incoming weather,
the sign on the door still flipped to Closed. I’m passing the empty hostess
stand when I notice movement at the very back, a tattered shadow peeling away
from the wall. Jax—the town loon, the crazy old man who lives in the woods.
Most people turn away from him, either out of pity or fear, but not me. For
some reason I can’t put into words, I’ve never been afraid to look him straight
on.
He takes a couple of halting
steps, like he doesn’t want to be seen—and he probably doesn’t. Jax is like a
deer you come up on in a meadow, one blink and he’s gone. But this time he
doesn’t run.
His gaze flicks around,
searching the street behind me. “Where’s Paul.” A statement, not a question.
Slowly, so not to spook him,
I point to the sleek double doors on the next building, golden light spilling
out the windows of Keller Architecture. “Did you check inside?”
Jax shakes his head. “I need
to talk to him. It’s important.”
Like every time he emerges
from out of the woods, curiosity bubbles in my chest. Once upon a time, Jax had
everything going for him. High school prom king and star quarterback, the
golden boy with a golden future, and one of Paul’s two best friends. Their
picture still sits atop his desk in the study, Paul and Jax and Micah, all
tanned chests and straightened smiles, three teenage boys with the world at
their feet.
Now he’s Batty Jax, the
raggedy, bearded boogeyman parents use as a warning. Do your homework, stay out
of trouble, and don’t end up like Jax.
He clings to the murky back
of the terrace, sticking to the shaded spots where it’s too dark for me to make
out much more than a halo of matted hair, the jutting edges of an oversized
jacket, long, lean thighs. His face is dark, too, the combination of a life
outdoors and dirt.
“Do you want me to give Paul
a message? Or if you stay right there, I can send him out. I know he’ll want to
see you.”
Actually, I don’t know; I
only assume. Jax is the source of a slew of rumors and petty gossip, but for
Paul, he’s a painful subject, one he doesn’t like to talk about. As far as I
know, the two haven’t spoken since high school graduation—not an easy thing to
do in a town where everybody knows everybody.
Jax glances up the street,
in the direction of far-off voices floating on the icy wind. I don’t follow his
gaze, but I can tell from the way his body turns skittish that someone is
coming this way, moving closer.
“Do you need anything? Some
money, maybe?”
Good thing those people
aren’t within earshot, because they would laugh at the absurdity of the
trailer-park girl turned married-up wifey offering the son of an insurance
tycoon some cash. Not that Jax’s father didn’t disown him ages ago or that I
have more than a couple of bucks in my pocket, but still.
Jax shakes his head again.
“Tell Paul I need to talk to him. Tell him to hurry.”
Before I can ask what for,
he’s off, planting a palm on the railing and springing over in one easy leap,
his body light as a pole vaulter. He hits the cement and takes off up the
alley. I dash forward until I’m flush with the railing, peering down the long
passage between Paul’s building and the cocktail lounge, but it’s empty. Jax is
already gone.
I push through the doors of
Keller Architecture, an open space with cleared desks and darkened computer
screens. The whiteboard on the back wall has already been wiped clean, too, one
of the many tasks Paul requires his staff to do daily. It’s nearing five, and
other than his lead designer, Gwen, hunched over a drawing at her drafting
table, the office is empty.
She nods at my desk.
“Perfect timing. I just finished the Curtis Cottage drawings.”
Calling a
seven-thousand-square-foot house a “cottage” is ridiculous, as are whatever
reasons Tom Curtis and his wife, a couple well into their seventies, gave Paul
for wanting six bedrooms and two kitchens in what is essentially a weekend
home. But the Curtises are typical Keller Architecture clients—privileged,
demanding and more than a little entitled. They like Paul because he’s one of
them. Having a desk is probably ridiculous, too, since I only work twenty hours
a week, and for most of them I’m anywhere but here. My role is client
relations, which consists mainly of hauling my ass to wherever the clients are
so I can put out fires and talk them off the latest ledge. The job and the desk
are one of the many perks of being married to a Keller.
“Thanks.” I tuck the Curtis
designs under an arm and move toward the hallway to my left, a sleek tunnel of
wood and steel that ends in Paul’s glass-walled office. “I’m here to pick up
Paul. There’s something wrong with his car.”
When he called earlier to
tell me his car was dead in the lot, I thought he was joking. Engine trouble is
what happens to my ancient Civic, not Paul’s fancy Range Rover, a brand-new
supercharged machine with a dashboard that belongs in a cockpit. More money than sense, my mother would
say about Paul if she were here, and now, I guess, about me.
Gwen leans back in her
chair, wagging a mechanical pencil between two slim fingers. “Yeah, the dealer
is sending a tow truck and a replacement car, but they just called to say
they’re delayed. He said he had a couple of errands to run.”
I frown. “Who, the tow truck
driver?”
“No, Paul.” She swivels in
her chair, reaching across the desk behind her for a straightedge. “He should
be back any sec.”
I thank her and head for the
door.
On the sidewalk, I fire off
a quick text to Paul. I’m here, where are you?
I wait for a reply that
doesn’t come. The screen goes dark, then black. I slip the phone into my jacket
pocket and start walking.
In a town like Lake Crosby,
there are only so many places Paul could be. The market, the pharmacy, the shop
where he buys his ties and socks. I pop into all of them, but no one’s seen him
since this morning. Back on the sidewalk, I pull out my phone and give him a
call. It rings once, then shoots me to voice mail. I hit End and look up and
down the mostly deserted street.
“Hey, Charlie,” somebody
calls from across the road, two single lanes separated by a parking strip, and
I whirl around, spotting Wade’s familiar face over the cars and SUVs. One of my
brother’s former classmates, a known troublemaker who dropped out sophomore
year because he was too busy cooking meth and raising hell. He leans against
the ivory siding of the bed-and-breakfast, holding what I sincerely hope is a
hand-rolled cigarette.
“It’s Charlotte,” I say, but
I don’t know why I bother.
On my sixteenth birthday, I
plunked down more than a hundred hard-earned dollars at the courthouse to
change my name. But no matter how many times I correct the people who knew me
back when—people who populate the trailer parks and shacks along the mountain
range, people like Wade and me—no matter how many times I tell them I’m not
that person anymore, to them I’ll always be Charlie.
He flicks the cigarette butt
into the gutter and tilts his head up the street. “I just saw your old man
coming out of the coffee shop.” Emphasis on the old man. “If you hurry, you can probably catch him.”
I mumble a thanks, then head
in that direction.
Just past the market, I spot
Paul at the far end of a side street, a paper cup clutched in his hand. He’s
wearing the clothes I watched him pull on this morning—a North Face fleece, a
navy cashmere sweater, dark jeans, leather lace-up boots, but no coat. No hat
or scarf or gloves. Paul always dresses like this, without a second thought as
to the elements. That fleece might be fine for the quick jogs from the house to
his car to the office door, but with the wind skimming up the lake, he must be
freezing.
The woman he’s talking to is
more properly dressed. Boots and a black wool coat, the big buttons fastened
all the way to a neck cloaked in a double-wrapped scarf. A knitted hat is
pulled low over her ears and hair, leaving only a slice of her face—from this angle,
her profile—exposed.
“There you are,” I say, and
they both turn.
A short but awkward silence.
If I didn’t know better, I’d think he looks surprised to see me.
“Charlotte, hi. I was just…”
He glances at the woman, then back to me. “What are you doing here?”
“You asked me to pick you
up. Didn’t you get my text?”
With his free hand, he
wriggles his cell from his pocket and checks the screen. “Oh. Sorry, I must
have had it on Silent. I was on my way back to the office, but then I got to
talking and…well, you know how that goes.” He gives me a sheepish smile. It’s a
known fact that Paul is a talker, and like in most small towns, there’s always
someone to talk to.
But I don’t know this woman.
I take in her milky skin and
sky blue eyes, the light smattering of freckles across her nose and high
cheekbones, and I’m positive I’ve never seen her before. She’s the kind of
pretty a person would remember, almost beautiful even, though she’s nothing like
his type. Paul likes his women curvy and exotic, with dark hair and ambiguous
coloring. This woman is bony, her skin so pale it’s almost translucent.
I step closer, holding
up my hand in a wave. “Hi, I’m Charlotte Keller. Paul’s wife.”
The woman gives me a polite
smile, but her gaze flits to Paul. She murmurs something, and I’m pretty sure
it’s “Keller.”
The hairs soldier on the
back of my neck, even though I’ve never been the jealous type. It’s always
seemed like such a waste of energy to me, being possessive and suspicious of a
man who claims to love you. Either you believe him or you don’t—or so I’ve
always thought. Paul tells me he loves me all the time, and I believe him.
But this woman wouldn’t be
the first around these parts to try to snag herself a Keller.
“Are you ready?” I say,
looking at Paul. “Because I came in the boat, and we need to get home before
this weather blows in.”
The talk of rain does the
trick, and Paul snaps out of whatever I walked into here. He gives me that
smile he saves only for me, and a rush of something warm hits me hard, right
behind the knees.
People who say Paul and I
are wrong together don’t get that we’ve been waiting for each other all our
lives. His first wife’s death, my convict father and meth-head mother, they
broke us for a reason, so all these years later our jagged edges would fit
together perfectly, like two pieces of the same fractured puzzle. The first
time Paul took my hand, the world just…started making sense.
And now there’s a baby, a
perfect little piece of Paul and me, an accidental miracle that somehow busted
through the birth control. Maybe it’s not a fluke but a sign, the universe’s
way of telling me something good is coming. A new life. A new chance to get
things right.
All of a sudden and out
of nowhere I feel it, this burning in my chest, an overwhelming, desperate fire
for this baby that’s taken root in my belly. I want it to grow and kick and
thrive. I want it with everything inside me.
“Let’s go home.” Without
so much as a backward glance at the woman, Paul takes my hand and leads me to
the boat.
Excerpted
from Stranger in the Lake by Kimberly
Belle, Copyright © 2020 by Kimberle S. Belle Books, LLC. Published by Park Row
Books.
About the Author:
Kimberly
Belle is the USA Today and internationally bestselling author of six novels,
including the forthcoming Stranger
in the Lake (June 2020). Her third novel, The Marriage Lie, was a
semifinalist in the 2017 Goodreads Choice Awards for Best Mystery &
Thriller, and a #1 e-book bestseller in the UK and Italy. She’s sold rights to
her books in a dozen languages as well as film and television options. A
graduate of Agnes Scott College, Belle divides her time between Atlanta and
Amsterdam.
Social Links:
Author website: https://www.kimberlybellebooks.com/
Facebook: @KimberlyBelleBooks
Twitter: @KimberlySBelle
Instagram: @kimberlysbelle
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/kimberlybelle
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