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CHAPTER1
Her hips hurt.Ann couldn’t even fathom why or how, but her hips ached, straight from the joint down through the length of her legs and into her feet, which were also telling her they were in quite a bit of pain. The car was chilly as she got inside, and that didn’t help the throbbing any.
With the engine running, she closed her eyes and shifted in the seat so it wouldn’t hurt so much while she made the twenty-minute drive home.God, everything hurt.She was not the young, spry nurse she used to be, and for some reason, this week had been particularly brutal. Shivering, Ann attempted to focus. It was dark outside already, as it usually was when she drove home from her ten-hour shift.
Home wasn’t much better than work some days, which meant it was exhausting. With the car finally warming, Ann put it into reverse and backed out of her favorite parking spot. The streets flew by as she made the familiar drive to the house they had purchased ten years ago on a whim. It had been a foreclosure, a modular with a bit of land around it on the edge of town.
When they’d seen it, they’d known it was perfect. Close enough to the hospital that Ann could get to and from work when the weather was bad, but isolated enough that they could have their own space and not have to worry about neighbors. Pausing at a stoplight, Ann pondered her situation.
When had she come to be comfortable living with such a disconnect between herself and Heidi?It seemed almost as if it was yesterday when they had all the hopes and dreams of the world—kids, family, friends. But something had happened in between, and even as Ann tried on occasion, she couldn’t figure out what it was or when it happened.
At some point, she’d stopped pushing for adoption. It was never the right time, and they weren’t in enough balance with each other to think it’d be a good environment to bring a child in. Heidi had brought up fostering several times over the years, but those comments and questioning looks had come less often in the last two or three years. Ann couldn’t even remember anymore how long it had been since they’d talked about it last.
As the light turned green, Ann stepped on the gas and the car moved forward. They lived quite the life of solitude if she thought about it. Sure, her fellow nurses knew all about Heidi, and even some of the issues they had, but they rarely went out and did even the occasional dinner with friends, Heidi especially. Ann was certainly the more outgoing of the two.
She pulled through the city limits and upped her speed on the highway as she went. Two more miles until she got to her turn off. She gripped the steering wheel tightly as the car struggled to catch up with what she demanded of it. The roads were slick with a fine layer of moisture from rain that must have fallen while she’d been ensconced inside the hospital for hours. She hadn’t even noticed.
Usually rain was a huge deal in their part of Kansas, so any inkling it might have happened was the talk of the town for days before and days after. Living in an area of the county filled with farmers and ranchers that had been slammed with drought for years would do that. But she’d grown up there. She loved it there. Ann would have it no other way.
The turn off onto the dirt road was expected, and her low-to-the-ground car bounced a little as she hit some holes that needed filled and the areas the grader had missed on the last pass. She’d been told several times her little car wouldn’t cut it in the rainy season, but it had survived her a good ten years already and she’d managed well enough. Farmers liked to think they knew everything about the land, but Ann knew better than to trust their advice on the world.
Pulling off the gravel and onto the slab of cement that was their driveway, Ann parked. Heidi’s car was no doubt in the one-car garage already, as was their habit. Lights in the house shone through the darkness as she stepped out of the vehicle and walked toward the front door.
Ann twisted the knob and stepped inside. Her stomach dropped at the sight that greeted her. Nerves worked into her chest and then her stomach, swirling a vortex of worry and betrayal. Boxes littered the living room, all of them put together, some of them ones they had used years ago to move into the house. Ann shut the door with a click, glancing around the living room to try and figure out what was going on.
“Heidi?”
“In the bedroom!”
Her hips still ached as she waddled her way down the thin hall to the master bedroom. Heidi sat on the floor of the closet, her legs stretched out before her as she dug through an ancient box. She stared up at Ann, her endlessly dark brown eyes filled with stirring emotion that she never let loose.
Ann sucked in a breath. There was no denying she found her long-time partner attractive. That had never been their issue. “You moving out?”
“What?” Surprise rang through Heidi’s tone. “No! Why would I do that?”
“The boxes.” Ann moved her arm to indicate the mess in the bedroom but also the stack of boxes in the living room.
“Oh! No. I had a client today, and it got me thinking, and you know me when I think.”
“Sure.” Except Ann didn’t really know. She’d been trying to crack that nut for the last decade at least and had given up at some point.When had that happened?She needed to fix that and pay more attention to the nuances of Heidi.
Heidi shrugged, but she didn’t move like she was going to get up. “I was just cleaning out the closet. Do you remember the last time we did it? I don’t.”
“Nope.” Ann sighed as she sat on the edge of the bed to take off her nasty hospital shoes. She probably should have taken them off by the door like she preferred, but she’d been so surprised to find the boxes everywhere and so worried Heidi could be leaving that she’d forgotten all about it. Pulling the laces, she popped her tennis shoes off and dropped them to the floor. Next would be the disgusting scrubs she was wearing.
“How was work?” Heidi asked.
“Work was work. Lost a patient today.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that.” Heidi’s eyes softened.
These were the moments Ann could read, but the rest? It was an abyss of the strange and unknown. Unraveling the mystery that was Heidi was something Ann was pretty sure was impossible, at least for her. She’d never been given the key.
Standing, Ann shucked her bottoms and then her top, dropping them in the laundry basket in the corner of the room after tiptoeing around the mess on the floor. “Will you have this cleaned up enough so I can crash soon? It was a long day.”
“Sure. I can finish tomorrow or later in the week.” Immediately, Heidi was up off the floor and shoving boxes and piles of crap into new piles of crap. Heidi was right. They did need to do a massive spring cleaning of the house in general. Too bad it was mid-fall and they’d missed the official spring clean-out.
Ann jumped in the shower for a quick scrub-down to get the hospital gunk off her skin. It helped ease the ache in her hips too, which was a bonus she hadn’t expected. When she was out and toweled off, Heidi already had mostly cleared a path for her to get to her side of the bed. She dressed in a loose pair of sweats and a T-shirt she’d had since her college years that was so thin she should probably toss it along with half the crap Heidi was finding.
