Rainshadow Road (Friday Harbor #2)(78)

Lucy looked at her soldering table. Two of the corner pieces she hadn’t yet affixed to the rest of the window, cuts of black obsidian glass, curled and wriggled. “Go on,” she said, and instantly they flew from the table, another pair of bats joining the attack against Kevin.

The trio of bats sliced through the air with serrated wings, diving until they had driven Kevin to the door. Stumbling and swearing, he went outside. Two of the bats followed him. The third flew to the corner of the room and dropped to the floor, scuttling across the cement surface.

Taking a deep breath, Lucy went to the window and opened it. The sun was low, rolling toward twilight, the air weighted with the lingering heat of the day.

“Thank you,” Lucy said, standing back from the window. “There you go.” After a moment the bat took flight, slipping through the open window, disappearing into the sky.

Twenty

“You’re going to have to clear out soon,” Sam said, lowering to his haunches and watching as Alex worked underneath a tiny staircase that led from the second floor to the central cupola of the house. Alex had scraped and cleaned every crevice beneath the rickety staircase, and was now in the midst of pounding shims into the edges of all the treads and risers. By the time his brother was finished, the staircase would be solid enough to support an elephant.

“Why’s that?” Alex asked, pausing in his hammering.

“Lucy’s coming over for dinner.”

“Give me ten minutes, I’ll be finished with this.”

“Thanks.” Sam contemplated his brother with a frown, wondering what to say to him, how to help him.

Alex was behaving strangely these days, slinking around like a nervous cat. Sam and Mark had both hoped that getting through the divorce would have provided some kind of relief to Alex, but instead he was going downhill. He was thin and haggard-looking, with dark circles draped under his eyes like funeral swags. It was a testament to Alex’s genetic blessings that, even emaciated and exhausted, he was still strikingly handsome. At Mark’s wedding he had stayed in the corner, drinking, and women still hadn’t been able to leave him alone.

“Al,” Sam said, “you’re not getting into bad shit, are you?”

The hammering stopped again. “I’m not doing drugs, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“You look like hell.”

“I’m fine. Never been better.”

Sam gave him a dubious glance. “Good to hear.”

At the sound of the doorbell, Sam went downstairs to see who it was.

He opened the front door to discover that Lucy had arrived early. Instantly he knew that something was wrong—she looked the way someone did when a death had occurred. “Lucy?” He reached for her automatically, and she swayed back. Recoiling from him.

Sam was mystified, staring at her alertly.

Lucy’s mouth looked dry and ravaged, as if she’d been biting it. And then she forced herself to smile. “I have something to tell you. Please don’t interrupt, or I won’t be able to get through it. It’s great news, actually.”

Sam was so distracted by Lucy’s counterfeit cheerfulness, and the obvious misery beneath, that it was hard to take in what she was telling him. Something about an artist grant or program … something about an art center in New York. The Mitchell Art Center. She was going to accept. It was a prestigious grant—the kind of opportunity she had worked for her entire life. It would last a year. She probably wouldn’t come back to the island afterward.

Then she fell silent and looked at him, waiting for his response.

Sam groped for words. “That’s great news,” he managed. “Congratulations.”

Lucy nodded, wearing a smile that looked like it had been tacked on with pins. He stepped forward to embrace her, and she let him for just a moment, but all her muscles were knotted and stiff. It was like putting his arms around a cold marble statue.

“I couldn’t turn it down,” she said against his shoulder. “A chance like this…”

“Yeah.” Sam let go of her. “You should do it. Definitely.”

He continued to stare at her, trying to wrap his brain around the fact that Lucy was leaving him. Lucy was leaving. The phrase filled him with a numb, blank sensation that he guessed was relief.

Yes. It was time. Their relationship had started to get tricky. Always best to cut things off when they were still good.

“If you need me to help you put your stuff in storage—” he began.

“No, everything’s under control.” Lucy’s eyes had turned wet even though she was still smiling. She stunned him by saying, “It’s easier if I don’t see you or talk to you from now on. I need a clean break.”

“Alice’s wedding—”

“I don’t think there’ll be a wedding. Which is good, for Alice’s sake. Marriage is hard enough for people who actually love each other. I don’t think she and Kevin had a chance. I don’t think—” She broke off and let out a shivering breath.

As Lucy stood there with tears glittering in her eyes, Sam was gripped by an unfamiliar feeling, the worst feeling he’d had in his adult life. Sharper than fear, more painful than grief, emptier than loneliness. It was what he imagined an ice pick in the chest might feel like.

“I don’t love you,” Lucy said with a wobbly smile. At his silence, she said, “Tell me you feel the same way.”