“She doesn’t even pay attention to you,” I replied. Also not true, she thought Bradley was more my type.
Tav didn’t answer, only assessed me shrewdly. “Did she tell you I saw her out at dinner a few weeks ago?”
She had.
“No,” I lied again.
Let him hang himself, I thought. If he has a reason to, I’ll know it.
“I don’t believe you.”
I didn’t reply, but I held his gaze like we were in a sharp shooter standoff in the middle of our kitchen. Say it. Say it. Confess now and I can stop living in this constant state ofis he or isn’t he?Steph had me questioning Tav’s fidelity from the moment she found out Tav was working all week in the city.
I hadn’t been able to shake it since.
“Girls like Steph have issues with men. I wouldn’t take her advice if you paid me.” He uttered, then turned and walked out of the kitchen. I watched the broad stretch of his muscular back beneath his workout tank. I loved him. I think. But how could I know for sure?
Was Tav really the man I wanted to spend the rest of my life with?
Ten
Tav was on edge all day.
Monday. We should have been back at home. Back at work. Back to our regularly scheduled lives.
It made me laugh to myself now, the thought of Tav walking out of the door this morning as if he was heading out to work, leaving me here as his happy little housewife. As much as I was a homebody, a homemaker I was not. Did I want kids with Tav? Maybe someday, but not as long as he worked in the city all week with only weekend visits. Tav was obsessed with moving up the career ladder, he often said he worked hard now so he could work less later. I didn’t complain, because he took care of me. But if I was suddenly left to raise a baby alone like my mother, I’d suffocate under the pressure.
My mother earned a degree in psychology and worked full-time, sometimes two jobs if that’s what it took to keep a roof over my head. She rarely dated and talked about her relationships with men even less. She kept her life private then, and it grew more so when a thousand miles separated us.
The idea of raising a baby without her made my chest ache. I placed a palm over my heart as I watched Tav shoveling in the evening light that split through the mountains.
He’d been working outside most of the day, I didn’t ask at what. I sensed he was working out his worry with tasks, while I just worried. I spent part of the afternoon stewing the last of the fresh tomatoes into pasta sauce that could be kept in jars for at least a few weeks.
Not that we would be here that long.
A soft bang made me jump. My eyes averted to the front steps, Tav was banging a snow shovel against the porch step as he chipped thick pieces of ice away. I frowned, wondering why he was working so hard when I was sure I’d seen a bag of salt in the basement specifically for melting ice on the pathways.
I was about to tell him this when the door swung open and a burst of cold air swept through the chalet.
“There’s a bag of ice melt downstairs we can use for the steps.”
“Why didn’t you bring it up then?” The bite in his words stung.
“I-I’m sorry, I will.” Before he could say anything else, I retreated down the hallway and descended the stairs that led to the basement. Right at the base of the steps was a small utility closet. I opened the door, eyes on the brightly colored bag. I bent and yanked, realizing now it was a lot heavier than I thought. I yanked again. Finally it slid across the cement floor, a tower of boxes with filters and other junk falling on the floor at my feet. I bent, sweeping everything back into the box with my hands and then wiping the dust off on my pant legs. I felt grimy already. Whoever had been in this closet last was probably long dead based on the thick caking of dirt and grime. I yanked the bag again, realizing there was no way I could carry it up the stairs. I’d have to march back up there and tell Tav he’d need to get it himself. A smile twitched my lips as I thought of the small satisfaction that would give me. But the dark look that would inevitably cross his eyes wasn’t worth it.
I stood, kicking the bag of salt with my shoe when something hiding in the darkness of the closet clattered and then fell forward.
I gasped, bending to lift the business end of a very powerful assault rifle. I’d never been in the presence of a gun in my life, my mom was toomake-love-not-warfor that, but even my meager firearm knowledge told me this was a semi-automatic rifle with a long barrel and large scope. It looked exactly like the guns I’d seen used in sniper movies. And it looked clean, if not freshly polished and gleaming with oil. This gun looked like it’d never been shot. What was it doing here among all this dust and grime?
I crammed my eyelids closed as I tried to recall if Tav had ever mentioned firing a gun. Maybe he’d had to go to the gun range for his job with the department? But then, why wouldn’t he have mentioned that? Steph had me so obsessed with proving Tav’s infidelity that maybe I’d overlooked something more?
From the beginning Tav had refused to tell me much about his current contract, and I’d never cared enough to ask questions. All of his work was behind a computer screen when he was with me, but did his daily life at the office look vastly different all week long?
I scoffed at myself, shaking my head as I realized the simple explanation was probably more like the owner of the house left the gun here for emergencies.
Like what?
“Hey!” I called up the stairs, the barrel of the gun wrapped in my hand as I climbed. “Did you know there was a gun in the house?”
