The House in the Pines by Ana Reyes

Author:Ana Reyes [Reyes, Ana]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2023-01-03T00:00:00+00:00

TWENTY-TWO

Maya had been drinking since five p.m., the tea in her mug replaced with orange juice and the cheap gin she’d bought on her way home from the museum. Four hours later, the pint was nearly empty, and she felt calmer, but not drunk, as she should have. Any other time she would have been sloppy by now, but it was as if her body wouldn’t allow it, as if her every cell intended to stay vigilant.

The smell of chili seeped through the walls. Roasted cumin and garlic, sizzling beef. This was one of Brenda’s best dishes, but Maya hadn’t had any. She understood that she was being cruel, but her mom had questioned her sanity again.

It wouldn’t have bothered her so much if she wasn’t tempted to succumb to her mom’s fears. If she just agreed that she was crazy, Maya would be given the kind of meds that would make her sleep for twelve hours straight. She added more gin to her mug. She was sitting in the dark, cross-legged on top of the bed with her phone in one hand. Hours of searching for information on Ruby Garza hadn’t turned up anything new. And even if it had—if Maya could link a third dead woman to Frank—she still wouldn’t know how he did it.

And in the meantime, Dan hadn’t texted back.

He had been tagged on Instagram by someone with the handle nina_borealis. He was sitting in a booth at Silhouette Lounge, drinking what was probably a rum and Coke across from his law school friend Sean and Sean’s girlfriend, Ellie. The three sat close together, presumably with Nina, who’d taken the picture. A quick search had revealed Nina to be a pretty Filipina architect who enjoyed traveling.

Maya had never been insecure in her relationship with Dan, but he’d never ignored her texts before. Was Nina single? Flirtatious?

Maya reminded herself that she had no reason to mistrust Dan—while he had every reason to mistrust her. He must have known she was hiding something, must have sensed it, and this was probably why he hadn’t texted back. Dan cared about the truth. Being secretive was so much worse than if she’d told him about the Klonopin, which he wouldn’t have judged her for anyway. Half the people they knew were on medication for anxiety, depression, or something else. As the night dragged on and he didn’t text back, the possibility of losing him began to feel real.

The thought made her chest cave in. She’d been in such a bad place when they met, drifting through her days, forgetting most nights, and it was Dan who’d cut through that fog. He was her Orpheus who never looked back, helping her return to the land of the living. He made it a place she wanted to be. He was the kind of person who refused to buy jarred tomato sauce because homemade was so much better, and he enjoyed making it. They’d cooked together almost every night since Maya moved in,

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