Every Single Secret(56)

When they’re finally finished, I follow them back into the restaurant. Natasha and her friends settle at a table in front of the long, plastic-shielded buffet where three men—their husbands, I guess—are working on plates of pie, locked in on the boxy TV.

I sit at a small table a couple of yards away. There’s a check printout and a five-dollar bill near a plate with a couple of soggy fries in a pool of ketchup and an uneaten biscuit. I pull the iPad out and start to open it, then stop.

Across the room, Natasha has her arm draped around a man I recognize. Round, shiny face, swoop of mud-brown hair. Dr. Reggie Teague. The face is the same, but he looks different from when I last saw him. He’s not dressed in a suit and bow tie or wearing the preppy glasses.

He’s wearing a firefighter’s uniform. All three of the men are.

I am shaking now. Reggie Teague, or whoever this man is, is a firefighter. Not a therapist who was called back to Dunfree on a family emergency. Not Matthew Cerny’s jovial associate.

I’m shaking so hard, I’m not even sure I can move. I close my eyes and try to slow my breath. If I have a panic attack in this diner, Reggie Teague will see me. I’m not sure where his loyalties lie—how deeply involved in this thing he is or how far he might go to protect his own interests—but I can’t risk getting caught. If he stops me from getting to the police station, I’m done. This much I know.

I resist the biscuit, despite my gnawing hunger, but I slip the five-dollar bill out from under the plate. The familiar act of self-preservation gives me a boost of adrenaline, which turns out to be the necessary motivation to get my legs working. I stand up as inconspicuously as I can and make for the door.

The bell jangles, and back in the restaurant I hear Reggie and his two firefighter buddies cheer lustily in response to something wonderful that just happened on the TV.



Chapter Twenty

Thursday, October 18

The Day Before

Heath’s breakfast dishes were already cleared from our room. My plate, still covered, waited on the table.

I yawned. The clock said it was past ten—which was hard to fathom. I hadn’t slept this late in years. I nestled farther under the covers, warm and contented, until a wave of nameless anxiety washed over me. I bolted up, remembering last night.

The fog. All those dead birds.

When my brain had finally registered what I was looking at, I’d bitten back my screams and run back to the house. I’d woken Heath and told him what I’d seen. He explained that it was probably a coyote or some other predator that had gotten after them, that I should try and get some sleep, and he’d tell Cerny about it in the morning. I was so distraught I’d almost told him about the Sinatra song I’d heard in the hallway. But I stopped myself. Something told me it wasn’t a good idea.

Maybe it was the fact that Luca and I had been together when we’d heard the song—sneaking around the house like some kind of detective duo—and Heath might misread the situation. Or maybe I worried he was beginning to doubt my stability. Last night, as I’d ranted about the dead birds, the expression on his face had seemed so patient. So completely unconcerned, like dead birds in the yard were an entirely normal situation, and he was merely allowing my neuroses to spin themselves out.

He’d held me until I’d finally fallen asleep, which hadn’t been until around three in the morning, reassuring me that everything was fine. His voice had remained calm. The voice of reason in the midst of my hysteria.

I returned to bed and drifted back to sleep almost instantly. When I awoke again, light in the room had shifted, and the room shimmered in the cold. I burrowed deeper under the blankets and looked up at the ceiling, at the unseen camera that was, no doubt, recording me. I felt the tension creeping back into my neck and shoulders. I needed to run. I needed to sweat, to feel my heart swelling and pounding like it was going to explode. To feel my jaw ache with the lack of oxygen, taste the trace of blood in my mouth.

I rolled over and looked at the clock. One forty. I cursed aloud. Glenys and I were supposed to meet at two thirty at the top of the mountain, that’s what we’d agreed at the creek yesterday. She’d be glad to hear I’d finally talked to Heath and told him everything about Chantal. And she’d probably want to hear the story too. I owed her that much. If it wasn’t for her, I didn’t think I would’ve ever been brave enough to come clean with Heath. If I threw on clothes now and sprinted up the mountain, I’d only be a few minutes late.

I pulled on running tights and a zip-top, then inspected the meal under the cover. The eggs had gone cold, but the bacon was still good and the fruit too. I pulled apart a biscuit and stuffed a flaky half in my mouth. At the nightstand, I stopped. My earrings and ring were gone, probably swept to the floor in the chaos of last night. I peeked under the table, but the floor was bare. I’d just have to search for them later. I popped a beanie and gloves on and stepped into the empty hall. It was freezing. The temperature must’ve dropped fifteen degrees since yesterday.

I glided down the front staircase and across the foyer, ducking into each of the front rooms for a quick check. No one was in the library, dining room, or salon, but as I retreated to the rear of the house, I could hear voices in the doctor’s office. I stopped and let them roll over me. In a strange way, the sound of humans talking was the most warming, comforting sound in the world. Life went on, didn’t it? On and on and on.