“Two months,” their mother responded.
Lauren froze.
Two months?
She’d been in New York about two months ago, visiting her best friend, Reese. Lauren remembered the call from Lahn. She’s been in San Francisco for an art show and had left the event only discover her tire had a flat. Lahn had called Lauren from a bar across the street from the parking garage after she ordered a drink and waited for a tow to the dealership. Lauren had laughed and ridiculed her for like the hundredth time for not learning the basic car mechanics their father taught her.
Lauren told Lahn to cancel AAA, that she’d call Derrick who lived about five minutes away from the venue.
Looking pointedly at Ma Mable, Lauren asked, “Exactly how long haveyouknown about the pregnancy?”
Her mother wouldn’t look at her.
“Nearly a month and a half.”
The deception, the betrayal, broke through Lauren’s emotional defenses and she screamed as if she’d been stabbedin the heart. An actual dagger through the chest would’ve hurt less.
“I’m sorry Shug! I thought it was something Lahn should tell you herself, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it, so I promised her we’d do it together. And with the wedding coming up…”
“Indays! With the wedding coming up in days, and you figured thatnow… Get out!” she snarled, her voice sounding demonic.
“Shug–”
“Get out!” she screamed. “Get out, get out, get the fuck out!”
Everything she valued was packed into her SUV. She’d had an impromptu estate sale for the rest and instead of canceling the movers coming on Sunday, she had them take the rest to storage instead of Derrick’s place. And again, she did it all on her own because no one,no one, had come back to check in on her. NotLahn, not her parents, not Derrick, which was all fine and good because she’d hit the road Sunday night, refusing to give them another opportunity to hurt her.
“Fuck, fuck,fuck,” she shouted, slamming her fist against the steering wheel, because she still hurt. Still hurt horribly.
Grabbing her iPhone, she ignored the multitude of missed calls and opened her DMX playlist, needing the aggression that filled the interior of her SUV.
After driving another hour, the brief escape of emotion was corralled back into the dead place within her heart. She drove to the nearest gas station, used the restroom, and fueled up. She’d been reluctant to stop any place overnight because the remaining parts of the life she valued were inside her SUV. Though it had dark tinted windows, she couldn’t stomach the possibility of anything else being taken from her.
But she was exhausted, and she needed a bath and a solid night’s sleep. Before pulling away from the station, she used her phone to reserve a cabin in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, whichrequired she check in before seven this evening or she’d lose her reservation and deposit.
Entering the cabin’s address in her GPS, she decided to continue on the scenic route instead of taking the interstate. The interstate would get her to her destination about two hours earlier than the deadline, but she’d still have plenty of time going over the mountain. These solitary backroads had absorbed her pain in a way that nothing and no one else had. She chose not to abandon her journey for a quick meaningless ride. Decision made, she put her Toyota 4Runner in drive and headed higher up into the mountains.
Santiago Stillwater rocked back on his heels twice then looked down the part of the two-lane road not laid to waste. The seventy-year-old woman still gripping the steering wheel of her dead husband’s mint green 1965 Pontiac GTO glared at him. It was a real shame about the car. It had been in perfect condition before now.
“Sheriff Stillwater, you give those keys back right now or I swear I will get out of this car and beat the stuffing out of you!”
Santiago waved Deputy Roan Gray over.
“Yeah Sheriff?” she said, stopping beside him.
“Take Mrs. Veronica over to Olivet Hospital to get her checked out,” he said, then lowered his voice. “And Roan, make sure you get a urine sample, even if you need to Mirandize her before you do it. I want her medically cleared before we take her to our best cell at the Shrouded Lake Jail and Spa.”
“Uh, Sheriff?” Roan said, leaning closer. “Derry’ll be here in a few minutes, maybe it’d be best if he took the lead on that.”
“I’m fighting to maintain my peace right now, Roan.”
“Copy that, Sheriff.”
Santiago backed up a few steps. The optics of him laying hands on and arresting the mayor’s elderly mother was something he wanted to avoid.
Roan tried to reach through the open driver’s side window to unlock the door, but the older woman tightened her lips and gripped the door sill with her thin knobby fingers, holding it closed.
The onslaught Santiago had been dreading began.
