“Hey, it’s not like I want to follow you. I just … I need to be sure that you’re safe. Forgive me for being diligent and doing my job.”
“I’m safe. Besides, I stopped being your ‘job’ when we left New York.”
“New York.” He ran his hand down his face, rubbing his eyes. “I’ve gotta get back there, but …” He shook his head and made a sound of complete, intense exasperation. “I don’t know why I’ve got this weird sixth-sense thing happening—you know, like somehow I know something bad is going to go down. It’s driving me fucking nuts. There’s no way Trotta could track you here now. I know that, but still …”
He rubbed his forehead with one hand, as if he had a massive headache, and Allie’s anger softened.
“Maybe the sixth-sense thing isn’t about me,” she said. “Maybe it’s because you know if you leave, you’ll never patch things up with Shaun. Look, Harry, I’m having dinner at Marge’s house tonight. Why don’t you—”
He held up his hand. “Don’t start,” he said. “Just … go back to work, Allie. You can’t save me. You were smart to walk away when you did. I’m going to … Yeah, I’m definitely going to leave on Monday. You’re going to be fine. I’m just going to give it a few more days.”
Monday. Monday was in four days.
“Will you …” She swallowed and had to start over. “I hope you’ll come back sometime soon, to see your kids.” And me. She couldn’t say the words aloud. She had far too much pride, too much self-respect.
Harry smiled, but it was a smile filled with pain. “That’s one of the things I like best about you, Al. Even when a situation is utterly hopeless, you still find a way to hope.”
“Harry, your situation is not—”
“I’m going to say good-bye now,” he said. “I think it’s probably easier that way.”
Kim paced the living room while George took a nap.
He’d gone into the bedroom to lie down more than three hours ago, and he was still sound asleep.
She wanted to wake him up. She was going to wake him up. Soon. She had only a few hours before she had to go to work, and she had to talk to him.
She had to tell him about Michael Trotta.
She would be honest. She would tell him how Michael made her approach George at the Fantasy Club. She would tell him that at first she was only doing a job. But she would make him understand how that all changed when she’d fallen in love with him.
George would understand. She knew he would. He would kiss her gently, the way he always did, and he would smile at her and for the first time in her life, everything would be all right. He would figure out a way to keep her safe from Michael. If anyone could do it, George could.
She made another circuit around the living room, slowing as she approached George’s bookshelf. He had tons of books, more than twenty times the number of books she’d read in her entire life, maybe. He had books on every subject—medical books, books about guns, books about World War II. They were neatly arranged in groups according to subject. She smiled. George had an entire shelf of books about Star Trek. He was a science-fiction nerd. She should have known.
Another shelf was devoted to what looked like a collection of photo albums, yet another to fitness and diet books. One of the titles caught her eye. Better Buns in Thirty Days. Now, had George bought that book simply to look at the pictures of women’s butts, or did he have a secret wish for self-improvement?
She pulled out the book and flipped it open.
It was definitely a book written for women, and the pictures were nothing special. Any Victoria’s Secret catalog had far better thrills.
But then she saw handwriting on the cover page—a note, written right on the book.
She angled it toward the light.
“To Nic, the best piece of ass in the agency. Happy Anniversary. Your husband, G.”
Kim stared at the words, wishing they didn’t make quite so much sense.
Nic. Nicole. G. George. Anniversary. Husband.
Oh, God.
She could be wrong. She might be wrong. Although suddenly things started to click into place.
Nicole dropping over at all times of the day and night. The barbed comments they both made, the simmering tension between them.
And last night …
Last night Nicole had come over expecting that Kim wouldn’t be home, because George had told her Kim wouldn’t be home.
George was cheating on Kim with his ex—the woman he’d all but confessed to being still hung up on. The woman he still loved.
Maybe she was wrong.
She reached for the photo albums, hoping to find a clue.
The first held pictures from a vacation. Scenery. Mountains and valleys. Who the hell bothered to take pictures of only scenery?
She snapped it shut, fighting tears she refused to let come—after all she could be wrong. She put it back, drawing out the album with the white cover. White, wedding …
It was a professional album, with thin paper protecting the photographs. She pulled the paper back, and …
George and Nicole. Gazing into each other’s eyes. George looking heartbreakingly handsome in a black tuxedo, Nicole, the bitch, in a white dress and veil.
Oh, God. George was still in love with Nicole. Except their relationship was so perverse and twisted, he had to use her to make Nicole jealous enough to want him back. He didn’t love Kim, he’d never loved her, he would never love her.
As Kim stared at the photo, all of her hopes of everything finally being all right crashed and burned.
Shaun found Mindy at the basketball courts by the high school.
She was playing Around the World, all alone, and to his surprise, she was sinking most of the shots.
He knew exactly when she spotted him—she started missing.
He’d said some awful things to her. It had been over a week, and she still hadn’t shown up back in his playroom. She was the one who now avoided him at school, running if she saw him coming.
He knew he’d killed their friendship. He’d pushed past the point of forgiveness with the things he’d said. He knew it was possible—no, it was probable—that there was nothing he could say to make things right again.
But he had to apologize. He couldn’t bear the thought of Mindy going through the rest of her life actually believing he’d meant what he’d said.
She kept shooting, kept missing, as he parked his bike and walked out onto the court.
“Better watch out,” she said, shooting over his head. “Someone might see you talking to me.”
“I don’t care.”
“Yeah, well maybe I care if someone sees a loser like you talking to me.”
What could he say to that? “I …”
“What do you want?” she asked, holding tightly to the ball, as if she were keeping herself from throwing it at his head—but just barely. “Spit it out. If you’re here to say you’re sorry, get it over with, so I can tell you to go to hell and get back to my practice.”
“I brought some pictures of my father to show you.”
It wasn’t what she’d expected him to say, and she blinked her enormous eyes, temporarily silenced.
Shaun held out the photo album as if to prove his point and she actually moved closer. He opened the cover, and she sidled slightly behind him, to look over his shoulder.
“These were from Em’s second birthday,” he told her. “Harry and my mom were divorced by then, but they were both at the party. They were really nice to each other, but I knew there wasn’t any chance of them getting back together because my mom was already spending lots of time with this other guy, Tim—he, you know, stayed overnight a lot.”
Mindy touched the clear plastic that protected the photographs, pointing to a picture of Harry holding Emily in one arm, his other arm locked around Kevin’s neck. Shaun, nearly twelve years old and still tiny, stood nearby.
“That’s your dad?” she asked.
He nodded. In the picture, Harry w
as laughing. They all were laughing—all except Shaun. He just looked wistful.
“And here’s my mother.” There was another picture beneath it—Sonya holding Shaun in her arms. Shaun had never fought to get away, not like other nearly twelve-year-old boys. He’d loved her so much.
“That’s you.” Mindy ran her finger across his face. “Wow, you were short. You’re, like, twice as big now.” She turned the page, looking at the other photographs, all taken during that same party.
Shaun and Kevin, playing ball with Emily. Everyone mugging in front of the birthday cake they’d all helped decorate. Harry giving Kevin a piggyback ride. Em and Shaun hanging on to his legs.
“Who’s this?” she asked, pointing to Kevin. “A cousin?”
“He was my brother. Kevin.” Shaun didn’t look up, but he could feel the change in Mindy. She’d gone very, very still at his words. Was. Past tense. It said it all without having to say the awful words, the ugly words like died. He knew she wouldn’t ask for the details—no one ever did. It was as if now that Kevin was gone, no one wanted to speak his name.
Everyone wanted to back away from death, to keep their distance. Problem was, death had come and set up permanent camp in Shaun’s yard. There was no avoiding it. It was there for him, every day, right in his face from the moment he woke up in the morning and realized painfully once again that Kev and his mom were dead.
Dead. Not gone, not passed away, not quietly past tense, but horribly, violently dead.
“He and my mother were killed when a truck hit their car,” he told her. “It was just a few months after these pictures were taken.”
“I didn’t know,” Mindy whispered.
“How could you know?” he asked. “I didn’t tell you.”
“Oh, Shaun.” Her gigantic eyes were filled with enormous tears.
He forced himself to hold her gaze. “It doesn’t excuse the things I said to you.” It didn’t excuse Harry’s actions either. Em had needed him. Shaun had needed him. But he’d left them to struggle through on their own.
“Maybe not,” Mindy told him, “but it makes it much easier to forgive you.”
“So how is Harry?” Marge asked. “He looked awful. Is he drinking? His mother was a terrible drunk.”
“The entire time I’ve known him, he’s only had a couple of glasses of beer.” Allie toyed with the crust of her pizza. Marge, bless her, was lactose intolerant, and had ordered one of the pizzas without cheese, thus saving Allie from a dinner of only salad. “He doesn’t sleep well, though. He’s … haunted.”
“I worry about him,” Marge said. “The few times I’ve seen him around town, he’s looked as if he’s just barely holding on. If you see him, do me a favor and let him know I’ve taken to leaving the answering machine on at night and turning off the ringers on the phone. I’ve been getting these awful prank phone calls in the middle of the night. Students, I think. I’m pretty sure I’m not going to teach again next year. Anyway, just let him know, will you?”
“I haven’t really talked with him lately myself,” Allie said.
Marge glanced toward the living room, toward the sound of Emily’s laughter. The little girl had taken an instant liking to Mrs. Gerty. Annarose Gerty. They were all on a first-name basis here.
Shaun and Mindy had gone upstairs to the attic playroom and were watching TV. Shaun had been terse all throughout dinner, Mindy anxious.
Harry’s son was a dancer, of all things. Marge was taking him and Emily into Denver that weekend for an audition with a summer dance company that would be based here at the college in Hardy. According to Shaun’s teachers, he was almost guaranteed to win a spot.
“Feel free to tell me to mind my own business,” Marge said, “but it seems kind of strange, you coming all the way out here with Harry, and then him leaving, and you staying behind. Particularly since it’s so obvious that he’s as crazy in love with you as you are with him.”
“Oh,” Allie said. “Oh, no.” She laughed. “You’re wrong, we’re … we were just friends.”
“Ah,” Marge said. “My mistake.”
Eighteen
HARRY SAT IN the dark, with the car window open, listening to the quiet sounds of the warm spring night.
The light in Allie’s apartment had gone out hours ago and everything was completely still.
He knew he should go back to the motel, get some sleep. He knew he’d reached the point where he was physically exhausted. He’d be asleep the second he hit the bed.
Or he would be if he could only shake this feeling of dread he’d been carrying around for the past week.
Something was wrong. The feeling hovered around him relentlessly. It was the same feeling he’d get if he ever accidentally left the house with the stove on. The threat of impending disaster would niggle at him until he went back to check. Somehow part of his brain knew that something had been left undone, that something had slipped past him.
Allie’s life depended on the fact that nothing had slipped past him now. He knew he’d done everything right. He knew she was completely hidden from Trotta. So why couldn’t he shake this feeling?
Fatigue could play a part. And the fact that he missed her so goddamn much might have something to do with it, too. Add in a barrel of shame from knowing his son’s accusations had been right on the nose. He may have taken care of Shaun and Emily’s financial needs—he’d made sure they were housed and fed and cared for—but he’d abandoned his children on the most basic, emotional level.
And there was nothing he could do to change the past, no way he could take a do-over.
So instead, he’d walked away from his kids for good.
He knew if he could do that, leaving Allie would be a piece of cake.
Harry got out of the car, taking care to close the door silently behind him. He made a slow circuit of the garage. Allie’s place was on the second floor of that outbuilding. The apartment door was cheaply made, the lock ridiculous. Anyone could kick it open with one well-placed push. And if they wanted their entrance to be a silent one, they could easily climb to any one of the apartment windows—none of which had locks.
He should’ve insisted she get an apartment with some kind of security system. He should’ve insisted she take that money today.
He should’ve told her the truth—that once he left, he wasn’t coming back, not ever. He should’ve told her to stop hoping.
But expecting Allie to stop hoping was as ridiculous as thinking she could stop breathing. If there was one thing she had plenty of—too much of—it was hope.
His own hope was gone. He’d used it all up that day he got the call to come identify Sonya and Kevin’s bodies. All the way to the hospital, he’d hoped it was a mistake, hoped it was someone else’s ex-wife and kid who’d been brought in, DOA.
But he’d hoped in vain.
So he no longer wasted his time on hope. He factored it out of the equation. He didn’t hope he wouldn’t hurt Shaun and Emily anymore—he’d completely handled that by pulling himself out of the picture. In the same way, he’d removed himself from Allie’s life. He shouldn’t have to hope Trotta wouldn’t find her. He should know that wasn’t going to happen.
But that little niggling doubt remained, and as he stared up at her open bedroom window, he found himself hoping—fervently—that he was simply overtired, and that somewhere, somehow, he hadn’t left some burner unattended, about to explode into flames.
“Lemon-pepper linguine,” Harry said with a smile, his warm gaze dropping to her lips right before he bent to kiss her.
Alessandra knew she shouldn’t melt against him. She knew she should warn him, tell him they had to run.
They were back in the Super Stop and Shop, and any minute now George was going to get shot.
But then the sharp sound of the gunfire rang out, and it was Harry who jerked, Harry who was hit.
Harry whose life she was trying so desperately to save.
“Don’t do this,” she begged him as the life draine
d out of him through a gaping hole in his chest. She was covered with his blood. There was no way to stop it, no way to save him. “Don’t leave me, don’t you leave me!”
“I’m going to say good-bye now,” he told her. “I think it’s probably easier that way.”
He pointed up toward the ceiling, and Allie lifted her head.
Mrs. Gerty’s dog, Hunter, was perched on top of the shelves, balanced on the stacks of canned goods. He wagged his tail and seemed to smile. But then his face changed, and he wasn’t friendly Hunter anymore. He was Pinky, Michael Trotta’s dog.
He snarled and barked, glaring down at her with his devil’s eyes, tensing his body and leaping, teeth bared.
And Alessandra screamed and screamed and screamed.
“Nightmare! Allie, come on, wake up. You’re having a nightmare.”
She opened her eyes, and Harry was there, really there, safe and whole, leaning over her bed in the moonlight. She reached for him, and he pulled her into his arms, holding her tightly.
“It’s okay,” he murmured. “You’re okay. Jesus, you scared me to death. I heard you screaming from the street.”
His arms were so warm, his chest so solid, Allie couldn’t speak. She could do nothing but cling to him and hope he’d never let her go.
“That dog spooked you today, huh?” he asked. “I saw the way you ran.”
He pushed her hair back from her face, running his fingers through it again and again. The sensation was dizzying. He smelled so familiar, and his arms felt so much like being home. How could he leave her? How could he even consider leaving her? She wanted to cry.
“You’re shaking,” he said. “It must’ve been a bad one, huh?”
She nodded.
“Can I get you something?” he asked. “A glass of water, or …?”
Or what?
“Stay with me.” Her voice broke as she asked him—no, not asked, begged. She was strong, she knew she was strong. She’d spent the entire past week being strong, proving to herself and to Harry that she would be fine without him. And she would be. But it didn’t make her want him any less. And so she would beg if she had to. “Stay with me tonight.”
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