Drawing a deep breath, she injected more energy into her voice as she said, “I’m doing great. Everything over here is... just great.”
“Is the business taking off the way you’d hoped?”
Cliff probably didn’t know it, but she’d supplied a lot of the furnishings for his house. She’d traded hundreds of photos and ideas with Charlotte right after Cliff bought their mansion, so she’d had a big hand in the interior design. She’d had fun with it. Sloane knew Charlotte liked her style. She also knew Charlotte had been trying to help her get her design business started, and she was grateful for that, even though she’d been disappointed in how things had gone between them since. “I don’t know if you could say it’s ‘taking off.’ That remains to be seen. But we’re building a good client base, and this has been a great month, thanks to an article that was printed in a local magazine.”
“Send me a copy of it,” Charlotte said. “I’d like to see it.”
“I will.” She shoved the empty containers from her lunch into the sack. “Jules, your calls and texts have been pretty scarce lately. How’s it going with Mom and Dad?”
“I’ve just been here working my fingers to the bone, doing your share as well as mine.”
Sloane smiled as she got up to toss the bag in the wastebasket. “You’re the one who insisted on taking care of them,” she reminded him.
He chuckled. “I know. They’re doing great. Dad even has a new butt pillow, thanks to Charlotte.”
Sloane returned to her seat. “Charlotte, you gave Jerry a butt pillow?”
“I know. It’s kind of weird,” Charlotte said. “But I was in the drugstore picking up something for a headache when I saw it and couldn’t resist. I thought it might make a big difference, since he sits behind a desk most of the day.”
“Oh, he’s going to love it!” she said with a laugh.
“Just so you know, Char, we’re going to pretend our mom bought it,” Julian said. “Hope that’s okay.”
“I actually feel more comfortable going in that direction,” she said and laughed with them.
For a moment, it felt like old times. Sloane had missed her best friend. She’d missed her best friend’s brother, too. And California! She’d moved to Seattle for Ben’s sake; this was where he’d been offered the best job when he got out of pharmacy school.
If only she wanted children—then maybe her marriage wouldn’t feel so precarious, and she wouldn’t question whether she’d launched the business in the wrong city.
At work, Ben was usually too busy to think about anything but prescriptions. But on this unusually slow day, the feeling that something wasn’t right with Sloane crept in again. The longer they were married, the more remote and distracted she seemed to be. Sometimes he’d let the door slam before speaking, and she’d still startle when she heard his voice as if she’d been so deep in the well of her own thoughts she hadn’t even realized he was there.
Something was wrong. He was certain of that. But what?
He’d asked her several times, but she always gave him that determined smile of hers and insisted it was nothing. Or that she was just worried about work. It wasn’t as if he thought she was having an affair. She was always with Rory, and Rory had a husband. Besides, she’d shown no signs of having another man in her life. She came home after work, wasn’t remotely guarded with her phone and was always where she should be.
Was it about money? He brought home a good paycheck, but he was carrying a lot of student debt, plus housing in Seattle was expensive and the money they’d invested in the store didn’t leave them with a lot of extra. She could be stressed about their finances, feeling as though the store wasn’t going to make it...
It wasn’t easy starting a new business, especially in an industry that was so sensitive to the state of the economy and whether people had discretionary income. But Sloane was an exceptional designer. If anyone could make it in that field, he believed she could. Their home was a beautiful example. It looked like something out of a magazine even though she’d had to decorate it on a budget. No one knew how to put things together quite like she did. She could make even garage sale finds look stylish.
But he was losing her. He just couldn’t figure out why.
The bell rang, signaling that someone had come to the pharmacy at the back of the store to pick up a prescription. Sandra, the middle-aged woman who worked the same schedule he did and typically handled the register, was out sick today, and there’d been no one who could come in to replace her, so he walked around the tall shelving that usually hid him from view. “Can I help you?” he asked a young woman waiting with an older gentleman who was in a wheelchair.
“We’re here to pick up my father’s blood pressure medication,” the woman replied.
Ben got the man’s name and started digging through the bins filled with sacks of medication that’d been alphabetized by customer. “Here we go,” he said when he found it. “You already know how to take this, right?” he asked the man.
“Oh, yes.” His daughter spoke for him. “He’s been on it for years.”
Ben rang it up, gave them the medication and told them goodbye. Then he went into the back, downloaded a new batch of prescriptions and started filling them. Still, his mind stayed on his beautiful dark-haired, dark-eyed wife and the disquieting thought that he had to act before it was too late.
But what should he do? Whatcouldhe do?
Penny wasn’t feeling well again, so Charlotte insisted on making dinner.
“You seem to be doing better,” her father commented as she served him some of her tomato-lentil soup. Penny had gone to lie down and didn’t plan on joining them, but she’d indicated she might have a bowl later.
“Iamdoing better,” Charlotte said. “Thanks to Julian and Sloane. You find out who your true friends are when you go through a setback like this.”
