The Red Hunter(56)

“Hey.” Paul came up behind her. “What’s up?”

She wiped her eyes, embarrassed. “Nothing,” she said. “Just. Everything.”

He held her. That was it. Chad would be talking, talking, talking, trying to help, to comfort, to explain why she shouldn’t be upset. He’d be telling her to relax, to not take so much on, everything didn’t have to be perfect. But Paul didn’t say anything, just let her cry until it passed, his arms tight around her.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m just—”

She couldn’t go on, and anyway he held up a hand. “That’s what I’m here for.”

His face, angular, icy eyes that were wrinkled with kindness. “You okay?”

“Yes,” she said, nodding.

“Let’s go back into the fray.”

On the way back, his arm around her, they bumped into Chad, who had come out looking for her.

“Sneaking out behind the shed with my wife?” he said when he saw them.

“What can I say, brother?” said Paul. “Women just want me. And you’ve got to give the ladies what they want.”

Paul shifted away from her. But Chad wasn’t jealous, not in the least. He was so sure of her, of Paul.

“I hear you, man,” he said, dropping his arm around Heather. “You okay, babe?”

“Just—stressed.”

He squeezed her. “Everything’s perfect. Just relax.”

That was the day when she started thinking about Paul in ways that she shouldn’t. And then that night with Chad off fishing—barely a word spoken between them, just the blessed release of all the tension she’d barely acknowledged. Neither of them ever thought it could be more; there was no discussion about what happened next. There was no torrid affair. Just that one moment in time, separate from the rest of the universe, from who they were outside that moment. Chad’s wife, his best friend and brother. Those people didn’t exist.

Paul left about an hour before the sun came up, kissing her long at the door.

A month later, she was pregnant with Zoey.

? ? ?

“YOU’LL TELL ME,” HEATHER SAID to Paul now. “If there’s something I need to worry about.”

She glanced up at the window to Zoey’s room; the light inside glowed orange.

“I’ll make sure he tells you,” said Paul. “If there is. But I’m sure it’s nothing.”

It was still there, all these years later. He leaned in and kissed her on the cheek, then pulled away quickly and got in his truck.





twenty


Claudia sat and waited, hearing the horn of the train blowing mournfully in the distance.

I want to come home.

The text had come in from Raven at eleven, just as Claudia had finished her final stubborn attempt to get that goddamn wallpaper down.

I’m on the last train.

She hadn’t tracked Raven all night. When Raven was with Ayers, Claudia never worried. But there she was, her little blue dot floating on a faint purple line marked Erie Lackawanna.

She dialed Ayers but just got voicemail. She hung up and texted him.

What happened?

She tried Raven, but the call just went to voicemail. Service on the train was always spotty. After about an hour, she got in the car and went to the station.

I want to come home. The phrase filled her with a kind of strange happiness. Claudia knew she didn’t mean the ramshackle old house in Nowhere, New Jersey. It was Claudia, her mother, that was Raven’s home. As much as her daughter railed and raged, she still needed her mom.

The train pulled in to the station, and Claudia climbed out of the car. A stunning young woman all in black, followed by a tall young man with a mass of blond curls, exited from the last car. It took her a full second to recognize her own daughter and her daughter’s lifelong friend Troy.

When Raven saw Claudia, she broke into an awkward run in boots that Claudia had never seen. Troy was carrying Raven’s pack and her jacket.

“What happened?” Claudia asked when Raven fell into her arms.

“Hey, Ms. Bishop,” said Troy.

“Troy,” said Claudia. “Does your mom know where you are?”

He nodded. “She said it was okay if I brought Raven home and stayed with you.”

Lydia was a free-range parent. She treated Troy as if he were a twenty-year-old, and always had. Maybe that’s why he acted as if he were so much older, wiser than his years—thoughtful, responsible, just sweet. Or maybe Lydia just got lucky.

In the car, Raven spilled it—how she’d lied, what she’d done. Claudia breathed through it; she didn’t want to freak out and have the whole thing turn into a screaming match. But her heart was revving; she could feel the blood rushing through her body, heat coming to her cheeks.

“Raven,” she said. They were pulling off the road onto the drive to the house. “What possessed you? To seek him out, the son of the man who—raped me?”

She had to pull the car to a stop, her breath coming sharp and fast. She actually felt dizzy. She rested her head on the steering wheel. She felt Troy’s hand on her shoulder from the backseat, and Raven moved in close.

“I’m sorry, Mom,” she said. “I didn’t think of it like that. I was just looking for the place—where I belong.”