Josie was grateful for Wren’s flippant description of women’s innate threat detection system. Somehow, it lightened the gravity of the conversation. Wren tended to shut down whenever a serious topic came up.
When she didn’t answer, Noah said, “Or was Cassidy’s perv-o-meter on high alert the last time you saw her?”
“It’s probably dumb,” Wren said.
“Nope,” Noah said. “Nothing any of us say in this house is dumb. This is a stupid-free zone. All statements or questions uttered within these walls will be deemed un-dumb.”
Even in profile, Josie could see Wren’s tiny smile and the eye-roll she directed at Noah. “Un-dumb? That’s not even a real word.”
“Don’t care,” he said. “You can’t make fun of me.”
Oh, God. Josie was very close to having second-hand embarrassment on behalf of her husband. This was the kind of banter he engaged in with Harris. There was a big difference between an eight-year-old and a fourteen-year-old, though. She was surprised when Wren gamely played along.
“I wasn’t going to make fun of you. I was going to suggest that you buy a dictionary.”
A dictionary. Josie’s mind immediately went to Cassidy and Turner’s daily word game. What would they have used in this situation? Something more obscure than just smart. Sagacious, maybe.
“I’ll think it over,” Noah said with mock seriousness. “In the meantime, tell us about the thing you think is probably dumb but really isn’t.”
Some of the lightness in Wren’s demeanor drained away but she wasn’t holding herself as rigidly as she had been a few minutes ago. “Okay, so the last week or two of school—I can’t remember exactly—I heard her talking to another junior. She said she thought there was some perv hanging around.”
Alarm bells pinged in Josie’s mind. “Hanging around where?”
Wren shrugged. “I think she said at home. Her friend said she should report him.”
Turner would have told Josie if Cassidy had reported someone following her. In fact, Josie was certain that he would have done something about the “perv” at the time that Cassidy told him, and he most definitely would have mentioned it to Josie last night.
“Home with her mom or home with her dad?” asked Noah.
“Oh, I don’t know. All I heard was home.”
Josie knew what he was thinking. Dustin Emmer had all but admitted to being near Turner’s apartment building at least once. Was he the man Cassidy had noticed? Or was it someone else? Someone lurking near Dani’s house? Or had Emmer followed Cassidy to Dani’s house so he’d have access to them both?
“What did she say when her friend told her to report him?”
“That she could handle him and if she told her dad, he’d go nuts being overprotective and then her parents would get into a fight, and she didn’t need her mom hating on her dad more than she already did.” Wren’s face flushed. “I sound like a total psycho, don’t I? Eavesdropping like that. I’m not usually like that but I don’t know, I was?—”
“Interested,” Noah filled in.
She gave a half-shrug. “I guess. Curious. When it comes to families, I didn’t exactly have the ‘normal’ experience. Sometimes, when I hear other kids talk about their families, Ican’t help myself. I listened to Cassidy, and I kept thinking that it must be nice to have divorced parents instead of two dead parents who you never even got to see in the same room. God, that is awful. I’m really awful.”
She clamped a hand over her eyes. From the flush in her cheeks, Josie could tell she was upset, maybe close to tears. Slowly, Josie took her wrist and pulled it away from her face. Sure enough, her blue eyes were glassy. “Do you really think it’s awful to wish that your parents were both still alive and divorced instead of gone? To wish that you knew what it was like to have them both there, both physically present at the same time?”
Wren blinked. “Um, no?”
Josie released her wrist and held her hand instead, relieved when Wren didn’t pull away. With a quick glance in Noah’s direction for moral support, she took a deep breath and spoke. “You know the basics of how I grew up. Noah had the exact opposite. Two loving parents, siblings, family vacations, Christmas traditions.” Wren didn’t need to know just how spectacularly all of that had fallen apart once Noah turned eighteen. Looking over at him, Josie asked, “Didn’t your mom make you all wear matching Christmas pajamas and take photos every year?”
“This isnotabout me.”
Wren smirked a little and Josie was flooded with gratitude that they might be getting somewhere. “I’ve always been jealous of him,” she admitted. “Always.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, of course.”
“For what it’s worth,” said Noah, “we both wish your parents were still here, too, married, divorced, or in any other scenario. Not because we don’t want you here because we absolutely do. Just because we want you to be happy.”
“Thanks.” Wren’s palm grew moist against Josie’s, but she still didn’t pull away. “It’s just weird, you know? Having no real idea what a family, even a divorced one, is like. So yeah, I listen to conversations I probably shouldn’t.”
