The Red Hunter(55)

“How have you been?” he asked. He moved in closer, too close. She stepped away, to put the milk in the fridge. He was the only one who ever asked her that. She and Chad were in communication all day—about all the minutiae of their shared existence: Did you call the plumber? Can you pick up some milk? How did Zoey do on her quiz?—calls, texts, email. He never asked her how she was because he knew, better than anyone.

“You know,” she said. What could she say? That her life revolved around Zoey and Chad, that lately she’d been thinking she never should have stopped working, that she wasn’t unhappy but that she wasn’t happy exactly either. “Same old.”

There was the slam of the car door outside, then the sound of Zoey’s running feet. She must have seen the truck, burst in the door a few seconds later and straight into Paul’s big embrace. He lifted her off the ground, gave her a spin. How’s my girl?

Then it was the Paul and Zoey Show. Belly laughs and high fives and inside jokes. When Heather watched them together, it was as if something heavy was lifted off of her. She felt a big smile spread across her face. With Chad and Zoey, Heather always wondered who was going to draw first blood.

“Hey, Mom.” Zoey leaned in for a kiss; Heather gave her one and a pat on the bottom.

“How was your quiz?”

“I did okay, I think.”

She didn’t worry about Zoey, her straight-A student, driven like her father, maybe because of him, because nothing was ever quite good enough.

“I’m sure you did fine,” she said. And he thought she was too easy. These kids, they’re overpraised. Wait until they find themselves out in the real world. No one’s handing out participation trophies there.

She fed them. They sat to dinner like a family, big bowls of stew and fresh bread from the bakery. She had a glass of wine, felt herself go loose the way she did when Paul was around. Everyone was more relaxed when Paul was at the table, even Chad. It was like his stepbrother brought out everything that was good about him. And there was so much; there really was.

After dinner, Zoey had to go do her homework and Paul looked at his phone.

“He wants me to meet him in fifteen minutes,” he said. “Burgers and Brew, just like you said.”

“Should I be worried?” asked Heather.

He waved a hand at her. “Nah,” he said easily. “Just work stuff probably. Maybe he just wants to talk through a case.”

But there was a frown behind his eyes. He reached for her hand, and it lingered there too long. She let it. He seemed about to say something and then didn’t. She heard Zoey’s voice upstairs, on the phone, chattering happy and high pitched. At the sound of it, he got up and started clearing the dishes.

It was just one night. And it was so long ago, a million years ago it seemed. It was a mistake buried under the debris of years. It could have been so easily forgotten—if he’d ever married, had kids of his own—except that he didn’t and it wasn’t. She never forgot it. How could she?

“Leave it,” she said. “I’ll get it.”

He ignored her, helped her load the dishwasher, wipe down the table. She walked him out to his truck.

“I’m glad you came by,” she said.

He looked back up at the house, and then into the sky. Then he snaked his arm around her waist and pulled her close. She glanced back around her to Zoey’s window, which looked out onto the front of the house.

“Don’t.”

“I never stop thinking about you,” he said, his voice thick. Why this night? Was it just because they were never alone without Chad and Zoey?

“Paul,” she said. But she wasn’t resisting him. His thigh against hers, the strength of his arm around her back, her hand on his wide shoulder.

When Chad had been away, some fishing trip she hadn’t wanted him to take, a weekend of drunken stupidity that would leave him wrecked for a week, Paul had come. She’d seen his car pull up, watched him walk up the drive. She’d come out to stand on the porch. Neither of them said a word as they moved inside, locked the door. She dissolved into him, disappeared. He took her on the staircase, then on the landing in front of the bedroom. Later in the bed she shared with Chad. Again, downstairs in the kitchen. His scent, the feel of his lips, the gentle, powerful way he held her, the way he moaned, deep and desperate, as if he’d never known pleasure—God, it stayed with her. She’d never made love like that with Chad. Never once.

The thing was that Heather and Chad were never not going to be together. He was her first everything. They met in high school, were married before they graduated college. He went on to the police academy; she got her master’s in education. Paul was older, already gone to the city while they were still in high school. Paul, Chad’s stepbrother, best friend. To her, he was someone mysterious, just out of reach, like the coywolf she sometimes saw on their property lately. Eventually he became her friend, too, later their best man. When had it changed?

It was Christmas. She and Chad had been married a couple of years, they were trying to have a baby. Had been trying for over a year—and it was starting to become a thing. They were stressed about it (he didn’t really want kids, did he?) and arguing a lot. She was cooking that holiday. Again. For his family and hers, for friends who had been dropping by all day. The house was crowded, overwarm.

Finally, with the walls closing in on her and the sound of the television and everybody talking at once, she went out back and hid behind the shed where Chad snuck his cigarettes (did he think she didn’t know?). She just started crying. It was cold; she was shivering in the thin red cardigan, her breath pluming out with each sob. The sky threatened snow, gray-white above her. Even her feet were cold.