What She Didn't Know (What She 1)

“Oh, come on, Mason. It hasn’t been that long.”

I was afraid to guess. Terrified, actually.

“It’s Shelly.” She didn’t say anything else.

“Is Lynn with you?” I rushed to ask.

She made a noise in her throat that I could hear through the phone. “Tsk, tsk, Mason. Can’t you even tell me hello? It’s been years.”

Yeah, and I’d hoped to keep it that way. “Where is Lynn?” I asked. “Is she okay?”

“Lynn’s fine,” she said.

“Let me talk to her.” I sat forward in my chair, resting my ass on the edge of the seat, my elbows on the desk.

Shelly let out a tiny sound that dragged across my heart like silk embedded with sharp shards of glass. “She’s not here right now, Mason. I just wanted to let you know that I’ve spoken to her.”

“She’s all right?” Please let her be all right.

“I wouldn’t go that far—”

“What have you done?” I jumped to my feet so fast that Mrs. Anderson backed quickly toward the doorway.

“I haven’t done anything. Yet,” she purred. “Gotta run.”

“Shelly!” I cried.

“Yes, Mason?” she said softly. Piercingly.

“Shelly, why did she leave? Did you do something?”

“Mason.” She heaved a sigh. “This time, it’s all your fault, my love.”

“I didn’t do anything.”

“Think about it, Mason. You’ll figure it out.”

The line went dead.

“Shelly?” I called. “Shelly!” I cried a little louder, pounding my finger on the button that hung up the phone. She was gone.

I slammed the phone back on the cradle. “God damn it!” I shouted, grabbing my hair in my fists and tugging.

Mrs. Anderson backed quietly away and shut the door behind her.

I kicked my desk chair back into place and sagged into it. “I didn’t do anything,” I whispered.

10

It was midnight and I’d worked all day. I even saw two patients, yet I was still scouring Lynn’s credit card records, looking for any hint that she had used them so that I could at least pinpoint her location. I set up notifications that would go to my phone if any of her cards had activity, and then I pushed back from the computer.

I had grown comfortable, probably complacent, because it had been so long since Lynn had left me like this. When we were younger, she took off all the time. The smallest thing and she’d detach, trying to protect herself from life. From me. From pain. From feeling things she didn’t know how to process.

However, as we got older, she disappeared less and less, and—dumb of me, I knew—I thought she was done running. For over two years, we’d weathered the storms together. She’d come to me when she was feeling stressed, and we’d talk about it. Then we’d make love until she forgot all her fears, until she remembered that together we could get through anything.

Her taking off like this with no provocation whatsoever… Well, she might as well have kicked me in the teeth. It made me doubt everything we’d shared for the past twenty years. It made me wonder if I would ever be strong enough to keep her safe and to make her feel it in every fiber of her being.

Suddenly, my phone chimed in my pocket. Unknown caller. My heart leaped into my throat and the breath in my body left me. “Hello,” I croaked.