2
There’s no blood, but Emma has finished her eggs. Most of them found their way to the surrounding areas. “What did you do to her hair?” A large chunk of her hair–by no means all of it–is wrapped around a ponytail on the top of her head. The strands fall limply to one side and pieces stick out in every direction.
“I tied it up,” Nate answers, his face proud.
That’s going to be hell come bath time.
I grab the sponge and with one crutch finagle my way to the dining room table.
“What are you doing?”
The question catches me off guard. “Wiping down the table.” Duh.
Nate steals the sponge from me and waves it around the tabletop, spreading eggs over the surface. “You’re supposed to be resting. I’ll take care of this.”
Eggs fall to the floor and he steps in a clump, smooshing them into the carpet. Definitely not getting my security deposit back. After Barry cheated, I needed a fresh start away from everyone in my past life. I didn’t just lose my husband to his affair. I also lost my best friend.
No, she wasn’t the babysitter, but midway through the divorce, while she was comforting me with a carton of Ben and Jerry’s, she slipped and let the truth out. She’d been aware of his ongoing dalliance for months and never told me. Her betrayal hurt almost as badly as Barry’s. A best friend should always tell.
Nate finishes ruining my carpet and throws the sponge into the sink, landing the shot from a good eight feet away. I’m a little impressed. He can’t drive, but with his height he might land a dunk.
Emma claps and pats at the high chair, but rather than get her out, I sit down in the chair next to her. Standing so long has tired me out and a slow ebb of pain has taken up resident in my leg—as if the bones themselves are pissed off I’ve taken such shitty care of them. Nate opens a laptop on his side of the table and taps away at the keys.
“Are you from Pelican Bay?”
He looks up to answer and then right back down again. “No, my aunt and uncle in Las Vegas raised me. They are the only family I have left.”
“Do you go to see them often?”
I pepper him with the second question. “No, we don’t see eye to eye.”
“Oh, that’s sad.”
This time Nate fully lifts his head at my comment. “Not really. They make Harry Potter’s guardians seem like loving parents.”
“Oh.” Well, that is a different situation then. His attention falls back to the screen, done with our conversation, but his answer only creates more questions. Did they lock him in a closet? A room under the stairs? When did Nate read Harry Potter? Did he find the ending was rushed or too drawn out? Would he agree they spent way too much time in the woods?
Nate types a few more seconds, but the ever-expanding list of questions continues to grow until I must ask. “Why did you leave the military?”
He winces and then lifts a shoulder in the air in a shrug. “Wasn’t fun anymore.”
“You left because it wasn’t fun anymore?” Is the military supposed to be fun? “Why did you move to Pelican Bay?” It’s like pulling teeth to get an answer out of the man. You’d think he’d be a little more giving since he almost killed me yesterday with his butterfly-eating truck.
Nate shrugs again but eventually lifts his attention and answers. “Ridge put together a new team of guys and asked for my help.”
Ridge must be an important guy if he can ask and people move to a little town in Maine to work for him.
“Why did you move to Pelican Bay?” he parrots one of my questions back at me.
“Divorce and a fresh start. I took a job as an administrative assistant with the city in Clearwater.”
“Where is your family?” Nate’s as good of an interrogator as I am.
I’m much better at answering. “Bangor with my ex.”
“You don’t miss them?” he asks.
My attention falls, not sure how to answer his question, and I notice his laptop looks like mine. Although I guess most laptops are black. “Bangor isn’t that far away. I still see them.” Unfortunately.
