The Almost Wife by Gail Anderson-Dargatz

Author:Gail Anderson-Dargatz
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperAvenue
Published: 2021-05-21T00:00:00+00:00

22

I smoothed a hand over the crescent-shaped marks I’d left in the pine table fifteen years before. Then startled as Nathan appeared at the door.

“Find anything?” he asked. “Was Olive here?”

“I think so. Somebody sure as hell was.” I glanced around the room with him at the broken window, the shards of glass on the floorboards, the wet pillow, the opened stove door and the footprints through the dust on the floor. I was still shaking with rage, or grief, or adrenaline—I hardly knew which anymore.

Seeing my face twisted with emotion, Nathan pulled me into a hug. “Hey, hey,” he said. “What’s going on?”

But I didn’t explain. He already knew part of the story, and I had never found a way to tell him, or anyone, the rest.

“My mother always hated this cabin,” I said instead, as I pulled away from him to wipe my face. “Even before she and my father were divorced.”

“Well, she would, wouldn’t she?” he said, looking around. Water dripping from his rain jacket pooled at his feet.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“This was your dad’s getaway. He took you out here to train, or on his hunts, without her. Your mom was jealous of anything that didn’t include her, where she wasn’t the center of attention. Remember how she bullied her way into managing your training? That was always your dad’s thing. After your folks split, she just took right over.”

“That’s not the way it was.” Not with the training, at least, I thought. But then here I was, still defending her. “I was living with Mom. It made sense that she would take me to events.”

He sunk his hands into his jeans pockets. “And when she did, she pushed me out of the picture.”

“You still competed,” I said. “We saw each other at races.”

“Yeah, but your mom made it clear she didn’t want me around.”

He’s a distraction, my mother had said of Nathan. You need to focus on your training, on the events. She said the same of any friend I made, but especially Nathan. She called his mom, Teresa, an interfering bitch, and her dislike of the woman extended to her son. When we stayed at the summer house, I had to sneak out to see Nathan, lie in order to meet up with him. It seemed that habit had extended into my adulthood.

“Did Buddy pick up Olive’s scent?” I asked.

Nathan shrugged. “In this heavy rain, he’s going in circles.”

I headed for the back door. “We need to go farther into the forest, under tree cover. Maybe he can pick up her scent there.”

I trained the flashlight outside, across the wall of black. Rain fell in a glossy sheet from the overhang. The storm had only gotten worse. Wind pushed the young trees almost horizonal. Branches fell from the larger trees. Everything was in motion, branches and leaves swirling in the black. And there, standing at the edge of the bush, was a figure in the dark, a girl.

“Olive?” I called. Or was it my doppelgänger?

“You see her?” Nathan asked.

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