What happens at the end of The Housemaid by Freida McFadden?
After Nina is kicked out of the house, we find out Nina purposely engineered this situation so that she could be free from Andrew.
Andrew locks Millie up in the attic room, but Millie finds some pepper spray in the attic room and attacks Andrew. She locks him in the room and tortures him, turning the table around on him. We then learn that Millie went to jail for accidentally killing and attempted rapist and has a few other violent incidents in her past. Nina knew about it all along. She not only wanted Millie to be a replacement, she was also hoping Millie would kill Andrew.
When he dies, Nina offers to take the blame for it, since it’s what she wanted all along, she just didn’t have it in her to kill him. When the police detective comes to question her it turns out his daughter was Andrew’s ex-fiance who was traumatized by him. The detective concludes the death was an accident. In the Epilogue, Millie interviews for a cleaning job but it becomes clear the woman really just wants Millie to kill her abusive husband. Millie takes the job.
Did Nina instruct Cecelia to be mean to Millie?
So, I don’t think there’s a black and white answer on this, it certainly is not explicitly said one way or another. My guess is no. It sounds like Cecelia was kind of a brat to begin with and because of her experiences she is distrustful of strangers, so I think she probably did all that on her own. Millie probably got off on the wrong foot with Cecelia by offering her peanut butter, since that’s the same way that Andrew threatens her.
I think you could also argue that Cecelia probably used her mother’s behavior as a guide on how to behave herself, so if her mother was treating Millie poorly, then she’d be inclined to do the same thing.
Do I need to read The Housemaid before reading The Housemaid’s Secret?
No, but it provides helpful context. Also, it’ll give away the ending somewhat to The Housemaid if you skip to the second book. I would pretty strongly recommend reading The Housemaid before reading The Housemaid’s Secret.
Did Nina actually try to drown Cecilia in the tub?
No it was Andrew
I have a question what does the second part of the housemaid mean like I know it’s giving nina’s point of view but it’s really confusing. Like why is Nina with her ex husband if she wants to kill him is it to save time for Millie to figure out a plan to kill Andy? Sorry for the grammar I just didn’t bother writing with proper Grammer sorry.
Nina stayed with Andrew because she had no other choice; he wouldn’t let her leave. If she tried to leave, Andrew would just call the cops and say that she’s mentally unstable and irresponsibly took her daughter with her and etc. So her only other option was to make him fall out of love with her and move onto someone else.
I had a question about what Millie made Andrew do at the end with pulling his teeth, and then the comment the mom made at the funeral. Was it a coincidence or is there a connection somehow?!
This is what I’m wondering about too literally been on Google trying to find out🤣
I thought that Andrew was psychotic as a result of the same behaviors that his mother used on him. Her comment led me to believe she was a very psychotic person too.
Andrew was traumatized as a kid. The ending revealed that Andrew’s mother used the same forms of extreme punishment on him when he made mistakes as a kid. There were moments throughout the book I guessed that what he was doing was learned behavior, especially the moment when his mom commented on the lights and Nina took the blame. Then we see as an adult man, he punishes women who he prefers to look like and dress like his mother (wearing white with blond hair). He reenacted the same his trauma almost as a pseudo way to punish his mother for how she hurt him. Also, he developed a very distorted view of love due to the trauma he endured by her hands.
Why did the police do such a superficial investigation on Andrew’s death?
Because the detective on the case knew that Andrew was abusive- his daughter was severely traumatized after being engaged to him. He had sympathy for Nina and made the case “go away”.
I found the ending confusing. Millie was trapped only once by Andrew, during which time she had to go through some painful exercises in order to get free. In response, she tortures Andrew in the cruelest way, lies to him about getting out, and allows him to die of dehydration. That’s a pretty extreme response to one uncomfortable night in the room.
Then when the police investigate, it is Nina who fears she will go to jail, not Millie. Nina didn’t kill him, Millie did. Doesn’t make sense to me.
After finding the pepper spray Millie worked out it must have been left there by Nina and therefore she must have been locked in the room also so I think she was getting revenge for both herself and Nina.
I think Nina took the blame as she felt ultimately guilty for hiring Millie and creating the scenarios which lead to his death, which she wanted anyway.
If Millie had a key to the attic all along why didn’t she let herself out before laying for hours with the heavy books on her?
The door locks from the outside
Do you think that the Grandma was punishing/abusing Cecilia while she was babysitting her?