Live to Tell - Lisa Gardner [0]
The Perfect Husband
The Other Daughter
The Third Victim
The Next Accident
The Survivors Club
The Killing Hour
Alone
Gone
Hide
Say Goodbye
The Neighbor
Contents
Other Books by this Author
Title Page
Prologue
Part 1 - Thursday
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Part 2 - Friday
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Part 3 - Saturday
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Part 4 - Sunday
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Part 5 - Monday
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-Four
Chapter Forty-Five
Epilogue
Author’s Note and Acknowledgments
Lisa Gardner on D.D. Warren
Excerpt from Love You More
Get an exclusive peek at the script for AMC’s addictive new series, The Killing. Premiering Sunday, April 3 at 9/8c. Only on AMC.
About the Author
Copyright
PROLOGUE
DANIELLE
I don’t remember that night much anymore. In the beginning, it seems like you’ll never forget. But time is a nebulous thing, especially for a child. And year by year, bit by bit, details started to fade from my memory. Coping skills, Dr. Frank assured me. The natural evolution of my psyche starting to heal. Nothing to feel guilty about.
But of course, I do.
I remember waking up to a scream. Maybe my mother’s, but according to the police report, most likely my sister’s. It was dark in my room. I was disoriented, couldn’t see. And there was a smell in the air. That’s what I remember most clearly after all these years. A smoky odor I thought might be from a fire, but was actually cordite, drifting down the hall.
More noises. Things I could hear but not see: pounding footsteps, the thud of a body falling down the stairs. Then my father’s voice, booming from outside my bedroom door.
“Oh Danny girl. My pretty, pretty Danny girl.”
My door opened. A bright glowing rectangle amidst a field of black. My father’s shadow, looming in the doorway.
“Danny girl,” he sang more brightly. “My pretty, pretty Danny girl.”
Then he tapped the gun against his forehead and pulled the trigger.
I’m not sure what happened immediately after that. Did I get out of bed? Did I dial 911? Did I try to revive my mother, or maybe stop the blood pouring from my sister’s shattered head or my brother’s broken body?
I remember another man walking into my room. He spoke in a soothing voice, told me everything was okay now, I was safe. He picked me up in his arms, though I was nine years old and too big to be treated like a baby. He told me to close my eyes. He told me not to look.
I nodded against his shoulder, but of course I kept my eyes open.
I had to see. I had to record. I had to remember. It is the duty of the lone survivor.
According to the police report, my father was drunk that night. He’d consumed at least a fifth of whiskey before loading his service revolver. He’d lost his job with the sheriff’s department the week before—after being reprimanded twice for showing up for work in a less-than-sober state. Sheriff Wayne, the man who carried me out of the house, had hoped the termination would force my father to clean up his act, maybe join AA. I guess my father had other ideas.
He started in the bedroom, catching my mother next to her bed. Then he moved on to my thirteen-year-old sister, who’d stuck her head out of her room, probably to see what was going on. My eleven-year-old brother also appeared