Murder By The Book

Crime Fiction by Dana Norton

Matthew invited his young wife, Hayley, to go down to the basement with him. He told her he wanted her to see for herself the water damage by the east wall. In a shadowy corner of the basement lay the heavy crowbar, ready.

Don’t go! Abby silently warned her. She bit her lip and turned the page.

“Hey, babe?”

A long shadow fell over the couch. Damn! Right at the best part of Husband from Hell: The True Story of a Grisly Murder.

“It’s 9 a.m. Time for your medication,” said Jason.

Abby tore herself away from her book and looked up. Her handsome husband of less than two years stood over her smiling, holding out his hand. On his palm lay a shiny blue-and-turquoise capsule, its usually bright colors looking muted in the dim morning light.

She turned away, toward the living room window. Outside, the winter day was gloomy and gray, about to rain. It seemed to be telling her, though she was barely twenty-three, “See how dreary life can be?”

Lately it had been. No wonder she spent most of her day with her nose buried in a book.

Abby turned back to her husband. It was important to remain calm.“I really don’t think I need those pills, Jason. Why are you pushing them on me?”

He sighed. She recognized that look of mingled pity and irritation. She’d seen it often enough on her parents’ faces when she was growing up. She felt on the verge of tears. Why did people always react to her that way?

Jason took a step closer. “I’m just trying to help you, Abby. You know what Dr. Berk said. This medication can really take the edge off those paranoid feelings.”

“I’m not paranoid.” If she didn’t know better, she’d almost think her husband and the doctor were conspiring against her.

Jason frowned. “You’ve only been taking the pills for four days and already you’re giving up on them? What are you afraid of?” At times like this he looked almost wolfish, with his thick dark hair worn long in the back, heavy beard, and hazel eyes with amber flecks.

Finally she picked up the pill. It was the quickest way to get back to her book. She pretended to put it in her mouth but palmed it instead, just like she had for the past four days. In a few quick gulps she downed the glass of water Jason had placed on the coffee table.

His smile reappeared. “Good girl.” He left the room, and she dropped the pill into the narrow gap between the couch and the wall.

Back to Husband from Hell. It was proving even better than Promise You’ll Never Hurt Me, the book she’d finished last night. She gathered her fluffy pink blanket around her like a cocoon and sank back with a sigh onto the soft, velvety cushions.

Her phone rang. Now what?

“Just calling to see if you’re okay.” The voice of Lucy, her older sister, sounded higher pitched than usual. “Jason’s worried about you. Actually, he told me not to tell you, he thought you’d get upset. But I just had to call. See if you’re okay.”

What?“Of course I’m okay. I don’t understand. What was Jason worried about?”

There was a pause. “Well…he said you’ve been kind of depressed lately. He said he was scared you might harm yourself—or worse.”

“You mean suicide? That’s insane.” Abby threw off the blanket and sat up straight. “Maybe I’ve been feeling a bit off lately. But I’m not about to kill myself.”

“Are you telling me the truth?” Lucy’s voice quavered. “I’m really worried about you. Ever since you got laid off a couple months ago, you don’t go out any more. All you do is lay around, practically inhaling those wife-killer books.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“What’s wrong? First, they’re depressing as hell. Second, you’re reading books all day and not getting involved in real life. Pretty soon you won’t be able to tell fantasy from reality.”

Abby took a deep breath. Then, after reassuring Lucy a gazillion times, she got her off the phone.

Once again she curled up under the woolly blanket. But she could no longer concentrate on Husband from Hell. Why on earth did Jason tell Lucy she was in danger of killing herself?

Funny, it reminded her of something she’d read a long time ago. She tried to remember what it was, but couldn’t. Oddly, she felt a tiny prickle of fear.

***

Hayley led the way down the stairs to the basement. She began to walk toward the east wall. Behind her, Matthew picked up the crowbar and raised it high.

What a monster, Abby thought. How could some women be so unsuspecting? No way would she ever be so clueless.

A few minutes later, Jason poked his head into the living room to say goodbye. He was heading off to his job as sales manager for a pharmaceutical firm.

Abby got up and walked to the front door with him. “Will you be home for dinner—this time?” Even to her own ears her voice sounded whiny.

“I could be. If you’re making my favorite meal….”

“I’ll defrost the shrimp.”

Jason put his arm around her, looking concerned. “Babe. This afternoon, why don’t you leave the place for a change? Venture out into the real world?”

Abby just shook her head. Lately, their big, rambling Victorian house was world enough for her. Whenever she needed a change of scene she’d travel from one room to another.

He sighed. “Are you going to do something productive, at least? Or just wallow in true crime?”

The minute he left, Abby dove back into Hell. So what if she liked to read true-crime books? “But why only ones about husbands killing their wives?” Jason would smirk.

Abby couldn’t answer that. All she knew was, curled up with one of these books on their cozy couch, she devoured each move by the conniving husbands. She shed tears over the fate of their unsuspecting wives, many of them timid young women only recently married to these deceptively charming men.

Right now, though, she couldn’t concentrate and gave up trying to read. The house was tomb-silent. Outside, the rain made snaky patterns on the windowpanes.

Maybe a change of room would help. She went up the curving oak staircase to their bedroom, lay down on the pretty blue and white quilted bedspread, and closed her eyes. Soon she drifted into that murky twilight between wakefulness and sleep.

The image of a giant blue-and-turquoise capsule floated before her. It was shiny, perfect. Slowly, to her horror, it melted into an ugly mass, covered with scratches and sticky granules.

Abby’s eyes flew open. That capsule she dropped behind the couch this morning. It had looked a little the worse for wear. Or was she just imagining things?

She jumped up from bed and ran downstairs, back into the living room. The couch screeched like nails on an old-fashioned blackboard as she shoved it away from the wall across the polished wood floor.

There they were, the four pills, just where she’d dropped them. All bright and shiny, all identical. So she was wrong. The latest pill hadn’t looked odd.

Wait. This morning’s capsule was the fifth one. It must have rolled further away. She got down on her hands and knees and poked around, ignoring the dust balls that clung to her clothes.

It was under the grubby old radiator. Its surface looked a little dull, not shiny like the others. Of course, that could be due to laying in the dust. But Abby was almost certain it wasn’t.

What the hell was going on?

Her stomach rumbled. She’d been so engrossed in her book, at the moment the evil husband wielded the crowbar, she’d forgotten to eat breakfast. She went into the kitchen, took the shrimp out of the freezer, and made herself a cheese sandwich. She brought it into Jason’s study and sat down at the massive oak desk, where her husband often liked to work from home.

Not lately, however. The last couple of months, he’d been spending more and more time at the office, coming back late most evenings. Everyone in his department, he explained to Abby, was working their tails off on something called the Lansing Project. It had an extremely tight deadline.

How she missed those cozy evenings they used to have! After dinner, they would sit on the couch and catch up on their favorite TV series, Stillwater Island. Each episode featured a brand-new murder mystery.

“How do you do it?” Jason would exclaim, after she correctly guessed the identity of the murderer each time.

“Sheer talent,” she said, teasing him, but she was pleased. What pleased her even more was snuggling with her husband on the couch during the program, nestled in the curve of his warm, comforting arm.

Abby forgot her distrust of Jason for a moment. She wanted those evenings back.

Stop whining, she told herself. She was actually a lucky woman, compared to many she knew. Her great-aunt Alice had left her a tidy little sum when she died six months ago. Although Abby missed her former job at the local library, she didn’t need to hurry to find another one.

Besides, Jason had a solid career. It was great he was so conscientious about his work.

Or was he?

In her true crime books, many a husband who claimed he was working after hours later proved to be miles away from the office. Was Jason really hard at work all those evenings? Did the Lansing Project even exist? There was an easy way to find out.

She picked up her phone and called Melissa Barnes, the administrative assistant in Jason’s department. Her husband wouldn’t be there. He was working offsite today.

Melissa was not someone Abby really wanted to talk to. But the petite redhead, a real wise-ass, was the undisputed queen of office intelligence. Abby would do a little subtle probing.

“Global-Deliverables-Unit-may-I-help-you?” said Melissa, in that rapid-fire, offhand way she had. In the background her nails clicked rhythmically on a keyboard.

“Hey, Melissa. It’s Abby.”

“Misplaced your husband again?”

“Ha, ha.” Abby cleared her throat and plunged in. “Uh…I was just calling to ask you a question. I’m planning a dinner for some friends Friday evening and I need to find out if Jason will be available. I don’t want to text him because he’s with a client. But I thought you might know if people in the department were planning to work late that day.”

“Why would Jason stay late on a Friday?” Melissa asked.

“Well, he’s been staying late practically every worknight for the past couple of months. You know…the Lansing Project.”

The typing stopped. “Just a sec,” said Melissa. “Got another call.”

A moment later she was back on the line. “You were saying….”

“The Lansing Project—”

“Oh, yeah. Jason and everyone else in the department have been working super hard on it.”

“Every single evening?”

Melissa laughed. “Why not? Jason’s very passionate about it.”

Passionate? Abby’s eyes narrowed. Subtlety be damned. “Melissa, tell me the truth. Is there really a Lansing Project?”

“Sure,” Melissa said. “Gotta go.” She hung up.

Abby stared down into her lap. Things were becoming clearer. Melissa was trying to tell her something, but couldn’t come right out and say it. But now Abby knew the Lansing Project was as real as the Loch Ness Monster.

And what about Melissa’s strange choice of words? Jason liked his job well enough, but no one would ever describe him as passionate about his work. Passionate about a person?

She looked up for a moment, and her glance fell on the antique mahogany bookcase in the corner of the study. Jason had filled it with his old mystery paperbacks. He loved Agatha Christie and other traditional mystery writers. Actually, so did Abby. Before discovering true crime, she’d been an avid fan of the fictional kind. She’d read every book in that bookcase.

She gave a sudden start. There, on the top shelf, stood Murder Most Devious. The book she’d been trying to recall this morning! Now she remembered the plot. A scheming husband tells his brother-in-law that he’s worried his seriously depressed wife might kill herself. A few days later he substitutes something lethal for her usual medication. Near her body he leaves a carefully forged suicide note.

Abby was shaking, but she was sure now. Never had Jason thought she would kill herself. In calling her sister, her beloved husband was merely preparing the ground for Abby’s upcoming “tragic suicide.” Thank God she hadn’t taken that pill.

No wonder it hadn’t looked as new as the others. It had been tampered with. Jason must have pried it open, removed its contents, and substituted something deadly. Maybe a ground-up overdose of her sleeping pills? She took them from time to time and kept the bottle in her nightstand. After her death, accompanied by a poignant suicide note, everyone would assume she took the overdose herself.

There was no doubt in her mind. Her husband was trying to kill her.

At the same time a small part of her lodged a protest. The whole thing didn’t make sense. If Jason was having an affair and wanted out of their marriage, wouldn’t he simply file for divorce?

Not a chance, whispered a little voice inside her. If Jason divorced you, he’d no longer enjoy the fruits of your inheritance. But if you died, and because you never made a will, he might be able to claim part or even all of it.

Abby’s phone beeped. It was a text from Jason: Finished early, home at five.

She looked at her watch. He’d be here in ten minutes! She forced herself to take deep breaths, to calm the beating of her heart. She had to think.

Jason was probably expecting to arrive home and discover her cold, lifeless body on the living room floor. He had no idea she hadn’t swallowed the pill. That little text he sent was for the police’s benefit, later on, to prove he’d no inkling she was dead.

What would he do when her found her alive and kicking? He might not wait very long to make another attempt. He might even try tonight.

There was no time to have the contents of the fifth capsule tested. But Abby knew her suspicions were correct. The police, on the other hand, would laugh at those suspicions, laugh her right out of the station. The only person who could save her was herself.

She would pretend she suspected nothing. If Jason ever realized she was on to him, he might murder her on the spot.

Five minutes left. What was she going to do?

***

Jason enjoyed every last bite of the dinner she prepared—shrimp scampi over linguini and a Caprese salad. Together they polished off a whole bottle of wine.

After they cleaned up, he turned to her. “Think I’ll do some work in the study this evening.”

“Sounds good,” she said. “Oh—before you do, can you come down to the basement with me? I want you to see for yourself where it’s leaking from outside.”

Abby opened the kitchen door that led to the basement and motioned to Jason. “After you.” They went downstairs. Five minutes later, she came up alone.

***

Matthew laid down the crowbar and picked up the hacksaw. He’d already prepared the huge tarp, the trash bags.

These were the words that greeted Abby soon after she awoke the next morning. Feeling fuzzy, a little hungover, she’d mechanically reached out for her book on the nightstand. A little dose of true crime before breakfast would be nice.

Oh, God!

The events from last night hit her like a freight train. The basement, the heavy shovel, Jason’s body lying in a pool of blood. Herself standing over him, wielding the weapon.

What madness had come over her yesterday? How could she ever have imagined Jason wanted to kill her? The only way to explain it was temporary insanity. So much for that talent of hers sniffing out murderers on TV. It had zero to do with real life.

Now she saw the truth with a pitiless clarity. There’d been no tampering with the capsule, just her own imagination going off the rails. There’d been no affair with another woman, just a snarky office worker having a little fun with her. As for Jason telling her sister she might harm herself, well, why wouldn’t he be worried about a wife who never left the house and spent the whole day buried in true crime?

She didn’t let herself think about the practical side of things. Like how to dispose of the body. Like what to say to Jason’s employer when he never showed up again. Instead, she lay back in bed and cried and cried. She realized only now how much she’d loved Jason.

She felt a strong need to be near him, but she couldn’t face the lifeless body in the basement. Instead she went down to the study, his room. One by one, she picked up the heartbreaking little mementos on his desk. The antique brass compass she’d given him for their second anniversary. A framed picture of them on a palm-fringed beach during their honeymoon in Hawaii. The tiny stuffed monkey that was their own little private joke from that wonderful trip to Jamaica.

Desperate to find more such items, she began wildly pulling out the drawers of the desk. She yanked open the bottom right drawer so violently a folder fell off the rack. Its label said TAXES, in bright red marker.

Her mind wandered. How silly Jason had been, making her promise never to touch his files. As if she wanted to! Especially this one. In fact, they had laughed about it together. How she wouldn’t touch a folder called TAXES with a twenty-foot pole. She’d been happy to leave all that boring financial stuff to him.

As she picked up the file and prepared to re-install it, a scrap of paper fluttered gently to the floor. She picked it up. It was half a sheet torn from some old-fashioned stationery someone had once gifted her.

Strange—it had her handwriting on it. No. It simply looked a lot like her handwriting. She read the note and froze.

Dear Jason,

I’m ending my life because I just can’t face things anymore. I’m so very, very sorry.

I love you so much.

Abby

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Bio: Dana began her career as a newspaper feature writer, but has never regretted her shift a few years ago to short crime fiction. In 2025, her short story “A Killer Background” will appear in Kings River Life Magazine, and in 2023 four of her stories appeared in Tales from Shelf 804: An Anthology. She is a member of Sisters in Crime New England and the Short Mystery Fiction Society.

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