“To tell them about the photos.”
“No, they’ll laugh at me and tell me that I’m crazy like they always do. I’m tired of hearing the same crap from them. I’m done. I’ll find out what the fuck is going on. Me. Not Brad, or Logan, or Chief. Screw them. The only thing they’re good for is getting in the way.”
“Cool it.” She raises a hand. “Do you want us to kidnap Virginia if we see her?”
I look up. Joss smiles.
“Don’t leave it to the Tilford Lake cops, Joss.”
Her smile drops. “Is that a yes?”
I take a deep breath in through my nose and get back to shoveling out Virginia’s car door.
“Babe? You didn’t answer me.”
“Just pull up next to Virginia, open the door, and she’ll jump in. I guarantee it.”
“Like a dog?”
“She lives for attention.”
“Yeah, like a dog.”
“Jim, careful with my truck,” Nate says. “Put it in a ditch and you’ll be the next person who disappears.”
Jim leans across Joss. “Hey.”
“What?” Nate tosses a pile of snow away from the trunk before he looks at Jim.
“I love you, man.”
“Good. But that doesn’t give you permission to fuck up my truck.”
Jim kisses the dash and rubs it lovingly before he backs out. Laughter promenades down the driveway, muffled out when Joss closes the window.
“She’ll get fired if anyone from the plant sees her in town.”
“She’s playing hooky again?”
“Supposedly, she has the flu.”
“Jim’s the same way. His motto of ‘women before work’ always comes back to bite him in the ass.”
“Oh, great,” I gripe.
“Huh?”
“The door is frozen shut.” I tug on the handle. “I can’t tell if it’s unlocked or not.”
Nate leans against the door and throws his weight into it, breaking the ice around the seal. “Can you get me some hot water?” He pulls out his wallet and uses a credit card to chip away at the remaining pieces. “Not too hot, I don’t want to shatter the glass.”
“Be right back.” I go inside, fill a pitcher, and bring it out to him.
He pours it over the rubber seals, puts his weight against the door twice more, and says, “Open Sesame.” His fingers wiggle with the magical phrase. He tries the door and it opens. “Guess it was unlocked.” He sinks into the leather driver’s seat and spins the air fresher that hangs from the rearview mirror. “Smells like peaches.”
“Peaches and cream.”
“You know your air fresheners.” He checks the center console. “Empty.”
“The freshener is in the shape of an ice cream cone. See the orange the white swirls. What else could it be?”
“True. Good eye, Salem. You should come on a job with me sometime.” He fingers the roof, checks under the visors, surveys the back seat, then opens the glove box. “Car manual for a Cadillac sedan, registration, tissues, and a flashlight.” He shines the light around, then steps out and looks under the seats. “Her car is spotless. Not even a hair. Let’s try the trunk.”
“Her room was spotless, too.”
“Yeah? You always go in people’s rooms when they’re out?”
“No, not ever … or not usually,” I correct. My cheeks flush with thoughts of Frank catching me with Nate’s pillow. “I had to see if Virginia was all right. In case she fell or…”
“Or died?” He scoops icy chunks off the top of the trunk.
“Yeah. It’s the same as what we’re doing now.”
“Did you find anything?”
I thrust my shovel into a snow bank and leave it there. “Nate, she even emptied the trash. I couldn’t believe it.” I blow on my hands, the ice burning cold. “Can you tell I’m a wreck?”
He leans his shovel against the car and takes my hands in his, squeezing my fingers to warm my skin. “Change comes about fast, doesn’t it?”
“That’s for sure. Alive, dead, alive, dead. I didn’t expect any of this to happen.”
He places soft kisses on my wrists, gentle-eyed and considerate. “An endless emotional spin.”
I nod. “The weight of my past is exhausting at times, but Eli’s worth holding on to. This is, too.” I gesture toward the lodge. “I know I say that a lot, but I’d never give it up.”
“You must daydream about taking off.”
“Sometimes. But those thoughts are always short-lived. I can keep doing it. I’m here for him and the lodge. Things will get better.” I pause, stare down at my hiking boots, tap the top of my boot with the heel of my other. “Sorry. Joss is right that I’m always thinking about my family.”
“A lot of us do.” He shrugs. “Bet most people have family on their minds … and sex. Hopefully not family and sex at the same time.”
I laugh. We pick up our shovels and continue to dig, the rear end of the car budding out of the snow.
“I told Joss once that I’d rather have Eli’s disappearance be like the abrupt turn of a rickety, old roller coaster. At least that’s quick. Your stomach hollows out for only a second, but with a missing person everything moves at a crawl.”
“I get that. Always ‘what-if’ scenarios, but never any substantial evidence.”
“Exactly. What if a car hit him and the driver panicked and hid his body? Each day is a guess.” I stab the snow. “Twenty years later and this is the first week of change.” I touch his arm. “Good change. The past has come back. You. Virginia. My granddad’s letters, the keys, the stash, and now the photos, I’m confident the release of all these secrets is for a reason.”
He runs his fingers through his hair. I’m lost for a moment in his blue eyes, so utterly sensitive to his charm. His sexy dimple teases his cheek, a hint that he’s aware of my fixed stare.
“What?” I ask, taken with the scent of his cologne on my skin.
“Nothing. You’re just … you’re amazing, Salem.” He smiles.
I smile back. “Pop the trunk, Nate.”
“You got it, beautiful.”
• • •
“Two suitcases and her purse,” I tell Joss, “a winter coat and a pair of boots. Nothing else was in the trunk. She’s still in Tilford. She’s not going anywhere without her car and her things.”
“We looked. We asked. No one has seen a woman walking around town who fits her description.” Joss spreads the photographs of Eli across a tabletop in the sitting room. I place a cup of tea in front of her, warning her not to spill it on him. “I’ll be careful.” She motions me to sit next to her. “Salem, these had to have been taken by a professional photographer. They’re so much better than the ones you have of him. No offense.”
“I know. They’re gorgeous pics. I can see every tiny detail, like the fine hairs on his face. The family portrait over the door in the lobby was shot by a professional, but I have only a handful of others that aren’t blurry or taken from ten feet away.” Joss’s eyes follow my finger to a mole on Eli’s chin. A mole I don’t remember. “These close-ups are remarkable.”
“Some look staged, like this one of him with the two sheepdogs. Did your mom ever take him to a studio?”
“What? No. Why would she take him and not me and Connor?”
She holds up a handsome headshot of Eli. “Because this little guy was much cuter than the two of you. I think your mom liked him better.”
“Amusing.” I twist my lips, my voice dry.
“I’m trying to make you smile.”
I bite down on my lower lip and flash a top-toothed smile.
“See, that wasn’t so hard, was it? You look like a beaver, by the way.” She tucks my hair behind my ear. “Babe, these could’ve been taken by someone in town, maybe when you and Connor were at school. Virginia could’ve known the person and wanted to get these to you.”
“Doubtful.” I pick up a p
hoto of Eli biting the head off a chocolate Easter bunny. “See his hair? It’s different lengths in the shots. And this one was taken in the spring.” I put the photo down and tap another. “This one, this was summer. He’s swimming. And in this one he’s wearing a turtleneck, leaves are falling from the trees.”
“But he doesn’t grow up. He can’t be the same age in every shot, not unless they’re Photoshopped. Someone took these before he disappeared, otherwise…”
“Otherwise what?”
She takes a hard look at the photos. “Otherwise, there’d be pictures of him past this age.”
“In other words, he may have died at four. Right?”
“Or this photographer never saw him again. What did you say Virginia did for a living?”
“I have no fucking clue. She’s lied about everything, aside from her name.”
Joss uncrosses her legs and pulls down her skintight black skirt, her deep cleavage exposed in a low-cut top, one that laces at the neck but is unlaced. My hole-in-the-knee jeans and pilled sweater are vegetative by comparison, but better suited for the night. If I were meeting Brad at the bar, I’d fend him off from the get-go with a stinky shirt and baggy jogging pants, eat an onion sandwich beforehand. No makeup. No perfume. And I’d be sure not to touch up my nail polish where I bite my nails.
I sip my tea, my attention back to the photos. Eli appears happy, but the images are totally tragic. Tragic by circumstance. Tragic that his haunting eyes are on me no matter which way I turn the photos.
“You’re coming with Jim and me to the bar. Nate, too.”
“Nope.” I sneer. “I’m not getting in the middle of this.”
The water in Jim’s room above us shuts off. The shower door swings open and slams shut. Bottles clatter as if he cleared the bathroom counter with a quick swipe of his arm. I watch the ceiling and touch the side of my neck, pausing in thought. “The shit you get yourself into, Joss. I swear.”
“Jim’s okay with it. It’s just a night out with a friend.”
I laugh. “Yep, you, Jim, and your bestie, Brad Brenner.”
Her mouth opens. She’s considering a hardnosed comeback when she notices I’m pondering the idea of going out. For a second I feel sorry for her. She shows signs of shame, eyes down like a scolded kid, her shoulders slumped.
I check the time on my cell. 7:30. “I have to wait until eleven to make sure no one’s coming in tonight.”
Her eyes brighten a little. “Have you seen the snow? The quilt show is over, and no one in their right mind will be driving into Tilford Lake tonight.”
“Well, Nate’s taking a nap. I don’t want to wake him.”
“That’s no surprise after your second workout this afternoon.”
“Third.”
“Third? Shit, really? He’s a keeper.”
“I know.”
She nudges her chair closer and takes my hand. “Salem, come on. You have no new reservations, no guests besides Nate and Jim. Why not come out with us to the bar? It’s been too long.”
“Because I hate it there. Besides, I have to figure out what to do next with all this.” I wave a photo in the air.
“We can make plans over a pitcher. It’ll be easier to figure out what to do after a few beers.” She caresses my hand. “Babe, the photos aren’t going anywhere. Neither is Virginia. You have her purse behind the reception desk, and I bet her car keys are in there.”
I nod. “They are. I looked.”
“Good. Lock up and head out for a night before the spring weather returns and you get bombarded with guests.” She lifts her fallen bra strap to her shoulder then tugs the bra down to get her boobs where they need to be.
I try to picture what it’d be like to have an ordinary life and a regular nine-to-five job. Would the dull days bother me like they do Joss? Or like most people, would I even be aware? The positive of Sparrow Lodge is that it is unusual. It keeps my mind alive. There’s no need to stare at the television in boredom or kill monotony with drink.
Please, Joss mouths.
She gives up on me for a second to put on a fresh coat of plum-colored lipstick, smearing it across her full lips. She presses them together in a smoothing motion before taking a drink of tea, leaving thin, vertical lipstick lines on the white rim. They look like my palm lines Virginia fingered the day when she asked if I had a good friend, and then said, “Don’t lose her.”
I look at Joss and smile. Being small-town girls, I know our dating pool is shrinking. And for Joss, I know she hopes one night things will change. I know she wants to say the best day of her life was something other than prom night. I know this is true. I know everything about her. I know she wants to remind me the guys are leaving after tomorrow, and she wants to tell me I have too many responsibilities, that I no longer take fun seriously.
I also know Joss doesn’t want more from life than what this small town has to offer. She likes to be where everyone knows everyone, where she can be a big slutty fish in a small pond, where she sticks out like a sore thumb and wouldn’t have it any other way. Her needs are simple: a pair of jeans that actually fit, one story to always treasure, and a true friend—a friend who’ll go to the bar with her when she asks.
“All right, Joss. When do we leave?”
twenty-three
Martin’s Bar is cramped and seems smaller than the last time I was here, but the stench of armpits, stale beer, and cigarettes are the same. Smoking isn’t allowed inside. It drifts in from the back door that leads to the parking lot where a makeshift smoker’s lounge—complete with plastic lawn chairs, a string of lights, and a fake palm tree—has been cobbled together by the locals.
“You guys wait here.” Joss unravels her scarf and flips her hair off her shoulders. “I see Brad in the back. I’ll tell him we’re here.”
“You mean, warn him we’re here,” I say. “He still doesn’t know we’re coming.”
“He does now,” Jim says.
Brad’s mouth sets in a hard line when he sees us. He stands with hesitation. Joss waves. He stays rigid.
“Give me a couple minutes.” She kisses Jim on the cheek. “Behave.”
“I’ll try my best.”
She elbows her way to the back of the room, past men whose pick-up lines have to do with working at the plant. Like, “Sit with me, I make grape company,” and, “I got canned today because I can’t concentrate after seeing your juicy lips around town.” And the worst one, “If I take you to the back seat of my truck, will you let out a little wine?” Tanked-up women laugh. I roll my eyes.
Brad crosses his arms and falls into his cop stance. He’s at the unlucky table, the one that’s a defunct, tabletop arcade game from the ’80s. Under a dartboard and next to the restrooms, it’s where I vomited on my twenty-first birthday, where Joss and I got drunk the night I found out my mom had cancer, and where I came apart at the seams the first time I saw my ex-husband clumsily cup a woman’s breast, which he insisted was an accident.
“I can tell you don’t like it here,” Nate says.
“What gives it away? Is it because I’m biting my nail or cutting off the circulation in your hand?”
“Both. Want to leave?”
I continue to gnaw at my nail, not in the right headspace to drink tonight, perfectly willing to be the designated driver. “The noise gets to me, that’s all. Sorry about my bad habit.” I hide my hand in my pocket. “I know its nasty.”
“No sweat. It’s trivial. Now, if you picked your belly button lint all the time, that could be a deal breaker.”
I laugh and swing his arm. “You’re so good at helping me to relax.”
“Look at that badass cop.” Jim lifts his chin, his gaze set on Brad. “He got all dolled up for Joss. What boyband you think he’s in?”
Brad’s curtained hairstyle is gelled to look wet.
“Don’t forget she did this for you,” Nate says. “If you hadn’t swung at—”
“I was h
elping you out.”
“That’s what she’s doing for you.”
Jim shrugs. “I can still make fun of his hair if I want.”
“You mean if you want to act like you’re ten.” Nate takes off his wool coat. The muscles in his arms are hard through his tight-fitting thermal. He slides his sleeves past his elbows, a treat for my nose to hunt out his warm cologne amid the other scents in the bar. Men like Nate know they look good. There’s no need to tell them, a craving smile is enough.
“Look at him throwing a fit,” Jim says.
Brad slams a chair into the table. He tosses his hands up in protest, his elbow knocking into a woman serving drinks. She steadies her tray with both hands, stopping the beers from toppling over.
“Watch it, butthead,” she says loud enough for the entire bar to hear.
Ryan Sherwood, a guy I went to high school with, pushes past us to get inside. “Butthead Brenner!” A Star Wars nut with a head too big for his body, he could pass as a bobblehead. “Yo, looking good, pal. You buy that gel by the gallon?” He slips off his coat and elbows Nate in the gut. “Sorry, loser.”
I put my hand on Nate’s chest. “Trust me. Don’t.”
“Yo, witch,” Ryan harasses. “Did Martin finally make a space in the lot for you to park your broom?” Laughter follows him throughout the bar. He settles in at a table with two women.
“Nice guy.” Nate keeps his cool.
Joss slings her coat over a chair, a drifty smile on her face. She heads to the bar with Brad, two fingers up for us to wait two more minutes. Jim responds by holding up one.
The older men hunched over barstools are quiet, their hands shaking when they lift their beers, possibly age-related or from alcohol withdrawal. After claiming the same stool for decades, I can tell who sits where by the size and shape of the curves permanently molded into the sparkly red vinyl.
The men sprout upright when Joss enters their space, the guy next to her pivoting to check out her ass.
This is where Joss shines in all the wrong ways. Where she’s queen of the room with the swing of her hips, her boss makeup, “can’t miss it” hair, and bouncy boobs. The men she’s fucked, almost every guy in here, still gawk, still drool, and still make Joss feel like she’s the most sought-after girl in Tilford Lake. This is her showtime, and Martin’s Bar is as good as it will ever get.
The Release of Secrets: A Novel Page 20
