AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Yes,” Lenna answers. “But…also no. I mean, I’m still me. It still happened.”
Sarah looks at her belly. “Yeah. Huh.”
They share a comfortable, silent moment. It fills Lenna with uncanny companionship. Here is the one person in the world who maybe understands her best. Odd that it’s the person she feared most.
“You really didn’t follow me here?” Sarah asks. “Track me down?”
“Of course not. I mean, I did come because I thought being here would help me get over what happened. But as soon as I realized you were…you,I tried to escape.” Lenna points at the Suburban out the little garage window.
“Who brought you in here?”
“Rhiannon.” Lenna looks toward the door again, as if Rhiannon will step outside, finally, on cue.
“Really?” Sarah cocks her head. “How do you know her?”
“She’s one of my closest friends. From LA. She’s the one I wasfighting about with Gillian at the canyon, actually. Did you hear that part? Gillian was texting Rhiannon from my phone’s account. Gillian knew both of us, but then Rhiannon left. I actually thought she somehow orchestrated us getting together, or was working with you in some sort of revenge, though she swears she wasn’t…” Lenna trails off and looks at Sarah. “What?”
Sarah’s face is pale. “Rhiannonis R?”
“…Who’s R?”
Sarah clutches the side of her head. “This is bad.”
“Why?”
“Because,” Sarah whispers. “Rhiannon was the one who recruitedmeto come here, too.”
20
Sarah
November
Two years before
A few months after Gillian’s accident, Sadie still felt like she was being followed. She never saw anyone tailing her. It was more of a premonition.
She was slogging through life. She woke writhing in the dead of night. She kept seeing Gillian’s wide eyes as she fell. She felt rain on the back of her neck. She saw Lenna lying there, too, inert, unconscious, all because Sadie had hit her. She couldn’t focus. Some days she couldn’t eat. She just needed to start over, tochange,toforget,but she didn’t know where or how.
It was September. The weather was hotter than Sadie ever remembered. She stopped into a coffee shop on Santa Monica Boulevard for a shot of espresso. As she was waiting for her turn, the bells chimed, and another woman stepped in line. Sadie wasn’t sure how, but she could tell the new woman who’d just come into the café was here for her. Her gaze seemed to bore pointedly and meaningfully into Sadie’s back.
Sadie ordered and hurried over to the counter for some napkins. Just as she predicted, the woman took her place next to her, reaching for a sugar packet. For a split second, Sadie worried it was Lenna. The fact that Lenna had dropped off the face of the earth and hadn’t come forward when Sadie was no longer a suspect just didn’t add up. Sadie was waiting for her to reemerge.
It was a woman with auburn curls instead. “Are you Sadie?” she asked quietly. “Sadie, um, Wasserman?”
Her skin prickled. “Do I know you?”
“No.” She glanced at the tables. “Can we sit? Just for a minute?”
Sadie stiffened. “What’s this about?”
The woman’s smile was unassuming. “Really, it would be better if we just sat down.”
Sadie didn’t know why she indulged her. They sat by the window, watching cars stream by. The woman pulled the lid off her coffee and blew on the liquid. She glanced up guiltily. “I heard you had a friend who died.”
The hair on the back of Sadie’s neck stood on end. “Where did you hear that?”
“The news.”
