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The gardening magazines are more interesting, with photos ranging from cozy cottage flowerbeds to the cultivated gardens my husband preferred. He thought they spoke of wealth. Power.
The adrenaline that pumped through my body from the nightmare has faded. Staying awake is no longer an option. My thoughts drift to Butterscotch and how stroking him eased my panic attack at the lake when his owner approached me. But that’s not the last image that slips in as sleep pulls me under its spell.
That would be his owner’s smile.
6
TROY
March, Present Day
Maple Ridge
Olivia removesNova from her car seat and puts her on the sidewalk. The red Honda Civic is parked on the street in front of the house my crew and I are renovating. We’ve currently stopped for lunch and are sitting on the low brick wall in front of the house.
The toddler charges across the dead grass to where I’m sitting, her puffy yellow jacket bright in the sunshine. I push to my feet, ready to catch her.
She stops and her little arms reach for me. “Up!”
I scoop up the giggling two-year-old and swing her into the air. “Hey, sweetheart.”
She giggles some more.
Olivia walks up the path, carrying a picnic basket. “She’s been excited to see you all morning. I told her we were bringing you lunch, and she wouldn’t stop bouncing.”
Nova’s bright-blue eyes peer up at me, so much like her father’s. For the longest time after his death, it hurt to see so much of Colton in her little features. “Butterscotch?”
Butterscotch scrambles to his feet from where he’d been snoozing in a patch of sunlight and rushes over to my leg. I kiss Nova’s forehead and put her down.
She attempts to pat Butterscotch’s head, but he jumps back and bounds over to his ball. He returns with it in his mouth and drops the ball at her feet.
She grabs the ball and tosses her arms up. The ball lands a foot away, and my crew chuckles.
Butterscotch doesn’t seem to care he doesn’t have to go anywhere to retrieve it. He’s just happy to play with her. He picks the ball up and drops it again at her feet.
“I made this for you, Troy.” Olivia holds up the picnic basket and sets it on the ground in front of where I’d been sitting.
“I hope you baked us some of your world-famous brownies, Livi.” Lance flashes her a goofy grin.
She rolls her eyes. He knows better than to use that name. The three of us went to school together, back when she only responded to the name Livi. But somewhere during the past decade, she decided to only answer to her legal name—a fact Lance likes to ignore.
“Of course I brought y’all brownies.” She opens the basket, removes a plastic container, and hands it to him. “God knows you’d never give me a moment of peace if I didn’t.”
“And this is why we love you.” He flutters his eyelashes at her. The other men on the crew laugh.
Olivia sits on the wall. I sit next to her. The men resume their previous conversations. And we all keep an eye on Nova and Butterscotch.
“How’re you doing?” It’s been my standard question for Olivia since Colton committed suicide. In the beginning, she was so devastated, she could hardly talk. Colton had been the love of her life. My mom and Olivia’s mom had taken turns looking after Nova. It had taken Colton’s mother months before she could look at her granddaughter without bursting into tears. “No school today?” I ask.
“Nope. So we thought we’d bring you and your crew some lunch. Then Nova and I are going to the lake to visit the ducks.”
Her mention of the lake brings with it memories of the woman I saw there the other evening. I’ve thought about her off and on for the past two days, trying to figure out what could’ve happened to her to make her so jumpy. And that made me think more and more about the fundraiser Bill had suggested someone organize to help people with PTSD and their families.
Olivia hands me a sandwich. “Did you hear? A woman is now living in Iris Bromfield’s house. Can you believe someonewantsto rent that haunted old place?”
Shit, I was hoping Frank had been wrong about that. “I don’t think there are actual ghosts living there.”
“You can’t be sure about that.”
