But Martha interrupted me, her brow furrowing as though she were putting pieces together. “Didn’t you say you were traveling with your wife and baby?” she asked John, her voice light, curious, completely unaware of the storm she’d just dropped into the room.
John’s gaze slid to mine. “They’re in the car,” he said, his voice steady.
The words hit like a blow to my stomach, knocking the air from my lungs. My smile faltered, brittle around the edges. Tuesday and the baby were here? My mind spun—why? Why had he come all this way, hours from home, with a newborn in tow? What did he think he would find?
I barely had time to catch my breath before Martha clapped her hands together. “Well, it’s settled then!” she said brightly, beaming as though this were the best news she’d heard all week. “We’ll prepare a cabin right away.” She turned to me with a pointed nod, her cheer unshaken. “Vivienne, why don’t we show them the grounds while I have the staff get a cabin ready for them? What do you say?”
The next thing I knew,we were rattling across the grounds in Martha’s golf cart, her cheerful voice rising easily over the hum of the engine. “This lodge has been in the McHenry family for more than forty years,” she said proudly, one hand steady on the wheel, while the other spread wide in a grand, sweeping gesture. “Every beam, every brick—my brother picked out himself.”
She cast John a sideways smile, her eyes twinkling. “And you’re in for a treat. Tonight’s a low country boil. Crawfish, corn, potatoes, sausage—the works. It’s tradition here at the lodge. Every summer, the whole family gathers out by the fire pits. We roll the tables in paper, pile everything high, and eat with our hands. Nothing fancy, just good food and even better company.”
Her voice softened as though she’d slipped into memory. “It’s always been my favorite night. When the lodge feels most alive.”
I sat in the back with Tuesday, her baby bundled tight against her chest. George padded alongside the cart, tongue lolling,every so often darting into the trees before reappearing with that happy, bounding gait that made my heart ache.
John sat up front beside Martha, his silence heavier than the humid summer air. He didn’t smile at her stories. Didn’t even nod. Just stared out over the water as we passed the lake, the tall redwoods framing the horizon like watchful sentinels.
By the time Martha steered us down the narrow path toward the guest cabins, the pressure in my chest was unbearable. Each turn of the wheel wound me tighter, until it felt like I couldn’t draw a full breath.
She pulled to a stop in front of mine and Dean’s cabin, still smiling, blissfully unaware of what she’d just delivered to my doorstep. “Here we are,” she chirped.
I slid out first, forcing my expression to stay light, even as my insides splintered. George trotted ahead of me, tail wagging, as though this were any ordinary afternoon. But nothing about it was ordinary.
I ushered John and Tuesday inside quickly and closed the door behind us. The moment we were alone, and Martha’s cart rumbled away, the smile slid off my face like it had never belonged there.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
John’s eyes swept the cabin, his stance already rigid. “Don’t you thinkIshould be the one askingyouthat question?”
The baby, who’d been quiet up until this point, stirred, her tiny cries cutting sharp through the room. Tuesday rocked her quickly, pressing soft kisses into her forehead as she whispered comforts.
A headache pulsed behind my eyes, the kind that made everything blur at once. I pressed my fingers to my temples, wishing I could untangle the mess with a single sentence—but where was I even supposed to begin? My voice cracked when it finally came. “I can’t believe you drove all the way out here…”
John’s jaw flexed. “What did you expect me to do, Em? You send some weird text?—”
“And then that email?” Tuesday cut in, her voice trembling as she clutched the baby tighter. “A family emergency? What the hell was that? What were we supposed to think?”
John’s voice rose right over hers. “You disappear for days, no calls, no texts, no responses?—”
“We thought you’d been kidnapped!” Tuesday’s words cracked over his. “Five days, Em. Five days we waited, texting you a million times, and nothing.”
Their voices tangled together, fear and anger and relief, all chasing each other.
Images bloomed in my mind. Of John pacing the living room, waiting for a phone call that never came. Watching my location which never moved. “I forgot you were on my email list,” I admitted, my voice low and frayed. “How did you even find me here? There’s no service… how did you?—”
“You were still sharing your location with me from when you went to Vegas a few years ago. We went to the last place it pinged—which was the gas station down the street. We showed the man your picture. He told us you were staying at Pine Ridge.”
My chest tightened as I realized the lengths they’d gone to find me—driving more than five hours with a newborn just to make sure I was safe.
The weight of the situation slammed into my chest. I opened my mouth to try to explain, but the door creaked open at that exact moment.
Dean stepped into the cabin, and everything around us froze in place. His gaze moved over all of us in one sweep—from John, to Tuesday and the baby, then finally back to me. “What’s going on?” he asked me, his voice much too calm for the situation we were in.
John’s posture changed instantly—shoulders squaring, jaw tightening, his whole frame coiled with suspicion. “I was about to askyouthat same question,” he said.
I could practically see him making the connection. From meeting Dean at Jake’s barbecue over a month ago—where I’d avoided him like the plague—to standing here now.
“Em,” John pressed in, his voice rougher, pleading for answers.
