The House Across the Lake(61)

I remain slumped against the door as Tom leaves. I listen to his footsteps moving away from the house, the car door opening and closing. I watch the headlights fade on the foyer wall and hear the hum of the car growing distant in the October night.

Yet I stay where I am, weighed down with worry.

That Tom will return at any second.

That, if he does, I’ll suddenly vanish like Katherine.

Too scared and spent—and, let’s be honest, too drunk—to move, I close my eyes and listen to the grandfather clock in the living room tick off the seconds in my head. The sound soon fades. As do my thoughts. As does consciousness.

When there’s another knock on the door, I’m only vaguely aware of it. It sounds distant and not quite real. Like a noise in a daydream or a TV left on while you sleep.

A voice accompanies it.

Maybe.

“Casey?” A pause. “Are you there?”

I mumble something. I think it’s “No.”

The voice on the other side of the door says, “I saw Tom drive by and got worried he was coming to see you. Are you okay?”

I say “No” again, although this time I’m unsure if the word is spoken and not simply thought. My consciousness is fading again. Beyond my closed eyelids, the foyer spins like a Tilt-A-Whirl, and I move with it, spiraling toward a dark pit of nothingness.

Before I reach it, I’m aware of two things. The first is a sound coming from below, in the basement I refuse to enter. The second is the chilling feeling that I’m no longer alone, that someone else is inside the house with me.

I sense a door opening.

Footsteps coming toward me.

Another person in the foyer.

Startled out of my shit-faced state for just a second, my eyes fly open and I see Boone standing over me, his head cocked in what’s either curiosity or pity.

My eyes fall shut again as he scoops me up and I finally pass out.





I wake with a pounding head and a roiling stomach in a bed I have no memory of getting into. When I open my eyes, the light coming through the tall windows makes me squint, even though the morning sky is slate gray. Through that heavy-lidded gaze, I see the time—quarter past nine—and a mostly full glass of water on the nightstand. I take several greedy gulps before collapsing back onto the bed. Splayed across the mattress, the sheets tangled around my legs, I struggle to recall the night before.

I remember drinking on the porch.

And ducking stupidly behind the railing when I realized Tom was watching me.

And Tom at the door, yelling and knocking, although most of what he said is lost in a bourbon haze. So is everything that happened after that, which is why I’m startled when I notice the scent of something cooking rising from downstairs.

Someone else is here.

I spring out of bed, accidentally kicking a trash can that’s been left beside it, and hobble out of the bedroom, my body stiff and sore. In the hallway, the cooking smells are stronger, more recognizable. Coffee and bacon. At the top of the stairs, I call down to whoever’s in the kitchen.

“Hello?” I say, my voice ragged from both uncertainty and a killer hangover.

“Good morning, sleepyhead. I thought you’d never wake up.”

Hearing Boone’s voice brings another flash of memory. Him coming to the door not long after Tom left, me trying to answer but uncertain if I actually did, then him being inside, even though I’m pretty sure I never opened the door.

“Have you been here all night?”

“I sure have,” Boone says.

His answer only prompts more questions. How? Why? What did we do all night? Although the realization that I’m still in the same jeans and sweatshirt I wore yesterday suggests we didn’t do anything.

“I’ll, uh, be right down,” I say before hurrying back to the bedroom. There, I check the mirror over the dresser. The reflection staring back at me is alarming. Red-eyed and wild-haired, I look like a woman still reeling from drinking too much the night before, which is exactly what I am.

The next five minutes are spent stumbling and fumbling in the bathroom. I set what has to be a record for the world’s fastest shower, followed by the necessary brushing of teeth and hair. One gargle with mouthwash and a change into a different, less smelly pair of jeans and sweatshirt later, I look presentable.

Mostly.

The upside to that flurry of activity is that it made me forget just how hungover I really am. The downside is that it all comes roaring back as soon as I try to descend the steps. Looking down the steep slope of the stairwell makes me so dizzy I think I might be sick. I suck in air until the feeling passes and take the stairs slowly, one hand on the banister, the other flat-palmed against the wall, both feet touching each step.

At the bottom, I take a few more deep breaths before heading into the kitchen. Boone is at the stove, making pancakes and looking like a sexy celebrity chef in tight jeans, a tighter T-shirt, and an apron that literally says Kiss the Cook. I catch him in the middle of flipping a pancake. With a flick of his wrist, it leaps from the pan like a gymnast before somersaulting back into place.

“Take a seat,” he says. “Breakfast is almost ready.”

He turns away from the stove long enough to hand me a steaming mug of coffee. I take a grateful sip and sit at the kitchen counter. Despite my clanging headache and not knowing any details about the previous night, there’s a coziness to the situation that prompts both comfort and no small amount of guilt. This is exactly how Len and I spent our weekend mornings here, with me savoring coffee while he made breakfast in the same apron Boone now wears. Doing it with someone else feels like cheating, which surprises me. I felt no such guilt when having sex with a stagehand from Shred of Doubt. I guess because, in that instance, I knew the score. What this is, I have no idea.