Live to Tell (Live to Tell #1)(40)

Now, arriving back home in the late afternoon, she sidesteps a barking, tail-wagging Chauncey and goes straight to the phone to check the voice mail and caller ID log.

No Nick.

He obviously got confused about the day, or forgot, or…something.

Fear threads its way through her once again. Nick might be forgetful—and, okay, a jerk—but he should have called to check in by now.

Lauren listens impatiently to a message from her mother, wanting to pick a date for the visit, and one from a boy named Josh, looking for Lucy.

“Daddy didn’t call?”

She looks up to see Lucy behind her, paper shopping bags in hand and an expectant expression on her face.

“Sweetie, I’m sure everything’s okay. Oh, and someone named Josh called looking for you.”

“Really?” Lucy perks right up at that. “What did he say?”

“To call him back.”

“Great! I’ll do it upstairs.”

Lauren should probably ask her who Josh is, and why she’s so happy to hear from him, but isn’t it obvious? Lucy likes Josh. Josh—hopefully—likes Lucy. And anything that gets her mind off her disappointment in Nick is probably a healthy thing.

“Why don’t you go put your new clothes on hangers before they get wrinkled? And here, maybe you can help Sadie do the same thing with her dresses.” Lauren offers Lucy the bags from Gymboree and Gap Kids.

Sadie didn’t want to shop for new clothes; she didn’t want to try anything on; she didn’t even want to carry the bags into the house.

Now, however, she grabs at the purchases. “I can put them away myself.”

“But you can’t reach the hangers,” Lucy points out. “Let me help you.”

“No, I can do it!”

“Fine.” Lucy disappears with a shrug.

Lauren sighs, not in the mood for a tantrum. “Sadie—”

“I don’t want anyone in my room!”

“Why not?”

“I just don’t.”

“Sadie—”

“No!”

Pick your battles, Lauren reminds herself. She looks her youngest child in the eye, both admiring and dismayed at the spark of determination she sees there.

“Okay, sweetie, you’re right. You’re a big girl. Go ahead and hang up your own clothes.”

Sadie takes the bag from her and marches out of the room.

Frowning, Lauren watches her go. She doesn’t look back.

Concern over Sadie gives way to renewed concern that something might have happened to Nick. Lauren picks up the phone again and dials his cell phone, hoping to hear a “Hey, what’s up?”

Instead, she’s greeted by the usual recorded greeting. This time she opts to leave a message. She hasn’t in a few hours.

“Nick, it’s me again. The kids are upset that you didn’t show today. They’re worried, and I…so am I. Please call me back, okay? Please. As soon as you get this.”



“I don’t understand why you let Garvey get away with so much, Marin.” Heather Cottington pokes at her salad with a polished silver fork. “You really need to let him know that it’s unacceptable to come sailing in here out of the blue, and then sail right back out again.”

“Unacceptable to you?”

“Of course not. You know my door is always open for houseguests. Lord knows I have the room.” Heather waves her empty fork toward the house, silhouetted against a twilight sky.

From this perch on the wooden deck amid the dunes, the home looks even grander than it is. Light spills from windows on all three levels. Marin’s girls are inside, along with Heather’s three teenagers and a large group of friends.

“I just think it’s hard on you and the kids when he comes and goes like this,” Heather goes on.

She should talk. Her own husband, Ron, isn’t here. He’s away on one of his many golf weekends.

But Marin isn’t about to bring that up. What does it matter? They’re not talking about Heather’s marriage. They’re talking about hers.

Why? Why does Heather have to bring this up again? Didn’t they have this same discussion earlier today, over a lunch that Heather kept saying she prepared just for Garvey—who, she knew all along, couldn’t stay to eat it?

It makes Heather feel better to criticize other people’s marriages, given the state of her own.

Or maybe she has a point, Marin admits reluctantly—but only to herself.

Aloud, she says, “We’re used to Garvey coming and going on the spur of the moment.”

“I think that’s sad.”

“It isn’t. Not to us. And it goes with the territory.”

Ignoring her friend’s dubious expression, Marin sips from her lime-infused Perrier, glad she opted not to join Heather in another bottle of wine tonight. Last night, they overdid it—Marin did, anyway. She woke up queasy this morning and it lasted, along with a headache, all afternoon.

Heather, who drank twice as much wine as Marin, appeared no worse for wear—which speaks volumes about her tolerance level. She’s the embodiment of the 4Bs—Marin’s private nickname for a certain type of woman: blond, bejeweled, boozy, and bone-thin.

Women like that populate her social circle back in Manhattan. Marin supposes that she herself fits the bill on a good—or bad—day, depending on how one looks at it.