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What if he’s been in Grimstone longer than I think?
What if he followed me out here weeks ago…
“What’s wrong?” Emma says.
My mind is racing with wild theories—what if Gideon’s the one who’s been messing with me? What if he’s not missing at all but just waiting, watching, biding his time?
“The sheriff knocked on my door this morning,” I tell her. “He said he found my ex-boyfriend’s truck.”
“Here?”
“Yeah, like two miles from my house.”
“Did you know he was coming?”
I shake my head. “Maybe he tried to call me, but I still have him blocked.”
I told Emma all about Gideon, so I don’t have to fill in the backstory again.
“Where’d they find his car?” Emma says with a sly look. “Anywhere close to Dane’s house?”
“Don’t start that again.”
“Why not?”
“Because for one thing, we’re not even dating anymore.” Just saying it out loud makes my stomach clench. I don’t feel good about the things I said to Dane, and I feel even worse when I remember the look on his face.
But he lied to me. Annie told me—his baby didn’t die of meningitis.
I don’t know why he lied, but I’m tired of being with someone I can’t trust.
Love, trust, and respect—you can’t have one without the others.
“I’m just saying, people have a hell of a lot of accidents around Dane Covett…” Emma glances over at her cousin. “Including Tom.”
My stomach gives another guilty squirm. I never told Emma that it looked like the ceiling joists had been sawed through. I told myself I wasn’t sure; it’s an old house…they might have just snapped that way…
You’re afraid of the truth.
I can feel it, every time I try to fit the pieces together…the anxious panic that builds and builds until I stuff it all down and slam the door shut in my mind.
What am I so afraid of?
I don’t know.
I don’t understand it.
I don’t understand myself.
“Oh, there’s Helena!” Emma points. “Let’s get our tarot read.”
Helena’s sitting outside her shop, dressed like a fortune teller, dripping shawls and gold jewelry. Last time I visited her, she was just wearing yoga pants.
“Sit down, sit down!” she calls.
“You first.” Emma shoves me forward.
“Where’s your date?” Helena asks as I take a seat across her small, round table draped with purple cloth.
