Every Single Secret(90)
A jaunty horn section drifts from outdoor speakers, making its way through the pines and over to my deck. My next-door neighbors, who I haven’t met and don’t intend to, playing their favorite Pandora jazz mix. First Mel Tormé, then Sam Cooke, and Dean Martin, which is fine. Inevitably, however, Sinatra always comes on. Tonight when it happens, my entire body tenses, but that’s the extent of it. I’m past the counting and hair-band snapping. I know another song will always come after.
Today’s sunset—blue melting into pink, then warming to orangey red—is as spectacular as always. Even so, I’m surprised to find tears dripping down my cheeks. I blot them with the sleeve of my flannel shirt, but don’t move from my chair. I don’t want to go inside—don’t want to take a pill or put on my running shoes and head out for a jog. I mostly walk now, anyway. It feels kinder to my body.
It’s been eight months since I escaped Heath. Not the first time I’ve sat on this deck and cried. Just the first time I’ve done it because I know everything is going to be okay. So I can sit here and ride out the tears, I guess. Sometimes it’s good to just feel things.
Behind me, on the drive, there’s the sound of crunching gravel. It sends jolts of electric fear into my arms and legs. Under the chair, my fingers close around my ever-present canister of bear spray. A reflex.
“Ms. Green?” a man calls from around the side of the house. Somewhere near the foot of the steps.
The voice is oddly familiar.
He must’ve cut through the thicket of blackberry bushes alongside the driveway and come around to the back deck. It doesn’t mean he’s a threat. He may have already tried the front door. I keep the alarm on and everything bolted up even when I’m here.
“Sydney Green? Are you here?”
Leaping up from my chair and knocking over my glass of wine, I run across the deck to the giant spruce that grows up through the middle of it. I slip behind the tree. Press my back against the trunk and carefully ease off the safety on the bear spray. The man is standing on the far side of the deck. I can practically feel the vibration of his breathing across the planks of wood. I wish for a gun. A good old-fashioned American revolver, but this is Canada, and I’m not that resourceful.
“I saw the last name on the mailbox,” the man says. “And the lady down at the market in the cove said she knew a Sydney Green who’s caretaker of this cabin.”
I can’t place the accent—I think I’ve heard it somewhere, but my heart is hammering so hard, I can’t be sure. Footsteps thud, and that out-of-body panic sensation takes hold. He’s getting closer. I will myself to stay put. To wait until he’s within spraying range. When I judge it’s time, I jump out, executing a neat one-eighty and depressing the trigger in short bursts like the YouTube video instructed. The man leaps backward, yelling and windmilling his arms, eventually stumbling down the deck steps.
I throw the can at him, run inside the house, and lock the door, just before I hear him yell out.
“Daphne!”
At my kitchen table, Luca takes the damp washcloth I offer and mops his red, swollen face for the umpteenth time. From a safe distance, I study him. Navy sweater and black jeans. Worn black combat boots, laced halfway up. Wavy brown hair that he keeps raking off his forehead, even though it just falls back in his eyes every time. It’s grown out since I’ve last seen him.
My hair’s different too. Pixie length and dark brown. I keep fiddling with it, oddly self-conscious. Also, I keep apologizing. But that’s only fair. I’m a crack shot with bear spray, and even though the level of capsaicin in it is substantially lower than in the human variety of pepper spray, it still hurts. Good thing I didn’t have a gun.
“It’s okay.” Luca manages to make eye contact with me through one not-so-puffy eye. “You did the right thing.”
“Oh. So you do speak English.”
He does the so-so thing. “Learning. Slowly.”
“No, it’s good. You’re doing great.”
Weirdly, inappropriately, all I can think about is that he’s built exactly like a bear—a human-size, disconcertingly sexy bear—and I’m worried I’m going to say it out loud. It’s been too long since I’ve been alone in a room with a man. I’m fairly certain my filter’s out of whack. Thankfully, he fills the silence.
“You stay here all the time?”
“So far, yeah. The owners only use it for two weeks at the end of every summer. I’ll figure out something to do when they want it.”
He nods. “I should explain. About Baskens.”
But I’m not sure I’m ready for that. I think I’d prefer to ease around the subject for a little longer, if we could, so I say, “How did you find me?” Quickly, lightly, to divert his attention.
“Jessica,” he replies. “Jessica Kyung.”
Surprise ripples through me. Why would Jessica give me away now? Back when I first drove out of Georgia, she was the only one I called when I was finally able to get my hands on a phone. It turned out to be the right choice. After listening to the whole sordid story, Jessica had told me a story of her own. How, around a year ago, she’d caught wind of rumors about goings-on at Baskens in the mid to late nineties, before Cerny started the retreats. She’d embarked on a bit of unofficial, off-the-record investigating, though was never able to turn up anything solid. But she always sensed bad mojo around Matthew Cerny and that place.