Using the system she’d already devised for the message, she routed it through various locations, shut down the temporary account. As she often did, she thought she would have enjoyed communicating with her FBI contact, exchanging thoughts and opinions, but she had to settle for gleaning information from the occasional memo or file she hacked.
After shutting down, she locked her copy of the data away.
“We’ll walk,” she told Bert. “I’ll practice what I need to say to Brooks while we do. Tomorrow, everything goes back to the way it should be. We have to work for a living, too, right?”
As she pocketed her keys, Bert rubbed his body against her leg. “I met another dog today. He’s very sweet. I think you’d like him.”
When she stepped outside, Bert fell in at her heels. “You’d like a friend. Next year I’ll get a puppy. You’ll help me train him, and he’ll be good company for both of us. That’s all we need, isn’t it? It’s all we need.”
With Bert, she walked around to look at her young vegetable garden. “It needs some tending, and it’s time to think about putting in some more flowers. Past time. I’ve been distracted, but we’ll get back on schedule. I need to do more work on the virus. One day, Bert, when the time’s right and I’ve perfected it, we’re going to infect the Volkovs like a plague.”
She sighed. “But I can’t think about that now. I have to think about this situation.”
She unzipped her hoodie as they moved into the woods, laid her hand briefly on the butt of her gun.
The wild plums popped, fragrant petals among the tender haze of green, and the willow someone had planted yearsbefore dipped its lacy fingers toward the busy water of the stream. Wood violets spread a carpet of rich purple.
In the quiet, in the scent, in the color, she calmed as they walked through sunlight and shade.
Quivering in anticipation, Bert shot her a look, and on her go joyfully scrambled off the slope of the bank to splash in the water. It made her laugh, as always, to watch the big bruiser of a dog play like a toddler in a wading pool.
She gave him his moment while she scanned the woods. Birds called, a musical lift accompanied by the rat-a-tat of a woodpecker hunting for lunch. The sun through the filter of young leaves cast a dreamy light.
It would brighten as they walked, she knew, and the view would open to the hills. She loved looking out from the high ground, studying the rise and fall of the land. And here, in soft light and shadow, with the birdcall and the mutter of the stream, the splashing dog—here, she thought, was more home than the house.
She’d buy a bench. Yes, she’d go online later and find something organic and woodsy. Something that looked as if it might have grown there. Of course, benches didn’t grow, but it would have that illusion. And she could sit where the world opened to the hills, while her dog played in the stream. Maybe one day she’d feel secure enough to bring a book. Sit on the bench in her woods with the hills outstretched beyond, and read while Bert splashed.
But she had to stop thinking about the future. She had to deal with the right now, or the coming evening.
“All right.” She signaled the dog, kept her distance as he raced out to shake a storm of water in the air. “ ‘Brooks,’ ” she began, while they walked, “ ‘while I find you attractive and certainly enjoyed having sex with you, I’m not in a position to pursue a relationship’—no, ‘I’m not willing to engage in a relationship.’ That’s firmer. ‘I’m not willing to engage in a relationship.’ He’ll ask why. That’s his pattern, so I have to have an answer ready. ‘My work is my priority, and involves not only a great deal of time but requires my focus.’ ”
She repeated it, trying different inflections.
“It should be enough, but he’s tenacious. I should say something about appreciating his interest. I don’t want to make him angry or upset, or to damage his pride. ‘I appreciate your interest. It’s flattering.’ Flattering is good. Yes.”
She took a long breath, relieved the panic didn’t come again.
“Yes,” she repeated. “I could say, ‘I’m flattered by your interest.’ And I am. It’s easier to sound sincere if you are sincere. ‘I’m flattered by your interest, and I’ve enjoyed our conversations.’ Should I bring up the sex again? God. God! How do people do this? Why do they? It’s all so complicated and fraught.”
She lifted her face to the sun, breathing in the warmth and light as she came out of the trees. And looking out over the hills, she wondered. So many people out there, with so many connections, all those interpersonal relationships. Parent, child, sibling, friend, lover, teacher, employer, neighbor.
How did they all do it? How did they mix and mingle and juggle all those needs and dynamics? All those expectations and feelings?
It was easier to live quietly and alone, with your own schedule, your own goals, meeting your own expectations and needs, without constantly being required to add others to the mix.
It’s what her mother had done, and certainly Susan Fitch was successful on all fronts. Yes, the daughter had been a disappointment in the end, but then again, that’s what happened when you added another individual.
“I’m not my mother,” Abigail murmured, as she laid a hand on Bert’s head. “I don’t want to be. But even if I wanted relationships and complications, I can’t. It’s not possible. So, let’s try it all again. ‘While I find you attractive,’ ” she began.
She worked on the content, tone, structure of the speech, even the body language, for nearly an hour, fine-tuning it as she and Bert walked home again.
Assuming the discussion and dinner should be civilized, she opened a bottle of Shiraz. And had a half-glass to steady her nerves. By six-thirty she had to order herself not to pace, or pour another half-glass of wine.
When he drove up at six-forty-five, her nerves had taken the time to build again. She repeated her prepared speech in her head, using it to calm herself as she went to the door.
15
He really was pleasant tolook at, she thought. It might take some time for the chemical reaction she experienced around him to dissipate.
